• Her official photographer has posted many of the pictures on Palin's Facebook page, along with the credit "The Photo Opportunity is Provided By SarahPAC," so, if you want a shot of yourself wearing an Obama shirt next to Palin you'll have to contribute to her PAC. • Sarah Palin will give the keynote address at the International Bowl Expo 2010, the "premier international convention" of bowling in June. A rep said: "Regardless of your political affiliation, Ms. Palin is a force in American politics and culture. Her presence underscores the impact and importance of bowling, one of our country's leading national pastimes and a growing $10 billion industry." • Leroy Benros was charged with rape at a New York nightclub after his alleged victim texted her friends during the attack. After he forcibly kissed her, the woman texted her friend: "I'm being molested. Help." By the time two of her friends found her, police say she was partially naked under a coat with her eyes closed and her arms dangling. Her friends pulled her away and Benros was arrested. • Now that Maurice Clemmons, the ex-convict suspected of killing four police officers, is dead, authorities are focusing on the people who may have helped him escape and stay on the lam for two days. Prosecutors are expected to charge alleged getaway driver Darcus D. Allen today. Clemmons' aunt and another woman have been arrested and are expected to be charged for giving him first aid and helping him escape. Police are still investigating a handful of other suspects. "Some are friends, some are acquaintances, some are partners in crime, some are relatives. Now they're all partners in crime," said a police spokesman. • Cocaine abuse is on the rise among young English women. Among women ages 18 to 25, the number of women who needed treatment for cocaine abuse in England. jumped 80 percent in the past four years from 329 to 592. Experts point to a growing "ladette" culture, which is also blamed for increasing alcohol abuse among young women. • In a new British study, researchers say they have discovered how and where androgenic hormones work in the testis to control normal sperm production and male fertility, which may allow for the development of a male birth control pill. "This study provides a new opportunity to identify how androgens control sperm production, which could provide new insight for the development of new treatments for male infertility and perhaps new male contraceptives," said Michelle Welsh, Ph.D., co-author of the study. • An increasing number of British women are hiring doulas to help them give birth, but anesthetist Dr. Abhijoy Chaklader questioned their role in the British Medical Journal. He wrote the trend toward hiring doulas, who have no medical training, may "be a sad reflection of failures in the delivery of medical and midwifery care, a sticking plaster concealing greater problems... a cynic might ask whether the doula business is actually necessary or whether it is exploiting - for profit - unspoken fears about NHS perinatal care and the seemingly limitless market for birth related products and service." • Switzerland elected women to the nation's top three political positions today: president, speaker of parliament's lower house, and speaker of the upper house. Swiss women couldn't even vote in national elections until 1971. • A Dutch man was arrested for allegedly collecting information on more than 30 girls from social networking sites, then blackmailing their parents. He posed as a photographer and told the parents their daughters had performed sexual acts on camera, or suggested they had been raped by others, then said he'd upload the non-existent pornography online if they didn't pay him. • Family members say a New York hairdresser who disappeared last week after dropping her 6-year-old daughter off at school complained about a creepy man she kept encountering near the school. "She mentioned to us about this guy in the street she would see every day," said Jamaica Smith's niece. "He was real aggressive toward her, always saying, 'Hey, baby, you look so pretty.' ... We know for a fact she was abducted because she would never leave her daughter." There are rumors that some people saw her struggling with a man near her home, but police deny the story and say they don't think foul play was involved. • After General Motors CEO Fritz Henderson announced yesterday that he was stepping down, someone claiming to be his daughter Sarah Henderson posted on GM's Facebook page, "HE FUCKING GOT ASKED TO STEP DOWN ALL OF YOU FUCKING IDIOTS. I'M FRITZ'S FUCKING DAUGHTER, AND HE DID NOT FUCKING RESIGN. WHITACRE IS A SELFISH PIECE OF SHIFT [sic], WHO CARES ABOUT HIMSELF AND NOT THE FUCKING COMPANY. HAVE FUN WITH GM, I HOPE TO NEVER BUY FROM THIS GOD FORESAKEN [sic] COMPANY EVERY [sic] AGAIN. FUCK ALL OF YOU." It was later removed. • Adeline Bayne-Goody, a 56-year-old New York City subway driver, may lose her job over an incident in October in which she subdued a crazed man who threatened other passengers, spewed racial epithets, punched her and spit in her face. She held him down until the police arrived, but officials told her she committed "gross misconduct" and should be fired because she left her post. • Carmen Huertas, the woman accused of driving drunk in Manhattan, injuring six children who were in the car and killing one, has been trying to commit suicide in jail. "She's tried to place objects around her neck," said her lawyer. "She's confused and devastated, and understands the consequences of her actions." • Thirteen female ski jumpers have filed a request with Canada's Supreme Court to allow the sport in the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver. The International Olympic Committee voted in 2006 not to include women's ski jumping in the 2010 Olympics because they say the sport is not developed enough. • The Japanese man who recently married his virtual girlfriend from the Nintendo DS game Love Plus has responded to media reports with a letter and some photos from his honeymoon. He writes: "Now that the ceremony is over, I feel like I've been able to achieve a major milestone in my life. Some people have expressed doubts about my actions, but at the end of the day, this is really just about us as husband and wife. As long as the two of us can go on to create a happy household, I'm sure any misgivings about us will be resolved." •

Bobby Brown — I'm Too Damn Fat [TMZ]

Both the coke and the bisexual woman seemed planted by producers for "Miami-ish" storylines. (As though coke and lesbians are completely foreign to L.A. Lindsay Lohan, anyone?)


