[Stereohell via Copyranter at Animal]

Dear Colleagues:

With less than a month until the close of 2008, our entire organization continues to do everything possible to anticipate and adapt to the unprecedented changes affecting all our businesses. We know it hasn't been easy and we couldn't be more proud or more appreciative of how you have risen to the challenge.

Even in these tough economic times, Viacom has a strong hand to play. We have a broad stable of outstanding brands, diverse revenue streams and an impressive global footprint, backed up by exceptional financial strength. Added to that we have talented employees, extremely able leaders and a creative ingenuity that runs deep.

Unfortunately, our advantages and best efforts can't completely protect Viacom from the very serious and broad-based challenges of this economic recession. Viacom's long-term health will depend on our shared commitment to adapt, to innovate and to make difficult choices. To compete and thrive, we need to create an organization and a cost structure that are in step with the evolving economic environment.

Today, we are announcing a company-wide restructuring plan that includes staffing reductions in all divisions. This will result in a reduction of our worldwide workforce of approximately 7 percent, or about 850 positions. We are also suspending salary increases for the Company's senior level management in 2009. In addition, after a comprehensive review of our operations, we will write down certain programming and other assets. These three actions will bring us significant cost savings and other efficiencies.

Top managers at every part of the company worked thoughtfully, carefully and compassionately to create a leaner, more focused organization. It was not an easy task, but it was an essential step that will keep Viacom at the competitive forefront today and tomorrow. Department heads and supervisors will provide you with more information about the changes that will be taking place in your division.

Saying goodbye to friends and colleagues is always difficult, particularly when we have shared so much. Those of you who will be leaving should be proud of your contributions, which we will always respect and appreciate. We thank you and we wish you the best.

The true measure of an organization is how it deals with change and overcomes challenges. We know that you are up to the task and that together we will push through the difficulties ahead and go on to even greater achievements.

We truly appreciate your continued commitment and hard work and we thank you for everything you do each day.

Sincerely,

Philippe and Tom

From MTV's Judy McGrath to employees:

I'm sure you've read Philippe and Tom's note, and I want to talk to
you about what it means for MTV Networks – today and in the context of
our overall mission and strategy going forward.

We all know there's a fundamental restructuring of our entire economy
going on, and it extends beyond our borders. This is not just about
MTVN, Viacom or even sister media companies – it's happening in every
industry, all over the world. This doesn't make it easier to say
goodbye to people we love and respect, but it is the hard truth. In
these tough times, we are responsible for sustaining and reinventing
our company as thoughtfully as we can. The changes we're making today
are necessary, difficult, and the responsible way for us to move
forward.

Here in the U.S., we're consolidating some groups, centralizing
functions and outsourcing others, and aligning our resources across
brands and platforms. Specific details of the changes and how they
affect you and your group will be communicated by your department
heads today. Our International organization continues to implement a
new approach to structure and operations, which has been underway
throughout the year. Further moves will be outlined by the leadership
of each MTVNI region.

Change like this is so tough, to say the least. But we must accept
that we operate today in a state of constant evolution, constant
change.

We believe the next chapter for each of us will be all about new
possibilities, creativity and invention. This is where our
opportunity lies. We can use this moment of global transformation to
reassert our capacity to innovate, to inspire through creative and
business excellence, to connect with our audience as powerfully as
ever. We will be a leaner organization, but we will always be
champions of new ideas, champions of all of our customers and brands,
and leaders in new ways of doing business.

Everyone here contributes to MTVN and Viacom every single day and
night without exception. We hate to see dedicated friends and
co-workers leave us, and we say goodbye with care, gratitude, support
and respect.

Thank you all for your continued commitment to MTV Networks.

— Judy

From Paramount's Brad Grey [via Variety]:

Dear Colleagues:
By now, you all have seen the email from Philippe Dauman and Tom Dooley regarding Viacom's cost-saving initiatives, which are designed to better position the Company in this difficult economic climate. Like all other divisions of the Company, Paramount too is adapting to the changing conditions and, as a result, we will reduce our global workforce.

These reductions are across the studio: accounting, business/legal affairs, corporate and government affairs, home entertainment, human resources, information technology, production, studio lot operations and Vantage. The vast majority of affected employees will be notified today in the United States and in the coming days internationally. We wish them the best, and thank them for their many contributions to Paramount.

Without question, the changes we implement today required us to make difficult choices. We take these steps after a careful analysis of our overall business and as part of a broader strategy to overcome the challenges of this unusual time in the market and to chart a successful course for the future.

As we look ahead, we are encouraged by the strength of our slate, the quality of our creative partners, the innovation we see on the lot every day and the projects we have in development. These assets, coupled with your talent and hard work, I believe will enable us to remain strong over the long term.

