Either Rick Perry is very chummy with Chuck Todd, or he doesn't know Chuck Todd's first name.

@RalstonReports
"Good morning, Todd, how are you?" -- Rick Perry greets @chucktodd just now.

@mtomasky
Rick Perry wears glasses all the time now? And I think he just called Chuck Todd "Todd."

@aterkel
Rick Perry also ended with, "Thank you, Todd!" to @chucktodd

@NoahCRothman
Pretty clear Rick Perry has no idea who Chuck Todd is.

From the "not-the-kind-of-coverage-you-want" files:

The New York Times:

CNN provided heavy coverage last week of the troubled introduction of the website tied to the Affordable Care Act. The result was the lowest weekly ratings for CNN in more than a year.

The Hollywood Reporter:

The cable news network suffered its lowest Monday-Friday primetime average in over a year for the week of Oct. 28 to Nov. 1. Averaging just 385,000 viewers and 95,000 adults 25-54, both key measurements marked CNN's worst showings since the 20-year record lows last August when the network suffered particularly against coverage of the 2012 Summer Olympics in London.

TV Newser:

It was CNN's lowest ratings in primetime since August 6, 2012, before Jeff Zucker took over the network...although CNN topped MSNBC for the second quarter of this year, the network has struggled of late, finishing third in both primetime and total day for October.

New York:

If CNN can't win the ratings during a breaking crisis, it really is in trouble.

Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) gave an interview to The New York Times to announce that he was "restructuring" his office -- but not firing anyone -- after plagiarism allegations that surfaced last week continued to mount on Monday.

"What we are going to do from here forward, if it will make people leave me the hell alone, is we’re going to do them like college papers," he said Tuesday. "We’re going to try to put out footnotes. We’re going to have them available. If people want to request the footnoted version, we’re going to have it available."

However, Paul's problems went beyond citing sources. The website BuzzFeed on Monday found that parts of a Paul op-ed in the Washington Times were copied nearly word-for-word from an op-ed written by Dan Stewart of The Week.

Wrote Stewart:

At least 20 states, both red and blue, have reformed their mandatory sentencing laws in some way, and Congress is considering a bipartisan bill that would do the same for federal crimes.

Wrote Paul:

At least 20 states, both red and blue, have reformed their mandatory-sentencing laws in some way, and Congress is considering a bipartisan bill that would do the same for federal crimes.

Wrote Stewart:

He will be 72 by the time he is released, and his three young children will have grown up without him. “Matt,” who turned out to have a long history of drug offenses, was more fortunate -- he received a reduced sentence of just 18 months after informing on Horner, and is now free.

Wrote Paul:

John will be 72 years old by the time he is released, and his three young children will have grown up without him. The informant, who had a long history of drug offenses, was more fortunate -- he received a reduced sentence of just 18 months, and is now free.

Even with a citation, the passage would still constitute plagiarism since Paul used the author's words, instead of paraphrasing them.

In addition to the drug-sentencing op-ed, MSNBC's Rachel Maddow said last week that Paul had borrowed much of a speech supporting Virginia gubernatorial candidate Ken Cuccinelli from the Wikipedia page for the 1997 film "Gattaca."

When asked about the plagiarism accusations, Paul struck a defiant tone. "And like I say, if, you know, if dueling were legal in Kentucky, if they keep it up, you know, it would be a duel challenge. But I can't do that, because I can't hold office in Kentucky then," he said Sunday on ABC's "This Week." In an interview with the television network Fusion, he blamed "haters" for the accusations.

Paul is mulling a presidential bid for 2016. Plagiarism accusations sunk the 1988 presidential campaign of then-Sen. Joe Biden (D-Del.).

A bear, a tiger and a lion. They’re dangerous predators, but they’re friends. The reason they do not attack each other or consider the other as rivals, is that they were brought up together.

More than four in 10 Americans believe it's acceptable to wear blackface makeup on Halloween, according to a new HuffPost/YouGov poll.

According to the new poll, 43 percent of Americans think it's acceptable for a white person to wear blackface in order to appear as a black person on Halloween, while only 37 percent think it's unacceptable. And respondents were almost equally divided on whether it's acceptable to dress specifically as an ethnic stereotype on Halloween. Forty percent said it's acceptable and 41 percent said it's unacceptable.
Blackface was frequently used in stage and later film productions in the 19th and well into the 20th century for heavily stereotyped portrayals of black characters by both white and black actors.

Among white respondents to the new poll, 46 percent said it's acceptable to wear blackface on Halloween, while 44 percent said it was acceptable to dress as an ethnic stereotype.

Black respondents disagreed. By a 68 percent to 21 percent margin, most said it was unacceptable for a white person to wear blackface to dress up as a black person on Halloween, while by a 76 percent to 17 percent most said it's unacceptable to dress up as a racial or ethnic stereotype.

The poll also found a political divide in Americans' views on blackface. By a 59 percent to 27 percent margin, most Republicans said that they thought wearing black face is acceptable, while by a 53 percent to 30 percent margin, most Democrats said it is unacceptable. A 43 percent to 33 percent plurality of independents said they believed wearing blackface on Halloween is acceptable.

The results come on the heels of several instances of blackface that have attracted media attention, including actress Julianne Hough, who dressed as Crazy Eyes from "Orange Is The New Black," an Italian fashion designer who donned blackface at an African-themed party, and a pair who chose to dress as Trayvon Martin and George Zimmerman for a Halloween party.

Still, the poll showed signs of progress on the issue. Younger respondents were less likely than older respondents to say that wearing blackface or dressing as a racial or ethnic stereotype is acceptable, with a 41 percent to 31 percent plurality of Americans under 30 saying that blackface is unacceptable.