[Copenhagen, December 8. Image via Getty]

A girl stretches up to the top of a globe to point out Denmark while her friend giggles at an art installation entitled 'Cool Globes', an exhibition about combating global warming and climate change in Kongens Nytorv in Copenhagen on December 8, 2009. The Copenhagen summit, COP15, opened Monday involving 192 countries attending talks, including about 100 leaders to discuss emissions cuts and financial measures to combat climate change. AFP PHOTO/ Adrian Dennis (Photo credit should read ADRIAN DENNIS/AFP/Getty Images)

In an "explanatory note" on the text, Levitt and Dubner admit (in somewhat disingenuous "we're-so-bad" fashion) that their previous book, Freakonomics, lacked "a unifying theme." Superfreakonomics sort of has one — the authors write in the introduction that "it seems to be part of the human condition to believe in our own predictive abilities — and, just as well, to quickly forget how bad our predictions turned out to be." Their aim is to provide a lighthearted and eclectic corrective to this stodgy short-sightedness — a challenge to the status quo, complete with jokes.

Some of their revelations are quite interesting. Particularly timely in light of the recent horror in Richmond is their takedown of the standard view of the Kitty Genovese story. Genovese's death has become a symbol of the apathy of Americans — and New Yorkers in particular — in the face of suffering. A New York Times account of the event famously began, "for more than half an hour 38 respectable, law-abiding citizens in Queens watched a killer stalk and stab a woman in three separate attacks in Kew Gardens. [...] Not one person telephoned the police during the assault; one witness called after the woman was dead." In fact, the number of witnesses was more like six, and one of them may have called the police in time to save Genovese — but they were slow to respond because they thought it was a domestic violence call. As Levitt and Dubner frame it, the Genovese story is less about uncaring bystanders and more about incompetent police and sensationalizing reporters. They roll this information together with a critique of modern altruism research to form a convincing argument that people at large are neither as evil nor as good as they're sometimes made out to be.

Levitt and Dubner are less enlightening on the subject of women in the workplace. We've already critiqued their discussion of prostitutes, but a drop in hookers' relative wages isn't the only social development they try to pin on "the feminist revolution." The other is the decline in the quality of schools, which they blame on women's entry into high-paying professions that had previously been closed to them, like medicine and law. Levitt and Dubner write,

As a consequence, the schoolteacher corps began to experience a brain drain. In 1960, about 40 percent of female teachers scored in the top quintile of IQ and other aptitude tests, with only 8 percent in the bottom. Twenty years later, fewer than half as many were in the top quintile, more than twice as many in the bottom. It hardly helped that teachers' wages were falling significantly in relation to those of other jobs. "The quality of teachers has been declining for decades," the chancellor of New York City's public schools declared in 2000, "and no one wants to talk about it."

The authors don't suggest that we turn back the clock on feminism in order to benefit schoolchildren, but they do question whether women have really profited from their increased opportunities. They mention the wage gap, then contend that because women take fewer finance classes and more "career interruptions" than men, they are actually choosing their lower wages. Levitt and Dubner write, "while gender discrimination may be a minor contributor to the male-female wage differential, it is desire — or lack thereof — that accounts for most of the wage gap." It's hardly a new argument, and their question, "could it be that men have a weakness for money just as women have a weakness for children?" isn't particularly groundbreaking. They don't explain why women should bear the full responsibility for educating schoolchildren, or how districts might make teaching more competitive with other professions. By bookending their discussion of women's work with talk about working girls, Levitt and Dubner try to make their arguments sound hip and different — but really, blaming women not only for their own lower wages but also for the problems of society is pretty darn conventional.

