John Koblin gets more info on today's Conde Nast hatchet-swinging: Roughly 180 layoffs, including Cookie editor Pilar Guzman. No solid word yet on the fate of Gourmet's Ruch Reichl. Any Conde people who want to share, vent, cry, or complain: Email us.


One argument: The Tribune Co. is bankrupt, its media properties have dim prospects across the board, and all of its employees are bearing the brunt of the managerial incompetence that's left it saddled with a hopeless debt load. Therefore, Tribune trying to pay $66 million in bonuses to top executives is borderline fucking criminal. Counterargument: Lee Abrams is priceless.


Very very predictable news that is nonetheless kinda sad: After the Rocky Mountain News folded, a hardy band of ex-journalists there decided to try to get together and launch an online, subscriber-only local news website, and, long story short, it has folded. But many of those same journalists reportedly found other jobs already, so, bright side.


Tim Wheatley, the business editor of the Baltimore Sun, was killed when his car was struck by a UPS truck this morning.

A preliminary examination of the Oxi-Clean pitchman's body had turned up no sign of drug abuse, just the prescription painkillers he was known to be taking for hip surgery. But it turns out he had used coke several days before his death.

Mays, known for his loud, energetic infomercials thrived on his manic energy, as seen in the Tonight Show clip we attached to his obituary. Pair this high-octane working style with his weight and middle age (he died at 50), and it's baffling that he would add cocaine to the mix.

According to the Sun, which claims to have been leaked the results of Jackson's autopsy, the singer:

• Weighed "8st 1 oz," which is apparently Druidic for 112 pounds
• Had nothing but "peach fuzz" for hair and died with his wig on
• Had scarring on his face from botched surgeries
• Was missing the bridge to his nose, the right side of which had "partially collapsed"
• Had nothing in his stomach save for partially digested prescription pills
• Had injection sites near his heart, apparently from Pulp Fiction-style attempts to revive him with adrenaline
• Suffered broken ribs from CPR

TMZ, citing literally nothing at all except for that they "learned" it, says the Sun report "was fabricated and completely false." Maybe it was, maybe it wasn't. TMZ has sources within the Los Angeles law enforcement bureaucracy, and if someone within or close the coroner's office were disputing the report, that would be one thing. But Jackson's family is highly incentivized to deny the claims, and would surely lie to TMZ in order to bat them down.

The Jackson family has demanded a second, private autopsy. It's unclear whether it has happened yet—the Sun says it happened on Saturday, the BBC says the Jackson family is still "seeking" it—but look for another round of (presumably less grotesque) autopsy leaks soon.

As for Billy Mays—he died of heart failure and had evidence of hardened arteries, according to his autopsy. There was no sign of head trauma, which puts to rest speculation that he might have suffered an embolism after being hit in the head by flying luggage during a hard airplane landing on Saturday. He'd been taking prescription painkillers due to recent hip surgeries, but the autopsy results say they didn't play a role in his death.

Also, thanks to TMZ, we've listened to the 911 call his wife made after waking to find her husband cold and not breathing. You probably shouldn't, but make your own call.

Mays claimed to be the last salesman trained by the old-school pitchmen. Among other things, he shilled: OxiClean, Orange Glo, Kaboom, ESPN 360, Impact Gel Insoles, Omni DualSaw, something called a Samurai Shark, the Grater Plater, and a bunch of other products you can find on his Wikipedia page. Mays also enjoyed crushing the dreams of children and was possibly the single most ubiquitous figure on television today, measured purely in face time according to the Washington Post.

Interestingly enough, Mays was actually a passenger on a "hard landing" US Airways flight that blew a tire upon arrival in Tampa last night. Nothing regarding Mays death has been tied to the incident as of this writing. Update: the FAA is now saying that Mays wasn't wearing his seatbelt during the landing. Mays' son Twittered his father's death:

Billy Mays appeared with his co-host Anthony Sullivan from the Discovery Channel's Pitchmen on The Tonight Show with Conan on June 10, 2009:

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And Mays appeared as a guest on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno earlier this year (April 7) with Dana Carvey:

He's the third celebrity of note to die in a week, following Farrah Fawcett and Michael Jackson. Actually, the fourth, counting Ed McMahon. Jeff Goldblum and Harrison Ford were rumored to be dead, but they weren't. Meanwhile, a nation of people who weren't sure about that "bad things come in threes" shit are far less worried about the wallet they lost and they keys they forgot than whatever's going to happen next.

Update: According to BNO, Mays got knocked upside the head by something on the flight, and made a joke about it to a local TV station.

And perhaps the close: "Not all of her performances will stand the test of time, but what is worth remembering is how hard Farrah Fawcett tried."

There's that word again—"Tried."

Apparently some people interpreted that as an insult and lost sight of the rest of the piece, because overall we thought that the piece was, well, "fair and balanced." One thing to keep in mind, something apparently lost on those who wrote in to take issue, was that this was not Farrah Fawcett's New York Times obituary. Her obit is here. This was an analysis of her career, or as the Times puts it, "An Appraisal," and was therefore meant to be open to criticism.

