• Dr. Sanjay Gupta will begin recording daily features about medical issues through Cumulus Media Networks. Starting in May, Cumulus will offer four daily features exploring topics relating to health and wellness. Two features are designed for news/talk stations with two features geared to a younger audience on music and entertainment stations.

• Three of the four remaining GOP candidates will be on with Wolf Blitzer this afternoon on “The Situation Room.” Mitt Romney, Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich will appear for separate interviews. The candidates are campaigning ahead of the next three primaries in Wisconsin, Maryland and DC next Tuesday.

• Kyra Phillips talked with producer/correspondent Lowell Bergman about his upcoming “Frontline” documentary on Rupert Murdoch and the phone hacking scandal. Bergman says he’s gotten no response from News Corp. “No one will talk — period. The only communication that we had was, off-the-record I thought, with Geraldo Rivera that he blogged about.”

If founder Brian Lamb had to do it over again, C-SPAN wouldn’t be called C-SPAN.

“It’s not the greatest name around,” says Lamb, 70, who steps down Sunday as CEO. “Three people know what it stands for. I don’t even know what it stands for. One of our board members asked me. We rarely ever spell it out.”

Drum roll, please.

Cable-Satellite Public Affairs Network launched on March 19, 1979, with four employees (including Lamb) and a reach of 3.5 million homes. It now includes three networks, a staff of 280 and a universe of 100 million homes.

Most Americans assume the ‘C’ in C-SPAN stands for Congress, since covering Congress’ proceedings – live, unfiltered, gavel-to-gavel – is its raison d’etre. But in 1979, with cable in its infancy, Lamb felt it more important to brand C-SPAN as a non-broadcast enterprise.

“Otherwise, people wouldn’t have known what it was,” says Lamb, newly-named executive chairman. “At that point, we were only the sixth cable network.”

These days, C-SPAN suffers no such identity crisis, though Lamb does, often being mistaken for Sen. John McCain, Ed Harris or John Glenn. According to C-SPAN’s most recent survey, 75 percent of respondents recognize the non-profit network’s name, Lamb says. Since C-SPAN does not have ratings, however, he has no hard numbers on viewership.

ABC’s Cokie Roberts, who was, in her own words, “very involved in the birth” of C-SPAN, sees the network’s identity issue differently.

“I don’t think people are aware of the brand, but they’re very aware of the product,” Roberts, 68, says. As an NPR reporter in the late ‘70s, she and her colleagues in Congress’ Radio-TV gallery joined Lamb in lobbying the House of Representatives to allow TV cameras on the floor.

Despite C-SPAN’s noble mission, Jon Stewart, Stephen Colbert and ‘Saturday Night Live,’ among others, parody the network’s frequently-static content as a perfect sleep aid.

In real life, C-SPAN fan Ed Rendell, former Democratic National Committee Chairman, swears by the network for his nightly zzzz’s.

“I have a hyperactive mind, so I watch TV in my living room and fall asleep for about 90

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Matt Lauer and Steve Capus at the NBC News/MSNBC upfront.

NBC Newsers always like to say they are part of one big family. But in a family that big, with several making millions of dollars a year — even a select few in the double-digit millions — there is bound to be sibling rivalry. And so it was on display Thursday as NBC News held an upfront presentation at the event space 583 Park Avenue. Matt Lauer tweaked Brian Williams for his run-on questions; Williams took a shot at Willie Geist: “I just found out he had a show;” who had fired first: “Brian is the caregiver for our parents and grandparents at 6:30 every night.”

Kidding aside, the event was all business: a gathering of sales teams, planners and agencies in an effort to get advertisers excited by what NBC News — the #1 news network — and MSNBC have to offer. At one point, Williams mentioned “the elephant in the room.” While some may have thought he was talking about his primetime newsmagazine’s ratings — “Rock Center” hit a new viewership low drawing just 2.6 million viewers Wednesday — the newsman-comedian was actually taking a jab Hoda Kotb and Kathie Lee Gifford.

“Hods and Kathie Lee are just baked. Permanently hammered,” said Williams of the fourth hour “Today” team. He referred to Ed Schultz as “a big bowl of humanity. His head alone is bigger than my first apartment in New York.” And after Al Roker revealed he and Williams “spooned” in a tent

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Before last week, the name Sandra Fluke had only entered the discussion in a column by TIME humorist Joel Stein, before her testimony on Capitol Hill Thursday, Feb. 23

MSNBC covered the testimony that Thursday morning, including talking to Sandra Fluke. They reported on it throughout the day. The following Tuesday, Megyn Kelly reported the story on Fox News: “It hasn’t seen a lot of media coverage so far,” said Kelly, “but there was a congressional hearing late last week that’s now getting some attention.” The next day, on his radio show it got a lot more attention courtesy of Rush Limbaugh. On his radio show, he called Fluke “a slut” and “a prostitute.”

The following day, on MSNBC’s “Ed Show” Ed Schultz , had the first interview with Fluke reacting to Limbaugh’s comments. (Schultz, you’ll recall, served a suspension for calling Laura Ingraham a slut, twice, on his radio show last May.) On Friday, Fluke was interviewed by Matt Lauer on the “Today” show, and returned to MSNBC, on Andrea Mitchell‘s show. Just before her interview with Mitchell, Fluke had taken a call of support from Pres. Obama.

By then Limbaugh doubled, then tripled down, for the next two days talking about the amount of sex Fluke must be having. By Saturday, he’d apologized. But by then, the Fluke story was factoring into the GOP primary and it certainly would come up on the Sunday morning public affairs shows.

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The debates may be behind us, but Fox News Channel host Mike Huckabee — who, four years ago at this time, was running for president himself — will host the GOP candidates for another forum Saturday night.

