But seriously, Is this not one of the best presidential photographs of all-time? Even Sarkozy looks like he's sneaking a peek, though he's French, so we expect him to do it. However, in Obama's defense, that is a great ass!

And naturally, Drudge is having some fun with this.

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The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.

We can't wait to see Robert Gibbs try to spin this one.

Photo via TMZ

(UPDATE: The complete Top Ten has been embedded below.)

CBS posted the rather hilarious preview onto YouTube earlier and we'll post the full Top Ten here later after the show has aired and it's available online, but it looks pretty funny.

One last thing re: Bruno/Sacha Baron Cohen. We were chatting with a show business "insider" earlier today who offered an interesting tidbit as to why Cohen appeared on Letterman out of character earlier in the week—Word is that Bruno isn't tracking well in middle America where "viewers might not exactly be in on the joke," or, more likely, stricken with homophobia, so the studio may have been thinking that giving these people a chance to see that the star of the movie isn't actually gay may make them more willing to see the film. We'll see soon enough.

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The problem was with Ayiiiiiiia. How do you solve a problem like Ayiiiia? How do you catch a frown and ask it to leave the house? No one knows.

This episode was one of those ones that's edited to such a weird degree that you can't really tell what's what or when's when. As the vomit-splattered curtain was drawn back on the scene last night, Emily and Ayiiiia and Shabazzle were getting along famously. They were riding pennyfarthing bicycles down by the arcade. They were flying kites and going to kissing booths and eating cotton candy and doing this and doing all of this stuff and it was summertime every minute of every day, just breezes and balms. Everyone was so happy!

Except Johnnay. Johnnay wasn't happy because she was sitting up on the deck, her black hair matted in nest-like snarls atop her little round marble head, staring down at the three frolicking ladies and seething. But she didn't care, she didn't care that they were having the best time of their lives, that they were becoming Sistahs with a capital SISTAHS, because she had the boys. She had tumble-topped Binky with his suspicious accent, creepy-faced Bronne with his bleary creeper features, that gay one, and Melody, the tattooed rocker hunk with chestnutty good looks and a badass attitude. She has all of them! So she doesn't need Ayiiiia or Emily or Mafarffle. And they don't need her.

So the house was divided and everyone was drunk so they couldn't stand. While at the club one night, Ayiiiia decided to up and leave and everyone got worried because this is downtown Mexico where the national pastime is gringo abduction and the official currency is crumpled twenties covered in blood. After 45 minutes of looking and yelling her name for a while ("Ayiiiia! Ayiiiiiiiia!" it sounded like Japanese soldiers dying in comic books from World War II), they finally found her standing on the street. Now if your roommates had been looking for you and had been worried that you were going to wind up mostly dead in the back of a rusted-out El Camino, you'd naturally do what Ayiiiiia did, I think. Which was yell at them. She got mad that they'd been worried and looking for her. Because... that makes complete sense I guess. So we started to see some cracks in the Ayiiiia veneer there.

This didn't stop the three girlyfriends from hanging out though. Mad that Johnnay had gone to lunch with the boys one day, they decided to go out club dancing without her. Just Ayiiiia and Emily and Verdell. So they went and drank fizzy drinks and the lights swirled and Emily saw Ayiiiia there across the way, grinding her hips into the air, her horsey bucks and thrusts hypnotic in their crassness. So when the ladies got home, sprawling down the stairs in their pointy boots and pointier features, Ayiiiiia and Emily left Gargamel twirling in the kitchen and went to bed. They went to bed, not to sleep. If you catch my meaning. If you're picking up what I'm laying down. What I mean to say is... I'm pretty sure that Emily and Ayiiia from The Real World: Cancun had sexual relations with each other after their girls' night out. So.

Sistahs were totally bonded! Everything was peachy keen! Except nothing was peachy keen. See while the three weird sisters were friendies, Johnnay was still hulking off in the perimeter, like Sirius Black in dog form. And as she stewed in her lonely juices, she riled up the dumb boys, who were just off in a corner hooting and throwing their feces around and drinking and annoying Emily. Dark clouds began to form in Em's eyes and the Earth began to tremble ever so slightly. But no one noticed, not yet. But soon they would.

Because they are nice or vain or probably both, the straight boys Binky and Bronne agreed to escort Derek to a gay bar for gay people. The gay bar in Cancun was basically like any other bar in Cancun except it was full of mens and only a scattered handful of women—those that just wanted to dance and not be bothered, those that needed the reassuring touch of a man but couldn't find it in Straightville. Bronne had asked Derek to "gay him up as hard as he could," which I half-chuckled at and thought That could make a could joke but really it's just too flat and boring. Gay me up real hard. Hardee hard hard. Bronne. Bronne was that guy you knew in college who was always just trying a little too hard. Wanted to be the party animal and the ladykiller and brah's brah and all that but was never quite sure how to do it, and you could tell that he was wildly reinventing himself from some nerdy obscurity he toiled in in high school and you sorta felt bad for him so you tolerated him and let him hang around but the more and more he pushed and pushed and pushed the more you got angry at him and eventually you just ditched him forever because oh holy God it was worth being an asshole and losing karma points because now he's gone and won't bother you and ahh blessed relief. Remember that dude? That is Bronne. It's sad.

ANYWAY. Nothing remarkable happened at the gay nightclub for gay people except that on the way back Derek got caught by a groundskeeper for peeing in the bushes and the small fellow tried to take him to apologize to the manager but Derek deftly eluded him by saying "No, I was just vomiting" and then making throw-up noises and motions. Blehhh Blehhhh! he went. And I felt bad for the teeny tiny Mexican man who was just trying to do his job, but really, son? Peeing in the bushes merits an awkward sitdown with the manager? This is Can-motherhumpin'-cun, friendo! The bushes must be practically made of pee at this point. Let it slide, dude. Just let it slide.

So the boys were supes drunks that night and when they woke up at 8 am, for a very important Student City business conference that involved ziplines and seal kissing, they were still drunk. Melody really wanted to be on time so he started bellowing the time to everyone and Bronne just acted cray-zay (it was just so exhausting to watch) and Emily started clawing at the walls and eventually she exploded into a furious ball of boy hating and screaming. The boys were not scared of her rage, just bemused by it, so they kept egging her on and she got madder and madder and when they finally got to the Student City Sitting In a Hammock Leadership Conference, she refused to participate in any of their reindeer games. She was mad at her roommates so she decided to punish herself with no fun zipline rides. I don't get it.

ANYWAY. Emily was also kinda mad at her once beloved Ayiiiia, because when the shit hit the fan with the boys, only brave Mulligatawny was woman enough to stand at her side and fight. Ayiiiia, on the other hand, just disappeared into an occluding smoke and mist of mutters and bleeped swears, carrying on some fight with herself and maybe other people, it was hard to tell. Whatever it was, Emily felt it was a Reason Why Not to like Ayiiiiia anymore. So being a mature individual, she decided to just not talk to her anymore. Like, really, she just blatantly ignored direct questions. She and Bilbao finally made friends with the boys and Johnnay again, and Emily apologized for being a bitchy bitch because it's not nice to be that way when you live with people for a TV show.

Ayiiiia sat alone in a hammock, sticking pins into little Melody-shaped dolls.

Back at the ranch, Ayiiia was stomping around and starting fights with people. She shoved Binky down a flight of stairs for no good reason. Derek came up and tried to give her a hug, so Ayiiiia ran him through with a curtain rod. He slumped over dead. Melody came walking by, singing a song, and she based a priceless Ming vase over his head. Ker-thunk. Johnnay was in another room entirely, doing her knitting, but Ayiiiiia closed her eyes really really tight and focused really really hard and suddenly Johnnay felt a pain in her head and then fell over, perished. Suffices to say, Ayiiiiia was in a bad mood. But then she made a critical error. She started some shit with Schlimazel. Their fight went like this:

AYIIIIA: Let's get in a fight, but don't be attitudey.

SCHLIMAZEL: Attitude? Who's got attitude?

AYIIIIA: You've got attitude.

SCHLIMAZEL: Attitude? I've got attitude?

AYIIIIA: Attitude: You've got it.

SCHLIMAZEL: Attitude?

AYIIIIA: Attitude.

SCHLIMAZEL: Attitude.

That was a verbatim transcription. They just said the word attitude back and forth for ten minutes and then both stormed away. Later Shlomo was bitching to Emily about their newfound Enemy and said Enemy was caught lurking behind curtains, listening. It was like that movie The Lives of Others except in this case instead of a conflicted East German Stasi officer listening in on a playwright, it was a stupid girl named Ayiiiia who won an online contest to be on a reality show standing behind a curtain in Cancun. But they're close relatives!

Finally the two lovers, dim Emily and rabid Ayiiiiiia, got in the spat to end all spats, shrieking and caterwauling while the other roommates milled about the living room like Sims that you don't control, they're part of some other person's game, and finally Ayiiiia said "At least I wasn't fucking adopted!!!" and ... oh dear, Ayiiiiiia. Just oh dear.

So that was basically the end of Ayiiiiia. All the other roommates were happy as clams, and decided to play kings. When they got to 9 Bust a Rhyme, Crickets or Fallujah or Jasmine or Attitudes or whatever her name is said both "cat" and "hat" which is really annoying because she took two words when she only needed one.

ANYWAY. Ayiiiiia went to go drink wine on the porch by herself. Which, all things being equal, is not a bad way to spend an evening. Watching the Mexican waves roll in while sipping wine and not having to go to work or pay bills or do anything unpleasant tomorrow. But when you're roommates are inside doing waterfalls and 2 For Yous and hating you, I guess it's a sad thing to be doing. So I guess Ayiiiia might go home. Pity.

What is it, though, about these contest winners? They never work out! Remember that fool from the Hollywood season a couple years back? Man that guy was a DISASTER. I mean, Ayiiiia sorta worked for a little while—she even did a lady!—but I guess it had to come to this. Yelling for no reason and then lonely porch drinking. Maybe the end came in the beginning, when she started bitching about dishes. It's never a good idea to bitch about dishes on this show. It just never works out well.

ANYWAY.

Here:

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We reported yesterday that Politico's Mike Allen was spotted milling about as a guest at the White House's "backyard bash" by the pool reporter, who was allowed into the event for 40 minutes and kept in a pen before being ushered out. When Allen quoted from the pool report in his Playbook column the next day, he deleted a reference to his own name and didn't bother to tell his readers that he was actually at the party.

