Starting next month, MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough and Michael Kinsley, the founding editor of Slate.com, will become the first opinion columnists for Politico.

The news was announced on “Morning Joe” by Politico‘s executive editor Jim VandeHei. Politico writers and editors are frequent guests on Scarborough’s MSNBC show. VandeHei joked that Scarborough, “has a tremendous amount of self confidence and is committed to writing about obesity two times a month.”

Scarborough said what his column won’t be:

“I told Jim, if they are expecting a ‘from the right column,’ they won’t get a ‘from the right column’ from me, just like they won’t get a ‘from the left’ column from Michael Kinsley.”

As a part of the Intelligence Squared US debate series, BloombergTV will be broadcasting a special debate titled “Good Riddance to the Mainstream Media” this evening, tomorrow, and Wednesday at 9pmET.

The debate centered on “the viability of the mainstream media,” and the debaters included Vanity Fair/Newser.com’s Michael Wolff, Politico co-founder Jim Vandehei, and Phil Bronstein, editor-at-large of the San Francisco Chronicle.

NYTimes’ David Carr countered arguments that the major media organizations won’t survive and argued a point that some in the TV news biz have also argued: “…The New York Times has a news budget of two hundred and twenty million dollars, dozens of bureaus all over the world, many other news organizations have the same footprint. And we’re going to toss that out — which is the proposition — toss that out and kick back and see what Facebook turns up. I don’t think so.”

FishbowlLA’s Tina Dupuy spent Friday at what she’s calling EOVMWHAWCNCon — the Politico.com conference that looked back at the election and ahead to how the Obama administration will lead.

The final panel included Mark Halperin of Time, John Heilemann of New York Magazine, Mark Barabak of the LA Times, and Mike Allen, John F. Harris and Jim VandeHei of Politico discussing the campaign.

During the Q&A the question of who will be the next Tim Russert came up. See what these journos thought.

And check out all of FBLA’s coverage of the conference here. It’s politics, left coast style.

Today’s “Politics 2008″ conference at Time Warner kicks off with a keynote roundtable moderated by CNN’s Campbell Brown. The panel features CNN/U.S. president Jon Klein, Time Magazine managing editor Richard Stengel, Vanity Fair editor Graydon Carter and Politico’s Jim Vandehei.

For updated Twitter coverage from the Politics 2008 conference, click here…

TVNewser will be attending, “Politics 2008 — The Media Conference for the Election of the President,” co-hosted by Time Magazine and CNN at the Time Warner Center, today and tomorrow (FishbowlNY will be there as well).

After the conference kicks off with a welcome from Time Warner CEO Jeffrey Bewkes, TVNewser will Twitter throughout the keynote roundtable beginning at 12:45pmET, moderated by CNN’s Campbell Brown. The panel features CNN/U.S. president Jonathan Klein, Time Magazine managing editor Richard Stengel, Vanity Fair editor Graydon Carter and Politico’s Jim Vandehei. (Follow TVNewser on Twitter.)

Other sessions today feature panelists ranging from CBS’ Jeff Greenfield to CNN’s Candy Crowley, and things close out with an interview between Anderson Cooper and comedian Lewis Black.

Tomorrow Dan Rather talks media bias, Christiane Amanpour and Wolf Blitzer discuss the global perception of the U.S. and more.

Stay tuned to TVNewser tonight and tomorrow for video, pictures and posts about the conference.