For helping Fox News continue pulling in more viewers than any other cable network, Roger Ailes was rewarded $19.9 million in the last twelve months, double what he was paid in the year prior. His pay package includes a measly $5 million salary, plus a $1 million bonus and, from Fox News alone, a $4.5 million bonus. How are things looking farther up the ladder, though, where Rupert Murdoch sits? Still healthy, but not such year-over-year largesse. In fact, Murdoch's pay slipped last year. Fourteen percent lower, Murdoch's total compensation rang in at $27.5 million; $17.5 million of that was a cash bonus. As for Democrat-loving COO Peter Chernin? He beat the bossman, with pay of $28.8 million; even still, his award dropped a full 15 percent.

Roger Ailes, the Fox News head earning $11 million a year whose job description is loosely phrased as "perform Rupert Murdoch's bidding," did something most would expect from his boss: He bought a newspaper. It's the 3,000 circ Putnam County News and Recorder, the 142-year-old paper of Ailes' hometown. And like a good Murdoch minion, Ailes is taking care of the whole nepotism thing: He's hired his wife, Elizabeth, to be its publisher. Also like Murdoch, there are promises that nothing about the paper will change. Heh. [NYT]

David Carr did something very brave. The Times media columnist and reformed crackhead – with his new book detailing his druggy past, that description will carry on at length – dared confront the Fox News publicity machine and call it out for what it is: Another mouthpiece for Roger Ailes & Co.

That Carr would publish an article like this — lots of finger-pointing, zero niceties — is very interesting, and potentially very game changing. Undoubtedly, it's a piece he's been wanting to pen for months, if not longer. But for somebody working an industry beat to so deliberately slam the garage door down on one of the niche's major players is a bold move; the gossip that spills out from the item today will not be even close to the sum of the fall out.

The real gauge of this article's effect will be determined only months, perhaps years, from now, as Carr continues reporting on Fox News, the network's PR division continues it's aggressive defense tactics, and countless more reporters engage in a tug-of-war with Ailes' spirited charges.

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The most worthwhile takeaway from today's O'Reilly/News Corp. vs Olbermann/GE feud story isn't the whiny phone calls from Roger Ailes and Rupert Murdoch to Jeff Zucker and Jeff Immelt complaining about Keith's attacks on Fox News, or the whiny phone calls from Steve Capus to Ailes complaining about O'Reilly's attacks on NBC News correspondent Richard Engel.

It's that News Corp. wanted an lefty blog's Bill O'Reilly "ambush video" to be off limits for Olbermann, even though O'Reilly's own use of ambush video cameras drive some of the show's highest ratings and YouTube views.

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While this morning's Page Six item about Keith Olbermann recyles previous Jossip reports, it also makes one thing more clear: News Corp. has many vehicles to push its anti-MSNBC/GE crusade, and Bill O'Reilly's diatribes are just one of them.

Repeating our previous reports about Keith Olbermann's behavior and conflicts with other talent like David Gregory and Dan Abrams, P6 also finds itself on the front lines of O'Reilly's battle against the network — which, it turns out, News Corp. tried to quell at the highest levels, and is now more than content to keep supporting. Just like the real war!

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Was Roger Ailes a little flexible with the truth in his "the doors aren't locked / shape up!" memo to staff? That's what Fox News' Public Enemy No. 1 Dan Cooper claims in another blog post aimed as his former bosses.

Ailes, who has already kicked out two high-profile commodities, claims that back on "February 6, 1996, exactly twelve years ago this week I walked into this building for the first time as a new employee of News Corporation to build a cable news channel for Rupert Murdoch. At that time we had no employees, no studios, no control rooms, no executives, no staff, no news gathering capabilities, no equipment, no programs, no stars, no male or female divas, no international operations and no perks."

Except, well, there was a Fox News before Roger Ailes. And it did have staff. Maybe you might recognize the name Shep Smith? Or Rita Cosby? Or how about Joe Peyronnin, the then-president of the network?

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Just days after reminding staffers "that there are no locks on the outside of the doors keeping us here," word arrives that Roger Ailes is dismissing (at least) two on-air heads from Fox News Watch.

Gone is moderator Eric Burns, who was told he'd be a goner within the next two months, while Neal Gabler was told last November the network would renew his contract to contribute to the show, but never offered him new paperwork. (FNC says they couldn't agree on terms.)

The exits shouldn't be too surprising to outsiders: Gabler was one of the channel's most vocal critics, and used his platform on FNC to remind everyone as much. Joining the network in 1996, and Fox News Watch in 1998, Gabler regularly threw FNC under the bus. (Some might argue his points were mostly valid.)

Never mind, though. With Keith Olbermann's ratings continuing to climb, Bill O'Reilly doesn't exactly need his own network's talent to summon false logic to make baseless defense arguments.

Roger Ailes longs for the better days of Fox News when, 12 years ago, the air was filled with "positive attitude, team spirit, energy, personal sacrifice, cheerfulness, lack of complaints, kindness and a 'can do' attitude." Nowaways? Everyone is complaining, whining, and showcasing a whole lot of entitlement.