While Khloe didn't actually partake in any snorting, Kourtney got in on a little girl-on-girl action by kissing her bisexual friend on a few occasions at a gay bar. She was just experimenting, though, and ended up realizing that she's straight.

On a different note, does anyone speak Spanish? I was trying to figure out what the inappropriate remark this man made at the two women, but I have no idea. They don't teach this stuff in Rosetta Stone.

Would You Ever Date A Mentally Retarded Person? from Pot Psychology on Vimeo.

Now Valerie Frankel, a former editor at Mademoiselle, has a book called Thin Is The New Happy, in which she details her experiences at the magazine. What does she say about working at the glossy for smart young women? "I did more blow in my first two years at Mademoiselle than in college, when I lived with a coke dealer." Plus:

"Self-starvation was a competitive sport. At staff lunches, the girl who ate the least won," Frankel writes. "During downtime, we'd sit in our offices smoking cigarette after cigarette (to quell hunger) and talking about who ate what, the calorie counts of our lunches, the latest dieting trends, who on the staff looked heavy."

Oh, and by the way, Frankel had a sex column, in which she may or not have dispensed advice. While high. Coke psychology!

What I hate about stories like this is that it reinforces some shitty stereotypes, namely that women cannot work together without life being a living hell, especially in the magazine industry. But what I'm guessing is that things probably haven't changed that much. At the time, Mademoiselle was owned by Condé Nast. Frankel says human resources told new hires to "represent the magazine in [their] personal appearance," and the office motto of sorts was "get thin or die trying." Hence the "hillocks" of coke and the co-worker who carried a scale to weigh everything she ate. But even though Mademoiselle has folded, Condé Nast still owns and operates Vogue, W, Glamour, Allure, Self, Teen Vogue, Lucky, Brides and Modern Bride. What are the chances that those publications are being run by women involved in drugs and starvation?

Tales From ‘Mademoiselle’: ‘Self-Starvation Was a Competitive Sport’ [NY Mag]

• There are already quotes from the Palin-Gibson confab! She threatens war with Russia, sidesteps the hubris question, and can't blink! It sounds all kinds of fair and balanced and totally not fluffy. Just because they're taking a stroll together doesn't mean it was too chummy.[Mark Ambinder, Mark Ambinder, TV Newser]
• But just because ABC is stretching the interview into 5 different news segments doesn't mean they're looking to boost ratings, obviously. The first segment airs tonight during what I like to call "drinking time" and other people consider "dinner time." [LA Times]
• In a page from Bush's playbook, Palin conducts state business on a personal email account to avoid disclosure laws, since that worked out so well for the Bush Administration. [Think Progress]
• Obama may have been kidding about being a Popular Mechanic centerfold, but they're offering to take him up on it anyway. David Axelrod needs to jump on that shit, like, yesterday, and show the pistol-packin' mama (per Cindy McCain) who's a regular person. [Popular Mechanics]

• Elsewhere in the world, Biden and his gaffe-maker (also known as his mouth) are prepping for the debate with Michigan Governor Jennifer Granholm. She's going to try to be mean, and he's going to try not to be. [NY Times, HuffPo]
• Bolivia expelled our ambassador for daring to suggest maybe growing coca for export to the U.S. is a bad thing. [LA Times]
• Putin is threatening to point missiles at Europe if we put missiles in Europe, so Palin's thoughts of war with Russia might not really be that far off. [BBC News]
• Oh, and non-North Korea doctors — possibly even ones the regime didn't kidnap — operated on Kim Jong Il's brain after the stroke he's denying he had. Do Chinese doctors take a Hypocratic Oath? Is there a greater-good thing they could've relied upon? [Boston Globe]

• Daniel Radcliffe tells Details magazine that he lost his virginity at 16 with an older woman! He says the age difference "wasn't ridiculous" but "would freak some people out." What age would freak you out? 21? 31? 41? [Daily Mail]
• Also from Details: "I think part of me would love to play a drag queen, just because it would be an excuse to wear loads of eye makeup." — Daniel Radcliffe. [MSNBC, UPI]
• Joe Francis has had a new assistant since his release from jail in March: She is Holly Montag, Heidi's older sister. Apparently she is running his life. Joe says: "Holly is fantastic, probably the best assistant I have ever had." The Montag family, so classy. [Page Six]
• Holy crap! OK! magazine has a double cover for the first time ever. Democratic on one side, Republican on the other. Obama and Palin are the new Britney and Lindsay. [MSNBC]
• Us Weekly has a Sarah Palin cover too. More on this in a verrrry interesting Midweek Madness. [Us]

