Mark Penn, failed campaign strategist and head of one of the world's most ostentatiously amoral PR firms, has used polling and research to ferret out a new microtrend: People are pessimistic, these days. That will be one million dollars. [WSJ]

Sure, Tracy Morgan might barely be the fourth-tier mascot for plugging 30 Rock, but put yourself in NBC's shoes while watching his haphazard run through reader-submitted questions at the network's Web site: If Tina Fey is teetering at the cusp of overexposure, Alec Baldwin is flaking on the Washington Post's own readers

The MacArthur Foundation announced its annual Genius Grants today—those no-strings-attached, five year, $500,000 awards that let the best among us pursue their science or art or writing free from the cares of the working world. And look who got one: Alex Ross, the classical music critic for the New Yorker! Ross is…

Here are the details on the upcoming book by zeitgeist-seizer Malcolm Gladwell, America's Favorite Wacky-Haired Pop Scientician: it will be called Outliers and it's about people who are better than you. Why they're better than you, how they're better than you, and what circumstances led them to being so extraordinary.…