Then there's Levitt and Dubner's discussion of global warming. This part of the book has gotten a lot of media play — Levitt talked about it on The Daily Show — and it's likely to be the most controversial. To be clear, the authors don't argue that global warming doesn't exist — they just don't think we need to cut back on fossil fuels in order to stop it. Rather, they champion a series of cool-sounding inventions like a hose that would squirt sulfur dioxide into the stratosphere, blotting out just enough light to cool the earth. These plans sound interesting, and it's not clear whether the scientific and environmental communities are considering them seriously. Part of this lack of clarity may have to do with the fact that Levitt and Dubner portray Al Gore and everyone else who believes in carbon reduction as at best a bunch of stick-in-the-muds and at worst a cult. They write,

[T]he movement to stop global warming has taken on the feel of a religion. The core belief is that humankind inherited a pristine Eden, has sinned greatly by polluting it, and now must suffer lest we all perish in a fiery apocalypse.

In response to ideas like the sulfur dioxide hose, Levitt and Dubner quote Al Gore as saying, "I think it's nuts." It's unclear if that's all he had to say, or if he perhaps had an inkling that he was about to be portrayed as the "patron saint" of a misguided religion and decided to clam up. Whatever the case, it's hard to evaluate the "geoengineering" ideas the authors present because the larger scientific community doesn't get to have a say. The authors have a stake in appearing contrarian and cool, and they don't give much space to the lame-os who might disagree with them.

Levitt and Dubner write in their introduction that "we're trying to start a conversation, not have the last word." If their book really does spark a discussion about creative ways to reverse global warming — or to improve schools, for that matter — that will be all to the good. Unfortunately, right now Superfreakonomics looks like that very dangerous thing, a little bit of knowledge. Casual readers may pick it up, find out that women don't want higher wages and that a special hose will save the world, and assume that neither social nor environmental change is necessary. Because as much as Levitt and Dubner portray themselves as upstarts, many of their ideas just give people permission to behave as they always have. And as much as they claim to want to open a dialogue, they don't really give the other side its say.

SuperFreakonomics: Global Cooling, Patriotic Prostitutes, And Why Suicide Bombers Should Buy Life Insurance [Amazon]

[Barcelona, November 2. Image via Getty]

Environmental group World Wildlife Fund (WWF) activist performs for a protest during a UN conference in Barcelona on November 2, 2009. Representatives of some 180 countries kick off five days of climate talks today, the last UN session before a December conference in Copenhagen tasked with beating back the planetary threat of global warming. AFP PHOTO/JOSEP LAGO (Photo credit should read JOSEP LAGO/AFP/Getty Images)

[Brussels, October 29. Image via Getty]

ActionAid activists displays a banner prior to a European Union summit near the European Council headquarters on October 29, 2009 in Brussels. Europe's leaders grapple with deadlock on how to fight global warming and the legacy of recession, all the while jockeying for control of arguably the biggest appointment in Brussels' history. AFP PHOTO / GEORGES GOBET (Photo credit should read GEORGES GOBET/AFP/Getty Images)

[Sydney, September 23. Images via Getty]

SYDNEY, AUSTRALIA - SEPTEMBER 23: A women is seen walking her dog under the Sydney Harbour Bridge on September 23, 2009 in Sydney, Australia. Severe wind storms in the west of New South Wales have blown a dust cloud that has engulfed Sydney and surrounding areas. (Photo by Stuart Hannagan/Getty Images)

A woman takes a photograph as the Sydney Opera House (C) is shrouded in an eerie blanket of dust on September 23, 2009. Sydney's cars and buildings turned orange as strong winds blew desert dust across the city, snarling commuter and air transport and prompting a warning for children and the elderly to stay indoors. AFP PHOTO / Greg WOOD (Photo credit should read GREG WOOD/AFP/Getty Images)