• Two men from Malibu have been charged with misdemeanor counts of battery for attacking a paparazzo who was snapping pix of Matthew McConaughey surfing in the Pacific Ocean in June. Officials say the two dudes threw the photog in the water from where he was taking pictures on the beach. They each face up to six months in jail and a $2000 fine. [Reuters]
• Hilary Swank is set to "pack on the pounds" to play the lead in French Women Don't Get Fat, the adaptation of Mireille Guiliano's best-selling book, which Swank is also producing. Even though the book is um, nonfiction, a story is being crafted! Hilary will play the manager of a champagne company dealing with French ladies who eat bread, wine and pastries and never gain an ounce. Fun. Lemme guess: She learns to slow down and enjoy, thereby losing weight? [E!]
• Remember how Josh Brolin and Jeffrey Wright were arrested in Shreveport, Louisiana for allegedly keeping cops from breaking up a bar brawl? Seems like the whole thing is getting swept under the rug. The police department supposedly has tapes of the incident, but they have never been released. Could it be because cops maybe called Wright the N-word and he was hit with a taser? [Radar]
• A friend of Lily Allen's was abducted at gunpoint and held hostage for a week. He's been released and Lily has thanked the police: "We were all terrified and from what I hear you guys did an amazing job." [Daily Express]
• Scene: Lily Allen and Elton John on stage at the GQ Awards. Lily: "And now to the most important part of the night-" Elton: "What? Are you going to have another drink?" Lily: "Fuck off Elton. I am 40 years younger than you and have my whole life ahead of me!" Elton: "I could still snort you under the table." Lily: "Fuck off. I don't know what you are talking about." [The Sun]
• The new movie The Women might suck, despite its secret new age-y message. [Fox 411]
• Cameron Diaz and Paul Sculfor have been all over each other at the US Open. Is it Love? [The Sun]
• Oh, but when Cameron shops, Paul gets bored. [Page Six]
• Blistex polled 3,000 women and Keira Knightley was voted as having the "perfect pout." [The Sun]
• Tiffani Thiessen, who played Valerie on 90210, doesn't seem that into the new 90210. [E!]
• Jon Bon Jovi is teaming up with the State of New Jersey to build homes that will cater to homeless people with special needs, like AIDS patients. Oh, we're halfway there. Oh. Oh! Living on a prayer. [USA Today]
• Wow, haven't heard from this guy in a while: Howard K. Stern is suing the man who used to be Larry Birkhead's bodyguard. And! He also has a $60 million libel suit pending against the company (and woman) that published Blonde Ambition: The Untold Story Behind Anna Nicole Smith's Death. He's not happy about the gay allegations. [Yahoo News]
• Jessica Simpson almost quit singing but Dolly Parton helped her with letters of encouragement, aww. [Yahoo News]
• Some idiot paparazzi was harassing Chris Brown, asking him if he was going to sing with the Jonas Brothers; Chris responded, "No, I'm doing a duet with your mom." [TMZ]
• Heath Ledger's estate has sold his Hollywood Hills home, nicknamed The Treehouse, for $2.5 million. It is unknown if Michelle Williams and Matilda will get part of the money from the sale. [News.com.au]
• Does Hugh Grant have a new 27-year-old ladyfriend? He was seen hanging with former model Catherine Fulmer in The Hamptons recently. Catherine, by the by, was wearing a vest, shorts and no shirt: Toplessness! [The Sun]
• Morrissey has split with his management firm after just three months. Please please please: Let me get what I want this time. [Reuters]
• A poster for Angelina Jolie's film Wanted was banned in the UK because it "glamorizes gun crime" and is "likely to provoke violence." It's the one where she's lying on the hood of a car holding a shotgun. [The First Post]
• Blind item! "Which hip-hop mogul had a hidden video camera installed in a light fixture in his bedroom? He likes to record his sessions with unsuspecting ladies for future replays." [Page Six]
• Blind item! "Which closeted actor who once dated an actress 'beat the hell out of her,' according to her friend?" [Page Six]
• The Library Of Congress will honor Stevie Wonder with the Gershwin Prize for Popular Song. This is only the second time this prize has been awarded: The first was in 2007, to Paul Simon. The award recognizes a musician's lifetime of work and Wonder will receive it on Feb. 23, 2009. Love's In Need Of Love Today, you guys. [AP]
• Rock band Great White, whose pyrotechnics sparked a nightclub fire that killed 100 people in 2003, will play $1 million to survivors and victims' relatives. [Newser, via AP]
• Who is Philip Olivier? He used to be on Hollyoaks or something. It doesn't matter: He is smoking hot. Click here to see. [The Sun]
• "Am I gay? If you want to know the truth, ask the people who go to bed with me." — The late Dusty Springfield, in a 1999 interview. [Page Six]
• "I have auditory hallucinations, I hear voices saying derogatory things, like I'm terrible and I'm going to die, and they're usually worse in the afternoon" — Brian Wilson. [Page Six]
• "I had the hot iron in my hand and he had a handful of my hair. He grabbed the hand with the iron in it and was pushing [it] toward my face. He ended up pressing that hot iron against my other arm. I heard my flesh sizzling, and the smell was sickening. I started screaming from the pain. He dropped the iron and I turned to run, and his nail swiped across my eyeball and shredded my cornea." — Sandy (Pepa) Denton of Salt-n-Pepa, on her abusive boyfriend, a man she calls "Brad." She is celibate now. [Rush & Molloy]

MOE: Yo I am here, barely, at an airport hotel that is not actually an airport hotel, more an airport adjacent hotel located nearby a Westfield Mall, but this is where the JetBlue flyer with the friendly Nationwide Hospitality Inc. operator got me the $69 rate, and my god, I am tired, maybe because here it is five in the morning, but news that New Jersey school officials want to ban Red Bull just reminded me I am no longer in school and therefore should probably go locate myself something containing Guarana.