• "Ros-Lehtinen received a call on her cell from a Chicago based phone number and an aide informed her that President-Elect Obama wished to speak to her.
• "A gentleman sounding like Obama introduced himself when Ros-Lehtinen cut him off and said that 'I’m sorry but I think this is a joke from one of the South Florida radio stations known for these pranks'
• "and hung up.
• "Cong. and Chief of Staff designate Rahm Emmanuel (sic) called Ileana and stated 'Ileana, I cannot believe that you hung up on the President-Elect.' Ros-Lehtinen told Rahm that she didn’t believe the call was legitimate
• "and hung up on Emmanuel (sic).
• "A staffer to the Congresswoman informed her that Chairman Howard Berman of the Foreign Affairs Committee needed to speak with her urgently. When Chairman Berman called, Ros-Lehtinen urged him to recount a story only both of them would know [emphasis added], which he did, and told her that she had indeed hung up on the President-Elect."

Then Obama called this insane lady again, telling her "it is very funny that you have twice hung up on me," by which he meant, "please tell me what you would like to see happen in Cuba, so that I know how not to conduct diplomacy there, because you sure suck at that kind of thing."

Being idiotic is basically incurable, and was Palin's real problem to begin with, not the red herring crank call thing.

The rumor itself is actually at least 18 months old — we first heard it last year after a reporter at a major business magazine got the News Corp. nuclear treatment when he rang up the flacks to ask whether they had made out at a party — largely spurred by Deng being named the "chief of strategy" at MySpace China last summer, putting her in close (business) contact with DeWolfe. And then there were reports that DeWolfe was using his friendship with Deng in his negotiations for a new compensation package with News Corp.

The first time in the most recent spate of tips was in the form of an an email from someone using the Dark Knight pseudonym "Harvey Dent" and was pre-written in gossip-columnese ("What media mogul billionaire’s wife has been guilty of so many sexual escapades that she is the talk of LA?"), but it also made some amateurish mistakes, such as referring to "Wendy Deng." The second tipster came from inside a media organization that's locked horns with News Corp. plenty of times in the past. The third was the most aggressive. Their first account was that they had heard that someone with a grudge against Murdoch had hired a private investigator who had discovered that Deng was involved with "Chris DeWitt." Asked why someone was digging dirt on Rupert, they said it was "more of a personal interest."

None of the new tipsters have offered any new evidence to made us think it's true. Like the Jossip item, all leaned heavily on the detail that they're hooking up at 141 Prince St. But that's hardly a secret address. since that's where the Murdochs live when they're in New York. And as someone familiar with the Murdochs points out, they sold that apartment in 2005 and now live on Fifth Ave. So color us skeptical. Though, of course, if you know more than our previous tipsters, we're interested in that, too.

Here's what you need to know about new Secretary of Commerce Bill Richardson: the former UN Secretary really wanted a foreign policy gig, but he's terrible with foreign policy, having been incoherent about both Gulf Wars and supporting the Contras and also persecuting Wen Ho Lee (so the Chinese hate him). He's also shitty on domestic policy, but less dangerous, especially at Commerce. He was owed a position for supporting Obama over Clinton, his old boss. He has a bad habit of being grabby with ladies. He used to have a beard. He's a free-trader who decided, after pushing NAFTA, that he is now a "fair trader."

But yes he's mostly harmless.

Before he earned his eight gold medals and became a global celebrity at the Beijing Olympics, Mr. Phelps and three teammates agreed to endorse PureSport, a protein mix made by a tiny Austin, Texas, company that didn't exist three years ago...

The foursome, introduced to the company while training in Austin last year, took a 5% stake in exchange for their endorsements

So now, in exchange for 1.7% of nothing and all the sugar-and-whey mix he can guzzle, Michael Phelps is obliged to plaster his face all over this product's packaging, and be dragged around the country to various promo events seven days a year, where hopefully he at least gets mad chicks. [WSJ]

The billions gushing in from Google's search monopoly don't make for a good story. Whenever Google's PR executives have looked to drum up press, they've led with the candy-colored offices, the free food, and the copious free time. All of those are now on the chopping block — which leaves not much to talk about at Google except the profits.

The Wall Street Journal takes a look at Google's new push for cost cuts. As others have reported, Google is curtailing service at its cafeterias, reducing hours and restricting guests. A third of Google's 30,000 workers are contractors — and many of those jobs will disappear. (Conveniently, when a contract ends, it's not deemed a layoff.) And superfluous offices are being shut.

More importantly, Google's employees no longer have free rein to pursue their own ideas. Google's engineers can spend 20 percent of time on side projects. That freedom remains, in theory, but the progress a lone engineer can make on a new website without hardware and additional personnel is limited. The new message: Fiddle all you want, but don't expect any money from Google to back your creation.

When Google went public in 2004, founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin told shareholders to get ready to be taken for a ride. Not in so many words, of course. But in the company's IPO prospectus, they defended the company's already-lavish perks, and said that investors should expect spending to go up, not down.

But Larry and Sergey have grown tired of coddling their employees. Far from being grateful, the perks have made employees feel entitled. Brin in particular has complained about workers taking bowls of M&Ms and free bottled water for granted.