• An online divorce company has been stopped from offering its services in Washington after the state attorney general found that it was offering paralegal services without the oversight of a state-licensed lawyer. • Interstitial cystitis or "painful bladder syndrome," a condition that mostly affects women, may be caused when a person's colon is irritated by spicy food. • Male-to-male sexual contact transmissions represent 72% of new infections of HIV in males while 61% of new female infections occurred in black women. • Former Playboy centerfold Candace Collins Jordan has jumped on the blogging train. • Gina Gershon as Sarah Palin: "I think global warming is P.S.: polar bear shit. Everyday I open my door in Anchorage and it is freezing. End of experiment." • A dog named Scooby was the first dog to testify in French court after a veterinarian suggested he take the stand to see how he reacted to the suspect of Scooby's owner's death. • Uh, hey Cambridge University researchers? We don't need you guys to conduct a survey to tell us that Americans' personalities vary from region-to-region. We already know that. • A Massachusetts firefighter revived a kitty that he saved from a burning apartment on Tuesday via mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. • New research shows that parents can pass on a form of herpes that is responsible for roseola (and possibly neurological disorders) to their children via their DNA. • A new report found that approximately 18% of women between the ages of 18 to 24 have experienced forced sexual intercourse (which the study defines as intercourse via verbal or physical pressure, or being physically held down) at least once in their lives. • The highest paid woman in corporate America? Margaret C. Whitman, a Special Advisor to eBay who makes (deep breath) $120,427,360 a year. • A father and daughter were ordained together as Presbyterian ministers in western Pennsylvania. The father was inspired to enter seminary after his daughter joined up. • Germany's national advertising council has admonished a butcher for using "degrading and highly misogynistic" ads that had naked women with "Meat Products, Fresh Service" stamped on their bodies. Me thinks the butcher needs to read some Carol J. Adams. • An Italian mugger got more than he bargained for when he attempted to rob a woman who turned out to be a female Italian karate champion. • A professor of psychology and "skilled illusionist" in England has conducted a study that says that children's self-esteem and confidence increases when they are taught magic tricks. • Amira Sa'id, a professional belly dancer, has gained some sci-fi nerd success by performing in a Princess Leia gold bikini at Star Wars conventions. • A new biography of Hugh Hefner titled Mr. Playboy: Hugh Hefner and the American Dream asserts that Hefner and Playboy became a symbol of "women's freedom to make choices." •

• Nancy Pelosi said aloud today what everyone knows implicitly and no one ever acknowledges: when the right-wingers talk about "San Francisco values," they're condemning San Franciscans for not spitting on the LGBT community with a wink and a nod. Tolerance is so for liberals. [HuffPo]
• Speaking of the intolerance of the right, an inspector general's report has unsurprisingly concluded that Monica Goodling and Kyle Sampson inappropriately used political considerations when hiring at the Justice Department. Goodling asked interviewees what they liked most about Bush, what their stances on abortion were and, in one case, refused to renew a prosecutor's appointment believing him to be gay or at least, very metrosexual. Hey, it was 2006, that phrase was still acceptable! [Washington Post]

• Not to dwell on Bushies, but, um, one of them called the Iraq War "fucking stupid." He helped design a counterinsurgency strategy that relied on more than boots on the ground that we've partially ignored, but he is an Aussie after all. That accent doesn't translate well into "Texan." [Washington Independent]
• What translates a little easier is a McCain adviser promising conservatives that McCain won't really push a greenhouse gas plan because candidates always promise stuff they won't deliver on. Here's hoping he says that about McCain, oh, another couple of hundred times between now and November. [Think Progress]
• Hillary Clinton's totally hitting the trail for Obama once she gets done catching up in the Senate, Terry McAuliffe swears. And he's, like, totally reliable. [CNN]
• John McCain had another mole removed today, which reminds us to always wear sunscreen and that John McCain is really old. [CNN, John McCain Is Really Old]
• Obama is reportedly seriously vetting Virginia Governor Tim "not Mc" Kaine for the VP slot, but Tim just makes us wonder what is up with the eyebrows of Virginia's past 3 governors. They're really bushy and strange. It is becoming a great way to handicap the Governor's race down there, though. [Washington Post]

MOE: So today Obama is a country club snob who sips a martini and alternately peddles a fruitcake version of the Constitution and makes snide comments about passersby while ignoring the beautiful date he brought for some new chick from out of town…ummmm is the whole campaign going to be this incomprehensible a tantrum? Why don't they go after the fact that his Christian outreach program consists of hosting things called "American Values House Parties"? That could at least make for some fun photoshop work.