This will be Huckabee’s third presidential forum. So far three candidates, Newt Gingrich, Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum, have committed. Ron Paul has still not decided, the New York Times reports.

The forum, from 8-10pmET, will originate from Ohio, the biggest of the Super Tuesday states. Huckabee announced on his show last Spring, that he would not be running this time around. He has yet to endorse any of the current GOP candidates.

At tonight’s GOP debate,  John King asked a question submitted to CNNPolitics.com: “Since birth control is the latest hot topic, which candidate believes in birth control and if not, why?”

The crowd didn’t like it. They boo’d. The candidates didn’t much care for it either, except Newt Gingrich who used it as an opportunity to go after his favorite targets: the media and Pres. Obama.

“You did not once in the 2008 campaign, not once did anybody in the elite media ask why Barack Obama voted in favor of legalizing infanticide,” said Gingrich. “So let’s be clear here. If we’re going to have a debate about who the extremist is on these issues, it is President Obama.”

Then Mitt Romney jumped in: “John, what’s happened — and you recall back in the debate we had George Stephanopoulos talking out about birth control, we wondered why in the world is contraception — why is he going there? We found out when Barack Obama continued his attack on religious conscience.”

> More: In the post-debate wrap up, Gloria Borger asked Rick Santorum his reaction to those who say he is “spending way too much time talking about divisive cultural issues.” His response: “As John King tried to do on contraception and other things that are outrageous questions, and then the next question is ‘why are you talking so much about social issues?’ They ask and then they say, ‘you’re talking about social issues all the time.’ Look, I understand the game. and we’re just going to go out and continue to stay on message.” King responded later, “I understand the game as well, and I don’t think it’s out of bounds to ask a presidential candidate about something they said in a presidential campaign.”

John King, along with Arizona State University students playing the parts of Ron Paul, Rick Santorum, Mitt Romney, and Newt Gingrich, is doing a run-through today ahead of tonight’s GOP debate in Mesa, Arizona. This is the 20th, and likely final primary debate. The first face-off on Fox News last May, also featured four candidates — only one of whom, Ron Paul, is still in the race. The other attendees were Herman Cain, Gary Johnson and Tim Pawlenty.

Tonight’s debate will feature the candidates at a table instead of podiums. Playbook reports CNN last used this set-up for a GOP debate on Jan. 30, 2008, at the Reagan Library. Sitting at the table then were candidates John McCain, Mike Huckabee, Romney and Paul.

The Arizona debate airs on CNN at 8pmET.

GOP candidate for president Newt Gingrich, who has gotten some significant mileage out of the televised debates this primary cycle, may not be finished debating. But the networks that hand over precious air time, may be. Toward the end of today’s Washington Post story on Gingrich‘s plans going forward, there is a line about the Gingrich campaign looking toward more debates.

His strategists are also lobbying two networks — Fox News and ABC — to add debates to the schedule between now and March.

But those networks say that’s not the case. Fox News tells us no one from Gingrich’s team has lobbied them. And we’re told it’s unlikely Fox News will have another debate for the remainder of the GOP primary season. ABC tells us no one has lobbied them either, but a standing invitation is out to the candidates to debate on “This Week.”

The next debates are tentatively set for February 22, in Arizona on CNN;
March 1 in Georgia also on CNN; and March 5 in California on NBC.

“Brit built this foundation,” Fox News anchor Bret Baier says of his predecessor Brit Hume. “We’re just trying to complete the house.”

Baier, host of “Special Report,” lead anchor of FNC’s primary coverage, and moderator of five GOP debates, is profiled by the AP’s David Bauder today.

Of Newt Gingrich‘s proposal to debate without a journalist-as-moderator, Baier says, “I don’t think that would work. I don’t think it would be too enjoyable to watch.” And of Gingrich’s attacks on the media: “It’s just politics. A lot of politicians have complained about media coverage and media questions. He just does it more frequently than others and perhaps more effectively.”

After another Mitt Romney primary win — this time at the Nevada Caucuses — Newt Gingrich decided to hold a press conference, instead of a second-place-ain’t-so-bad speech. It was carried live on CNN and Fox News. (MSNBC signed off at 11pmET airing “Lockup: New Mexico.”) A defiant Gingrich brushed off rumors he’ll be dropping out, saying he’s in it until the convention in Tampa. Gingrich says he’ll be able to stay in it state-by-state, because his is a national campaign: “If I am on ‘Hannity’, or I am happy to be in the Associated Press, or if I’m on one of the networks or even in The New York Times that in fact it reaches the whole country.”

At one point during his Q&A, Gingrich cited Fox News contributor Charles Krauthammer‘s comments about  Mitt Romney not quite understanding “conservative philosophy.”

After the newser, Krauthammer told Bret Baier, “I appreciate the shout out but it will not work.” And summing up the news conference, Krauhammer added, “That was the best of Newt and the worst of Newt.”

Stephen Hayes agreed: “This is what flailing looks like. It was not a pretty performance by Newt Gingrich.”

As CNN waited for Gingrich, they kept their Caucus Cam trained on a late gathering of GOP voters, held after sundown to accommodate Orthodox Jews and Seventh Day Adventists. One Caucus-goer, a Ron Paul supporter, bemoaned Paul’s perceived lack of media coverage, even claiming he’s been poorly lit at the debates. “I’ve looked at some of the debates and when they go on Ron Paul, the lighting is dimmer, sometimes they don’t even allow him to talk, they don’t even get him into the conversations,” the woman said, live on CNN. “It’s just hideous how the media has been handling this entire thing.”

Gingrich also revealed he’ll be rooting for the Giants later today. As a Green Bay Packer shareholder — his son-in-law hails from Sheboygan — Gingrich decided it was best to root for the team that beat the Packers on the road to the Super Bowl.