It's funny that Rupert Murdoch's response to a vague question about "expected losses" for Fox Business Network would result in such, uh, straight-shootedness. "We can talk pretty honestly about it. … It will probably cost us best part of $60 million to $70 million this year."

Which hey, just proves that CNBC and Jim Cramer still lead the day, despite what FBN is trying to sell you through their commercials. Which is the other funny part…although you probably couldn't name one program on Fox Business, you could certainly recognize their ads a mile away, despite the fact that Murdoch says that he's only going to get "aggressive" about getting ads once he hits over 50 million subscribers.

What, so those earlier ads that FBN put on CNBC slamming the station's own Jim Cramer weren't aggressive? Can't wait to see what Murdoch does when he gets out the big guns…if he ever has a chance too.

Remember that part of The Happening, where right before the trees make you kill yourself (ugh) you start talking in this crazy nonsensical syntax, like "I can feel the calculus!" or some shit?

Well, it looks like reporting on Merill Lynch long enough will do that to you too. CNBC's Charlie Gasparino needs to be given a Xanax and maybe some Risperdal, because he's just cracked. Or else he's just pulling a (Jim) Cramer.

It's not enough these days just to have a lot of viewers or readers or subscribers to your YouTube channel or what have you. At least, not if you are Jim Cramer. The Mad Money host isn't catching a break this year, and right now it's his website The Street that's posting the big losses, despite an increase in web traffic.

See, even when shit is bad for the economy, people will watch CNBC. In fact, they'll watch it more. Even when Jim Cramer is wrong in his predictions for stocks, like his massive blunder with Bear Stearns and Wachovia, he still makes bank over his competitors at FBN.

But online, that's a different story. And now Cramer is forced to take the reigns at his own online enterprise (gasp!) or risk losing it all together when the ad sales floor drops from under him.

CONTINUED »

Oh Jim Cramer, so angry at hedge funders for playing the market stupidly and picking bad stocks and giving wrong advice:

Jim Cramer, host of CNBC’s ‘Mad Money’, told viewers yesterday that many hedge fund strategies have been dead wrong, such as the betting on a Chinese recovery after the Olympics, TheStreet.com, which Cramer co-founded, reports…

The result of hedge funds gone bad is forced selling, he said, and at around 2:45 p.m. each day, hedge funds begin preparing for the next day’s round of redemptions by liquidating their ill-conceived positions.

‘These funds are getting killed,’ he claimed.

The vociferous Cramer also blamed fund-to-fund managers for pressuring their underlying funds for immediate redemptions, forcing managers to think only for the short term.

Um, except hasn't Jim Cramer been so incredibly wrong about the banks and everything these past couple months that the only thing still keeping him on CNBC is his good ratings? Even Fox Business knows what a joke Cramer has become, and bought out time on CNBC to run anti-Cramer commercials.

Next time you want to pass the blame buck, Mr. Mad Money, it would behoove you to go back and watch your March tapes on Bear Stearns, where you announce the company was "not in trouble" literally days before this whole economy meltdown got a kick-start from the Big Bear.

Jim Cramer is to Wall Street what Gallagher was to watermelons. The CNBC Mad Money stock-picker with a penchant for prop comedy has found himself in a loyalty-slump recently, after making bad calls on his show for investing in Bear Stearns and Wachovia, as well as advising viewers to take all the money they need for five years out of the market…a few days before the dow soared up 900+ points.

Fox Business News hasn't ignored this development of their major competitor, and in an effort to draw attention to the Achilles' heel of their opponent's hero, the Roger Ailes' owned station bought time on CNBC's own channel to play Cramer-dissing ads.

Funny thing though: Jim Cramer and CNBC are still kicking Fox's ass:

CONTINUED »

Fox and NBC stand at the polar ends of the spectrum in other things besides politics. While Fox might lead in the ratings for news, CNBC —NBC's business channel— is the number one source of financial coverage, and has only been gaining in viewers since the Wall Street fiasco. Fox Business Network has had less success, and recently went over to the dark side of smear ads, like the one to your right that attacks CNBC's Mad Money host Jim Cramer for his poor investment tips, including the sunk Wachovia Bank.

But CNBC flacks are no slouches in the mud-slinging department either, as this counterstrike P.R. statement can attest:

CONTINUED »

Thanks to a silly SEC requirement, TheStreet.com made Jim Cramer's salary a matter of public record. The stock picker of questionable talent saw his pay jump 30 percent, earning a base of $1.3 million this year (up from $1m) and, by 2010, some $1.87 million. Since we're crunching numbers, consider what would've happened should have followed Cramer's advice on CNBC about keeping your investment in crumble-prone Bear Sterns: If you owned 10,000 shares of the company when it was worth $60 a share, your $600,000 investment would've been worth just $100,000 after JPMorgan paid the $10 a share it bought the company for. That's a depreciation of 83 percent, or an overall value loss of 600 percent. And that's why some of us make the big bucks.