Why should Google's founders care, really? They seem increasingly detached from Google's core business, preferring to spend time on rockets and electric sports cars rather than optimizing AdWords. They increasingly deal with a small core of early Google employees, all IPO lottery winners, who are similarly insulated from the economic reality of living in one of the most expensive areas in the U.S.

A famous example of their cluelessness: Brin allowed his sister-in-law, Susan Wojcicki, also a Google executive, to spend millions of Google's money on a new child-care center which dramatically raised its costs. Rather than revise plans to make child-care more affordable, Google started charging employees nearly twice the market rate.

Investors will be unbothered by Larry and Sergey's change of heart. And employees, after they get done grumbling, will likely content themselves with the reality that they still have jobs.

No, the people hit hardest by this will be Google's flacks — and the servile journalists who so eagerly celebrated Google's lava-lamp culture. What stories will they tell now? How Google is cutting corners on the organic foie-gras hamburgers in its cafes?

No Senator or Representative shall, during the Time for which he was elected, be appointed to any civil Office under the Authority of the United States which shall have been created, or the Emoluments whereof shall have been increased during such time.

"Emoluments" is an old-tymey Constitution word for "scrill." And hey, wouldn't you know, between Clinton's 2006 reelection and now, the salary for Secretary of State went up to $191,300!

This has actually, as you might imagine, happened before, lots of times. Usually Congress just passes a bill cutting the salary. But what is different about this nomination, as opposed to the times this has come up in the past? Crazy obsessive anti-Clinton bloggers!

“There’s no getting around the Constitution’s Ineligibility Clause, so Hillary Clinton is prohibited from serving in the Cabinet until at least 2013, when her current term expires,” said Tom Fitton, president of Judicial Watch. “Barack Obama should select someone who is eligible for the position of secretary of state and save the country from a constitutional battle over Hillary Clinton’s confirmation.”

Clinton flack Philippe Reines' response is pretty choice: "This is a Harvard Law grad nominating a Yale Law grad here, so all parties involved have been cognizant of this issue from the outset." BURN.

"I'm really happy to be back in Calgary; I love Canada. I just want to comment on how it's become like a common thing in the NHL for guys to fall in love with my sloppy seconds."

Cuthbert (pictured below) is dating Calgary defenseman Dion Phaneuf, while Hunter ended up with Jarrett Stoll of the Los Angeles Kings.

Avery instinctively understands that the NHL, which is trying to attract new viewers, needs to play up conflict and characters within it own ranks if it wants to draw attention. "Tthe NHL does a terrible job of marketing [by not promoting its] villains," he recently told ESPN. "Nobody cares about Jarome Iginla and guys like that, they're just not exciting enough."

Call it the reality television approach to sports — or, less flatteringly, the professional wrestling approach. Either way, alienating the female half of the potential audience with this "sloppy seconds stunt" doesn't seem like the smartest way to extend the strategy. But then ladies man Avery should know that already!

Because Gossip Girl understands you, Jenny has become the avatar of all the listless young New Yorkians currently out of work. She stays at home in Brooklyn and does manic, weird tasks like arranging records by category, and worries about what the eff she's going to say to her parents. Plus she has an older Mexican orphan come over and steal her boyfriend, just like you! I'm talking of course about Vanessa (I know she's not necessarily Mexican. Comedy!) who had a terrible Nate-shaped (basically like a croissant only floppier) secret in her heart. Remember that she hid his lusty mash note to young Jennifer? Well she did. And now she and Nate are doin' it on the down low and she feels very conflicted. How far all of these morally superior characters have to fall once they've made a small mistake!

Then one of the Weird Sister Bitches came over, the Greek princess named Penelope (fitting!), and said "I hate you, make me a dress." Jennifer needed the bones so she said aight and got to sewing a fantastically stupid brackish dress. No matter, because that would soon be tossed to the wind when: young Nathaniel, played semi-convincingly by Twink Android model number #542-fancyfeather (service name: Chace Crawford), is caught by the nefarious Gossip Girl whilst sucking mug with his Dickensian chica. Ohhh the blood did boil when Jenny got her hair helmet in a snitz and saw the photos on her phone box! She needed revenge, nowwww!!!!

Like the lovelorn and world weary Odysseus, Jenny was drawn back to Penelope and dashed upon the rocks of her scheming bitchery. "Make her wear this see-through dress," the Weird Sisters (really mixing my metaphors here) hissed. Because, oh yes! What crime! To be seen in ones shapely underoos by a crowd of horny teenage boys! She'll be the laughingstock of awkward late night fumblings! Jenny, scrumple-faced and as unconvincingly motivated as ever, decided to go through with the wicked plan ("Is this a shitty see-through dress which I see before me?").