Well, he wasn't alone. Gawker has learned that the White House gave tickets to virtually every major news organization that covers the president—the New York Times, Washington Post, Newsweek, Time, ABC News, NBC News, CNN, CBS News, and so on, about 30 in all. The reporters were invited to attend on the following condition:

"You are being invited to attend this event as a guest. Blogging, Twittering or otherwise reporting on this event is not permitted. If you feel that you cannot agree to abide by these ground rules, please don't claim a ticket."

That's right: Much of the White House press corps spent the Fourth schmoozing with White House staffers, catching performances by the Foo Fighters and Jimmy Fallon, and watching the fireworks from the most exclusive vantage point in the D.C. metro area, all off the record—not to mention off-the-Facebook and off-the-Twitter. These are the same people who just a week ago were whining in the press briefing about Obama's malicious and dastardly attempts to "control the press." (Well, not the self-same people—we're not sure if Chip Reid and Helen Thomas, the primary antagonists in that exchange, were in attendance.)

There is a cosmic irony at work here: The party was "closed press." (Ha!) It was covered, under onerous restrictions, by a pool reporter—the Baltimore Sun's Paul West. West was ushered in by White House staffers for a mere 40 minutes, so he could record the president's remarks. He was kept in a pen so that he wouldn't run amok and interview someone. He shouted questions at Obama as he worked the rope line, which the president ignored. Then he was taken away. West wrote up his blindered account of the party and then e-mailed it to the White House press corps, many of whom were actually at the party, outside of the pen, hanging out with all the other guests. And then, because they had temporarily signed away the right to do their jobs in exchange for facetime with staffers, a few cold Stoudt's American Pale Ales, and some corn on the cob, their news organizations picked up that pool report and used it to tell their readers what happened at the party. This is how the press covers the White House.

The party was designated "closed press" because it was originally going to actually be closed to the press. But on Thursday of last week, a batch of last-minute tickets opened up, and White House staffers decided it would be nice to invite the press corps. They distributed them to the news organizations, who then decided who to give them to. (We are reliably told it was mostly White House correspondents who snapped them up.) But instead of just opening up the event to coverage, which would have meant spoiling a nice backyard bash with network cameras, radio correspondents, international press, and the vast machinery of live electronic media, the White House decided that it would be more fair to the news organizations who weren't invited if they just kept it off the record. That way, the thinking went, no one's getting special access. As absurd as that sounds when you're talking about inviting a select group of reporters to a party with the president, it kind of makes sense if you have to deal with a host of news outlets jockeying for access. If it's all off the record, a small regional paper can't complain that not being invited seriously hurts their coverage.

What doesn't make sense, at all, is why a group of reporters who have recently begun clinging to the notion that they are independent of Washington's clubby morass of back-scratching self-congratulation would agree to attend an off-the-record party at the White House while one of their own is walled off in a pen like some forlorn scapegoat, doing the job they're supposed to be doing.

When Gawker first introduced comments, they were an exclusive club. As we've grown, we've opened up the doors more and more, and our comments have become, to be charitable, more freewheeling. Today, we the editors are taking control back with what we're calling "featured comments" as the place directly under posts to gather the best of the best, as decided by your tireless editors and star commenters.

But before I get into that, a few other changes:

• You have 15 minutes after you leave a comment to edit it. So, please, no more comments pointing out your typos.
• There are new tools to easily upload images and YouTube videos. Use them!
• Comment threads are only viewable by reverse chronology, just like on Facebook and Twitter.

Now about those star powers. The editors are the only ones who can give you a star, and we'll be giving them out to the commenters we trust the most. This means that many people who have stars now will be losing them. But for those who keep their stars, your comments will automatically appear in the featured comments, and you will have the ability to promote non-star comments up to the top level. In fact, just replying to a comment will bump up to the front page. You'll also see all of the unapproved comments left by new users and can approve the ones that you think are up to snuff. But use your powers wisely. We're going to be taking a closer look at who's doing what. Use your star powers to make mischief, and we'll take them away.

So what kind of comments are we looking to feature? We're giving more prominence to the featured comments because we've realized that they go a long way to setting the tone of the site. So, we want them to be an addition to what we post, not just an open-forum place to rant. We want to feature comments that are first and foremost about the post they're left on. They may add information, be a well-reasoned critique, a particularly funny line or, if you're named in the item, a rebuttal. Oh, and proper grammar counts. What we're not looking for: snark for snark's sake, comments about Gawker, IM-like conversations, attacks on your editors, comments pointing out how stupid other comments are (do not engage the trolls) and basically anything else that we don't like.

There are no doubt going to be plenty of glitches and bugs, and please email those to me. As for any other questions, ask away in the comments.

For reference, here's our overlord Nick Denton's rundown on the new changes:

Six months later, we're finally ready to go live with the Ganja power commenting system across the nine sites of Gawker Media. Here's why we've overhauled the comments — and a summary of the key changes you'll notice on the sites later today. There will be some glitches and many complaints — but the new system is elegant, already rich in editorial possibilities with so much more to come. It's an enormous accomplishment by the tech team in Budapest, New York — and Kansas City.

1. THE PROBLEM

As a site gets bigger, the comments tend to get busier — and sometimes more annoying. Our titles are no exception. Deadspin's had to contend with a war between the daytime and nighttime users; Jezebel editors battle for control with a politically-correct mob; perceptions of Gawker are set by a small group of glib and bitchy commenters. All sites that are growing as rapidly as ours have something like this problem — and one that can't be solved simply by banning the offenders or applying more strictly our approval process.

It can't be solved because the most pernicious comments don't come from trolls or spammers. Those can be easily identified and barred. What ruins a good discussion is what we could call the chatty commenter. They may be a devoted reader, someone we don't have the heart to ban. But they only occasionally contribute something to the sum of human knowledge. And the chatty commenters — because there are so many of them — set the tone. Their presence puts off the subjects of items — or other people with something interesting to say.

So we need to introduce another level — the power commenter — to the hierarchy. We used to refer to our comment environment as a club — with a velvet rope to keep the riff-raff out on the street. Well, now the club is too busy. If we're going to maintain credibility, we need a the equivalent of a VIP room. We'll populate the VIP room by giving special privileges to star commenters. They'll get prominence and space — as will their guests. And — we hope — it will be this salon that sets the tone of discussion.

Our comments have stood out amid the illiterate abuse and empty-headed wittering of the rest of the internet; we're going to make sure it stays that way as the audience continues to expand.

2. THE KEY CHANGES

* Privileges for star commenters (see below)
* Image and video embedding in comments
* Comment threads switched (like Facebook and Twitter) to reverse chronological order
* Related stories show to the right of each post (and a few other design changes)
* Comments can now be edited (for 15 minutes after publishing)

3. RIGHTS OF A STAR COMMENTER

* A gold star next to each commenter's name (as now)
* Comments given priority and published immediately after post
* A star commenter can see comments even before a moderator has approved them
* By replying to any comment, a star commenter can give it priority
* Promotion of another's comments to the featured section

4. THE FUTURE

* Many more items such as interviews, live chats, live blogs, contests and photo pools
* Web submission and publishing of tips
* Discussion forums around personalities and topics
* Commenting via Twitter
* Rebuttal rights for the subject of an article
* Commenters able to call on friends or colleagues for support in an online discussion

The Post says Ruth's broker is considering this spacious-ish 481 square-foot 1BR in the Trafalgar House on East 90th St. Only $465K, cheap!

This one bedroom's Southeast exposure brings an abundance of light into the apartment. With its many closets and large kitchen, which includes a dishwasher, all that's needed is a little TLC to transform the apartment into a lovely living space. Building amenities include a large laundry room along with a storage and bike area.

Haha! It is a total dump*, be honest. Check it out:
*Still much nicer than my apartment.
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The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.
The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.

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Well, actually we don't know the real reason, other than Franco's claims of having to work on a film or something, but this video from The Harvard Lampoon, "James Franco's Rejected UCLA Commencement Speech," which actually stars James Franco, is pretty funny, so we thought we'd share it with you since we chronicled this whole saga last month. Enjoy, brah.

But that's not all! Agyness Deyn wears suspenders and retro band T-shirts and and she, like, DJs and has a band and likes rocker dudes. She might try acting one day but, like, she doesn't know yet and all, but she's, like, "into stuff that really pushes the boundaries, raises the bar ... like, puts you out of your comfort zone," but for now she's, like, just hanging out downtown trying to figure it all out, so the New York Times wrote, like, a big feature on her where they said she is "the visual articulation of our culture's unspoken hopes and latent desires," whatever the hell that means.

"You know, even though I'm in fashion, I don't, like, do fashion," she said. "Fashion isn't me, even though I work in it. It's just materialistic stuff. I just want to do whatever makes me happy."

What makes Ms. Deyn happy?

"Like being totally conscious. Laughing is, like, my favorite thing to do. Being with friends, having fun ... being a bit daft."

It is hard to say if she eschews her supermodel role because she doesn't have the id or will to assert it or because she doesn't fully understand her own potential. But this, again, may be part of the construct of Ms. Deyn's media persona: she projects a cultivated lack of savvy, as if she were acting from a Buddhist compulsion to consciously guard herself from arriving at too intimate an understanding of such worldly filth.

Does she intend to spontaneously skip any Fashion Weeks, as she did last fall?

"I don't know," she said, airily. "I kind of make the decision a week before. I love doing it, but then sometimes I'm doing another project or something."

So yeah, Agyness Deyn isn't some vapid model bitch like so many of the others who are, like, all stupid and lazy and have had everyone kiss their boney asses all their lives because they're pretty. You see, with Agyness Deyn, it's, like, all just an act. She may, like, come across like a insufferably dim bulb, but she's, like, really the reincarnation of Ludwig van Beethoven, Albert Einstein and Thomas Edison all in the same androgynous body. And now you know.

A Supermodel Who Is Of The Moment, and Thinking Ahead [New York Times]

He didn't trust the study because it was done in Finland and Sweden and the Finns and the Swedes stay "pure" by only marrying each other. Whereas in America, everyone marries everyone (so long as they're white and their partner is white. Oh, and straight!) So therefore the study doesn't mean anything.

Suddenly the clouds parted and a thin ray of sunshine shone down on the pesky corn nut that is Gretchen Carlson—descendant of some Nordic "species", for sure—and she ably, if simply, mocked crazy dumb Kilmeade for being crazy and dumb and possibly suffering from dementia.

