• Joel Stein calls Sesame Street's Elmo "an annoying tool." You see where we're going with this one. [LAT]
• Attention PR people: You have to get up pretty early in the morning to pull the wool over Rachel Sklar's eyes. (Here's a hint: mention "vaginas.") [PRWeek]
• Graydon Carter exposes the great fire hydrant fraud.…

• Time Inc. to launch SI Edge, fitness mag that won't offer abs tips. Retorts Zinczenko: "[W]e promise not to point out that he's naming his magazine after a shaving cream." [NYP]
• Hey, remember the big USA Today expose on how the phone companies were colluding with the government to create a big database of all…

• Katie Couric to narrate PBS docu on Walter Cronkite. No one ever said she's not clever. [B&C]
• Why does Bush likes to pick on the Times? Because of the Jews, of course. [SFChron]
• The New Yorker rock critic Sasha Frere-Jones wants to be a rocker, too. [LAWeekly]
• September VF will focus on fashion, be as fat as …

• Ron Burkle wants to buy the L.A. Times, and the Chandlers are finally willing to talk to him. And we're sure he'll continue to care deeply about Radar if he buys a real — well, real enough — media outlet. [WSJ]
• Bushies hate the Times even more than usual these days. [WP]
• AMI might be holding on to Bonnie, but a…

• The GOP apologists at National Review want the White House to revoke the Times's press credentials. [NR]
• The White House, thankfully, doesn't think so highly of the idea. [E&P]
• Knight Ridder is officially no more. [SJMN]
• Dan Rather had to die so that CBS News could live. [NYSun]
• People style spinoff TK?…

• The news is still big; it's the newspapers that got small. [Slate]
• David Carr asks: Is CNN news or entertainment? What, it can't be both? [NYT]
• Pissing off Dick Cheney was not, in fact, the Times' reason for running its financial-records-spying story, says Bill Keller. [NYT]
• As we already told you, WWD media…

• We did not go to Slate's pre-party panel discussion last night on the future of newspapers in the internet age, as we long ago decided we'd never attend another print-vs.-web panel. Others have a more flexible stance on this issue. [E&P]
• Speaking of The Note, Eric Boehlert kind of hates it. [Wash. Monthly]
•…

• Anderson's Angelina interview is "a watershed moment in the history of CNN." Huh. And we thought it was just kind of boring. [LAT]
• Connie Chung has no regrets — well, at least too few to mention — about her "Thanks for the Memories" farewell. Probably because she's the only person who hasn't had to watch it…

• Times to sell ads on front business page. Coming next: white after Labor Day. [NYT]
• VF to boost biz coverage; AMI to miss accounting deadlines. [NYP]
• Us Weekly has its best-selling issue ever, and Janice Min had nothing to do with it. [Jossip]
• New Times Building turning out to be a good investment. Huh. So it…

• Dan Rather says farewell and that he'll see us all soon. [Romenesko]
• Charlie Gibson doesn't care about ratings. Ya-huh. [WP]
• Michael Wolff doesn't like Slate because it's "by and for smart boys trying strenuously to be ever smarter than anyone they perceive as threatening their smartest status." Ironic, eh? […

• So it really looks like De Niro and pals will buy the Observer. And Kurt Andersen — like Peter Kaplan — is just thrilled about it. [NYM]
• Michael Eisner pisses off Pat Robertson by having the rightwing preacher on his CNBC show, challenges him on gay rights, whether Jews can get into heaven, and whether it was in…

• Ted Turner sells his memoir for $4.5 million; David Carr sells his for $300k. [NYP]
• You shall bow before Katie and Anderson, because they are royalty. [National Journal]
• Brad is Esquire's October cover. Brad doesn't want to talk about whether he cheated on Jen. Did Esquire agree to restrictions? [WWD]

• Charlie Rose — with a new pig-heart valve — returns to TV Monday. [NYDN]
• Congress boosts TV indecency fines, ensuring the Parents Television Council can continue its reign of puritanical terror over the nation's broadcasters. [WSJ]
• CBS's Kim Dozier returns to United States, still in critical condition but "in…

• Times Baghdad bureau likes 'em young; Times Mag editor Gerry Marzorati likes 'em late-30-something and in business. [NYO]
• And James Wolcott likes 'em monocled and on a compiliation DVD set. [New Criterion]
• Seth Mnookin says Da Vinci Code author Dan Brown is a plagiarist, if not necessarily by the legal…

• Fortune editor to co-write Alan Greenspan's memoir. He's say he's excited, but that might be viewed as irrationally exuberant. [NYT]
• And Ted Turner will likely have a memoir coming, too. [NYP]
• More and more newspaper advertising is shifting to web. Um, duh. [NYT]
• Elizabeth Vargas needed that anchor chair like…

• Hearst is the a great media company with a great headquarters and great executives who do great things. Yay! [NYT]
• Actually, no, Fox Business Channel isn't going to launch anytime soon. Never mind. [B&C]
• Where's the love for E&P? [MW]
• Time Inc. has extended its deal to sell All You exclusively in Wal-mart,…