Meanwhile, there was some lumbering nonsense about Serena and her Secret of NIMH boyfriend Aaron. She heard his ex-goilfriend Lexi making apt fun of the stupid Gyro lady photos he'd taken of S. and hung in a gallery. He defended himself dumbly by saying "women have been a focus of art since time immemorial" or some bullshit. That's like saying "bowls of fruit have been a focus of art since blah blah someone push me down a flight of stairs, please." His whole "Brooklyn artist" thing is just... he looks like a rat, OK? He looks a rat and I don't like it. All the while, Lexi was fixing her beady eyes on young Humph, innuendoing that perhaps he should escort her to the big school charity Snowflake Ball.

Oh! I forgot to tell you! Because I guess I assumed you would infer it anyway, because every fucking episode of this show must revolve around a party or some kind of dopey event. Well this one was the Snowflake Ball and it involved people dancing and mingling until midnight when Chace Crawford was lowered into the room on a disco ball, dressed as a sex elf named Snowflake. Or something like that.

So yeah, Lexi was going with Danno and Serena was grumbly about it and Aaron said "Dan ain't gonna be grumbly about it, that girl puts out on the first date for some weird tangentially feminist reason." Serena was all grossed out by sex so she decided to sex Aaron, after the big dance. Er'body wanted to bone! Including Blair and Chuckles, who continued to circle each other while the ever-quizzical Dorota squirms, stuck in the juicy middle. "You find me a date that I like, and I'll find you a date that you like" was the bet/dare/challenge/yawn of this particular episode and it yielded some funny results when: a) predictably, the dates ended up being into each other and b) Chuck showed up to Chace's big elf debut dressed as a third grader's bedroom ceiling. Seriously. It was like he had glow-in-the-dark stars and moons all over that sparkly jacket of his.

Something also happened with Rufus and Lily making goo-talk at each other, but the real dramz was unfolding when V. told N. about stealing the letter and N. was all "evs," but it was too late because she stepped out across the seal, thus destroying the temple in which the true Grail and the old knight guy are kept, and Elsa fell into a bottomless pit! into the middle of the room, the spotlight went on, and there, soooo embarrassingly, her perfect figure was revealed. Jessica Szohr did a good job of acting like she'd just pooped herself and N. ran up to Jenny, who looked like Catherine O'Hara in Beetlejuice at this point, and was like "you're so stupid" and then Jenny was all sad and was like "I can't believe I almost had sex with him" and then Chuck was like "you almost had sex with who?" and Jenny was like "Nate" and Chuck was like "bwahahah, your man Nate is a cake boy!" and Jenny was like "what?" and then Blair drove on the freeway and everyone shrieked. Or you know, whatever happened. Nate and Van are smoochily together in the end. Which is good, because she knows she has that Twink Android users manual somewhere at home. Jenny meanwhile made ominous threats to the Weird Sisters that she might be moving to Manhattan so she can compete in the ever-important high school social scene.

Then Dan and Serena had a weird awkward conversation about people sticking things into other people and how it made them feel and I don't like watching Penn Badgley try to dance or act lusty or really anything. I wish I could clap my hands or wrinkle my nose or blink my eyes and banish him back to John Tucker Must Die forever. I think things were resolved with them, but who knows??? Because then Lily came rushing up and said "holy fuck, there's been a fucking accident. That old dude's dead or something, holy shit balls what am I gonna tell that shitty kid of his? Ohhh for fuck's sake I hate my fucking life." I think that's verbatim, actually. You can consult the clip above to verify that.

So we're left teetering on the brink of something: when do we grieve? And how? Judging by the promo tease, it looks like Chuckles' hair gets long and greasy and there's some srsly big secret about why Lily was in the mental institution. Secret Rufus love child? Hysterical rickets? Schmendrick's disease? (Please someone get that last reference, I will give you money.*)

I guess we'll have to wait to find out next week! Oh it's all so exciting! And all so fleeting. Everyone's dying and lying and having sex now. I remember these jokers when they wuz but kids. It happens so fast. It happens too fast.

*Not really.

1. The setup—Say, for argument's sake, that Obama did order an expensive, custom-made ring to thank his wife for her help in the campaign. Would the chosen designer of that ring run out and immediately tell the press all about it? Not just the press, but the Daily Mail, a sleazeball London tabloid? No, because that designer would subsequently be destroyed by Barack Obama, the president of the US.

2. The story itself—What's the sourcing for this big story? Did Obama sheepishly acknowledge his gift with a smile once it broke? No. The sole source is a "spokesman" for the "designer" of the ring. Who also gave this ridonkulous quote:

'For obvious privacy reasons I cannot reveal the cost of the ring but bearing in mind it is made from rhodium or black gold and encrusted with diamonds you can be sure it will cost thousands of pounds.'

Mmm hmm. Classy. It's also painfully clear that the story is filled out by fun facts about rhodium pulled off some press release. Did you know that "rhodium was chosen as the material for the disc presented to Beatle Paul McCartney for being history's all-time best-selling songwriter and recording artist"? Barack Obama obviously did, which is why he insisted on ordering this here ring!