It was a fine moment of morning television. Incidentally, after discussing this execrable show with my sister over seltzers at a picnic table in Rhode Island this weekend, she called me this morning and said "I tried watching Fox & Friends. I couldn't even get through five minutes. How can you possibly watch this every day?" And then I told her that I don't, that there are lovely video people who watch it for me and I cackled into the phone.

So, in short, thanks guys!

If You Are White:

• Your black roommate makes you uncomfortable.
• You make your black roommate uncomfortable.
• You are far more likely to "break up" with your roommate if they're not white.
• You will not be affected academically by your roommate's race, because you care only about your own kind.

If You Are Black:

• You will do better academically if you have a white roommate, maybe in an effort to overcome your inferiority complex.
• Or maybe because you just don't like them and can get some work done.
• If you have a white roommate, your own "positive emotions" will decline.

If You Are Asian:

• Not only are you more racist than any other group, you also make those around you more racist. Scientific fact!

If You Are of a Race Other Than These:

• You are not as interesting to social scientists.

At left In this picture taken near Grand Central Station is an as-the-good-lord-made-her Bar Refaeli on the cover of Esquire. At right is dirty, dirty pornography. Below is the uncensored GQ cover. You can't even see his penis!The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.

Yes it was the winter break episode last night, and all the kids were bundled up and snowy, shivering against a cold world that threatened to consume them. In some cases this was quite literal. Kelli learned the notion of Death in the stony, frozen expanse that some ancient Indians called The Hamptons. Rusty old Rags McTattershanty had to make a frigid, pine needle-strewn Sophie's Choice last night. To save her rep and marry out of the hobo clan, or follow her tin foil heart and get railway hitched to reliable soup seeker Soots McKenzie? Never has a fifteen-year-old been faced with such adversity.

And some of the coldness, some of the arctic mire, was in a more metaphorical sense. There was poor potato-eyed Jessi, awash in a sea of dappled Miami sadness. Eating lonely lunches with her Florida friend, a beanbag chair wearing a wig, all the while missing her one true love. That unresponsive fellow is none other than mop-browed blunderer Peter "PC" Peterson. Yes PC was busy getting lost in the aforementioned Mexico, smothering his furtive, grainy desires—which were rushing up suddenly into his loins and mouth and brains like lava in a burbling Guatemalan volcano. He'd gone to visit an old boarding school chum, the lean and dangerous Charles Ryder JP, a young Mexican baron of sand and sadness, of louche-limbed sexuality that confounds and brutalizes PC's ever-knotting insides.

But we're getting ahead of ourselves! Let's return to that scene, of that crime, a bit further down. First:

The Tough Tale of Rags McTattershanty
It was glitter, she decided. Glitter that she'd begun seeing in the corners of her yellowed eyes. A bright, quick glint or sparkle there in the periphery when she awoke in the morning, covered in the debris of last night's meal. Chicken bones and magazine scraps. Uneaten sardine tails and flecks of tin. Rags was in love. Or some manner of love, some status-crazed version of adoration that had nestled and clotted in her heart like grease. You see, she and Sebastian were a thing. Of course Rags didn't know that Sebastian had taken his carriage for a day's journey to the countryside and visited with Kelli at her parents' Westhampton manor. That the angular and mismatched pair had played billiards and discussed the nature of pets, Kelli's feeble bat wing heart fluttering and whimpering. Rags didn't know of that visit and, really, she didn't need to. Nothing of note had happened, just feelings being glooped across the floor like the maid's wash water. Sebastian had sat there in the sprawling manse and the only thing that came into his mind was not sympathy for Kelli's ailing dog, Lady Stoutbiscuits (a dog that later died and Kelli shook and shuddered and plead with Death to take her instead but it would not work), but rather Rags. Rags with her squat, gymnastic frame. Her heaving bosom toppling cheaply out of a Target chemise. He needed her, he had suddenly realized. And so he dashed out of the mansion, Kelli calling dimly after him, and ordered his driver to spurn the horses harder, and harder still! To the city! To see his beloved!

Rags had been sifting through the small pile of rubbish she called her bureau, that nagging and delightful glimmer playing in the corners of her vision, when she felt a featherweight tap on her shoulder. And there he was. Her golden tendril'd Orpheus, the sallow stink of boxer shorts and potato chip breath like a sweet intoxicant cutting through the bitter cold air. The pair—reunited, soldered together like circuits on the beautiful motherboard of love—took a walk in the snow and discussed the lay of the land. "So what are we doing?" she asked him coyly. And he'd smiled and taken her hand and said, in verse lovelier than Byron, "I dunno." They kissed and parted ways and Sebastian stood there, shaky in his trainers, a new seed suddenly buried in fertile soil. Is this it?, he thought. Are we gonna do it?

As Rags puttered off in her jalopy made of popsicle sticks and stolen leprechaun wishes, she felt that nothing could be finer than a rich boy in her 'giner. But little did she know that something wicked her way was coming (is that a sentence?). That something came at her gymnastics meet. Hobo gymnastics meets consist of three events. There's Upside-down Pie Cooling on a Windowsill Stealing, the Vertical Knife Fight, and something called Chicken Tickling that, for FCC reasons, Bravo was unable to air last night. So this was Rags' first meet ever and she was very nervous. She twisted her kerchief in her fingers and lulled herself with soft vagabond melodies but still something rattled her. And then she realized what it was. There, perched in the bleachers like a scrawny vulture in an overcoat, was Soots. He'd come not just to watch her deft nabbing of a delicious rhubarb pie (which she aced, btw) but also to woo her back. After the meet he took her to a vegan restaurant and, after Rags stuffed all the silverware up her sleeves and filled her pockets with loose sugar, he rat-a-tat-tat gave her a laundry list of reasons why she should come back to him. He was so weird, a little young Woody Allen, all confident and forceful in that neurotic, nebbishy way.

So he wanted her to break up with Sebastian and she looked at him with her pursed, strawberry features and the wood and iron gears of her fraught hobo mind turned and turned. Next week it looks as though her music box romance with Sebastian will crumble. Which isn't surprising. Lord Sebastian had earlier gone to lunch with his terrible red-eyed father—a pierogi slump of a man in sad shiny brown pants, wisps of math-teacher-comb-over hair grimly foretelling Sebastian's inglorious future—who had prodded and probed him repulsively about his luck with the ladies. He wanted Sebastian to buckle down at school but also to party and fuck, to do the things one cannot do once the years have clumped and molded you into some land-wealthy Gollum, some zombie husk stretched over withered muscle that was once taut and defined from tennis games played in the browning 70s. Yes, maybe there was never really any hope for a bottle cap beauty like Rags and this vicarious teen boyangel. But still: Will she actually make the choice? Or will it just be made for her? Only time will tell.

And now for Part II.

A Corona Is a Glow, Coming from Millions of Miles Away
It was glitter, he decided. This strange shimmer sticking to his skin. PC picked at it, the silver speck on his forearm. It was the thick, dull part of morning and he was sprawled out in a bed, in his briefs, something rude and unfriendly taking root in his stomach. What had happened last night? He couldn't remember. But we can.

As mentioned before, PC was in Mexico. He'd gone to meet the dashing JP for a wintertime romp in shitty, slitty, glitzy Cancun. It was a strange place to find PC, the affected snob young hen of Upper East Side TV society, but it worked really well for the show. Because it stripped him of context and clout, reduced him to a sad, scared boy teetering on the brink of some wide chasm. And chasm, thy name is Homosexuality. Yes, last night we got our first substantial particle waves of the inexorably unfolding gay plotline and, I must say, it was done in far more interesting chamber piece fashion than I'd thought Bravo capable of pulling off. While PC and JP and RT and QV and DMX and the gang did their cock-and-ball strut through the booze-filled feeding trough, we saw poor PC just get angrier and sadder, sadder and angrier. That scary fugue of abandon was flickering full behind PC's beady hazel eyes, and a troubled character began to emerge. He just seemed to unhappy and frightened and botched and blocked.

See nothing really happened. And that was sort of the point. PC and his buddies were besieged by flock after flock of wayward vacationing girls, drawn like moths to the magnet glare of camera crew lights. Is there some homing beacon installed in the youngs nowadays that just seeks that shit out, like pigeons or computer-guided missiles? It's sort of uncanny. Anyway, tortured PC wanted nothing, I mean nothing, to do with them. Because, ew gross, they were from Texas or wanted to dance or wear sombreros or do Yaeger bombs. No Peter Chesley Malificent Peterson is wayyy better than that, plus there's JP.

There's JP, a tall "beautiful" Mexican, all sinew and strut, chest puffed out like a sail pointing towards Eden. Oh gorgeous JP who rumpled PC's hair on the beach as they sat, shirtless and free, and made jokes to boring girls about how PC was bisexual and had a gay boyfriend back home and PC just sat there and took it, just sat there and dreamed a thousand What Ifs, bundled them up like flowers or tissue paper, made houses of them, made children of them, made slow beautiful waltzes toward death of them. Here's the truth of it, plain and bald like Sebastian's ghoulish father in five years: PC is in love with JP and is struggling terribly with it and it is sad but, oh, it is also such compelling television. I hope Bravo isn't teasing us, I hope they don't cop out on us. We'll see.

For now, PC just seems upset and agitated all the time, happy and calmed only when JP has wrapped his tawny arms around his shoulders and urged him on into the night. For her part, boulder-faced Jessi sat rotting away in Miami Beach, calling and texting and BBM'ing and all other manner of communicating with PC to no avail. PC was ignoring her. "She isn't my girlfriend," he kept saying. And then he would say it once again inside his head, softer and more meaningful this time, She isn't my girlfriend. And she never will be. No one ever will be. And the finality of it, the fact of it, would just thud on him like coconuts in a 50s beach comedy, like the sproingy thwack of a tennis ball hitting the sweet spot of a Wilson. When he got back from Mexico—when the drinking and yearning had ended (or begun???)—he and Jessi stood in her room, unpacking. PC held up a rainbow-striped teddybear and asked "Is this a gay pride bear?" And she shrugged it off, thought nothing of it, ignored it, swept it away. But it lingered and hooked in PC and now suddenly there was a whole new freighted vocabulary. How the world suddenly handled differently, like a new car.

