The cable news nets took a brief Paris Hilton break to cover Defense Secretary Robert Gates' 1pm press conference.

MSNBC was late in getting to the presser, though, spending time on pictures of Hilton's mansion instead.

"And they were the first one to break away... back to Paris, of course," an e-mailer says.

Oliver Willis has the video...

> Update: 2:30pm: An MSNBC rep says the net was about 90 seconds late getting to the Gates presser because of a technical issue...