3. The designer—Supposedly Obama has ordered this ring to be specially made by Giovanni Bosco, an "A-list" Italian designer. Really? If he's so A-list, why has his name never—never!—appeared in Nexis, the database of all things media? If he's so A-list, why does his website look so D-list? And why does the "Press" section seem to be full mostly of his own ads? Decidedly non-Presidential.

So the worldwide media has bitten big-time on a story that was almost certainly planted by this jewelry designer himself, or a very enterprising flack. And everybody wins ("everybody" meaning "Right wing media outlets" and "Giovanni Bosco")! Good show, Giovanni Bosco. Thanks to all this press you will probably be able to sell some rings that are real. [Pic via]

[UPDATE: And the Obama camp just denied it.]

[UPDATE 2, via Politico: Tommy Christopher at AOL got a head-scratching statement from the spokesman for the jeweler in question, who also denies the story as reported:

I regret to inform you that because of reports so wrong and clearly different from the reality of our statements, we decided to not issue statement on this matter.

Unfortunately, we were negatively affected by read on national and foreign media news stories that have no basement[sic], and in excess of the objective reality.

I inform you that we have no intention to disseminate more information about this story.

Corporate colleagues also arched their eyebrows when Wintour told a reporter at the National Magazine Awards to "Just go away" after she asked about rumors of the editor-in-chief's impending retirement. The touchy reply added to their suspicion that Wintour, who just this past June celebrated two decades atop Vogue, was worried about being pushed out by Newhouse before she'd lined up a soft landing elsewhere. Her purported $2-million-per-year salary is seen as a hindrance, given the state of the economy, in lining up a follow-on fashion gig of the sort that seems natural, post Vogue: creative director at LVMH, that sort of thing.

Whether the palace intrigue at the world's fashion bible unfolds according to the Waverly buzz or not, it is clear the Vogue masthead is not at equilibrium. Wintour in recent years positioned herself as a sort of mini-mogul over various baby Vogues. But this fall, she's fallen back down to earth. The closure of Men's Vogue was a major personal embarrassment. It followed a possibly fatal blow to the Vogue Living experiment and the cancellation of Fashion Rocks. Worst of all, it came amid slipping numbers at Vogue itself, as competitors leveraged reality television to undermine the title's dominance over the world of fashion.

The poor performance surely undermined Wintour within Condé Nast. But even if the legendary editor-from-hell still had Si Newhouse's full support, there's the issue of personal satisfaction: Wintour could hardly be expected to content herself with a downgrade from "editorial director" of a magazine collection to mere editor-in-chief of a single title, shrinking in ad pages and influence. Even if Wintour does not yet realize that, Newhouse surely does. Thus we see the unwelcome rumors of her retirement in the tabloids. And so it may be that a French revolution comes to Vogue in January 2009. (Photo by Jeremy Kost)

UPDATE: As many of you noted in the comments, the rumored replacement of Wintour by her French rival puts a tragic (for Wintour) twist on a plotline specific to the film adaptation of the novel The Devil Wears Prada. The real-life French Vogue editor has said Wintour is "like a puppet." In a clip from the movie below, Wintour stand-in Miranda Priestly manages to divert her competitor Jacqueline Follet by arranging for her a job once promised to Priestly's lieutenant at Runway (aka Vogue). Her own boss is dissuaded by threats that Priestly's fashion-industry allies will blackball the magazine. That sort of loyalty seems far too posh an extravagance at a time of economic panic and powerful TV shows like Project Runway.

• Those of severely impaired intelligence cannot be blamed for their sins: This is the single best thing you have going for you, Dubya. You're an idiot. Everyone knows you're an idiot. Once upon a time you were a useful idiot; now that you're retiring in disgrace, you're no longer useful, politically speaking. But you're still an idiot. The upside of this is that it won't be hard to convince the world that forces far more cunning than you manipulated you into doing all these evil things. Forces named Dick Cheney. All you have to do is start dropping Cheney's name more and more into future interviews, until his controlling hand in all matters becomes clear.
  Ask an adult to help you with this.
• The inevitable post-presidential book: All ex-presidents "write" a book. You will do the same, without the "writing" part. Some of these books are truth-free extended versions of political stump speeches; others are so long and ponderous that any truth within is only ferreted out by the unfortunate journalists assigned to read them. Everyone knows you have no literary abilities, so your book should not be ponderous; and you were never a good speaker, so don't take a stump speech as a model. What you need is dirt. A teeny-tiny bit of dirt will suffice. That dirt should be about Dick Cheney, the bad man who convinced you to do all those bad things. See previous point for guidance.
• Get your nice, cushy, non-political job: Mr. Bush, you can be the next Commissioner of Baseball. You love baseball, and while I assume you are just as stupid about baseball as you are about other topics, you can take comfort in the fact that the many other stupid baseball team owners will make you look good in comparison. Look, I know tons of baseball fans would be outraged at the appointment of an incompetent warmonger as Commissioner. But most baseball commissioners suck, and with one or two decent advisers you should be able to avoid making any major mistakes. Five to ten years in this gig, and people will remember you more for improving the instant-replay system than for that whole Hurricane Katrina business. As an added bonus, people in baseball who give ridiculously nonsensical quotes are celebrated as icons (Yogi Berra) rather than despised as clueless disasters on the world stage (you, as president).
• Surround yourself with unobjectionable objects and people: Your mom is Barbara Bush. America loves her, despite the fact that there is no compelling reason to do so. They just see her as some idealized version of grandma. Your daughters will soon have their own children, George, and you can make a space for yourself as America's idealized version of grandpa: harmless, doting, chuckly, showing the toddlers around the ranch and telling tall tales about animals. Get yourself several cuddly dogs. Adopt a charity rich in heartwarming visual imagery—the Special Olympics would be appropriate. Babies, puppies, baseball, and the handicapped: these are the things you want associated with you in the public mind.
• Stay away from politics forever: Your idiocy may be enough to eventually absolve you of your past sins. But if you choose to pursue your twisted Rovian agenda into the future, nothing will be able to help you. It is of utmost importance that you leave the political world behind in favor of innocuous, popular activities. Jimmy Carter rehabilitated his own image as a failed president by taking strong stands on political issues, but Jimmy Carter is a far smarter man than you, George. Go back to Texas, enjoy your book royalties, and be sure to pin the blame on Cheney when you hit the speaking circuit. The only remnant of the Christian conservative agenda you should really cling to is the little prayer you say each night for President Obama's success. The quicker he can fix what you broke, the quicker people will forget about everything you did.

