This is going to be a fun political season.

Erin Burnett is leaving CNBC and moving on to CNN. CNN has been a disaster for years, so maybe a talent like Burnett will start to turn things around.

Meanwhile, you have to question the “brain trust” at NBC. What were they thinking?

She is considered one of the top stars at CNBC, and has even been talked about as a potential host for the “Today” show. However, a source told the Hollywood Reporter that NBC executives were not convinced of her suitability for a broader general news show, which could be a motive for her departure.

They’re nuts . . . Burnett would have been a star on the “Today” show or any other show they picked for her. It’s a big loss for NBC.

I just watched one of the worst interviews I’ve ever seen. Piers Morgan interviewed Rudy Giuliani, who took his expected shots at President Obama’s Libya policy, and Morgan didn’t ask a single question challenging anything Giuliani had to say.

This shouldn’t be a surprise. First, few “journalists” ever challenge Giuliani. Like Michael Moore, Giuliani usually peddles his bullshit without any worry that he’ll be challenged by his interviewer.

I looked up Morgan on Wikipedia and discovered that he’s a former host of Britain’s Got Talent and a host of America’s Got Talent. He also won Donald Trump’s Celebrity Apprentice. What a surprise. Maybe he can invite Trump to his show and let him howl about Obama’s birth certificate without any tough questions.

Somehow, the geniuses at CNN gave this guy Larry King’s time slot. Besides being a tremendous bore, Morgan manages to make Larry King look like Bill O’Reilly. He didn’t even pretend to ask Giuliani a tough question. When Giuliani proclaimed that Obama and the United States should have insisted on regime change in Libya and led Britain, France and the United Nations to achieve that goal, it didn’t dawn on Morgan to ask Giuliani how that could happen given that the Chinese and Russians would have certainly vetoed any resolution that went as far as regime change.

He’s just the latest CNN fail . . . .

This story sums it up.

This organization is so obsessed with getting hits and ratings that they will hype up every controversy they find, no matter how trivial or how ridiculous the charge. How is a stupid charge from a fringe blog worthy of a news headline on CNN?

I don’t have time right now to lay out all the reasons, but the hiring of Erick Erickson from RedState.com as a contributor is just another example of how clueless CNN is these days.

Erickson has said he needs to “grow up over time” now that people actually listen to or read what he says, but that hasn’t stopped him from making more stupid comments. I’m glad to see bloggers get air time, but is this the best they can do?

At least someone at CNN has some journalistic integrity left. Next, they need to get rid of Dobbs.

CNN President Jon Klein wrote an email last night to “Lou Dobbs Tonight” staffers telling them the Obama birth certificate story is “dead,” TVNewser reports.

“It seems this story is dead,” Klein wrote, “because anyone who still is not convinced doesn’t really have a legitimate beef.”

CNN focused on the additional information that all Hawaii records are now electronic, so they don’t produce paper copies of “original” birth certificates.

Will this end the story? Don’t bet on it. The level of hatred on the right for Obama is reaching a fever pitch.

UPDATE: A civil rights organization is demanding that CNN remove Lou Dobbs from the air.

Since Barack Obama announced his candidacy for President, we’ve seen the lunatic fringe on the right push the limits of idiocy. Since his election, the levels of insanity on the right have grown exponentially.

The “birther” movement has set a new standard, even by the standards of the loony right wing. They make the teabaggers looks like sober economic scholars.

Naturally, Jon Stewart, the most trusted newsman in America following the death of Cronkite, has a field day with this one.

Pay particular attention to his smackdown of Lou Dobbs, who brings up “questions” surrounding Obama’s place of birth several days after a guest host ON HIS OWN SHOW completely debunks the asinine story. Further proof that Lou Dobbs is a complete buffoon. Why is this clown still on CNN?

More like incompetent media if you ask me.

Liberals bloggers are having a field day ripping John King for his terrible interview of Dick Cheney. Naturally, Arianna Huffington skewered King with her usual flair.

Jon Stewart’s Jim Cramer interview was a pivotal moment — not just for Stewart, Cramer, and CNBC but also for journalism. It was a bracing reminder of what great research and a journalist more committed to getting to the truth than to landing the big get — and keeping the big get happy, and ensuring future big gets — can accomplish.

Stewart kept popping into my head as I watched John King interview Dick Cheney on Sunday. Each time King let Cheney get away with spouting gross inaccuracies and revisionist history, I kept thinking how different things would have been had Stewart been asking the questions. Stewart without the comedy and without the outrage — just armed with the facts and the willingness to ask tough questions.

King consistently refused to challenge anything Cheney said by asking tough follow-up questions. Also, when citing problematic facts, he would always couch them with timid qualifiers.

“There are people…” “They would say…” “And they have some numbers to back up their case.”

These are not some numbers that belong to some people being trotted to make their case. These numbers are actual data — empirical evidence. It would be as if King were interviewing a flat-earther and asked him: “There are people on this planet, watching this interview right now, who would say that the earth is round. And they have some pictures taken from outer space to back up their case. So what would you say to someone out there who is saying that?”

King’s desperate attempt to distance himself from the question would be laughable if it weren’t so repellent. It’s not him asking Cheney why we should listen to him. It’s not him putting forward objective data. It’s some strawman viewers, so please don’t hold it against him. And please, please come back. And tell your friends.

This is the problem with King and too many in the Pontius Pilot traditional media: They are so caught up in the obsolete notion that the truth always lies in the middle, they have to pretend that there are two sides to every issue — and even two sides to straightforward data.

Someone needs to kidnap King and take him to a deprogramming center — preferably one run by Jon Stewart and his team.

If CNN can’t use John Stewart, then perhaps they can have Fareed Zakaria handle all important interviews. The executives at CNN should be commended for putting Zakaria’s excellent GPS program on the air, and to some extent that makes up for spineless hacks like John King.