But for the most part, Stanley's analysis on Fawcett's life and career leaned positive. Whether or not the Times should have waited a day to run anything containing criticism of a recently-deceased star (What's the protocol on this?) is open to debate, but at that point it's lost some of its newsworthiness. Regardless, read Stanley's piece and make your own judgment.

A Sex Symbol Who Wanted to be More [New York Times]

The Los Angeles Times confirms the report, saying that Jackson was pronounced dead this afternoon after arriving at the hospital in a coma.

The troubled star had appeared frail and unhealthy in his infrequent public appearances in the past couple of years. Though he was trying to stage a comeback of sorts, having just recently announced some British tour dates. His mother and sister LaToya are said to have been with Jackson at the time of the incident.

Jackson came from a musical family of Jehovah's Witnesses in Gary, Indiana. Under his strict father's watchful eye, Michael Jackson and four of his brothers formed the groundbreaking Jackson 5, releasing a string of major hits in the 1970s.

Jackson later launched a solo career, starting with Off the Wall in 1979 and, three years later, Thriller, which became the best-selling album of all time. In addition to its success as a record, Thriller helped advance music videos as promotional tool and brought Jackson a level of mainstream recognition black artists had not previously received. Its top hits "Billie Jean," "Beat It" and "Thriller" became hallmarks of the 1980s.

Jackson would go on to release other influential, best-selling albums, most notably Bad and Dangerous, but Thriller had marked the dizzying apex of his career. Over time, his personal life, rapidly changing physical appearance and bizarre personality quirks would overshadow talk about his music. Through his career, the singer underwent round upon round of plastic surgery, drastically altering the appearance of his face, most notably his nose, chin and cheekbones.

He also lightened his skin; amid rumors he was bleaching his flesh, Jackson eventually disclosed the lighter tone arose from his vitiligo, which made his skin sensitive to light and caused splotches he had to even out with pancake makeup.

If Jackson's striking appearance made him seem odd, his idiosyncratic behavior only accentuated the effect. He was often seen with a chimp named Bubbles and in regal, glittering outfits. It was falsely rumored he had acquired the Elephant Man's skeleton.

Then there was Jackson's home, Neverland Ranch, whose Ferris wheels, movie theater and menagerie only underlined Jackson's flamboyance. The singer invited children to the compound and faced repeated charges of child molestation; he settled a 1993 case brought by the family of a 12-year-old boy for a reported $20 million. More devastating were charges from a 15-year-old who appeared with Jackson in the British docmentary "Living with Michael Jackson," in which he discussed the practice of sharing a bed with children.

Image of Jackson via Getty

After appearing in commercials and as a guest star on various television shows, Farrah rose to fame after posing in a red bathing suit for a poster that went on to sell millions of copies. Later, as a star of the popular Charlie's Angels, she became a bona fide American star. Fawcett went on to star in many theatrical productions and TV movies, most notably playing a battered wife in The Burning Bed, a role which earned her the first of three Emmy nominations she received. In 1995, at the age of 50, Fawcett made headlines when she posed nude for a pictorial in Playboy magazine.

Fawcett was married to actor Lee Majors from 1973-1982. Since 1982, she's been in a relationship with actor Ryan O'Neal. Together they had a son, Redmond. Fawcett and O'Neal were set to marry, though we've no word on whether they were able to go through with the ceremony before she passed.

In 1997 Fawcett made a bizarre appearance on David Letterman's show to promote another Playboy spread that she'd done, an appearance she later claimed was an act intended to engage the audience. Act or not, it will likely remain one of the most memorable moments of her time in the public eye.

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Vid via YouTube

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Charlie's Angels opening credits

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Fawcett in one of her more dramatic roles, the unfortunate Extremities

Her full name was Neda Agha-Soltan. Iranian security forces have forbidden her friends and family from speaking to the press about her life and death, even going so far as forcing them to remove the black mourning banners hanging in front of their house, but the LA Times was able to get comments from a few people who knew her and piece together some background on her, as well as what happened on Saturday when she was killed.

Neda Agha-Soltan was born in Tehran, they said, to a father who worked for the government and a mother who was a housewife. They were a family of modest means, part of the country's emerging middle class who built their lives in rapidly developing neighborhoods on the eastern and western outskirts of the city.

Like many in her neighborhood, Neda was loyal to the country's Islamic roots and traditional values, friends say, but also curious about the outside world, which is easily accessed through satellite television, the Internet and occasional trips abroad.

The second of three children, she studied Islamic philosophy at a branch of Tehran's Azad University, until deciding to pursue a career in the tourism industry. She took private classes to become a tour guide, including Turkish language courses, friends said, hoping to some day lead groups of Iranians on trips abroad.

Travel was her passion, and with her friends she saved up enough money for package tours to Dubai, Turkey and Thailand. Two months ago, on a trip to Turkey, she relaxed along the beaches of Antalya, on the Mediterranean coast.

"She was a person full of joy," said her music teacher and close friend Hamid Panahi, who was among the mourners at her family home on Sunday, awaiting word of her burial. "She was a beam of light. I'm so sorry. I was so hopeful for this woman."