Rebekah Wade, the editor of the Sun in London, recalls Murdoch telling a joke after a few drinks, as they wait for Robert Thomson to arrive at a posh London restaurant. "God this is brilliant...what's the difference between a fridge and poofter?" Murdoch booms to Wade. "Well, when you pull the meat out of the fridge, it doesn't fart!" But, then, seeing Thomson coming into the restaurant, Murdoch urgently whispers, "For God's sake, don't tell Robert what I said. He's a gentrified man...very clever."

Nice, Rupert, very classy.

In related news: there are few pursuits more fruitless than arguing with a review of your book, but that's what Wolff does on his blog in response to the negative review of his book The Man Who Owns the News, "a biography of Rupert Murdoch, is also implicitly about the failures of the Times and its publisher, Arthur Sulzberger, Jr."

Maslin herself views Murdoch with contempt, if not downright nausea. There is no aspect of his singular success or peculiar character that she finds compelling. He’s just loathsome—not least of all, it’s fair to assume, because Murdoch is the most likely buyer of the beleaguered Times... Maslin’s review seems to be so much more about the terrible dread that has enveloped the Times as it awaits its fate—quite probably Murdoch himself—than it is about my portrait of the man.

Yeah, but the review is from Janet Maslin, who is like the Sarah Palin of the New York Times.

Liz Lemon favors her right side. That’s because a faint scar runs across Tina Fey’s left cheek, the result of a violent cutting attack by a stranger when Fey was five. Her husband says, “It was in, like, the front yard of her house, and somebody who just came up, and she just thought somebody marked her with a pen.” You can hardly see the scar in person. But I agree with Richmond that it makes Fey more lovely, like a hint of Marlene Dietrich noir glamour in a Preston Sturges heroine.

Well, damn. Now we just love her more.

What does matter, according to “The Man Who Owns the News,” is his third wife, Wendi Deng, who is 38 years his junior and controls him to the point of reading his e-mail.

(“Let’s recast this story as a triumphal, even uplifting tale of pluck and achievement,” Mr. Wolff writes, about how she came to marry such a powerful older man. “She’s not Becky Sharp, she’s Pip in ‘Great Expectations.’ ”)

That little detail about Deng resonates especially strongly since it reinforces the picture the Journal painted of her in 2000 (original) as a deft and serial manipulator of powerful men:

Her ticket out of China came in 1987, when she met a Los Angeles couple, Jake and Joyce Cherry... Mrs. Cherry says she had grown increasingly suspicious about Ms. Deng's relationship with her husband. Mrs. Cherry recalls discovering a cache of photographs her husband had taken of Ms. Deng in coquettish poses back in his hotel room in Guangzhou. Mr. Cherry confirms he had become infatuated with the young woman...

The Cherrys divorced, and Jake Cherry married Ms.Deng in February 1990. But that union didn't last. Mr. Cherry says that about four months after the wedding, he told Ms. Deng to leave because she had started spending time with a man named David Wolf...

Former colleagues describe Ms. Deng as having been adept at juggling the interests of News Corp.'s various units, which like to operate independently... She is said to have shown no hesitation about walking unannounced into a senior executive's office to discuss the latest Chinese entrepreneur she had met or government official she had contacted...

In early 1998, she first appeared at [Murdoch's] side, acting as his interpreter when he traveled to Shanghai and Beijing. By the summer of 1998, the Star TV staff was buzzing about romance between the pair. After dinner meetings in Hong Kong, they were observed holding hands. In May, Mr. Murdoch had separated from his wife of 31 years, Anna. The split surprised even his closest aides, who say they hadn't seen any sign of a rupture.

