Mr. Beck's paycheck would put him among the top 25 highest paid baseball players, and it's not bad for a radio personality either. Sirius XM reportedly pays Howard Stern $60 M. a year after production costs, Rush Limbaugh's eight-year contract is worth $50 M. annually, and Sean Hannity's five-year contract is worth around $20 M. a year, plus a profit share on his show.

A talk radio fixture for about a decade, Mr. Beck left Fox News last year to start his paywall protected streaming network, GBTV. "The Glenn Beck Program" is syndicated to hundreds of stations by Premiere (owned by Clear Channel), making it a highly rated marketing opportunity for Mr. Beck's other ventures. Premiere also sells advertising for some of Mr. Beck's sites.

"He's been a horrible president," Trump said about Barack Obama. "I always said the worst president was Jimmy Carter. Guess what? Jimmy Carter goes to second place. Barack Obama has been the worst president ever. The history of this country, Barack Obama is number one. And he had this little minion go on television."

The "little minion" in question there was David Plouffe, Obama's campaign adviser who said that Trump has zero chance of winning the presidency.

Hannity also asked Trump about his fidelity to the Republican Party and to conservative principles.

He described himself as "very conservative, but with a big heart," and as someone who has "great values" including loving the country and loving people that work.

[Full disclosure: The New York Observer is published by Trump's son-in-law, Jared Kushner.]

Take a look:

Watch the latest video at <a href="http://video.foxnews.com" mce_href="http://video.foxnews.com">video.foxnews.com</a>

Debates: Hannity's red-meat rhetoric doesn't fly at National Action Network. [Obama08jalu]

2012: After meeting with Trump, Huckabee says, "I seriously believe he's going to jump in." [Maggie Haberman]

2012: "I would be proud to give those disclosures," Trump says. [Katrina Trinko]

2012: Trump is to Democrats what Bloomberg is to Republicans. [Jeff Mapes]

2012: "I would not leave Iraq and let Iran take over the oil," says Trump. [Kelly Evans]

Carl Kruger: He was "excused" from attending the NYS Energy and Telecommunications meeting, which seemed oddly crowded today. [nysenateuncut]

Cuomo's Pen: Quietly signs vetoes. [Liz Benjamin]

Cuomo's Agenda: Republicans note Silver is in the way. [Ken Lovett]

Garbage: Cutbacks may delay a major Bloomberg plan; spokesman says they're still committed. [Courtney Gross]

Changing Chancellors: 9 people evaluating Walcott's application. [Beth Fertig]

Changing Chancellors: A teacher complains "Walcott will actually serve as a much more effective salesman for Bloomberg’s policies than Black ever could have been." [Liza Campbell]

Bike Lanes: A proposed one in Brooklyn is stopped. [Elissa Gootman]

Public Information: DoITT Commissioner Carole Post is CIO of the year. [nyconvergence]

Open Government: Senator Peralta asks why a bill isn't going to the Finance Committee. Among the answers he gets is one that is softly whispered and barely audible around the 2:45 mark. [nysenateuncut]

The former Alaskan governor said she was baffled that commentators made a connection between her and the shooting because of her political action committee's graphic.

"I was puzzled at first as to why before facts were even gathered why it would be that the mainstream media would start accusing and using such a tragedy what appeared to be right off the bat some political game," Palin said.

When asked specifically about the use of the crosshairs icon, Palin said that it was not an original graphic, and that it has been used by both parties for years.

"The graphic that was used was cross hairs targeting the different districts and again that's not original. In fact, Democrats have been using them for years," she said.

Monday night's appearance was the first time she has gone on television since last Saturday's shooting, and the only time she previously addressed the issue was in a video statement she made on Wednesday. Her statement caused its own uproar after she condemned the mainstream media for committing 'blood libel,' a term associated with anti-Semitism that was used in the Middle Ages to accuse Jews of using the blood of Christians for religious ceremonies.

"I don't know how the heck they would or wouldn't know if I knew the term 'blood libel,'" she said. "No one's ever asked me. 'Blood libel' obviously means being falsely accused of having blood on your hands. In this case, that's exactly what was going on."

After the shooting, many commentators and politicians have called for a 'return to civility' in political discourse, and while Palin said she has no problem with being civil, she does not agree with the politization of the shooting.

"We should not use and event like that in Arizona to stifle to debate and that time honored and cherished tradition that we have in America being able to respectfully petition our government and protest peacefully and respectfully in order affect the change we would like to see in our government," she said.