MEGAN: Also, he wants to be President soooo bad, he's made up his own seal. But, to answer the question, yes, I think for the foreseeable future the campaign will just be one incomprehensible temper tantrum.
MOE: Do you think Karl Rove is trying to evoke a sort of Greg Germann image re Obama? Because Karl, I know you don't need me to tell you this, but it would be a lot easier to just play to the whole "latent racism" thing. But not nearly as fun!
MEGAN: People say they want clean campaigns, but they only pay attention and change their minds when it gets dirty, so it'll get dirty. Plus, you know, you've got pissed off PUMAs and the media is all sad that their golden boy refused to take public financing and so it's their disappointment that drives the coverage right now because they are literally 90% of the total population of people that understand what public financing is on a basic level and what it means that he didn't take it (and they're probably still mad that 99% of their viewers/readers didn't give a fuck about it).
MOE: oh my Goddd just when you thought David Brooks was sticking to his meds…

MEGAN: Whoa:

Every personal trait that led Bush to make a hash of the first years of the war led him to make a successful decision when it came to this crucial call [to have a surge]

I don't think that qualifies as "off his meds" as much as "on hard drugs this time."
MOE:

Bush is a stubborn man. Well, without that stubbornness, that unwillingness to accept defeat on his watch, he never would have bucked the opposition to the surge.
Bush is an outrageously self-confident man. Well, without that self-confidence he never would have overruled his generals. Bush is also a secretive man who listens too much to Dick Cheney. Well, the uncomfortable fact is that Cheney played an essential role in promoting the surge. Many of the people who are dubbed bad guys actually got this one right.

Ha ha, yes, dubbed. Oh for the rest of the world to be so attuned to the selflessness and idealism at the core of all Dick Cheney's actions.
MEGAN: Dick Cheney's just a peach! He knows what he's doing!
MOE: Anyway, I must confess, I think of stability in Iraq right now and I think not necessarily "failed state" or "fragile state" but honor killings and virginity checkups and the like. In that vein I don't think of coal consumption and "a distinctly American problem, as opposed to that of oil" automatically but according to this guy, James Hansen, I should. Do you sometimes wish all these nebulous global warming based arguments for minimizing waste and reducing consumption would do like the ice caps and wash away to reveal to Americans the secret reason everyone's trying to get them to stop driving Hummers and living in exurbs and swilling bottled water and gorging on high fructose nuggets of deforestation and animal cruelty which is to say IT'S JUST BETTER FOR EVERYONE THAT WAY??

MEGAN: Oh, I meant to tell you, HuffPo went out and couldn't find a single economist — not even a right wing shill — that would say that McCain's drilling plan would lower oil prices in the short-medium term?
MOE: Oh but to get to a point I was trying to make earlier coal is burned widely in China and I wouldn't call it "counterintuitive" to want to put an end to that. And yeah if the fucking Fox News booker couldn't find one I don't know how they were supposed to.
MEGAN: Two-thirds of our energy in this country comes from burning coal, and although the coal we burn is of high quality (and thus less environmentally unfriendly in terms of SOx emissions, if I recall correctly) than the higher-sulfur coal which is burned in China, it still ain't good. Someone on MSNBC yesterday, I wasn't looking at the TV so I didn't see who, said that we should try to become the Saudi Arabia of coal. I thought it was a bad talking point.

MOE: Did you read all the latest on our boychik Efraim Diveroli and the ambassador and the coverrup etc.

The day after the November meeting, the embassy’s regional security officer, Patrick Leonard, wrote an assistant an e-mail message obtained by the committee: “NY Times just arrived today and might be doing a story on this and it might get ugly. Ambassador is very concerned about the case.”
When The Times published its article on March 27, it was quickly forwarded to embassy officials. In an e-mail message to several embassy officials, Mr. Leonard said that the article focused on the arms company’s dealings. “No mention of Embassy involvement — thank God!”