Can't wait to see how the book is reviewed in the Post and Journal!

Packaging can be powerful, as Franklin Roosevelt learned. He included the term "new deal" as a throwaway line in his Democratic convention speech, delivered while he was trying to combine, on the spot, differing texts supplied by different advisers. But reporters immediately seized on the phrase and within a few weeks it was being rendered as the "New Deal," a powerful handle summarizing a vast array of transformative government programs in two words.

Obama seems considerably more confident in the power of branding. He is trying to convince everyone the country will have a "new beginning" with the Defense Secretary from the prior administration, a chief of staff from the administration before last, a Secretary of State who used to live in the White House and two wars and around $2 trillion in economic recovery schemes devised by the prior administration.

It's a monumental challenge, but "New Beginning" isn't a bad start, marketingwise. It certainly beats our proposed slogan, "We are still doomed, forever." Watch it in action in the video below.

"He was bum-rushed by 200 people," said Jimmy Overby, 43, a co-worker. "They took the doors off the hinges. He was trampled and killed in front of me. They took me down too...I literally had to fight people off my back."

A 28-year-old pregnant lady was also knocked down in the frenzy. The good news is that most people got that cheap XBox that Ricky wanted, and the "My First Sex Scandal" karaoke microphone/dildo that Amber was desperate for. So the young man didn't die in vain. What were we just saying?

Before police shut down the store, eager shoppers streamed past emergency crews as they worked furiously to save the store clerk's life.

"They were working on him, but you could see he was dead, said Halcyon Alexander, 29. "People were still coming through."

Only a few stopped.

"They're savages," said shopper Kimberly Cribbs, 27. "It's sad. It's terrible."

Peru has successfully promoted its national drink "Pisco Sour" during the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Leaders' Summit, Peru’s Environment Minister Antonio Brack said Sunday.

He noted that the flagship drink of Peru was well acepted by international guests, including Japan's Prime Minister, Taro Aso.

"Pisco Sour has been the "star" of the APEC Summit, the drink was served in several meetings at the Government Palace and the APEC Summit venue,” he told CPN Radio.

"We have achieved to place our products including pisco on international markets, but also kiwicha, sweet potatoes and traditional Peruvian potatoes", said Brack.

U.S. President George W. Bush, who quit drinking at 40, was apparently drinking a Peruvian cocktail during a meeting on Saturday.

Bush is reportedly looking forward to breaking a related personal vow during his next trip to Colombia.

Photo: ANDINA/Carlos Lezama

You Broke Grandma's Heart

The end of September marked my eight-month anniversary as associate editor for a trade pub in midtown, and I felt comfortable enough that I had invited my grandparents to visit my office. I love writing and journalism and still had faith in being able to work my way up and into a major news organization. As a single girl in my late twenties, I at least had a media job, my own apartment, and was working on getting things together. My grandparents visiting was a first, and I was excited and nervous. I had even told the publisher that they were coming. Although I knew the job was not forever, I felt safe to explore my options slowly from the comfort of a position with a steady salary and benefits.

At 10:30 AM, I went for a break. Ten minutes later, as I approached my desk, I saw the IT guy shutting down my computers. "What are you doing?" I asked. "Ummm, updating some of the software," he said nervously, lying. I turned around and the publisher was standing behind me. "Meet me in the conference room," he said.

Inside was the HR director, the publisher, and the editor. They said that I was going to be let go, I was not a good fit, and I needed to get myself and all of my belongings out of the office within 30 minutes. I would get two days of severence. My health insurance would end in a week. I was basically told that I would get nothing, and had no warning.

I sat in Bryant Park crying and had to call my grandparents, who were on their way, to tell them that I had to cancel because I had just been laid off.

Two months later, I have yet to find another job. It was not so much the getting laid off as the disrespect, the lack of warning and the SHOCK. On Thanksgiving I will visit my grandparents and they will ask me what I've been doing, if I have found another job, a husband, a plan (a life?) and I will say, "I've been searching."

If This Sort of Thing Gets You Fired, We Would Have Been Fired 5 Times By Now:

My story really isn't that outrageous: worked as a Web producer for a network TV affiliate on a "tryout" for... almost three weeks. A three-week tryout? I was fired today (two days before Thanksgiving) for introducing a minor and quickly-corrected error into a Web story. This was apparently the first mistake in the history of the Internet. This was also shortly after I offered to come in and work Thanksgiving Day.

Our "Job Re-Finding" Operators at the Tribune Are Standing By!

March 11, 2008,: I came home to find a message on my answering machine: "Hello S—-, this is Wanda from —-—- Outplacement Services. We've been hired by the Tribune to help with your job search. Please call us to schedule a time to take advantage of our outplacement services—no cost to you, the Tribune compensates us. We have classroom openings for next week, so we need to hear from you as soon as possible".