MEGAN: Doing Crappy Hour from the West Coast sucks balls in a way that no one who hasn't done it can ever understand. But that might be because I consider 5 am a time to strive to stay up until, not an hour to get up at.
MEGAN: If it helps, check out the long cool drink of water in this picture and rejoice that somewhere in the bowels of CNN.com, there is a Jezebel looking out for us.
MOE: Yeah I actually forgot to reset my alarm and so woke up around 3:45, but holy SHIT that picture is ridiculous. The gun is um scary though. Also, Obama's hip is hurting? Isn't that a body part whose inflammation we'd usually associate with John McCain…or his mom? Unless…

MEGAN: Um, I'll just say that sometimes after sex my hips hurt, but I have an old ballet injury to explain that, but if that's why Obama's hurts, well, go Michelle!
MEGAN: In other flotsam, by the way, SF mayor Gavin Newsom got straight-married this weekend... in Montana.
MOE: Yeah I bet the wedding I was at was better. Um before I forget can I just say I am fucking sick of shit like "Caroline Kennedy for VP???!!?" which is the only thing worse than "Chuck Hagel for VP????!!!?" which is to say, "WHY AM I READING THIS GO ON VACATION!!!!??!!!"
MEGAN: Everyone for VP!!!

MEGAN: I mean, McCain's got to pick someone before the Olympics start because no one will be paying attention otherwise, or so goes the meme, but I'll bet Obama's VP will interrupt Olympic coverage.
MOE: And then there's this story. I guess I'll listen to it, because really what better things do we have to do? Discuss the half trillion dollar budget deficit planned for 2009 — that's a record, by the way — or how the Frannie Freddie bailout is supposedly the largest government bailout since the New Deal?? Yeah, didn't think so. Although who knows, it's still early, I could see us getting into that shit.
MEGAN: We could talk about the protests at the Vatican to lift the ban on birth control, too.
MOE: Oh how serendipitous I was thinking of lifting my personal ban on that in response to public sentiment as well. I wonder if someone told the Vatican about me and they were like "oh jesus christ we do not want to be responsible for that person procreating." Seriously though, I don't know if this is going to have much of an impact in the Benedict administration.

MEGAN: I'm going to say... exactly none. The Pope listens to God, not the people of the world OR the AIDS rate in Africa. That's God's plan, or do Catholics not believe in predestination? It's so hard to remember CCD.
MOE: In other news does another fifty pointless deaths indicate violence returned to The Iraq? Petraeus seems to think maybe . Oh, and is Afghanistan a narco-state …I kind of want to actually read that one, because I found myself realizing the other day that I really did not know how Colombia had come to control 90% of the cocaine trade exactly and whether there are other countries with power vacuums and the climate and topographical conditions to get in on that, since heroin is, like, probably not as big a moneymaker.
MEGAN: Hahahaha, "returned" to Iraq. You're such a comic genius. Or else Petraeus is.

MOE: Hey I am going to miss how you actually get it when I am being sarcastic.

MEGAN: Although my dad got up and made me coffee this morning, I have yet to get a chance to get up and drink it because in your honor I read Maureen Dowd. That was painful.
MEGAN: But probably not quite as painful as Barack having to submit to an interview in Paris from La Dowd.

MOE: oh GOD.
MOE: I'm not bothering to blockquote this because there's no way anyone would confuse it for anything I would write and even if you charged me with parodying Dowd I could never come up with Even for Sarkozy the American, who loves everything in our culture from Sylvester Stallone to Gloria Gaynor, it was a wild gush over a new Washington crush.

MEGAN: Or how about this awfulness: Obama kept his cool through a week where he was treated as a cross between the Dalai Lama and Johnny Depp. I mean, in my mind, she says this in a little girl voice even more highly pitched than my own.
MEGAN: OK, also, now I have to ask what the fuck?
MOE: Okay this Afghanistan story is really fucking interesting. Basically, post-September 11 Afghanistan is the one kind of situation where this drug war we've been fighting for the past 20 years really comes in handy, as we learned previously from the story of that narcotics guy who successfully interrogated KSM. But the Pentagon, by some combination of generalized Bush Administration wrongheadedness, generalized Bush Administration ineptitude, generalized turf protection and listening to Hamid Karzai, not only systematically undermined the DEA's mission in the country and everyone involved with the drug war, but the whole idea that heroin was bad at all, which in turn just led to the continued flow of this massive spigot of funding to the Taliban and sundry other evildoers.

MEGAN: Wait, Karzai is pro-heroin? Or just anti doing terribly much about it? Anyway, didn't you know that Mary Jane is the Great Satan of our time? Or is it oxycodone? Or meth? Or can we just ask what it is about modern life that so many people feel the need to alter their consciousness to escape it? Because I know what it is about my life, but I'd sort of be interested to know if I'm unique in that.
MOE:

A lot of intelligence — much of it unclassified and possible to discuss here — indicated that senior Afghan officials were deeply involved in the narcotics trade. Narco-traffickers were buying off hundreds of police chiefs, judges and other officials. Narco-corruption went to the top of the Afghan government. The attorney general, Abdul Jabbar Sabit, a fiery Pashtun who had begun a self-described “jihad against corruption,” told me and other American officials that he had a list of more than 20 senior Afghan officials who were deeply corrupt — some tied to the narcotics trade. He added that President Karzai — also a Pashtun — had directed him, for political reasons, not to prosecute any of these people.