MEGAN: HA! Wow, dude, way to remember that email is forever.
MEGAN: I guess Efraim wasn't the only dumb one in that conspiracy.
MOE: Also: I don't know dick about dick, but HOWWWW again does the expanding influence of an Iranian-backed Shiite cleric who, by the way, isn't opposed to exploding his fellow Shiites by the dozen for the sake of stirring up hostility towards Sunnis = the troop surge is a success? Seriously, Megan? You know me, I don't know much about this stuff, and I never really did trust that David Brooks since he made up all those facts about how you couldn't find a $20 dinner in Franklin County etc., but seriously…
MEGAN: OMG THAT IS THE SAME DAVID BROOKS?
MOE: Um, earth to Megan??
MEGAN: My friend gave me that book for Christmas like 7, 8 years ago and it was soooo annoying I never read it.

MEGAN: Ok, sorry. Wow, that guy's more of an idiot than I thought.
MOE: Yeah the only good thing Brooks ever did to my recollection was this Slate "Breakfast Table" with Thomas Frank that I will dredge up sometime for old time's sake. We could role-play it on Crappy Hour, in fact, but I get to be Tom.
MEGAN: Man, why do I have to be the stupid one?
MOE: David Brooks wasn't as stupid then, maybe he was taking Adderall who knows.
MEGAN: I don't know, that book sort of made me want to gouge my eyes out (sorry, Ed).
MOE: But no on second thought I'd rather be Brooks because I think his writing style would be easier and more fun to emulate. I just have a hardon for Frank.
MOE: Bobos in Paradise?
MEGAN: Yes, it's literally sitting on my bookshelf right now, staring at me.

MEGAN: Ok, the back cover quotes are like a rogue's gallery: Christopher Buckley declares "The self-loathing yuppie is dead," which, obviously not because Brooks kept writing after this.
MOE: Oh shit, so this girl: just about plain looking enough that…okay but seriously dude, what's up with the jacket? Also, who fucking holds hands? Ah the mystery of that particular specimen of humanity. Which reminds me did you read that New York Magazine piece on how Bill Clinton's speeches were actually written on a more elementary reading level than Bush's? Well that wasn't what it was about exactly obviously it was about Obama but you get what I'm saying.

MEGAN: Aw, I hold hands. I like holding hands sometimes. It's better than talking sometimes, and you know I love talking.
MEGAN: The thing that's amazing about Bill Clinton is his ability to take a speech, like, 10 minutes before he gets it, read it, and then give it with the right tone and everything that it sounds like he just wrote it, but perfectly. I guess it would make a kind of sense that it would be relatively easy language, etc, because most people don't like when you use big words.
MOE: Haha Reagan didn't know the names of many of his speechwriters.... Poor Peggy and her XXXes... did you ever read how she never really got to say goodbye to Reagan in Political Fictions?? It's heartwrenching really. And speaking of …speaking, you ever read this presidential speech? I read it after reading a particularly impressive TR introduction to this book on, of all things, the Mongols. Right now however I'm a little too hungover to parse.
MOE: Oh shit, segue but Charlie Crist: comes off rather well in this Deborah Solomon interview, but why does he look like he raided Tim Russert's closet before the photoshoot?

MOE: Wait, that
MEGAN: Hrm, it seems like we might have wanted to pay attention to this part a little more carefully:

The leaders of thought and of action grope their way forward to a new life, realizing, sometimes dimly, sometimes clear-sightedly, that the life of material gain, whether for a nation or an individual, is of value only as a foundation, only as there is added to it the uplift that comes from devotion to loftier ideals.

MOE: Ah the beautiful and the lofty. Gotta bring back the lofty.
MEGAN: Well, we could just start by having some ideals, that would be good too.