According to her friends, Neda was an accomplished singer who was taking piano lessons regularly. What she wasn't was a political activist, but she felt inspired by the injustice of the recent election to join friends in a demonstration taking place on Saturday, despite warnings from her friends and family that something bad might happen.

"Don't worry...It's just one bullet and its over" is what she supposedly told a friend who'd expressed concern for her safety.

Her friends say that Neda was stuck in traffic with three others on the way to a demonstration on Saturday. Frustrated, they got out of the car for air. Shortly thereafter, they heard a cracking noise in the distance and Neda collapsed to the ground with a bullet in her chest. "I'm burning" is what friends say her last words were.

Family, Friends Mourn Neda Agha-Soltan, Iranian Woman Whose Death was Caught on Video [LA Times]

Carradine's death was originally thought to be caused by suicide, and then accidental autoerotic asphyxiation as well. Carradine's attorney has already cried out that both of these theories are wrong, and now, his family's trying to get the FBI involved to determine whether his death was actually accidental or the result of foul play. Results from a private autopsy - also enlisted by the Carradine family - won't be available for a few days.

Which American gossip outlets are running the photo? Not TMZ, who won't go Faces of Death for their readers, which is somewhat surprising, given the extent to which they typically peruse original material. Not P*r*z H*lt*n, who, besides not even being able to get Carradine's name right (writing it as "Robert Carradine") would have to incur the wrath of his righteous-outrage happy fans and the celebrities he kowtows to. They're going with the family's outrage angle instead, as most news outlets will. Via Keith Carradine, David's brother:

"The family wants it understood that, per attorney Mark Geragos, any persons, publications or media outlets will be fully prosecuted for invasion of privacy and causing severe emotional distress if the photos are published."

And no, we're not running the photo either. But one American outlet is: The Post Chronicle. It's - from what I can tell - an ad-heavy, shoddy news aggregation website based out of New Jersey. They've posted a photo of the newspaper, which, while still not a perfect picture, paints it pretty clearly. And this is how information that nobody else will want to touch - but still want to see - gets out.

We've linked to the photo below. The picture, while slightly blurred and a little shaky, is still obviously graphic, disturbing, and not something you really want to look at on a Sunday afternoon.

Shocking David Carradine Hanging Photo Online [The Post Chronicle]

Carradine was in Bangkok shooting a film. According to this Thai newspaper, a maid found him hanging in the closet of his hotel room yesterday after he failed to show up for dinner with the film's crew.

His agent confirmed the death to WABC in New York, but says Carradine died of natural causes.

One of his most recent roles was in an as-yet-unreleased film called My Suicide.

O'Reilly began his jihad against Tiller back in 2005 and, according to Salon, Tiller's been mentioned on 28 separate occasions on his show. In addition to dubbing him "Tiller the Baby-Killer," O'Reilly has referred to Tiller's clinic as a "death mill" and called his work "Nazi stuff" for which he has "blood on his hands."

On November 3, 2006, O'Reilly had women's rights activist Amy Richards as a guest on his show to discuss Dr. Tiller. Over the course of the interview, O'Reilly repeated the claim that he had "inside information" and "incontrovertible evidence" that Tiller had been "executing babies about to be born" because the mothers were suffering from depression, which led to rampant specualtion that someone had provided O'Reilly with Tiller's patient records. He also made a further quantum leap of logic by saying that because Tiller was performing abortions on young rape victims between the ages of 10-15 that he was, in effect, protecting and encouraging rape. Over the course of the interview Richards remained unflappable despite O'Reilly's constant badgering, and you can clearly see him growing more and more agitated by the second, eventually blasting Richards, "So you're okay with this man executing babies about to be born because the woman says she's depressed?" Richards remained remarkably unfazed throughout even after O'Reilly sarcastically remarked, "We'll let the audience decide who the noble person is here" and then got one last dig in about people like her not caring if babies were being murdered or not.

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In July of last year O'Reilly dispatched ace buttboy Jesse Watters, who our John Cook is still hot on the trail of, to ambush Kansas Gov. Katheen Sebelius at a Governor's Conference in Philadelphia. The purpose of the "interview" was supposedly to get Sebelius' opinion of Tiller, noting at the end that Tiller had donated money to her campaign for governor.

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In November of 2006 Watters confronted Tiller's attorney, Pedro Irigonegaray, outside of his law office in another ambush interview. Then in 2007, O'Reilly Factor producer Porter Barry caught up with Dr. Tiller himself on his way to work and carried out another ambush interview. We've spent a considerable amount of time tonight searching for these videos and have come up empty-handed. We're unsure if that's just a coincidence of if they've been scrubbed after Tiller's murder earlier today, but if any of you happen to run across is either of them, please send them along to us.

It will be very interesting to see how O'Reilly handles this whole situation on his show tomorrow. We're sure he'll denounce the violent act against Dr. Tiller and express sympathy for his family, but we doubt anything he says will be enough to pacify the many who will almost certainly claim that O'Reilly is now the one with "blood on his hands."