MEGAN: Is there some reason it matters that they're both Pashtun? Also, in an barely-stable government, I can sort of see the reason if he thinks that the narco-corruption isn't one of the destabilizing forces.
MOE: Well the news here is that no only has opium production grown — a UN report says 80% of poppies in the south were planted in the last two years — it is funding the insurgency and making farmers rich and Afghan officials all the way up to Karzai continue to say things like "it's tradition and poverty makes them do it and we don't want you to dust our crops aerially with pesticides because our poor farmers will think it is poison coming from the sky" when such things are demonstrably not true.
MEGAN: Crop dusting didn't really make us — or the Colombian government — a ton of friends when we did it there either but we didn't exactly stop doing it.
MOE: Well we haven't apparently started doing it in Afghanistan. The point is twofold, though. It's not so much that, according to this guy, how do you keep Afghanistan from becoming the Colombia of opiates, but whether you can use what you learned in Colombia to cut off the flow of funds to the insurgency, I think, I am not through yet though. I mean, I guess eventually, as in Colombia, everyone is in the business, on both sides, and then everything is just …really violent until someone like Uribe comes in and decides to grant wholescale amnesty to pretty much anyone who asks.

MOE:

Karzai was playing us like a fiddle: the U.S. would spend billions of dollars on infrastructure improvement; the U.S. and its allies would fight the Taliban; Karzai’s friends could get rich off the drug trade; he could blame the West for his problems; and in 2009 he would be elected to a new term.

MEGAN: Awww, he's like a mini GWB, just with drugs instead of oil!
MOE: Hahaha the chief of the anticorruption commission is a convicted heroin dealer.
MOE: And here's our little microcosm of the whole damn thing:

At the same time, the 101st Airborne arrived in eastern Afghanistan. Its commanders promptly informed Ambassador Wood that they would only permit crop eradication if the State Department paid large cash stipends to the farmers for the value of their opium crop. Payment for eradication, however, is disastrous counternarcotics policy: If you pay cash for poppies, farmers keep the cash and grow poppies again next year for more cash. And farmers who grow less-lucrative crops start growing poppies so that they can get the money, too. Drug experts call this type of offer a “perverse incentive,” and it has never worked anywhere in the world.

Sort of like the drug war has never worked anywhere in the world?

MEGAN:

KarzaiBush was playing us like a fiddle: the U.S. would spend billions of dollars on infrastructure improvement; the U.S. and its allies would fight the Talibanin Iraq; Karzai’sBush's friends could get rich off the drugoil trade; he could blame the Westliberals for hisour problems; and in 20092004 he would be elected to a new term.

MOE: Or Bush could blame the Middle East for his problems?
MEGAN: Hell, that shit doesn't even work in U.S. farm policy. You pay subsidies for wheat, they grow more wheat. You pay subsidies to let marginal lands grow wild, people plant on marginal lands for a year or two to collect the subsidies.
MOE: It would be a more direct counterpart.
MOE: Okay here is something depressing (or heartening?) Check the fucking comments. Some of the stuff that has been "recommended" is basically illiterate.

MOE: Such as

2008 8:35 am
After I saw American Gangster, I knew that the increase in heroin production was no accident. I'm sure the DEA is involved in shipping the drugs back to American cities. It's no wonder we can't see the coffins unloaded at Andrews Airforce Base.
— Jane, Royal Oak, MI
Recommended by 7 Readers

MEGAN: You know, there's a growing debate about whether to allow comments on newspapers' websites for exactly that reason. Like, I know Gawker employs a person (hey, Kaila! your hair is probably lovely today!) whose job it is to weed out the crazies and I've looked in the bin and WHOO boy are there some crazy people out there who write some crazy ass shit. But I guess because newspapers have higher comment volumes, or higher crazy volumes or haven't been able to figure out how to monetize their websites, they can't manage that shit?
MOE: Incidentally that other drug is in the news today too.

MEGAN: OH, speaking of drug wars, I've seen so many freaking meth heads back here. Upstate NY was slow to come to the metholution because of the easy access to good Canadian weed, but I do believe we've finally made it into the 21st century!
MOE: Yesterday I found this old story on Gabriel Garcia Marquez advocating "outlaw American chemists" develop a kind of synthetic cocaine to rival the real deal as a way to combat his own country's addiction to easy money. But um I sort of feel like, that's how we got meth, and meth did not do much good for Colombia.
MEGAN: Or Afghanistan! Meth is for people that can't afford crack, let alone coke, or heroin shipping in for Afghanistan, and who don't mind the side effects like the black teeth and the faster progression to heroin chic and the complete wasted crazy look that horrifies me in a bar to the point where my friend has to remind me to stop staring at the meth head.

"A sad commentary is that when one of these individuals was arrested, they inquired as to whether or not his arrest and incarceration would have an effect on his becoming a federal law enforcement officer," a DEA spokesman said. No shit. Apparently they had connections to a major cartel.

A student majoring in criminal justice was arrested for possession of 500 grams of cocaine and two guns, officials said.

As part of the investigation, officers infiltrated seven campus fraternities. In some fraternities, most of the members were aware of organized drug dealing occuring from the houses by members, officials said.

In one instance, a member of the Theta Chi fraternity sent out a mass text message to his "faithful customers" stating that he and his associates would be in Las Vegas for the weekend and cocaine sales could not be made.