MOE: Anyway The Man in The Arena was quoted by Richard Nixon in his resignation speech. Nixon who ushered in the end of the Meaningful Speech when he formally separated his speechwriting department from his policy analysis department, which sort of begs the question which department wrote his resignation but that, folks, doesn't appear to be on Wikipedia. Oh and Barack Obama referenced Man in the Arena when he brushed that dirt off his shoulder…

MEGAN: Well, speeches aren't about policy, they're about PR. That everyone before Nixon didn't know that was just their loss.
MOE: Well the point of the story was that style and substance are distinguished from one another to an unproductive degree these days in the political arena, which I would argue is actually the opposite of true these days, it's more like style is differentiated from "substance-esque style", but anyway sometimes a speech is just about sticking it to the haters and this is pretty awesome.

MOE: .

Shame on the man of cultivated taste who permits refinement to develop into fastidiousness that unfits him for doing the rough work of a workaday world. Among the free peoples who govern themselves there is but a small field of usefulness open for the men of cloistered life who shrink from contact with their fellows. Still less room is there for those who deride of slight what is done by those who actually bear the brunt of the day; nor yet for those others who always profess that they would like to take action, if only the conditions of life were not exactly what they actually are. The man who does nothing cuts the same sordid figure in the pages of history, whether he be a cynic, or fop, or voluptuary.

MOE: Of course this speech is just one long scathing critique of the critics so maybe not that much has changed except that I didn't know "voluptuary" was a word.
MEGAN: Dude, and now I know why voluptuous is sort of insulting: "a person whose life is devoted to the pursuit and enjoyment of luxury and sensual pleasure." is the definition of that! So, like, if I've got curves, then it's all about luxury and sensual pleasure? Dammit, where's my luxury? Where's my sensual pleasure?
MOE: I sense a POST coming on!!! Dude, here's a good paragraph from that New York Mag story
MOE:

M
y relationship to Obama has been a complex cycle of enthusiasm canceled immediately by self-correcting cynical objections, canceled by self-correcting enthusiasm, canceled again by the cynicism, canceled by the enthusiasm. Is he really this good, I wonder constantly, or do we just need him to be? The speech that finally tipped my inner scale decisively toward belief was his least decorative: no refrain, little alliteration, no audience exploding at shouted catchphrases—just the man himself standing there solemnly, neutralizing the hysteria of a potentially career-killing scandal with the naked power of grown-up thought. With his race speech, Obama chose the riskiest path in American politics: to be conspicuously thoughtful. It would have been like Clinton, in 1998, giving a long contextualizing address to the nation about human sexuality, the international status of adultery, etc. It was one of the most encouraging political moments I’ve ever experienced.

MOE: OK now I really have to figure out what picture to use
MEGAN: Enjoy!

• For those of you who don't recognize the people Obama is embracing, that's Debbie Dingell to the left and Senator Carl Levin to the right. They were two of the four Michiganders who led the fight to get Michigan's full delegate seated at the convention. [Kalamazoo Gazette]
• Which is a roundabout way of illustrating that Democrats are all kissing and making up and coming to the fold and John McCain may be feeling lonely without the ladies he was expecting to come over. [LA Times]
• Except for with Joe Lieberman, he's really pissing the Dems off. He might speak at the Republican convention, by the way, a la Zell Miller. [HuffPo]
• Obama confirmed the month-long rumors today that Patti Solis Doyle, Clinton's former campaign manager, will be joining his campaign. That's gonna be interesting. [Fox News]
• Gore endorsing Obama? Prolly gonna be less exciting unless he shows up with pictures of Manbearpig. Why won't anyone take him serially? [Washington Post]

• In more interesting news, many people are using the web to learn things about the candidates! You know, like, instead of just getting it from the news. [Washington Post]
• Unfortunately, John McCain is not one of those people. He doesn't even know what his own climate change bill is about. [Gristmill]
• And he didn't use it to find out that he was about to hold a fundraiser with a guy who suggested rape victims "lie back and enjoy it" if it's inevitable. Of course, everyone else did. [CNN]