Jessi looked him, sure that something was different. "Were there skanks in Mexico?" she asked, all fake in her chillaxitude and whatevsness. PC laughed darkly and told her no, not at all, they were all gross. Jessi seemed mildly satisfied but was still confused by the new flint she saw in her old friend. PC sat on the bed and felt himself retreating into darkness, into the cold peculiarity of a life he'd never planned.

Meanwhile elsewhere Camille was there, still cockled and strange, buying chocolates and whispering nasty things into Rags' ears. Hooting in her I-don't-wanna-be-a-nerd-anymore way that Rags should create as much boy drama as possible, so Camille can leech off of it, suck it deep inside herself so it can nourish and preserve that wicked tickle that now clamors more loudly than Grades or College or The Future combined. (Years later, when Camille is bundled up in a weekend rental Vermont ski house, Camille will turn to her partner Ruth and confess to her that that was the day, that winter afternoon in the chocolate shop, when she first felt her life yawing sideways, felt it dip then soar—a swallow fleeting a barn—into a brand new sky.) Rags listened to Camille's advice and mulled it over while playing her hobo harmonica—a contraption fashioned from dust and glass and old fireplace bellows—under her favorite bridge. What mystery awaited her, she thought. And that was just her next meal.

Kelli meanwhile lingered in a graveyard. She missed that skittering, yippy thing. She missed its silly hair, its cute noises and smells. Other than Sebastian, though, she also missed her dog Lady Stoutbiscuits. How hard it is to say goodbye to something! What pain God's given us and called it a life. She stood there, paying mournful tribute, until she got cold and she saw the cameramen getting disinterested and this episode was over for her. "Come on, let's go back. I'll have the maid make us some lunch."

But yes, back. We'll go back. Back to the bright silver blot on PC's arm. This bed, here in Mexico. This new thing in him a worm or an organ. At first he was confused, disoriented, unsure of the walls and drapes and sad sailboat painting framed beside a muted TV. But then there it was. Sense. Sense like sense has never been. Framed in a doorway, bent and beautiful. The smooth bulb of an Adam's apple, the rolled glens and hillocks of shoulder and collar, the crisp taper of stomach and waistband. JP. The legend to a map. A key. A beacon. A lighthouse.

A lighthouse perched on a precarious Yucatan shore, amid rocks and palms and finely-ground shells. The old elements and matter of dangerous Mexico. But it wasn't these things that destroyed PC. It wasn't disease. It wasn't villains on furlough from Juarez. It wasn't the burnished metal of a conquistador—not Cortes, not Pizarro, not eternal Ponce de Leon. No it wasn't any of that which felled proud, mighty PC. It was nothing simpler or purer than love and abandon themselves. Those things that eat from within and without. Here they were. Here we go.

PC scrambled out of bed while JP waited impatiently. He pulled on some shorts and a shirt and grabbed his wallet, his hotel key, his near-empty pack of cigarettes and they headed off for breakfast. Halfway down the hall JP threw his arm over PC's shoulders, pulled in him tight and asked, exuberant, "Ready for another day in paradise?"

And there, for just a second, while still in the warm pocket made by two people, faraway and safe in another country, PC felt ready for anything.

Cordero first made the news when she alleged that Epstein told her he could help her get a "modeling" career and used her for sex when she was 16. Then the Post reported she was born a man! And that she had talked about "masturbatory" fantasies on Myspace! And then they ran off and got a dismissive quote about Cordero from Epstein's flack, Howard Rubensteing—who is also the Post's own flack! A fact which they did not disclose, which is shady as fuck.

So Cordero sued the paper for libel, and now, the judge has ruled. In favor of the Post! Basically the judge said that, yes, they reported that she had sexy fantasies, but not that she actually did the sexy things, and the average person wouldn't think she's a "promiscuous slut" (exact legal language!) just because she had dreams of getting triple-teamed. Hell, the judge himself has animal fantasies that would make you sick, but he's a straitlaced guy in real life. We made that up. But if you want to call somebody a slut in print, just make sure you call them a fantasy slut. Relevant portion of the ruling:

Plaintiff's libel cause of action is predicated on the theory that the October 23 article was libelous per se because the statement that "[o]n one [of the Myspace pages], [plaintiff] gives a graphic depiction of a masturbatory fantasy' she has of being with multiple men and then multiple women" implies that she is "a promiscuous slut." Obviously enough, plaintiff can only recover damages on her libel cause of action if she can establish that the article was in fact defamatory - "tend[ing] to expose [her] to public contempt, ridicule, aversion or disgrace, or induce an evil opinion of [her] in the minds of right-thinking persons, and to deprive [her] of their friendly intercourse in society" (Rinaldi, 42 NY2d at 379). The Post defendants argue that the statement does not have a defamatory meaning because the statement only reported that plaintiff had a sexual fantasy; it did not report that plaintiff actually engaged in sexual conduct with multiple men and multiple women or otherwise acted on the fantasy. For that reason, according to the Post defendants, the statement does not imply that plaintiff is promiscuous and therefore is not actionable. Plaintiff argues that the statement suggests that she is so perverted that she publishes an online diary of masturbatory fantasies of group sex and therefore implies that she is promiscuous. Thus, according to plaintiff, the statement is defamatory...

At bottom, plaintiff's claim of defamation rests on the contention that the average reader reasonably would infer that someone with such a lewd fantasy also is in fact sexually promiscuous. That some readers might draw this inference does not render it reasonable.

[via THR, Esq.]

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.The creepy gold casket was wheeled in and the oddness began.

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.Old pal Stevie Wonder sang a sad, fitting song.

Legendary producer Berry Gordy, who helped work young Michael to the bone when he was hoofing it in the Jackson 5, called Jackson the "greatest entertainer that's ever lived." Hm.

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.Al Sharpton stirringly, if inaccurately, told Jackson's children that there "wun't nothing strange about your daddy." Sigh.

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.Jackson's childhood pal Brooke Shields tearfully recounted their shared bond over being children in the spotlight. Though, unfortunately, her constant mentioning of kids and little princes struck an awkward chord.

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.A crazy congresslady from Texas wandered up on stage and said that she wished she was a Jackson and that Michael was totally innocent of all those creepy charges.

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.Magic Johnson came up and told a few stories. But mostly he just plugged Kentucky Fried Chicken.

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.R&B singer Urrrsher won the award for Most Classless of the day, by wearing sunglasses and pretending to cry. Usher, you were never a good actor, so why try and finally go for the teary clip reel at a funeral of all places?

Toward the end, a bunch of escaped mental patients were brought on to sing a "Heal the World"/"We Are the World" World Medley that left everyone looking awkward and ashamed, except for a few of Jackson's grasping brothers, who just seemed thrilled to be on stage.

In a chilling final moment, Jackson's rarely-seen daughter Paris tearfully said she loved her father and that he was great. In a haunting evocation of a cycle continuing to grind on, her aunt Janet fixed her hair and dotingly but firmly told her "Speak up, honey. Speak up." It was pretty much devastating.

So, that was that. An odd mess of a thing—part exciting, part sad, but mostly confusing. Fitting, then, for a life lived bizarrely and publicly, a life that needed a new word for famous, a life that, in many ways, really ended and disappeared many years ago. This whole event just felt perfunctory, as if no one could imagine MJ going out without a bang, but weren't really sure how to make the appropriate gesture. So it was just a mash of things, of different tones and styles.

And then it ended, abruptly and strangely, leaving us all to ponder what it was exactly that we'd just seen.

Image via Getty

Lopez might act in a Broadway musical and take off his shirt a lot, but that doesn't make him gay. At least they got Zachary Quinto, who doesn't keep his personal life much of a secret, correct. How about a do-over with just the people who got Spacey right? Or you can just have at it in the comments.

(Chart by Julia Schweizer and Nick Denton.)

On almost no notice, Palin convened a late-night press availability in a remote fishing village in western Alaska for NBC News, CNN, ABC News, and Fox News in order to further obfuscate her already thoroughly inscrutable rationale(s?) for quitting her shitty job as governor of some crap state that's not even connected to the real America.

The interviews were a postmodern clusterfuck of epic proportions—a governor and her family on a desolate beach in the Alaskan wilderness, wearing waders and a lapel mic, surrounded by camera crews and sleep-deprived network news personalities. ABC News' Kate Snow got in Mitchell's shot at one point. Even though the sun was shining, it was really 10 p.m. in Alaska, because time doesn't work there the way it does in the real world. The gambit guaranteed that between the travel and time spent editing and doing live shots for the morning shows, the reporters didn't get any sleep last night.

Palin is shaping up to be something like The Joker of the political-media complex: Turning up at unexpected times with bizarre stunts designed to make everyone extremely uncomfortable, and then cackling a lot and speaking in riddles. It seems clear that last night's interview was just a dry run to see if she could get folks to fall for a trap—next time it's a hostage crisis.

So what did we learn this time around?

• "One term was enough." Too much, Sarah. One term was too much.
• "[Fishing] teaches the kids not to be divas." That one was offered without prompting. She's like an 8-year-old who thinks she can trick her parents into buying her a pony or something.
• People who don't understand why she quit "might not be fully aware of all the conditions" of her job. Like how hard it is.
• "You know why they're confused? I guess they can't take something nowadays at face value." Sarah Palin's "career" thus far represents the triumph of convincing people to take things at face value. It's the only value she has.
• "Most public officials, they get to look into a camera and they say, you know, 'You better leave your hands off my kids!' And I haven't been able to say that." Because David Letterman is still statutory-raping your daughter, Sarah, as we speak.
• "The fish slime and the dirt under the fingernails—the stuff that is me." Well put!

The memorial itself starts at 1 p.m., and, oh, just because we're watching ABC doesn't mean you shouldn't watch other networks. We like the sick joke of ABC being owned by Disney, but there might be other, better, more-over-the-top coverage. Let us know in the comments!

So keep it R-rated and have fun and we'll see you out there.

We played this three times after getting it from our video department and can almost say with almost absolute certainty that yes, Sacha Baron Cohen has struck again! We're sure of it.

Hilton, apparently not content to be the world's leading purveyor of dirty celebrity doodles, is quixotically positioning himself as some sort of gay rights leader. Though, he's going about it all the wrong ways.