The message said there was a "sale" on cocaine and listed reduced prices.

Yearlong Probe Results In 96 Arrests [San Diego Union-Tribune]

• A fight broke out on the set of Pharrell's new video a few hours before Lindsay Lohan and Samantha Ronson showed up. Oh, and the N.E.R.D. song, "Everybody Nose," is about girls waiting on line for a club bathroom to do coke. [Page Six]
  
• Hey, guess who is making a cameo appearance in that video about cocaine? Your girl Lindsay! Classy. [Perez Hilton]
  
• Contrary to earlier reports, a source says Lindsay's album is on track to be released this fall. [People]
  
• As previously reported, Anne Hathaway's boyfriend, Italian property developer Raffaelo Follieri, was arrested for trying to pass a bad check for $250,000. [People]
  
• Also as previously reported: Naomi Campbell was arrested after a kerfluffle at Heathrow's Terminal 5, after a dispute involving a missing piece of luggage. Since Terminal 5 opened last week, more than 28,000 bags have been separated from their owners. Naomi is out on bail and must report to the police station in late May. [Yahoo News]
  
• There's some new strain of medical marijuana people are calling "Tom Cruise Purple" and guess whose lawyers are investigating? Spoil sport. [Rush & Molloy]

• Are Beyoncé and Jay-Z getting married today? [Mirror]
• It seems like they are! Guests must wear ivory and the location was not on the invitation. [Concrete Loop]
• Madonna's new video, "4 Minutes," is out! Watch Madge and Justin Timberlake undulate and flirt! [People]
• Officials in Malawi are backing Madonna's effort to adopt David Banda, which looks like a go — we'll know when she visits the country next week. [Mirror]
• Prince William and girlfriend Kate Middleton were seen dancing, giggling and kissing at a charity event with a burlesque theme. Is he gonna marry her or what? [People]
• Nicolas Cage has won libel action against the Daily Mail and actress Kathleen Turner over false allegations that he'd been arrested for drunk driving and had stolen a dog. [Guardian]
• George Clooney's request for a writing credit on new film Leatherheads was denied by the Writers Guild, so Clooney has withdrawn from the union. [Reuters]
• "Motherhood has never been an ambition. I don't think like that. I never have expectations like, 'When I'm 19 I'm going to do this, and by the time I've hit 25 I'm going to do that'. I just take things as they come, each day at a time, and if things happen then all well and good." — Renee Zellweger. [ONTD]
• Kate Moss and Agyness Deyn are in a spat, yawn. [Mirror]
• Scott Storch had trouble getting into a club and it made the papers. [Page Six]
• Maya Angelou is turning 80 this weekend, so Oprah is throwing her a huge three-day party in Palm Beach! Perhaps our invitation was lost in the mail? [Page Six]
• Chloe Sevigny collapsed on the way to the Nylon anniversary party she was supposed to be hosting due to a viral infection. [Page Six]
• Mick Jagger wears Nikes with platform soles so he can measure up to his 6 foot 2 girlfriend L'Wren Scott. You make a grown man cry! [Page Six]
• Heather Mills is moving to New York. Sigh. [Gatecrasher]
• Hmm, Yoko Ono is sympathetic to Heather Mills. "It's not very easy for a woman to be associated with The Beatles," Yoko says. [Mirror]
• Shanna Moakler, former Miss USA and ex of Blink 182's Travis Barker, is now datng Jay Grdina, Jenna Jameson's ex. Romantic. [Gatecrasher]
• Blind item! "Which publicist for the wife of one of Hollywood's biggest old school action stars doubles as a rep for her skin-care range? A journalist who recently expressed polite interest in the line was offered the chance to buy some." [Gatecrasher]
• Blind item! "Which proud new papa cheated on his fiancée two years ago with a famous starlet? The two were hanging at a private bash in his apartment when the mood turned a little lustful." [Rush & Molloy]
• Really? More Ashley Dupre Girls Gone Wild photos? So over it. [TMZ]
• 50 Cent's baby mama wants to stay in her $2.4 million Long Island mansion even thought 50 owns the house and they split up years ago. [TMZ]
• Kelly Ripa says she's "so excited" for Kathie Lee Gifford's stint on the Today show. Babe, you're the only one. [People]
• Former ANTM contestant Yaya has been cast on All My Children. Act with your eyes! [ONTD]
• Hulk Hogan is "very happy" with his new girlfriend, Jennifer McDaniel, who is — surprise! — a busty blonde, much like his wife. And daughter. [People]
• During the first week of the Beijing Olympics, Mia Farrow will be in Darfur, protesting China's involvement in that region of Africa. [Yahoo News]
• Kevin Federline has spent $50,489 in Vegas over an eight-month period. Guess who pays his credit card bills? The "Bank Of Britney." [TMZ]
• Britney and her mom went shopping at Ed Hardy for birthday presents for Jamie Lynn — today is JLS's 17th birthday. [People]
• Will Britney return to How I Met Your Mother? [USA Today]
• Survey says: No. [ONTD]

• OMG Bobby Brown's autobiography is going to be sofa king awesome: "I never used cocaine until after I met Whitney. Before then, I had experimented with other drugs, but marijuana was my drug of choice. At one point in my life, I used drugs uncontrollably. I was using everything I could get my hands on, from cocaine to heroin, weed and cooked cocaine." [Page Six]
  