I think I went into shock. I found out the next day from HR that it was "all a big mistake". Seems that my name was "placed on the wrong list". They were laying off so many people that I was the next week's decapitation - "List B". But a clerical error landed me on "List A".

Here I am, mortgage, car note, single mom to an eleven-year-old, out of money and health care insurance. And no one has ever said, "our apologies".

(Just to add to the story, Sam Zell dumped our severance pay into our 401K accounts, in an effort to avoid paying corporate taxes. Because this was the first time that action had ever been done, the 401K distributor, Hewitt, had no idea from the day-to-day what the payout process was. So.....it took me two months to pull the so-called severance out of my 401K account. I missed a mortgage payment, had to borrow my daughter's summer camp tuition, and the collection agency calls started coming in. My hair fell out.)

There is a class-action suit from Trib employees/former employees and the "severance" issue is part of the lawsuit.

Um... Happy Thanksgiving, everyone.

When reached for comment, Laura Bush's spokeswoman, Sally McDonough, said the White House usually prints separate cards, but in the waning days of the presidency, there had been an oversight.

As an added bonus, the wagon says "White House Christmas Tree 2008." Happy Holiday, everyone!!!

In America, reports the Times, mothers (JUST like this one!) are cutting back on their all-important clothes-shopping trips (down a whopping 18 percent, jeepers!) and using "online tools to organize meetings with other mothers to swap clothing, toys, video games and books. Others are buying DVDs and video games in bulk from warehouse stores like BJ’s Wholesale Club, then taking the sets apart to create multiple gifts."

Sounds intense. What do mothers spend their time frantically worrying about elsewhere? Buying that Doodle Pro or Mortal Kombat disk in time for Ramadan or whatever? Not quite:

Her friend rushed over to help her, struggling to wipe the liquid away, when she too was showered with acid. She covered her face, crying out for help as they sprayed her again, trying to aim the acid into her face. The weapon was a water bottle containing battery acid; the result was at least one girl blinded and two others permanently disfigured. Their only crime was attending school.

It was not an isolated incident. For women and girls across Afghanistan, conditions are worsening — and those women who dare to publicly oppose the traditional order now live in fear for their lives.

Well, we can't save the whole world, and we'll probably have that whole Afghanistan situation fixed up in another decade or two. What about closer to home? Let's check in with South Carolina:

Capers searches for jobs and money while she endures living apart from her children. Her children call crying and asking to come home, and they sleep on the floor because her grandmother doesn't have enough beds. Last week, her youngest son told her he missed her so much that she managed to scrounge enough bus money so he could spend a night with her at home.

Oh, that sounds bad. Wonder why that wasn't the Times' cover story of sacrifice. Must be one of those clichéd "topics or angles the Times has already addressed" about the South. Even closer to home?Say, in New England?

Sarah Gloudemans rarely has a slow day. In a typical eight-hour shift as a supervisor at Wendy's, she'll take customer orders, wrap sandwiches, make change and generally fix whatever needs fixing. After work, Sarah might do some grocery shopping or laundry before picking up her 2-year-old daughter, Alizah, at day care and driving to their home in downtown Concord.
Home, in their case, is a shelter.

And it just gets even more horribly depressing from there. Really not the sort of thing to pump you up to stimulate our wretchedly dysfunctional economy this Black Friday by buying a bunch of useless junk with money you didn't save from sacrifices that don't hurt on credit cards you shouldn't have. So, really: Good call, Times.

(We are doomed, forever.)

(Thanks to tipster Megan for the pointers!)

(Photo: Charity Beck/Times)

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Here he is! He's 28 and an associate at Milbank, Tweed, Hadley & McCloy in New York. It says here that Charlie got his JD in 2007 from NYU, and got his BBA and BS at the University of Texas. A nice Southern boy. Cutler, 30, told Reliable Source that they met "randomly in a bar."

Update from Jessica: We e-mailed Charles, but she responded:

"Charles is working and I'm about to go do my Thxgiving shopping, [but] I want to respond! We met in March of this year. We sort of did everything backwards: He asked me if I wanted to have kids with him before he proposed. After asking my Dad for his blessing, we went to Cartier and he bought me a Love bracelet instead of a ring (because I tend to lose things). On the way home from the store, he formally proposed in Grand Central about a month ago.

How we met is sort of a blur. I was so wasted.

Well, mazel tov!

[Carly] Simon and Ben Taylor, her son by singer James Taylor, had lobbied the feds to commute Forte's sentence, arguing he was a first-time offender.

Ben Taylor and Forte had become friends at the Phillips Exeter Academy in New Hampshire. Taylor often took him to visit his family, and Forte once worked as a backup singer for Simon.

There you have it: rappers will be considered for pardons as long as they made friends with the children of celebrities while attending pricey private schools. Utah Sen. Orrin Hatch also lobbied Bush to let him go! That is simply too awesome to be critical about. Welcome home, John. Kick these verses for Orrin: