A profile in the New York Times looks at conservative commentator Tucker Carlson and the standing of his news site The Daily Caller. In the piece Brian Stelter (who wrote it) notes that Carlson helped launch Rachel Maddow into cable TV stardom several years ago while both were working at MSNBC.

[H]is currency used to be debate — at CNN he co-hosted “Crossfire,” and at MSNBC he tangled with the liberal commentator Rachel Maddow and helped make her a TV star — now it is clicks for his site. And to get those, he doesn’t need to talk to the other side. In this new role, Mr. Carlson is succeeding: The Daily Caller, backed by the conservative businessman Foster Friess and several other investors, has quadrupled its page views and total audience in two years and reported that it became profitable earlier this year without ever buying an advertisement for itself.

Keith Olbermann, who was fired from his own MSNBC show in 2011, apparently read the profile. “Tucker Carlson didn’t have a fucking thing to do with it other than helping get her dropped by MSNBC in ’06,” Olbermann wrote on Twitter today.

Stelter — who before joining NYT founded the media blog now known as TV Newser — responded, “Maddow told me ‘the on-air folks who gave me the most help in getting into TV were Tucker Carlson and Pat Buchanan.’” He added, “Carlson had Maddow on his show regularly in 2005. The key word was ‘start.’ No doubt, you helped her career enormously.”

Despite the compliment, a sassy Olbermann took offense. “Every time I think this guy didn’t go from the best blogger to the worst reporter, he corrects me,” Olbermann said.