• Madonna donated 100 copes of Vanity Fair to the Kabbalah Centre. You know, the one with her on the cover. Soooo generous. [Page Six]
  
• Beyoncé and Jay-Z: Getting married this Friday??? [Perez Hilton]
  
• Jay-Z is on the verge of a $150 million deal with Live Nation — one of the biggest music contracts ever. Would getting married first mean Beyoncé could be all, what's yours is mine? [Reuters]
  
• Jessica Alba's unborn baby is a girl, and will be named Honor Warren. [Star]

• Jake Gyllenhaal and Reese Witherspoon: On vacay with the kids in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico. Cute! [MSNBC]
• Ed Westwick, aka Gossip Girl's Chuck Bass, has been spotted drunk out on the town again. His publicist must be working overtime to get him in the papers, but he's so damn cute we're falling for it. [Page Six]
• Speaking of GG, Chace Crawford (aka Nate ) has had a rough few weeks after breaking up with Carrie Underwood and being accused of dating JC Chasez. But he's "doing okay," his sister, Miss Missouri, says. You can stop worrying. [People]
• Kevin Federline's lawyer says Britney's dad is doing a great job. There was a situation and that seems to be stabilized. Does that mean she's cured? Of course not." [People]
• Britney's manager, Larry Rudolph, says Britney will make the biggest comeback in history. [ONTD]
• Mariah Carey canceled interviews in London because she's "not a morning person." Viva la diva! [Mirror]
• Amy Winehouse saw a gang of paparazzi camped out on her doorstep in the cold, so she made them tea and brought them cookies. Love. Her. [ Mirror]
• Jerry Seinfeld's brakes failed on Saturday night and his his vintage car flipped over as he was driving in the Hamptons. Jerry walked away unscathed. [People]
• Speaking of the Hamptons, longtime resident Billy Joel's wife, Katie Lee Joel, has a cookbook with a recipe for "Man Loaf" that "instantly makes any guy fall in love." As the kids say, vom. [Page Six]
• "Everybody thinks I'm in the loony bin, but I'm actually in rehab." —Steve-O. [Page Six]
• Brad Pitt has dropped his publicist, Cindy Guagenti, who has repped him since Thelma & Louise. Could it be the influence of Angelina, who has never used a publicist? [Page Six]
• Brad Pitt (with local Springfield, MO businessmen and his brother Doug) has established a new fund to help Springfield public school students who are in poverty: The fund will address hunger, hygiene, and health needs. [KSMU]
• Will Lindsay Lohan's new album get released on time later this year? She's reportedly not being cooperative and canceled important meetings with producer Timbaland. Girl, check yourself before you wreck yourself. [Gatecrasher]
• Katie Couric plagiarized a poem when she was in grammar school and has kept it a secret for 45 years. What other skeletons does she have in her closet? [Gatecrasher]
• Yeah, yeah, Laguna Beach alum Jason Wahler is getting his own VH1 reality show, we know. And we're not looking forward to it. [Gatecrasher]
• Is Brody Jenner involved in that show? Or getting his own? [People]
• Blind item! "Which TV starlet could be the next to have embarrassing naked pix revealed? The racy snaps are a souvenir from her on-again, off-again hookups with a co-star." [Gatecrasher]
• Teri Hatcher will sing on American Idol Gives Back. Consider yourself warned. [Rush & Molloy]
• Kirsten Dunst is redoing the $3 million penthouse in Tribeca, NYC, she bought to live in now hat she's completed six weeks of rehab. Nothing gets booze off your mind like a pricey renovation project! [Rush & Molloy]
• Did UCLA Medical Center employees spy on Farrah Fawcett's files like they did on Britney's? [TMZ]
• Heather Mills was spotted at the airport wearing a black wig as a disguise. WTF. [The Sun]
• The Lord Chief Justice has said people who represent themselves in court — like Heather Mills — just waste the court's time. [Telegraph]
• The mayor of the town in Chile where Daniel Craig is shooting the new Bond movie is leading a protest against the film. The mayor claims that when he drove his car onto the set, Daniel Craig "fled in terror." Bond would never flee! [Daily Mail]
• Kanye West's new travel site is just a "shoddily assembled web 0.5 front-end to house the Travelocity website." [AdAge]
• Elvis Costello hosting a talk show for Sundance Channel? Sounds good. [Reuters]
• Stop me if you think you've heard this one before: Morrissey has won an apology in court from the publishers of Word Magazine, which called him a racist and a hypocrite. [Reuters]
• A judge has dismissed a defamation lawsuit by a businessman chased down the street by Sacha Baron Cohen in the Borat movie. Go away! [USA Today]
• Francis Ford Coppola's new movie is getting a "sex change": Carmen Maura is replacing Javier Bardem in the role of mentor and teacher. [Yahoo News]
• The family of R&B singer Sean Levert wants the FBI too look into his death — he died Sunday night after being strapped into a restraint chair in jail. [Yahoo News]
• Steve Irwin's father has quit working at the Australia Zoo because he was becoming a "disrupting influence." [Sydney Morning Herald]
• See, there's this pesky tax investigation going on involving the Irwins and the Zoo. [News.com.au]
• The Irwins and the Zoo got scammed. [News.com.au]
• "I think legal prostitution is the way to go, given the awful, horrendous traffic in women and the danger of girls being out on the street, so vulnerable to pimps and johns. In a legal brothel, they're licensed, they're protected, and the johns are protected because they know the girls have to be medically checked every week" - Helen Mirren. [Page Six]

So anyway, it seems a lot of women seem to be coping with their eating disorders by replacing them with an alcohol dependency problem. Given all the problems celebrity eating disorders into which seem to evolve — ahem, Amy, Lindsay, Anna Nicole, etc. — I would say this is not such a terrible thing. Eventually they'll all recognize that the starve-drink-purge-large brunch-Gatorade-coffee-cigarette-nap cycle isn't really helping them lose weight so much as it's killing their productivity, and they will start ordering food again like a normal person, at which point they will realize their stomachs are incapable of breaking down anything without the assistance of alcohol.