It's a little bit funny! And today's a federal holiday! Watch!

Before directly addressing the controversy over Olbermann's donations, Maddow described a variety of political activity at MSNBC's rival Fox News.

Maddow detailed Sean Hannity's donations to Minnesota Congresswoman Michelle Bachmann and failed New York Congressional candidate John Gomez. She also discussed Hannity's participation in National Republican Campaign Committee fundraisers. Maddow also played clips of Hannity and Glenn Beck promoting Republican candidates on their respective shows. Maddow closed by outlining the various Republican politicians who do double duty as Fox News contributors.

After her Fox takedown, Maddow talked about Olbermann's suspension:

NBC's rules on political donations apply to staffers at MSNBC and NBC News, but not CNBC, which isn't under the NBC News umbrella.

Though Maddow said she understands the network's policy on donations, but she also said "the point has been made" and called for MSNBC to let Olbermann have his show back.

"I understand this rule, I understand what it means to break this rule, I believe everybody should face the same treatment under this rule. I also personally believe that the point has been made and we should have Keith back hosting 'Countdown,' Maddow said.

Maddow wrapped up her remarks by saying that she hoped the Olbermann incident would "lay to rest forever" the notion that MSNBC and Fox are "mirror images" of each other."

"Hosts on Fox raise money on the air for Republican candidates, they endorse them explicitly, they use their Fox News profile to headline fundraisers … They can do that because there's no rule against that at Fox. They run as a political operation, we're not. Yes, Keith's a Liberal and so am I, and there are other people on this network whose political views are shared openly with you, our beloved viewers, but we are not a political operation, Fox is. We are a news operation and the rules around here are part of how you know that," Maddow said.

Maddow's criticism of Fox isn't unfounded and she's right that MSNBC, the "Lean Forward" network, is transparent with its biases, but her stirring defense of Olbermann didn't adequately address all aspects of the controversy.

Olbermann didn't get prior permission to make the donations from his MSNBC bosses, but he also didn't disclose the contributions to his viewers. Raul Grijalva, one of the candidates who received $2,400 from Olbermann, appeared as a guest on "Countdown" the very same night he got the donation from Olbermann. Olbermann only came clean about the donations after the Politico article. According to Politico's Mike Allen, Olbermann was suspended for refusing to apologize for the incident on-air.

As Maddow pointed out, Hannity also didn't disclose his support for Republican candidates. Still, going with what is essentially the "they're messed up, so we can be messed up too" defense hardy indicated that the network has learned from it's mistakes.

Thomas Roberts, who filled in for Olbermann on "Countdown" Friday night, suggested that the suspension would be brief on his Twitter page.

"Just to be clear. I look forward to Keith's return. And I was honored to work on his show while they sort it out. End of story," Roberts wrote.

Olbermann gave $2,400 apiece, the maximum allowable by law, to Arizona Reps. Raul Grijalva and Gabrielle Giffords, and to Kentucky Senate candidate Jack Conway. Politico found Olbermann's donation to Grijalva in a campaign finance report filed with the Federal Election Commission.

When Politico reached out to MSNBC for comment, the network forwarded the following statement from Olbermann:

“One week ago, on the night of Thursday October 28 2010, after a discussion with a friend about the state of politics in Arizona, I donated $2,400 each to the re-election campaigns of Democratic Representatives Raul Grijalva and Gabrielle Giffords. I also donated the same amount to the campaign of Democratic Senatorial candidate Jack Conway in Kentucky.”

Grijalva appeared as a guest on Olbermann's show on Oct. 28. News of Olbermann's campaign contributions comes amid a controversy over fundraising at cable news channels. Rupert Murdoch gave a $1 million donation to the Republican Governors Association and another $1 million gift to the GOP-friendly U.S. Chamber of Commerce earlier this summer.

Fox News host Sean Hannity was also criticized for letting Ohio gubernatorial candidate John Kasich promote his campaign on his show. Kasich was a former Fox News anchor and regular contributor to Hannity's program. He later claimed that he raised over $21,000 in the 12 hours after his Hannity appearance. Kasich defeated incumbent Democrat on Tuesday. MSNBC has also been called out for allowing on-air fundraising. 

In a recent New York Times article on the political activities of cable news channels, MSNBC president Phil Griffin rejected the notion that his network was comparable to Fox News. “Show me an example of us fund-raising,” Griffin said in an interview. Last month, MSNBC embraced its liberal identity with the launch of a comprehensive, two-year advertising campaign featuring the slogan "Lean Forward."