In a riff to the entire FNC staff obtained by TVNewser, Ailes reminds peons: If getting paid comfortably and going to work with famous people "is not enough, you should note that there are no locks on the outside of the doors keeping us here." So get the hell out.

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In an email to friends, Roger Ailes tell-all blogger Dan Cooper announced he's planning a "bombshell" for Friday: "I'm going to publish the next bit of Naked Launch at www.caos.us, and it's going to reveal the backstory of the disgusting behavior of John Gibson with regard to Heath Ledger."

Also, he's going to explain an alleged request from the Fox News chief about installing bomb-proof windows for his office, because "as soon as we're on the air, homosexual activists are going to be down there every day protesting, and who knows what the hell they'll do."

For starters, the homosexuals might issue press releases.

Former Roger Ailes charge and current foe Dan Cooper returns – with what we imagine will be an on-going book teaser promotional play – to explain why, when Fox News was charging up in the late 90s, neither CNN or MSNBC made any major move to squash the newcomer.

When Ailes positioned FNC as "Fair & Balanced," marketing strategist Jack Trout told Cooper in 2003, "he re-positioned CNN and MSNBC as biased." Hilarious, we know.

But, as Cooper says: "The day 'Fair and Balanced' was first used was D-Day in the war to destroy the competitors. [...] The result: incomprehensible programming chaos at CNN and MSNBC over a period of years. Double-digit ratings declines. Inability to understand what Ailes is doing. Inability to develop, or even understand the need to develop, a counter-strategy. Just more talent and programming mistakes."

Psychological warfare! They might as well have waterboarded the enemy.

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This morning's brutal attack on Roger Ailes from former Fox News agent Dan Cooper continues in earnest today. But why dedicate only one item to the tear Cooper is on when there are gems like this?

One day during the launch, Roger and I had a huge blowup. It was one of many, but this one shook the building. The tongue-lashing I took from Roger was so personal, and so degrading, and it was done in front of so many of my subordinates, that afterward I stormed into a Fox attorney's office and charged him with abuse. You'll enjoy the whole story later, but for now I'll just tell you that subsequently, several News Corporation lawyers apologized to me for Roger's conduct, and made him apologize to me. One of the statements they made to me was a stunning admission: "Look. Rupert knows he's having his 15 minutes, and we know about his behavior". They had already beat Roger up. They begged me to walk into Roger's office, where he would apologize to me, if I would then immediately apologize to him. I said no. Then they begged me again. They pleaded for us to get along. Finally I agreed. I walked into Roger's office. He sat me down and told me, with a shocking display of warmth, that I should understand, and this is, like everything else in this story, a word-for-word quote: "I'm a diagnosed paranoid".

A whole lot more under here.

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Former Fox News architect Dan Cooper is lashing out at old bossman Roger Ailes – "a man I knew to be a schoolyard bully" – in a scathing … website post. In what's said to be the beginnings of a book, Naked Launch, Cooper's item story-tells how he's gone from member of the inner circle in the 1990s to corporate outsider, and now is as intent on destroying Ailes as Ailes is on destroying Cooper. Touche!

Back in '97, already ousted from Fox News, Cooper gave an "on background only" interview to David Brock for New York magazine about Ailes. And before the cover story even hit newsstands, Ailes had gotten wind of it, told Cooper's agent Richard Liebner (of N.S. Bienstock), and told him to drop Cooper as a client or none of Liebner's roster would ever be welcome at FNC. BECAUSE ROGER AILES KNOWS ALL! Oh, and he held a grudge against Cooper.

So Cooper left Liebner, and left New York for Los Angeles. And now he's ready to tell all. God, what we'd give for dramatic music right about now.

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The Judith Regan lawsuit conjured up some disturbing mental images of the former editrix and Bernard Kerik. But less unsettling was the allegation that News Corp. was trying to protect “America’s Mayor,” Rudy Giuliani.

Indeed the two have long ties. Roger Ailes and Giuliani go way back to his first failed run for mayor in 1989. In 1994, for a reception honoring Ailes, Giuliani prepared a speech where he wrote, "Roger has played an important role in my own career." Aw, thanks Rog.

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If Cody Willard’s grandfather could see him now, he would not be proud. At least that’s what the Fox Business Network anchor fears.

Twice last night at the Fox Business Network launch party, inside the Temple of Dendur at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Willard mentioned that his grandfather, who was a cowboy, would be disappointed in his grandson for needing make up before going on air. But what is Willard to do? As he said, “Fox Business causes bad skin.”

But the best way to spot a Fox Business Network anchor is not by blemishes, which were well-concealed, but lack of body fat. That, and every female Fox Business anchor we spoke to made a point of touching our arm during the conversation. It felt so intimate—like we were real friends! Perhaps it was to stay warm? Or a lesson they learned in refinery school?

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"A Perky Debut for the Fox Business Network!" proclaims Alessandra Stanley's in her correction-free evaluation of the news gals' first day on the job. Naturally, she's referring to the anchors' so-called "sunny dispositions," although, judging by their clingy, brightly colored news frocks (and pervy news prez, Roger Ailes) we're thinking the characterization works on many levels. [NYT]