Yes I am talking about myself. Anyway, this is why I advocate beer, because it kills the fewest brain cells and we need all the brains we can get to avoid going down that whole "eating disorders" road again.

Starving Themselves, Cocktail In Hand [NY Times]
Earlier: If You Drink Six Beers For Dinner, Are You 'Drunkorexic'?

• M-K Olsen is supposedly venturing out of her Salinger-esque hiding to attend the Giambattista Valli show today. [Fashion Week Daily]
  
• Too bad, because also in MK news: she is writing a book! With Ashley, about (what else?!) her inimitable style. We assume this means she'll also go on the road promoting it, as opposed to hiding it away to be unearthed at her death with her bottles of pills and thousands of empty Venti Starbucks cups. [Sassybella]
  
• Meanwhile, Giambattista Valli is a fan of Obama. [Fashion Week Daily]
  
• Erin Fetherston: The movie. Starring Zooey Deschanel and Kirsten Dunst. Based on Romeo & Juliet. We're, er, skeptical. [Nylon]
  
• Designer logos made with cocaine. [NY Mag]

• Kat Von D (of LA Ink fame) is doing a cosmetics line for Sephora, which will be in stores in May. [Sephora's Beauty & the Blog via BellaSugar]
• How did model Gemma Ward prepare for her role in the film The Black Balloon? "I...listened to '90s music (i.e. MC Hammer)." [Chic Report]
• "We got here early because this party is usually messy," Julia Restoin-Roitfeld on the Balenciaga afterparty. Ew. [WWD, 1st item]
• M.I.A is starring alongside Karen O, Joan Jett, Billy Idol and other in the new ad campaign for Converse. But it's cool because Converse is owned by Nike now. [Chic Report]
• What the fuck? Norma Kamali for Wal-Mart?! And it's going to be licensed through Cherokee?! [WWD, sub req'd]
• Oh yay: model Coco Rocha to try acting. [WWD, 3rd item]
• Pepe Jeans wants to be the brand that denim whores run to instead of the so-called "premium" denim brands. [WWD, sub req'd]
• Limited Brands' profits are down by a whopping 11.6% this quarter. That ain't good. [WWD, sub req'd]
• The funnel-neck: It's back. Oy. [WWD, sub req'd]
• Why don't models brush their hair? I assume because they are like me: Lazy. [BellaSugar]
• Oh no: The cold is killing the pashmina goats! [Reuters]

• ANTM cycle 8 winner Jaslene Gonzalez: Now the face of Lot29. What? A Top Model winner actually booked a job after wrapping the show? [WWD, sub req'd]
  
• Yes, still more on model Gemma Ward's film debut in The Black Balloon: Her character's name is Jackie. Jackie helps her boyfriend learn to accept his brother's autism. Also, Ward will be starring in another movie coming out this year, a thriller titled The Strangers which co-stars Liv Tyler. [WWD, 1st item]
  
• The new Versace fragrance is supposed to smell lke Donatella and its bottle is supposed to look like a Versace dress. We assume this means it actually smells like cocaine and cigarettes. [BellaSugar]
  
• Video! Marc Jacobs interviews Jennifer Jason Leigh, still has blue hair. [MySpace]

• More proof that everything is better in Japan: a machine washable suit will be introduced early next year. [USA Today]
• Alyona Akhmadullina, 29, is the biggest up-and-coming designer in Russia. Seeing that fashion is obsessed with all things Russian right now, expect to see her become fetishized and exploited in no time at all! [WWD, sub req'd]
• Three women in Birmingham, England were hospitalized after collapsing while waiting for a store to open after Christmas so they could score the big deals. [BBC]
• A la Karl Lagerfeld for Fendi, Ferragamo is also having a big ol' par-tay in China this year. [WWD, 3rd item]
• The dollar sucks against the pound right now, which means British fashion isn't selling so well stateside. Boo hoo, Stella McCartney. [WWD, sub req'd]
• Britain's Accessory Designer of the Year Tom Binns aspires to make women look trashier. [Vogue UK]
• Ew: Long pointy finger nails scare us. Do not want. [BellaSugar]
• Mazel Tov Karl Lagerfeld: Our favorite Krazy Kraut celebrates his 25th anniversary of designing Chanel in 2008. [Sassybella]
• Memo to all those celebrities shilling fragrances: The fragrance industry's sales are slipping. [WSJ]
• Fuck coffee: Fashion labels are going fair trade, too. [Times of London]
• The late Queen Mum was quite the soothsayer: bitching and moaning over the course of 80 years that fashion was too damn expensive. [Telegraph]