In the new profile by Boston-based gaypert Benoit Denizet-Lewis, the vicious and rotund self-ascribed Queen of All Media practically pleads with his interviewer to please accept him as a Righteous Gay. The Advocate story was written and filed before The Incident, but Denizet-Lewis has spoken to Hilton since and added his quotes to the online version of the article. Hilton, never the intellectual high jumper, buried himself even deeper:

But Perez tells me that, in the heat of the moment that night, he almost chose to use a different word. "I thought about calling him the n word," he says over the phone a week after the incident, "but I thought the f word was even worse. I was so filled with hate at that moment because I was hated on so much, and I reacted in the worst way possible. Then I went on to make a bunch of other mistakes. I shouldn't have made the video. I shouldn't have released so many statements. But what's come out of all of this is that I've learned so much about myself, and I'm in a much better place. I'm actually thankful that it happened. As cheesy as it may sound, I had almost a spiritual moment when I just let all of the anger and worry go and am now filled with peace, happiness, and wisdom.

Aw. Isn't that... vaguely horrifying. In seeking the forgiveness of the gay community (or not forgiveness, I don't think Hilton is concerned with forgiveness, but some weird meta thing somewhere between forgiveness and fear), Hilton decides to have us congratulate him for not saying the racist thing he was thinking. Terrific.

The late edition aside, the Advocate article is a mildly interesting, if not deeply-probing, read. Mostly the bitchy/sad blogger comes across as lonely and pretending, scorned by his one-time media friends and coworkers (like Queerty's Japhy Grant and head Jezebel Anna Holmes), intimidated and childish when trying to meet men. Basically he's any young gay guy with identity problems, only he's crafted a big pink dreadnought of a platform to loudly air his insecurities.

Thank God I don't have such a platform. Oh, wait.

Life, and the news, can't be all car chases, legislative gridlock, affairs by prominent Republicans, unrest overseas, war, and Sarah Palin. It seems eminently understandable that the circus surrounding the early death of a terribly famous man would continue to be considered newsworthy. But no! It is all the liberals' fault, or something.

First, Albany Republicans refused the man his moment of silence last week. Then, New York congressman Pete King called him a pervert. Now, T-Paw, the outgoing Minnesota governor who figures a national career awaits him if he just hangs in there and doesn't attack Letterman or go to Argentina, weighs in:

"[It's] time to move on." He opened his portion of the show talking, unprompted, about the Jackson coverage. "You can't get away from it. ... I've had enough of it.

"It's time to pay our respects and move on."

Are we alone in not being bothered, really at all, by the Jackson coverage, which has already tapered off, and which will be much more muted after the funeral, at least until the toxicology report comes back? We are liberal media elites, though, and so our sympathies, as always, lie with perverts.

(This is not even counting the various hundreds of dumb conservative bloggers who took Jackson's death to be some sort of MSM/Obama plot against them, or something. And here we thought it helped Mark Sanford!)

Mickey Kaus offered 14 theories for Palin's resignation, many of which are now kinda redundant and a bit stale. They can be whittled down to six.

Crime! This is the "theory" that Sarah Palin will sue us for mentioning, so we'll just say that there is no evidence at all that she embezzled anything, from anyone. Or, at least, there is no evidence that she is under federal investigation for embezzlement. So maybe not this one! But...

Some other terrible political thing Like maybe some new and more exciting ethics issue is coming down the pipeline? Maybe something is rotten with the Alaska state finances? But why would one more small-potatoes scandal end her heroic governing adventure?

Sex! Maybe Todd let Greta Van Susteren "handle" him, at the WHCD? Maybe Bristol got knocked up by A-Rod? Maybe Sarah slept with Greta Van Susteren? There are, as far as we know, no new rumors along these lines. Just idle fantasies.

Money Now we enter the realm of "likely but boring." Sarah Palin can make a lot more money writing books and giving speeches and maybe even hosting a TV show of some kind (can you imagine?) as a private citizen than she can as the Governor of Alaska. She did mention legal bills in her rambly speech, though the woman raises a million bucks from crazies every time she stutters, so how bad could things be?

She Just Hates Governing Yeah, has she ever demonstrated any aptitude for the actual business of governing? We realize that's a lot to ask of any leading light of the Republican party these days, but still. Alaska's running out of money, the legislature hates her, and none of that shit is as much fun as appearing on TV to complain about how everyone on TV is unfair to you all the time.

She Is Crazy Maybe the incoherent reasons she gave for quitting—to win the game, for the team—represent her actual thought process? Maybe she decided not to run for reelection, in order to position herself for 2012, and then she was like "you know what, if not running for reelection is how I get ready to be President, quitting altogether right now will have to make me even more ready."

Special bonus non-reason:

She Is Quitting Politics to Focus On Being a Private Citizen and Raising Her Children in Peace Yeah this one is the K-Lo fantasy, in which she's not a relentless ambitious career pol who uses her kids as props when that's convenient and decries their exploitation when anyone else mentions them.

Frankly? It is a pretty non-shocking example of the GOP's ability to find humor in the craziest and most racist of places. But here is the magical tale of Audra Shay, Young Republican leader:

Shay posted something dumb about health care, on her Facebook, and one of her friends responded, as anyone would, with an angry string of slurs.

Two minutes later, Piker posted again saying "Obama Bin Lauden [sic] is the new terrorist… Muslim is on there side [sic]… need to take this country back from all of these mad coons… and illegals."

Eight minutes after that, at 2:02, Shay weighed in on Piker's comments: "You tell em Eric! lol."

Yes. You tell em, Eric! Tell em something insane! And, hah, it got better! Shay only de-friended the people who complained.

Cassie Wallender, a national committeewoman from the Washington Young Republican Federation, then wrote: "Someone please help a naïve Seattle girl out, is Eric's comment a racist slur?" She answered her own question one minute later: "Okay, why is this okay? I just looked it up. ‘It comes from a term baracoons (a cage) where they used to place Africans who were waiting to be sent to America to be slaves.' THIS IS NOT OKAY AND IT'S NOT FUNNY."

This was followed soon after by the chairman of the D.C. Young Republicans, Sean L. Conner, who wrote "I'm really saddened that you would support this type of racial language. ..wow! Thanks Cassie for standing up…"

Shay was silent on this exchange, but soon word started spreading throughout the Young Republican circuit, open to GOP members under 40. Significantly, Shay then "de-friended" Wallender and Conner-in the world of Facebook, that means cutting off relations-after calling her out, but kept Piker as a "friend" (subsequently, it appears their profiles are no longer linked).

The election for chairman of the Young Republicans is next Saturday, guys. Let's see how many embarrassing and permanently archived examples of electronic racism the candidates can rack up in the coming days.

Because it looks like it could be funny? Look, we're not fans of Cody's snappy, reference-laden "writing" any more now than we were when Juno came out or United States of Tara (a show that got better only after Cody stopped writing episodes) debuted. But couldn't that jerky dialogue and look-Ma-no-hands kind of sardonic bravado acquit itself nicely in a silly/scary horror comedy? The Girl Gets Revenge trope worked fairly well in Teeth, and we all remember the nerdy Blockbuster clerk's wet dream that was Scream. Smoosh those two things together and you just might get Jennifer's Body. Something so head-poundingly annoying it's oddly entertaining. Y'know?

[via ShockTilYouDrop]

New York Magazine explores this perplexing issue at length in a story this week. Theory #1: People hate her because she's a woman.

Ruth's problem seems to be a particularly female one. "It's the gender politics of the culture," says Gloria Steinem. "It's easier to blame the person with less power." And, she adds, why aren't people blaming her sons? "They would be much more likely to be in cahoots, because they were in the same professional field. And the answer is, they're men, that's why."

Theory #2: She's just a dumb lady.

According to a friend from high school, it would not have been difficult to keep Ruth in the dark. "I don't know if you fully understand the difference between you and us," says the woman in her late sixties. "When we were young, and the man came home for dinner, he was the king of the house and we catered to him … We were the type of people who, if your husband came home and said, ‘Sign this,' you wouldn't ask why. If he asked you to sign it, you would sign it."

Theory #3: Oh maybe it's this .

"He conferred with her on everything. The idea that she didn't know anything is laughable," says the longtime Madoff employee.

Such a complicated issue, the whims of the public opinion! Really, where are these alleged people who have mixed feelings about, or even feel sympathy for, Ruth Madoff? We must smoke out this rare creature. With a poll. Vote below, and the truth will be revealed. [NYM. Pic: AP]

They were building new condos all over the 'Burg when the recession hit. Now construction has ground to a halt, as people slowly come to their senses, emerging from a boom-time daze and muttering to themselves, "Jesus, was I really about to pay $700K for a one bedroom condo one block from the BQE?" Boom, instant urban decay:

Williamsburg is ground zero in the growing scourge of stalled construction that has left the neighborhood littered with 18 vacant lots and rusting steel building frames — more than in all of The Bronx

More than in all of the Bronx. It doesn't get any more hood-like than that! This is a total free cool pass for every 21 year-old who moves to Williamsburg in the next year. "Dude," you'll tell jealous newbies as you sit in a gelato shop with them five years from now, "when I got here this place was a fucking hellhole." They'll think you mean 1992! This sort of street cred is a priceless gift.
[NYP]

The pair supposedly came together after JFK's assassination, first as a means to express their grief, then as a means to express their passion. Camelot insiders, including Bobby's wife Ethel, knew the affair was going on, but everyone knew that it would never go anywhere—because it was the 1960s, because they were Catholic and divorce was what it was, because Bobby couldn't risk a marital scandal if he hoped to take office someday. So the pair continued in secrecy until Bobby's assassination in 1968.

Some factoids from the book, which includes witness accounts from Jack Newfield, Gore Vidal, and Truman Capote:

Six months after JFK's death, during a May 1964 dinner cruise on the presidential yacht the USS Sequoia, Bobby and Jackie "exchanged poignant glances" before disappearing below deck, leaving Ethel upstairs. "When they returned, they looked as chummy and relaxed as a pair of Cheshire cats,"

At the Kennedys' Palm Beach estate during Christmas 1964, socialite Mary Harrington saw Jackie sunbathing topless, with Bobby kneeling at her side. "As they began to kiss, he placed one hand on her breast and the other inside of her bikini bottom," Harrington recalled.

According to Gore Vidal, "The one person Jackie ever loved . . . was Robert Kennedy."

Shipping tycoon Aristotle Onassis — RFK's rival for Jackie's attention — once threatened to "bring down" Bobby by going public with details of the affair. "I could bury that sucker," Onassis said, "although I'd lose Jackie in the process."

On June 4, minutes after winning the California primary, Bobby was fatally shot by Sirhan Sirhan at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles.

Jackie flew to his bedside — and Ethel allowed her time alone with the dying RFK, according to the book.

Bobby was brain-dead, but a distraught Ethel refused to pull the plug, and brother Ted Kennedy was in no shape to make the call, Heymann writes.

At 1:20 a.m. June 6, 1968, Jackie Kennedy ordered the respirator shut down and signed the consent form, the book reveals.

So, yeah, there you have it. The only sad, melancholy thing to ever happen to the moneyed, mossy Kennedy clan.

Image via Getty

Diplomat Sir John Sawers is supposed to be taking over the Secret Intelligent Service (better known as Her Majesty's Secret Service) in October. What kind of information did Lady Shelley Sawers, his wife, let loose on in her Facebook profile?

For starters: their friends! 'Cause it's Facebook, right? Photos show relationships with other diplomats, British actors (don't worry, nobody cool), and family. Family like Lady Sawers' half-brother Hugo Haig-Thomas, a former British diplomat that John Sawers succeeded on his way to the top. Haig-Thomas is "an associate and researcher" of a historian.

Not just any historian, though: Holocaust Denier David Irving. Winner! From Irving's extensive Wikipedia page:

By the mid-1980s, Irving associated himself with the Holocaust-denying Institute for Historical Review, began giving lectures to groups such as the far-right German Deutsche Volksunion, and publicly denied that the Nazis systematically exterminated Jews in gas chambers during World War II.[103] Irving was a frequent speaker for the DVU in the 1980s and the early 1990s, but the relationship ended in 1993 apparently because of concerns by the DVU that Irving's espousal of Holocaust Denial might lead to the DVU being banned.[95] He also alleged that parts of The Diary of Anne Frank might have been forged by her surviving father.

Awesome. Haig-Thomas has noted that he "doesn't necessarily share (Irving's) views," but he sure as hell doesn't condemn them.

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.What else is interesting? Well, the family likes Liza Minelli, as there's a picture of his wife and daughter re-enacting Caberet. But that's not nearly as interesting as, say, his codename, which was going to be "C" once he started working for MI-6. Read one awesome wall posting: "Congrats on the new job, already dubbed Sir Uncle "C" by nephews in the know!"

Theater Geeks, you'll appreciate this tidbit on their daughter, of whom there were also several pictures of on Sawers' Facebook profile:

Corinne, 22, a recent Oxford University graduate who is now an aspiring actress...recently began touring with Jenny Seagrove in the play Pack Of Lies, coincidentally about a middle-class household suddenly at the centre of an espionage drama when an MI5 spy turns up at their house.

Finally, location, location, location:

Despite the security implications, Lady Sawers revealed on Facebook the location of the London flat used by the couple and the whereabouts of their three children and of Sir John's parents.

Wow. The problem here, if you didn't notice, was that this guy's supposed to lead up one of the world's two most powerful secret service organizations. And serious secrets - like where the guy lives, who his friends are, who his family is, and what his wife's favorite Liza Minelli musical is - have been exposed (along with his Speedos, which terrorists and enemies of the British State everywhere will, at the very least, get a laugh out of). But politicians on both sides of the aisle in England don't think it's too cute: both liberals and conservatives are calling for his employment with MI-6 to be in question, which is funny, 'cause don't you think they'd just fire him? Eh, the Foreign Secretary doesn't think so:

Foreign Secretary David Miliband today dismissed allegations of recklessness. He told BBC1's Andrew Marr Show: 'It is not a state secret that he wears Speedo swimming trunks.' He added: ‘He was appointed 10 days ago to be the head of MI6; he's an outstanding professional who will do a really good job in an outstanding organisation that does a huge amount for this country'

At least we get to blame the outing of Valarie Plame on dumbasses like Robert Novak, who can't keep a good Beltway secret to themselves when they hear it. This is just piss-poor form. Also, if Chuck Barris can keep it a secret for twenty years and you can't, you've got problems. The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.

MI6 chief blows his cover as wife's Facebook account reveals family holidays, showbiz friends and links to David Irving [Daily Mail]

Someone decided to document said phenomenon on Craigslist for us! The poster in question is clearly a well-to-do Brooklyn philanthropy oriented type. She offers to help the man get his penis back in his pants, with her friends! And maybe a photograph of him on the internet might help it stay there, no? Here's the post:

After only one stop I looked up from a rousing game on my phone to see that you appeared to be in great pain because your face was contorted. Upon second glance I noticed the problem..Your penis was trying to escape from your pants!

Clearly it had found its' way through your zipper (I can only imagine the pain that caused) and wiggled away from your grasp. In fact, it was already making a break for it! I saw it hiding behind your man-purse where no one could see but me. You struggled to grip it in your hand very tightly in what must have been a valiant effort to contain the beast, every time you pulled it back a little it would escape further and with more force. I admire you, it's not easy - I'm a woman and I know those things can be hard to handle. Still, I was shocked. The penises I've come in contact with were always much more domesticated and happy with their owners - is yours unhappy with you?

Maybe you were pleading with me for help, because you were staring at me quite intently. I met your eyes and while I wanted to speak - to cry out and tell everyone of the trouble you were having - I had no words. However, a picture is worth a thousand words and so I thought I would snap one on my phone so I could warn the world of your unruly penis.

Your penis must be camera shy because once it realized a picture had been taken it receded to the safety of your slacks once again and you quickly ran off the train at Atlantic Street/Pacific Ave- no doubt to go discipline it - or maybe to go to a hospital and have it drugged. I don't really know.

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.

While the Craigslist poster nor the man in the picture have been identified, we'd like both to come forward if they wish, certainly one more than the other. Craigslist poster: you're a wonderful, fun writer! And it was so kind of you to charitably offer to help that nice man on the subway.

Other person: you're a fucking dirtbag, and I can assure you that if I or my friends see you on the subway, your penis will be kicked very hard to ensure that it stays where it belongs, or at the very least, someone's gonna call an MTA cop. Also, girls don't give a fuck about your peen; it's old and disgusting and you're certainly not going to help its cause by doing this. But you'll give us great material! So: carry on, I guess!

You dropped your penis, I snapped a picture [Craigslist]

An apocalyptic, borderline Mad Max sculpture by two guys who go by AIDS-3D. The center of the sculpture was a tower with the words OMG inscribed on it in lights. It originated as a GIF image file, at one point, they say. Interview with them here.

Someone sleeping in a bed, in the middle of the museum. Chu Yun, the artist, "supplied" his subjects with sleeping pills and the bed. The sleepers were being paid $10 an hour to sleep in the museum. Yun's previous work has included putting a woman with down's syndrome in a chair, in a gallery.The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.

Artist Guthrie Lonergan's Myspace Intro Playlist, in which the artist remixed a bunch of MySpace intro videos. It is not intended to be funny, according to the arist.

This video of rival street gangs in Belgrade fighting, scored to a trance techno track.

Three very large banners, one of which advised me: "DON'T PAY TAXES."

A installation with videos by artist Ryan Trecartin. The room had discarded Lay-Z-Boys and part of an airliner's interior on the side of it. I also remember seeing a shelf with sand on it, and a BlackBerry in the sand. Here is a Ryan Trecartin video. I'm simply incapable of describing its contents: The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.

The remnants of an art project that took place on the first floor of the museum. There was a bunch of cardboard paper, unfolded boxes, and various other "construction" scraps lying on the floor. There was a small TV in the corner depicting in fast-forward the artist and her friends, building a replica of Rome in 24 hours, and then destroying it. From New York's art critic Jerry Saltz's review of the show:

The first night, I watched kids fashion the altars and temples of Rome's archaic period; by the next morning, when I returned, they'd been destroyed ("by fires," said the artist), and I spied the beginnings of Classical Rome. Just before the opening, the whole city was again wrecked and left in ruins, as the Dark Ages began. Glynn is saying she's not going to listen to the bromides that assert that change takes time.

An 8-bit videogame called FlyWrench by artist Mark Essen. You use an original Nintendo controller to control a line going through different colored shapes: The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.

The laid out contents of three people, from whom Chinese artist Liu Chuang offered to buy everything off of their person for display in a museum. One included a cell phone, some pictures of themselves, and of course, all of their clothing.

A rotating spiral staircase on a platform, entitled: Nothing Is True, Everything Is Permitted, Stairway Edit.

Photographs of adults acting out Second Life and video game scenarios.

One of the gallery attendants, wearing a white 80s tracksuit with bloodstains on it. There was a card for it; this was part of this exhibition.

The last thing I saw before leaving was a banana peel on the floor. I couldn't tell if it was part of the show or not, and I didn't bother to check.

Okay, so, some comment, and some context (I lied! Getting you past the jump: it's an art.):

I'm by no means an educated art consumer or art critic, which is why it's probably safer to read Jerry Saltz's assessment of this thing for an actual, critical appreciation. The video game was fun. The message advising me not to pay taxes was nice. But: a woman was sleeping in a bed, in a museum. I'm often advised by people who know more about art than me that much of the point of this is to ask: is it art? Don't get me wrong: as you can tell by the publication you're reading this on, I'm all about the subversive (or painfully obvious) art of fucking with someone's sensibilities. But how does one get into the position to be able to put someone sleeping in a museum and call themselves an artist? Do you have to be embedded in the art scene? Well-established? Anyway. Maybe this makes me a conservative yokel without any kind of appreciation for the more intelligent "pleasures" of life. Or maybe it just makes me someone who went to a museum and "didn't get it." On that note, however, here are some ideas for the next time the New Museum goes at something like this. I submit them in sincere pursuit of the advancement of art and human civilization's ability to express itself:

• Me, sitting in a papasan, smoking a bong, eating sandwiches of various origin.
  
  
• A bounce-house full of puppies, while House of Pain's "Jump Around" is blasted on repeat in the bounce house. This will be at a frequency the dogs can't hear.
  
  
• A full-scale replica of Waffle House installed on the roof of The New Museum, with a staff imported from a Waffle House currently in operation somewhere in the Southeastern United States. The only thing you can't order will be bacon.
  
  
• A four year-old melting plastic toy soldiers with a blowtorch.
  
  
• A New York City MTA official punching himself in the face every hour, on the hour. He will have a stack of unlimited Metrocards in his pocket that you don't know are there.
  
  
• A drawing of me drawing a drawing, drawn by something that is not ordinarily asked to draw. There will be a new one each day. We will start with a parakeet and move forward as such.
  
  
• A coffee stain.
  
  
• This painting of pancakes on Nick Denton's head.
  
  
• A performance-art version of Gawker where I go around screaming at people on the Bowery and handing out gold stars to the ones who scream back something interesting. Any of the ones trying to correct my grammar get summarily executed or "banned."
  
  
• A Starbucks gift card with exactly one cent less on it than is required to buy a small cup of coffee.
  
  
• A pillow filled with marmite, accompanying a down comforter filled with nutella, and a mattress filled with english muffins.
  
  
• A giraffe named Mercedes.
  
  
• A puppet show performed exclusively by people who hate puppets.

That is all. Oh, and this:

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.

The Generational: Younger Than Jesus [New Museum]
‘Jesus' Saves - God bless the New Museum's tantalizing triennial. [New York]

Details on what caused the crash are sparse, but it appears to eerily mirror the DC subway collision. Video of the crashed monorail is here; there's nothing too graphic about it other than the Disney employee doing his best to get any and all cameras out of sight. Whether that was due to Disney's well-known penchant for secrecy or for the dignity of the employee, who knows. As someone who took great pleasure in riding the Monorail at one point in his life, though, I can definitively report one thing: this is as strangely sad as it is simply depressing. Also, bad things happen in threes, as we all learned last week. Avoid trains.

[CNN]

Update: the employee's name was Austin Wuennenberg. It appears he took great pride in his job:

According to Wuennenberg's Facebook page, he was a computer science major at Stetson University and was set to graduate in 2010. Wuennenberg, who graduated from Celebration High School in 2006, served as a teacher's aide from August 2007 to May 2008, the Facebook page said.

Wuennenberg listed his position as "Monorail Pilot," a role he had held since October 2008. He described his job as "running the highway in the sky!" The Facebook page also stated that Wuennenberg worked at Disney in "Sunset Attractions" from June 2006 to September 2008. His interests included video games, computers, programming and comedy.

He appears to be the first fatality from the Monorail at Walt Disney World since it first opened, though this isn't the first incident the Monorail's had.

Something else I learned about the Monorail today: Disney guests can join the pilots in the front cab - where Wuennenberg died in the crash's impact - and receive a special commemorative co-pilot's license (pictured here) for doing so.

The press conference was called suddenly and without warning, and the line leading up to the press conference was simply that she wasn't going to run for her office again.

First, the bizarre, kinda teary announcement: The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.

Even Politico got hosed, sending out a breaking email alert before the conference started about Palin not running for her next term as Alaska's governor. Palin then went ahead with the resignation and didn't let on anything about the presidential run. "I know when it's time to pass the ball. Some are going to question the timing of this. This decision has been in the works for a while," she noted.

Says Gawker's John Cook:

"They clearly deliberately leaked that she wasn't going to run for re-election an hour or two before the announcement in order to muddy the waters and get the "setting up for a presidential run" line out to blunt the obvious conclusion that a shoe is about to drop...."

So people are convinced: some shit went down, and someone's definitely got something. Any ideas? To the Twitteratti!

Gawker's Nightman to Gabriel Snyder's Dayman, The Cajun Boy, hears something pretty substantial:

Original Defamer editor and blogger Mark Lisanti is going with the Jimmy Hoffa school of thought:

Sarah Palin doesn't know she just resigned!

Jason Calicanis is trying to start a meme. Lisanti has yet another theory!

CNN's Rick Sanchez thinks she might be pregnant again! The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.

Mark Drapeau at True/Slant thinks she should be working on her personal brand, looking towards the future: "Get your voice out there - start writing for True/Slant or The Daily Beast, put up 5 minute videos with your raw opinions about news or issues on YouTube, and start experimenting more with things like Twitter, Seesmic, and 12 Seconds when you're mobile."

Yes, the Real World: Cancun had its first obligatory The Roommates Who Hate Each Other/The Roommates Who Fuck Each Other episode last night, and it just sort of farted into existence, all quiet and smelly, as if MTV was splayed out on the neighboring bed, our hotel room ruined, that cruel beach sun slanting in through the curtains, reminding us that day has arrived but our hangovers have not left. These kids are just sort of dull, the half-baked sorta people you'd see on a show like Fear Factor where personality doesn't matter. You just have to be trashy and scrappy and thoughtless. And these kids have that in spades!

So the two couples were:

Those That Hate
Swoony rockerbilly Joey likes to antagonize girls because he's a little pissant punk-wannabe with that kind of sitting-at-the-back-of-the-class bravado that's, oh you know, catnip to some of us. The girl he most likes to antagonize, because she is ridiculous, is Ayiiiiiia. They fight about basically everything. She walks around like she owns the place, he has mysterious herpes on his lip, he says mean sarcastic things to her, she yells about cigarettes, and then he spits in her taco. Yes m'am JoJo done up and spit in that girl's damn taco when they had been out there after the club tryin' to get theyselves some food. This was in retaliation for Ayiiiiiia running down the street and shrieking "Herpes on your lip! Herpes on your lip! You've got herpes on your lip!" It actually turned into a little song and I ran to the kitchen and grabbed a pot and a wooden spoon and paraded around the house banging them together, as if Ramona Quimby were a sad lonely 26-year-old in Brooklyn, sing-chanting "Herpes on your lip! Herpes on your lip! Everybody's got herpes on their lip!" It was a fun song, and a fun moment, until my roommate came up and spit in my taco. Well, I actually didn't have a taco and she didn't spit, but she did give me a withering look that seemed to say Only one more month..., but on the show Joey did, in fact, spit in the lady's taco. So that started a whole clusterkaduddle and everybody was yelling and Fuckface from UMass got involved and started getting upset.

So the girls were out on the balcony complaining about Joey and eating the tacos that had not been spit on. Those bitches really wanted some tacos. I mean, that's commitment. Inside the other roommates were just unsure what to do. Hilariously, the girl from Cadillac Stevens' Foodhut, Jonna, was sitting on a couch-bed eating rolls of ham of cheese. Like taking deli-sliced meats and deli-sliced cheeses and rolling them up into little cylinders and eating them. It was very funny because we've all been there, or at least I have. Points to you, Jonna. So everyone was confused and eating ham and cheese and Joey still wasn't done being in attack mode so he strode out onto the veranda playing a song called "Nobody Cares About Your Spit Taco" and the girls got so mad that they threw water at him and some of the water went into his guitar. His thousand-dollar guitar that is partly electric and now it's ruined. So Joey went to another balcony and cried and Derek the Gay tried valiantly to take advantage of him in his time of need (someday, Derek! believe in yourself!) and everyone was sad. Well, the girls didn't care. Ayiiiiia thought it was funny. Because Ayiiiiiia is annoying. I think I hear Joe Rogan calling, m'dear. Go be on that show.

Anyway, eventually the next day or whatever Joey apologized to Fuckface and she was all "Aw, I love everyone," and then later he took a walk with Ayiiiiiia and they brokered a tentative peace accord. Derek unzipped his fly and unleashed the doves from his pants and there they fluttered and flapped, into the silver-streaked azure sky, looking like souls should look, dancing. Then they decided it would be funny to pretend for the other roommates that they'd just gotten in another fight and she'd hit him so they ran back home and put on a show where Joey raged and Ayiiiiia threw things and all the other roommates were like "Ohhh, she's going home" and hilariously no one seemed to be unhappy about that but then oh ha ha, Ayiiiia and JoJo gave each other a hug and the roommates said "Aww, we're friends again!" and Derek unzipped his pants and instead of releasing more doves he just looked plaintively and expectantly at Joey, though he looked in vain. Everyone just sort of cleared their throats and said, OK, yeah, and slowly walked out of the room and Derek stood there alone, bare feet on the cold marble, a clock ticking off in some other room.

Those That Mate
Binky and Jonna are in love. Binky and Jonna are in love but there's nothing they can do about it because Jonna has a boyfriend back home in Sunstain, AZ and she's so loyal to him. She's so loyal to him that when she's grind dancing and spooning in a hammock and gratuitously hugging and talking about making out with Binky, all her thoughts are on her boyfriend. Every one of them. Every thought other than Man I want to fuck this roommate, every single other one, is about the boyfriend. Binky is upset because he broke up with his lady, and c'mon it's Can-fuckin'-cun, let's partay down. Invested in this whole lovers' duet more than more than the actual lovers is creepy Bronne. Creepy Bronne looooves to call Binky "the Heartthrob" and he's always smirking and leering while Binky and Jonna dance or flirt or dry hump in a vestibule, staring right at them, with intense bleary eyes. He's a creeper. At one point when Binks and Jinx were spooning in the hammock Bronne walked out wearing a wig and tapped out Jinkies and got next to Binky and Binks, thinking it was Jinx, pulled him in close and said "Mmmm..." You'd think that would be one of the stupid things I make up to entertain myself while writing these things, but it's not! It actually happened! Bronne walked out wearing a Jonna wig and spooned with Binky. He will murder someone. And he will murder them hard.

Anyway, at the clurrrb Binky tried to kiss Jonna on the mouth-hole and she was all "Nunh unh!" and later she called her boyfriend and said "Why would you think that I want to be with anyone else?" while her foot massaged Binky's crotch and she sat there naked drawing an arrow on her tummy that pointed down to her unmentionables.

So, they're totally gonna do it.

All Those Other Things That They've Done
Oh, and, they got their jobs! Yeah yeah yeah! They'll be working for Student City, an underground luxury travel agency for sex tourists and date rapists. They met their boss, the dimwitted Christina, and she told them the rules. And the Rules, my friends? The Rules are pretty goddamned strict. The Rules are:

- No drinking in front of clients.
- No sexing the clients.
- No smoking near clients.
- If you murder a client, make sure you dispose of the body in a manner befitting Student City's new Go Greeen! initiative.
- If a client murders someone, give them the $700 cash you have in your emergency pouch and point them towards El Salvador.
- Fridays are casual.

Now the whole murdering thing ey'body was aight with, but not that DRINKING RULE. Holy fuck, if I want to go out in Cancun and get shitfaced, that is my right as an American abroad on a television station's dime. That is my RIGHT. Ayiiiiia was especially adamant about this and it was truly beautiful to watch. It was like watching Harvey Milk come speechmaking out of his mother's womb. Like seeing Malcom X first clench his fist. Like stumbling by accident on Susan B. Anthony in the bathroom and her swatting her hand at you or at the door you can't quite tell and yelling "Hey, get outta here!" It was truly something. She brought a little soapbox with her to the Student City interview process, where the kids had to talk to Christina about what they wanted to do for the sex tourists and semi-professional Roofie-appliers. Christina just shook her melony head and said "Sorry, babe, no can do. We can't have anything reflect badly on the company." Which was... wait, what? On the company that organizes low-rent trips for horrid sunburned assholes from Ohio to get drunk and sloppily fuck and do horrible things they'll forever regret? That company? What, exactly, could possibly reflect badly on that company? Accidentally decapitating an old Real World cast member while just trying to get them to shut the hell up? Oh Paula, we hardly knew ye.

So that's gonna cause a problem and everyone will get drunk and several will die. At one point during the Christina Interviews, Fuckface said "I'm a leader." Fuckface works at Hooters. If that doesn't spell leadership, I don't know what does.

I don't know how to end this. So, here:

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.

HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY, MEXICO.

In the end, Schmidt, architect of the McCain campaign's wildly shifting meta-narratives and stunts, was smart enough to realize that his hail-mary VP stunt had backfired, terribly. And so his relationship with Palin, a paranoid narcissist, suffered. CBS's Scott Conroy and Shushannah Walshe are writing a book about Palin, and they are releasing some of its wonderful anecdotes to us, the public, in advance.

So. Remember when it was revealed that Todd Palin was a member of the secessionist Alaska Independence Party? The publication of that actual fact annoyed Sarah Palin greatly!

Palin blasted out an e-mail with the subject line "Todd" to Schmidt, campaign manager Rick Davis and senior advisor Nicolle Wallace, copying her husband on the message (all of the e-mails are reprinted below as written).

"Pls get in front of that ridiculous issue that's cropped up all day today - two reporters, a protestor's sign, and many shout-outs all claiming Todd's involvement in an anti-American political party," Palin wrote. "It's bull, and I don't want to have to keep reacting to it ... Pls have statement given on this so it's put to bed."

Her reference to a single protestor's sign and "many shout-outs" was indicative of Palin's occasional tendency to take anecdotal evidence of a minor problem and extrapolate it into something far more menacing.
[...]
Schmidt hit "reply to all" less than five minutes after Palin's e-mail was sent. "Ignore it," he wrote. "He was a member of the aip? My understanding is yes. That is part of their platform. Do not engage the protestors. If a reporter asks say it is ridiculous. Todd loves america."

That simple and smart response did not work for Sarah, who responded by "adding five more names to the 'cc' box, all of whom traveled on her campaign plane."

"That's not part of their platform and he was only a 'member' bc independent alaskans too often check that 'Alaska Independent' box on voter registrations thinking it just means non partisan," Palin wrote. "He caught his error when changing our address and checked the right box. I still want it fixed."

Haha that is just a straight-up complete fucking lie. This woman! She is pathological! She is not even responding to a question from a reporter, she is straight-up lying to her own campaign strategist, in a really obvious and stupid way. This is not the way normal people behave. This is the way bad children behave when they are caught being bad.

So Schmidt replied-all, again:

"Secession," he wrote. "It is their entire reason for existence. A cursory examination of the website shows that the party exists for the purpose of seceding from the union. That is the stated goal on the front page of the web site. Our records indicate that todd was a member for seven years. If this is incorrect then we need to understand the discrepancy. The statement you are suggesting be released would be innaccurate. The innaccuracy would bring greater media attention to this matter and be a distraction. According to your staff there have been no media inquiries into this and you received no questions about it during your interviews. If you are asked about it you should smile and say many alaskans who love their country join the party because it speeks to a tradition of political independence. Todd loves his country

We will not put out a statement and inflame this and create a situation where john has to adress this."

So yeah, one can see how working with Sarah Palin might be difficult. Neither that nor the admirable straighforwardness of these emails absolves Schmidt of his responsibility for the campaign's miserable failure, though.

Now that they're the proud parents of three chillens, it might be time for the actor couple to bust out of their simply tiny West Village townhouse and into more respectable mansiony digs. Perfect then that artsy power couple Jennifer Connelly and Paul Bettany sold their Prospect Park West manse last year. A company called Harken Pretty purchased the home for $8.45 million last December, and the Post thinks that simply must have something to do with SJP's production company Pretty Matches. It just must! Whoever bought the palace is gutting it completely. After all the work you put into, Jennifer...

Parker has shown an interest in Park Slope creatively recently, snapping up the rights to Amy Sohn's decadent take on the Park Slope mommy-cult Prospect Park West. It could become a TV series! Because everyone loved Lipstick Jungle so much they'll like it even better when it's about moms! In Brooklyn!

Oh man, get us outta here.

Pic via Curbed

"[There is] no indication that she was [manhandled]," [New York Police Commissioner Ray Kelly!!] said of Brooklyn blogger Chrissie Brodigan.

So now The Fuzz thinks they can intimidate citizens, pug dog owners, pukers, and bloggers alike by trotting out the "big guns" to try to shut down our protests? So Ray Kelly thinks this is "an appropriate issue for the Civilian Complaint Review Board to handle," eh?

Well that's actually pretty reasonable.

But dog-in-a-bag L train riders and their supporters will not be muzzled! Ray Kelly, we demand that you—and, hell, Mayor Bloomberg too, at this point—clear your schedules immediately to answer the following interrogatories:

FIRST: Why would you want anything bad to happen to a poor sick pug dog?

SECOND: Do you think pug dogs are cute, or just weird looking?

AND FINALLY: Have you ever gotten sick on a train? If so, explain in humorous detail.

Justice for L train dog puke victims—now and forever!
[NYP]

First, let's briefly recap what we and others have reported so far: The film was set to begin shooting last week. Five days before the start of shooting, director Steven Soderbergh turned in a rewrite of the original script, which was written by Steven Zaillian, that Sony executives, led by co-Chairman Amy Pascal, did not like. The studio felt that Soderbergh, who was insistent that every event in the film had to have taken place in real life, was taking the film in an "artsy" direction that they weren't willing to gamble $58-million dollars on, so they killed it. That's the short version of events according to Amy Pascal anyway.

Since then a few more details about the project emerged. Movieline and Deadspin provided some new information in reports of their own, and today the New York Times has an article that sheds some light on Soderbergh's zeal for authenticity.

One reason was to win the approval of Major League Baseball, which was not happy with some factual liberties in Mr. Zaillian's version. Such approval is crucial in a baseball film that intends to use protected trademarks.

"Typically, on a film like this, we look at it for historical accuracy," said Matthew Bourne, a vice president of Major League Baseball for public relations. "We've been in touch with Soderbergh and Sony, and they've been receptive to our requests."

What baseball saw as accurate, Sony executives saw as being too much a documentary.

All of this brings us to the information provided to us by a tipster who'd been working on the project and has a decidedly different point of view than that of Amy Pascal and Sony.

First and foremost, Soderbergh had been upfront with the direction in which he intended to take the film from the very beginning of his employment. In fact, it was clear to all of us - whether in the Art Department or the Costumes Department, etc. – that Soderbergh intended to use real people to play themselves in the creation of the true story of Moneyball. Additionally, for months Soderbergh had been shooting interviews with real ball players and people from Billy Beane's past, and the studio approved these shoots. How could the studio then at the eleventh hour claim that his approach was a surprise to them? He intended to tell the true story rather than a fictitious version of the story. How innovative.

What exactly is wrong with making a movie accurate? And since when does an authentic film translate as an "art" film? I know numerous people that thought that Soderbergh's approach sounded insightful and interesting and true to the game and what really happened. If baseball lovers and non-baseball lovers alike in my large social network felt this way (not to mention the hundreds of bloggers that were fans of the concept), why couldn't this approach have universal appeal?

Regarding the notion that Sony executives were shocked to discover the direction Soderbergh planned on taking the film:

Soderbergh's script dated June 17, 2009 was not the first script that he handed in to Sony. On June 7th, Soderbergh submitted a draft to the studio with the following note on the first page:

"NOTE: Scenes involving Billy Beane's minor and major league career have been removed from this draft. They will be determined by filmed interviews with scouts, coaches, managers, players and family members who were with him at the time."

Sony executives read this draft. And Sony executives gave Soderbergh their notes. Clearly Amy Pascal did not read this draft – if she had, maybe the drama that began with the June 17th draft could have been avoided.

Another fact: Soderbergh handed in yet another draft dated June 10, 2009 with this note on the first page:

"NOTE: Billy Beane's minor and major league career will be shown via filmed interviews with scouts, coaches, managers, players and family members who were with him at the time. These interviews will comprise approximately ten percent of the film.

"Another ten percent of the film will consist of re-enactments of real events as remembered by the people playing themselves. The purpose of these scenes will be to provide set-up and perspective for subjects, situations, or relationships which currently appear in the screenplay without the requisite/normal amount of context."

Now why in the world was Amy Pascal so shocked (or, rather, "apoplectic" as it was relayed to the production team) when she read the June 17th draft? Could Soderbergh have made his intentions any more clear? Even if these executives did not read beyond PAGE 1, they would have known the direction in which he wanted to take the film – and they should have perhaps reported that to their boss. And maybe, just maybe, if there had been communication with their boss, maybe, just maybe, another avenue could have been taken rather than pulling the plug three days before the film was supposed to start shooting. For instance, maybe they could have delayed principal photography while script/concept issues were resolved.

Our tipster closed with this note:

On the day that Amy Pascal pulled the plug, there were 230 people that were working on Moneyball. Now those 230 people are all out of jobs.

When Soderbergh had to address a stage filled with crew members who were about to lose their jobs, he told us that just as Moneyball was the unorthodox version of building baseball teams, Moneyball the movie was the unorthodox way of making a film. Unfortunately, Amy Pascal does not believe in Moneyball as a concept; otherwise the film would be in its second week of shooting right now.

So there you have it—Another side of the story. All of this is obviously meaningless in the grand scheme of life, not to mention very "inside baseball" (pun intended), but it's so damn fun to talk about. We anxiously await the next bit of backbiting to emerge between the Sony and Soderbergh camps.

Why Did Sony Kill the Pitt/Soderbergh Film Adaptation of Michael Lewis' Moneyball [Previously]
MLB Approval Still Murky as Moneyball Circles the Drain [Movieline]
Money Worries Kill A-List Film at Last Minute [New York Times]
Soderbergh's Moneyball Script Too Real to Get Made [Deadspin]
pic via Vulture