Jim Cramer's faulty Bear Stearns advice earned him comparisons to Neville Chamberlain, courtesy of FBN. But was his misstep a one-time affair, or does CNBC's Mad Money host have a record of doling out bad recommendations?

CONTINUED »

This Fox Business Network ad appears in today's New York Times, which touts the new-ish cable network's accomplishments — a list that basically includes "not airing Jim Cramer's crazy." (Click image for larger version) [via TVN]

Jim Cramer might have given questionable financial advice to his Mad Money viewers when it came to their investments in Bear Stearns. Some might say his suggestion – to keep your cash money in the bank, which went from $60 per share to $2 in a week – was not a smart move.

From the mailbag: "Apparently [CNBC anchor Jim Cramer's] TheStreet.com isn't doing so well. In the past two months various editors and reporters have been jumping ship, and they have yet to give out any end-of-year bonuses. Some senior editorial staff didn't receive any annual raise, while other lower-paid employees received just below the standard of living percentage increase." Sour wine grapes!

RE-UP CNBC superboy Jim Cramer has re-signed his contract with CNBC. The deal goes beyond furrowing his brow on Mad Money, however: Jim will also "produce and host four primetime specials a year on the NBC broadcast network." Which, we imagine, will sort of be like Deal or No Deal, but with stock certificates. And more sound effects. [Variety]

According to Barron's, Mad Money host Jim Cramer isn't just a melodramatic nutjob prone to nonsensical angry rants. He's also lousy at picking stocks.

Reportedly, viewers following Cramer's stock picks would be up 12% over the past two years. 'But, that's good!' you'd say.

That is, until you realized that the Dow Jones rose 22% and the S&P 500 jumped 16%, and your "earnings" were below market value.

Which is to say, "that's bad."

[Barron's]

I spend a lot of time trying to be—you know, I joke about being a statesman on Mad Money, I don't throw chairs anymore, I've been kind of methodical about what I have to talk about….I thought, let me go outside of character for a second and talk about humanity of the situation.

I had a platform, I had a pulpit. So I said, you know, maybe this is my chance to say what I feel could happen, what could happen. and I'm not goin to go back there, I've done that, I made my plea on Friday. when—I think and not if—things unravel, I don't want to look back and say i had a chance to do something and i didn't…so it was more my conscience speaking….I kind of want to go look at the world and say I spoke up. and I–I knew and I spoke up. I'm done speaking up. I'm now gonna go back to where I was…but if things play out—not when things play out—the way I think they will do, I will be proud of the fact that I said something.

–Mad Money host Jim Cramer, trying unsuccessfully to explain what this was all about

Say, remember the other day when Mad Money host Jim Cramer thought it might be fun to brag about manipulating stock prices on the trading floor and encourage viewers to do the same? Well, suddenly, it's starting to look as though that wasn't the best idea!

Especially that part where Cramer says, "a lot of times when I was short, I would create a level of activity beforehand that would drive the futures. . . . It's a fun game."

Hey, you know who doesn't think it sounds like a fun game? The Post's Roddy Boyd, who criticized Cramer for the random unsolicited admission, and pronounced it a classic example of "Too Much Information" (otherwise known as "TMI.")

Which might explain Cramer's sudden contrition and horribly awkward denial, in an interview with MSNBC's Don Imus earlier today, where he's asked to clarify whether or not he engaged in illegal activity.

CONTINUED »

For all the good things Jim Cramer has done – with raising CNBC's ratings about the only one we can think of at the moment &nadsh; sometimes the fella is just one big case of bad news bears. Like when he admits to manipulating stock prices to make a buck. While he's being filmed. Knowingly.

CONTINUED »

Jim Cramer is awesome — minus the TV theatrics

If Jon Friedman isn't playing listicle catch-up with his "Of The Year" awards, he's doting on James Cramer, the Mad Money host whose column in New York magazine is jerk-worth material for the Marketwatch scribe.

You know, the same James Cramer who's been subject to The Lou Dobbs Treatment for at least the past 12 months. Glad we've finally gotten around to noting that Cramer is, like, so totally rad.

• California values life, so obviously, if a prisoner died, they would resuscitate him before execution. [CNN]

• Tina Brown is leaving the Washington Post to hide away in her writer's hole. [NYP]

• Yay, more reality TV! CNBC's Mad Money man, Jim Cramer, is launching an apprentice-like TV show. Invest in some earplugs, and make sure the batteries in your remote are fully charged. [NYO]

• William Shatner sells his kidney stone to charity, and you can watch the uncomfortable jokes and complete weirdness tonight on CNN. Or, right now, on CNN.com. Or, (our recommendation) don't watch at all. [CNN]

• Forget mini-series, CBS has your micro-series. Someday, maybe ABC will have a nano-series. Who knows? [WaPo]