Yahoo's still going through the 445-page list but they've already turned up some choice boldface names.

Other prominent New Yorkers on the permit list include Howard Stern, Don Imus, Donald Trump and Donald Trump Jr., and Estee Lauder heir Ron Lauder.

Famous paranoiac Glenn Beck is known to mutter "God, I hate this town" on his radio show. We have to wonder if his name won't turn up next.

Last year, we marveled at Torrey Meeks' hilarious Bill O’Reilly Flips Out—Dance Remix. Today, we got hooked on another brilliant contribution to the genre, Michael Gregory's new video, Auto-Tune the News #2: pirates, drugs, gay marriage. (Also check out Episode #1.) With the help of an audio-processor, Mr. Gregory—a 24-year-old musician who lives in Williamsburg, Brooklyn—has transformed a number of talking heads into soulful songbirds.

CBS’s Katie Couric, CNN’s Kiran Chetry, and Fox News’ Sean Hannity—all feature prominently alongside Mr. Gregory in the latest video, singing out news bites about topics like gay marriage, drug control, global warming, and pirates.

At one point in the video, Mr. Gregory’s brother, Andrew, dons a gorilla suit and sings a duet of sorts with Mr. Hannity.

“Well, don’t you worry, baby-boo,” he sings to the Fox Newsman. “You’ll always have an angry gorilla to be angry with you./That’s what I do. Just ask Donkey Kong./He’s in my crew.”

On Thursday afternoon, The Observer caught up by phone with Michael Gregory.

So what inspired him to auto-tune TV newsmen?

Mr. Gregory said that during the presidential campaign he started watching a lot of TV news, a genre of television he had largely ignored in the past. “Some of the vacuous punditry that was going on, I found more funny than even watching, say, Jon Stewart,” said Mr. Gregory. “I thought it’d be fun to make a musical tribute.”

Mr. Gregory said that when he was in college he produced a couple of pop records, which made liberal use of auto-tune. “I used a lot of tuning,” said Mr. Gregory. “They were good singers but they wanted that effect.”

“With lots of hip hop artists using auto-tune so much these days, it’s also a funny testament to how easy it is to do that,” said Mr. continued. “Honestly, Katie Couric could have a side career as a recording artist.”

Mr. Gregory, who is originally from Radford, Virginia, says he finds the TV clips by browsing the news and politics section of YouTube to see what people are watching. He hopes to continue to auto-tune the news on a regular basis.

For his next project, he will be teaming up with the Web site Barely Political to create a 100-day recap video, which he hopes to put up a week from now. “It’s going to be in the same style, going through all the funny pundit clips, talking about Obama’s alleged mess-ups like bowing to the Saudi,” said Mr. Gregory. “It should make for some good auto-tuning.”

When he’s not auto-tuning TV newsers, Mr. Gregory works at a test-prep company here in New York.  He also plays in a band, called The Gregory Brothers, with his siblings and his sister-in-law—who all star in the videos alongside Michael and the TV pundits.

Does Mr. Gregory have a favorite TV newsman?

“I don’t know if it’s possible to like pundits,” said Mr. Gregory. “For the purpose of auto-tune, I’m making new favorites on every video, learning who to use and who not to use.”

“I thought that Hannity would be great because he’s shouting,” added Mr. Gregory. “I was like, ‘That will make great music, that will be an awesome melody.’ But it turned out not to work that well. Whereas, Katie Couric really surprised me.”

Right up front in the article—a companion piece, of sorts, to the What I've Learned feature the magazine did with Mr. Smith in December 2008—we learn that Mr. Smith has "a face made for television, a face seemingly created not just for the cameras but by them, a brand-name face that could be made into a mask and worn on Halloween."

Citing Mr. Smith's bosses at the network—Roger Ailes, John Moody, and Sharri Berg—Mr. Junod asks, "Is it fair to say that another distinguishing characteristic of people like Ailes and Moody and Berg and, yes, Shep is that they can also keep a straight face when they insist that ideology has nothing to do with what is reported on news programs like Shep's 7:00 P.M. Fox Report?"

Mr. Smith certainly thinks so. He tells Mr. Junod:

Last year, The Observer's Felix Gillette spoke to Mr. Smith in Ailes Acolyte Shepard Smith's Super Bowl Sunday!