Media-Whore D'Oevres



"NEW York Republicans are not too thrilled at the idea of Sarah Palin as their vice presidential candidate. The other night, private equity firm New Mountain Capital held a debate between James Carville and Karl Rove at Stone Rose in the Time Warner Center. When the moderator asked the 200 Republicans in the room how many were comfortable with Palin becoming president if something were to happen to John McCain, 'only one man raised his hand,' an attendee reports." (NYPost)

"MADONNA’S manic obsession with her body SHATTERED her marriage to Guy Ritchie, the News of the World can reveal. As their relationship went into meltdown the musclebound singer insisted on sticking to her strict FOUR-HOUR daily exercise regime DESPITE Guy’s pleas they should spend more time together. It meant the film director went 18 MONTHS without having sex with his wife." (Newsoftheworld)

"Marital mudflinging has become the new bloodsport in gossip, and I've booked myself a front row seat, kids. I've been loving the Madonna-Guy cross accusations, even though they tend to have a 'duh' feeling to them. ("He's emotionally retarded"; 'She's obsessed with her image'--DUH! This is even less shocking than the divorce itself.)The stuff that leaked from Guy's camp into yesterday's Post--that Madonna works out half the day, was too tired to have sex for 18 months, regularly slathers herself with expensive anti-aging creams, and sleeps in a plastic bag--may have been the best read since Madonna's brother's book, but it was hardly eye opening. It was everything we expect of Madonna!" (Musto)

"Mathematically, Obama can probably win the election without winning (NC, Va, In) — or Nevada or Montana or any of the other conservative states where he has campaigned in the past several months. What he probably can’t do, if he doesn’t convert enough voters to throw at least a few traditionally red states into the blue column, is get beyond what he dismissively refers to as the '50-plus-1' governing model, the idea that a president need only represent 50 percent of the country (plus 1 additional vote) to command the office. From the start, Obama has aspired not simply to win but also to stand as a kind of generational break from the polarized era of the boomers, to become the first president in at least 20 years to claim anything more than the most fragile mandate for his agenda. Absent that, even if he wins, Obama could wake up on Nov. 5 as yet another president-elect of half the people, perched uncomfortably on the edge of an impassable cultural divide." (NYTimes)

"So, yes, Obama will probably win the election two weeks down the road. But just to be contrarian (since it’s Monday) I asked Tom Edmonds, a prominent Republican media consultant, if he thought McCain had any chance of winning. He wasn’t exactly optimistic, but here’s why he thinks McCain isn’t dead yet. 'The states that will make the difference—Virginia, North Carolina, West Virginia, Ohio and Florida—are all pretty close. (We’re going to know the winner early this time because the key states are mostly in the East). It’s not that the polls are wrong exactly, but there are two problems: they are undercounting Republicans as a percentage of voters and they are overestimating the youth vote.'" (Harpers)

"NBC Universal chief Jeff Zucker told staffers in a memo Friday that the company will be cutting spending by $500 million next year. According to the memo, that figure equals about 3% of the company’s budget. 'We are living in a time of unprecedented economic challenges, and it is increasingly clear that the worldwide economic slowdown will continue well into next year,' Zucker wrote. 'As we have been working on our budgets and planning for 2009, it has become evident that the decline in consumer confidence and spending will impact our operations.' The internal announcement comes on the heels of NBC Universal showing a 10% bump in third-quarter profits. A source close to the network pointed out that the move positions the company to not only handle the current economic slowdown, but potentially be better positioned on the other side to avoid further cutbacks." (B&C)

"I am in Florida today for events in Fort Lauderdale and West Palm Beach, before joining Senator Obama to campaign together in Orlando." (Hillary Clinton/Twitter)

"...I went over to the Plaza where the World Monuments Fund was having its annual gala .. Over the past 20 years, they’ve given their Hadrian Award to an impressive array of prominent people such as David Rockefeller, The Aga Khan, Lord Rothschild, Marella and Giovanni Agnelli, Brooke Astor, The Prince of Wales, Paul Mellon, Carlos Slim, the Maharajah of Jodhpur and the Koc family of Istanabul, to name only half .. Thursday night the award was presented to Houghton, Doreen and Graeme Freeman whose Freeman Foundation is the largest contributor to the World Monuments Fund’s projects in East Asia. I’d never heard of the Freemans before. Or the Freeman Foundation (although I knew that it was only because there was something and someone I did not know). It was also interesting that the man who spoke of them and their philanthropic work and introduced them at the dinner was Maurice ('Hank') Greenberg, the former head and creative force between AIG. A man of the moment. This moment. Mr. Greenberg’s presence caught everyone’s ear." (NYSocialDiary)