Murdoch Buys Back Stock, Employees

LIBERTY AT STAKE Murdoch • Take back the right: Rupert Murdoch told shareholders News Corp. will be buying back its shares from fellow Master of the Universe John Malone's Liberty Media in a "practically cashless" deal. The deal to pay terrorists in the Gaza Strip $2 million for the return of kidnapped Fox journalists Steve Centanni and Olaf Wiig: not so cashless.

• Terror network: Also on the News Corp. beat is the Huffington Post, which unearths an internal Fox News memo seeking "any statements from Iraqi insurgents, who must be thrilled at the prospect of a Dem-controlled congress." Is there any more damning proof that Fox is working for the terrorists?

• Hype Hawker: The New York Observer's Michael Calderone reports that the New York Press is up for sale again. Employing some deadpan understatement, he writes, "Since 2002, the top of the Press' masthead has been in frequent flux."

• Amateur hour: Reuters has purchased a $7 million stake in Pluck, a blog network. "Our general view is that news is news," says Reuters Media president Chris Ahearn. "We don't take the view there is only one view you can trust and that we have it." Nor does news only break in the actual world, as the Reuter's Second Life Bureau attests.