NEW YORK — Less than a month after leaving MSNBC, liberal lightning rod Keith Olbermann said Tuesday he’s headed to Current TV, the public affairs channel launched six years ago by former Vice President Al Gore.

Olbermann will start this spring with a prime-time talk show on Current. He was also named chief news officer at Current, which is available in 60 million homes in the U.S.

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Keith Olbermann, who left MSNBC last month, announced Tuesday that he will join Current TV. The Associated Press

David Hasselhoff, left, and British Prime Minister David Cameron.

Bristol Palin

Financial terms were not divulged, although Current said Olbermann will get an equity stake in the company.

Olbermann’s hiring was the biggest moment in the history of Current, which began as a network geared primarily toward young people featuring viewer-generated short videos and is now evolving into a more traditional network. Its showcase is the investigative documentary series “Vanguard.”

“We now live in a world with fewer and fewer opportunities to hear truly unique, truly unfettered voices on television,” Gore said. “Keith is one of those rare voices.”

Olbermann’s sudden departure from MSNBC, announced simultaneously by himself and the network on a Friday night, was never really explained. He’d been an occasional headache for his bosses and was briefly suspended last year for making campaign contributions in violation of NBC News policy.

Yet his nightly “Countdown” show was MSNBC’s most popular, and the network built a left-leaning prime-time schedule from Olbermann’s template and with his proteges. Conservatives sputter at the mention of his name, but he’s a hero to liberals.

“Nothing is more vital to America than a free media,” Olbermann said, “and nothing is more vital to my concept of a free media than news that is produced independent of corporate interference.”

It’s a meeting of the Davids at Britain’s Parliament

LONDON — Prime Minister David Cameron met an unlikely namesake Tuesday, as TV’s David Hasselhoff took a tour of Britain’s Parliament.

Cameron ran into Hasselhoff – and posed briefly for a photo – as the actor and presenter strolled close to the famous clock tower that houses the world-renowned Big Ben bell.

Hasselhoff was being shown around Parliament by lawmaker and former musician David Morris.

The former “Baywatch” star was helping Morris promote a campaign to restore a disused entertainment complex in Morecambe, the northern England seaside resort he represents in Parliament.

Bristol Palin may or may not have a memoir out this summer.

NEW YORK — Listings for an “Untitled Bristol Palin Memoir” were viewable Monday on Amazon.com (release date June) and an online catalog for HarperCollins (release date August). The listings have since been pulled.

Publicist Seale Ballenger of the Harper imprint William Morrow declined to comment Tuesday.

Bristol Palin, daughter of former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, has become a celebrity herself through her appearances on “Dancing With the Stars” and as an advocate for sexual abstinence among unmarried teens.

The 20-year-old Palin is the mother of a 2-year-old, Tripp Johnston.

Lohan faces felony charge 

LOS ANGELES — Prosecutors said Tuesday they plan to charge Lindsay Lohan with felony grand theft of a $2,500 necklace reported stolen from a jewelry store last month.

District Attorney’s spokeswoman Jane Robison said the charge will be filed Wednesday. She is due in court for an arraignment that day.

The charge brings the troubled star another step closer to jail. Lohan, 24, remains on probation for a 2007 drunken driving case and a judge had threatened to throw her in jail if she ran into trouble again.

Los Angeles police said Feb. 2 that Lohan was under investigation for taking a necklace from a Venice store later identified as Kamofie and Co. Detectives obtained a search warrant to try to retrieve the item from Lohan’s home, but it was turned into a police station before any search was made.

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