Gore's win marks the second in a change of strategy for the Peace Prize people whereby they stop taking "peace" so goddamn literally and focus on people who are trying to create change that may actually be possible, like getting Americans to buy slightly more expensive light bulbs. But will it mark the end of all the obnoxious dudes I know still trying to convince me that climate change is not happening as a result of greenhouse gases; Gore's got it all wrong, etc.? Also, will it actually get people to start changing their light bulbs? And if those light bulbs save so much energy can't the country just make a law and ban the old ones already? Would that really lead us any further down the slippery slope towards totalitarianism?

Gore, UN Body Win Nobel Peace Prize [Washington Post]

• Oprah's golden retriever Gracie died in May after an unfortunate choking incident and still Oprah is talking about it, only now she's putting that Oprah-branded spin on it saying that Gracie's death was really a hidden message that she needed to slow down and take more time to appreciate her own life. Seriously, we don't even have a response to this. [USA Today]
  
• Oh yes: That's what's missing in the EU — machismo! [BBC]
  
• Memo to People magazine: Please do not ever ever put that Jenny McCarthy eats nachos as an item under the tag "breaking news". Ever. [People.com]
  
• Not shocking: Republicans don't want to pull out (from Iraq). But they don't want to give a Plan B either. Draw your own conclusions from this heavy-handed metaphor. [CNN]

• The Island of Britain, scientists have discovered, was created over 200,000 years ago by massive flooding. We think that's just past the timeline for which Al Gore can drop one of his global warming "I told you so!'s." [BBC]
• President Bush has called for the establishment of a new panel to review new safety precautions for imported foods. He says this is totally not all about China. Even a novice in Bush-speak knows that "no" always means "yes," so sorry, China, Bushie has it in for you! [CNN]
• Anyone else skeptical that North Korea seems to be volunteering for nuclear disarmament a little too easily? [NYT]
• Breaking news! Hootie and the Blowfish have delayed the start of their summer tour! Wait a second — Hootie and the Blowfish are still around? How the fuck is that possible? [USA Today]
• 1 U.S. casualty identified. [DoD]

• The Sopranos is coming to an end, but the Valentino drama continues. Private equity firm Permira struck a deal over the weekend with the Marzotto family to buy the family's remaining shares in the fashion house. But what to do with the 20% of shares held by Antonio Favrin, a member of the Marzottos rival family? We hear James Gandolfini may be looking for work...[WWD]
  
• Breaking news! English model Agyness Deyn's real name is... Laura Hollins. Christ. [Fashionista]
  
• What did the two women vying for England's Labour Party's deputy leadership debate to prove their worth for the position? The cost of their handbags, of course. [Telegraph]
  
• Versace is shifting its focus away from casino-casual clothing and towards the more-profitable gold-leaf, Medusa-head trashcan arena (also known as "home and lifestyle.") [WSJ]

• Forget climate change: The most threatening environmental force right now might be English socialites' love of luxury goods. [Guardian]
• More conflict in the Middle East: Gulf state private equity firms are jockeying to acquire luxury department store chain Barney's New York. [WWD, sub req'd]
• Today in high-low collaborations you can't possibly still be interested in hearing about: Alice + Olivia, Payless Shoes. [WWD, sub req'd]

• These Balenciaga heels are kind of ridiculous. And we kind of love them. [FabSugar]
• This week's Vogue best-dressed list is its best in weeks. Except, of course, for Chloe Sevigny's atrocious green floral Ungaro dress. [Style.com]
• Global warming means that Burberry is in, North Face is out. [WWD]
• Useless item: Penelope Cruz slutted all over Barneys New York the other day. Useless question: Did she swallow? [WWD, 3rd item]

• The reason that Jennifer Hudson looked so atrocious at the Oscars is that she's not an emaciated Russian model. [LATimes]
• Rock star. Movie actress. Fashion interns. Naughtiness. Discuss. [Fashionista]