Mwedia-Whore D'Oeuvres

"Pope Francis said in the first peace message of his pontificate that huge salaries and bonuses are symptoms of an economy based on greed and inequality and called again for nations to narrow the wealth gap. In his message for the Roman Catholic Church's World Day of Peace, marked around the world on January 1, he also called for sharing of wealth and for nations to shrink the gap between rich and poor, more of whom are getting only 'crumbs'. 'The grave financial and economic crises of the present time ... have pushed man to seek satisfaction, happiness and security in consumption and earnings out of all proportion to the principles of a sound economy,' he said. 'The succession of economic crises should lead to a timely rethinking of our models of economic development and to a change in lifestyles,' he said. Francis, who was named Time magazine's Person of the Year on Wednesday, has urged his own Church to be more fair, frugal and less pompous and to be closer to the poor and suffering. His message will be sent to national leaders, international organizations such as the United Nations, and NGO's. Titled 'Fraternity, the Foundation and Pathway to Peace', the message also attacked injustice, human trafficking, organized crime and the weapons trade as obstacles to peace. Anger at multi-million payouts for executives has swept across the globe as the economic crisis has deepened and the gap between the super-rich and the poor has widened.
But last month, Swiss voters rejected a proposal to cap the salaries of top executives at 12 times that of a company's lowest wage, heeding warnings from industry leaders that the measure could harm the country's economy." (Reuters)

"'When the cop stopped me, I had cocaine all over the car,' my friend 'V' told me. 'He took one look at me and said, ‘Clean yourself up, and I don’t ever want to see you again.’' He let me go, and I never took cocaine again, my friend said. V tried calling up the police station of that time, but they said no officer of that name worked there. He called all the surrounding police stations and the state police, and nobody by that name worked anywhere. He was an angel. 'Uh-huh,' I said. I was nodding to anything. I was advising my friend on how to sell his company, a mental health institution that catered to the needs of kids who were drug addicts. He was the founder and CEO. Someone had recently offered him $10 million for his company. I told him to turn it down. I thought he could make a lot more. 'Look at this,' he told me. He showed me his favorite porn site. He gave me the password.
If anyone sits in this chair in the mornings, it’s always sticky, he said. He laughed. Life was good for him. He was going to make a lot of money." (Observer)

"Early winter cold out there on the streets of New York yesterday. Getting colder, very heavy traffic everywhere. You can feel the energy of the upcoming holiday. Wednesday it was Michael’s and there was that energy I’m referring too. I was having lunch with my friend Dr. Cheryl Karcher who is also my dermo with Sadick Dermatology at 911 Park. I don’t go to her for cosmetic procedures, in case you’re wondering; although I’m sure there are a lot of men who do. I go to her when I’m wondering about that spot on the back of my shoulder or wherever, and is it ...? So far it’s been what she calls a barnacle. (Age.) However, I planned to ask Cheryl about her business because I know so many women who get cosmetic touchups fairly frequently. It’s phenomenal to me but ordinary, every day to a lot of people.  I was at dinner a couple of weeks ago seated next to a woman I’ve known since the Sixties. I reminded her of this fact, and then, looking at her, suddenly I added: 'You look exactly the same!' She smiled and said, 'Yes. Botox.'  My friend started to laugh; it was true. I was surprised. We went on to more important subjects but it was interesting because she looked great." (NYSocialDiary)

"As devoted as we are to covering the Fellini-esque scene that is Wednesdays at Michael’s, we do occasionally break tradition and report the news from 55th and Fifth on other days of the week when we’re invited to especially dishy lunches with A-listers. Monday’s head-spinning gathering of the 'Cosmo 100' hosted by the hotter-than-hot editrix Joanna Coles more than fit the bill. Boasting one of the year’s most impressive guest lists, the estrogen-fueled confab now in its second year, brilliantly showcased Joanna’s savvy for bringing together her vast network of female overachievers from every conceivable sphere of influence for the dual purpose of some high-profile networking and some serious brand building. 'Last year when I came up with the idea for this lunch, people came and didn’t really know what to expect,' Joanna told me as she stood in the lounge accepting air kisses and posing for photos with the growing throng of well-wishers. 'This year, we had people calling up asking to come.'Among those that did make the final cut: actresses Sarah Jessica Parker ('This is my new favorite yearly lunch!' she told me) and The Carrie Diaries star AnnaSophia Robb (The original Carrie and Carrie 2.0 met for the first time in the dining room and posed for their first ever joint photo during cocktails); The Daily Show‘s Samantha Bee; Arianna Huffington; Mika Brzezinski (whose late arrival during Joanna’s opening remarks earned the Morning Joe cohost some cheeky chiding about her tardiness); celebrity fitness guru Tracy Anderson; supermodel Coco Rocha (who sported a chic shorter hairstyle and towered over the crowd); producer Desiree Gruber; designers Georgina Chapman and Stacey Bendet; Jimmy Choo founder Tamara Mellon" (Diane Clehane)

"The Palm Beach rich kids who rented the Miami mansion which was the scene of last week’s alleged Barron Hilton beatdown are now being dragged into the battle. Remington 'Remy' Levine, the heir to Family Dollar discount store fortune, and Morgan O’Connor, 18, a Ralph Lauren model who’s also dating Lindsay Lohan, are alleged to owe nearly $7,000 for the rental of the Star Island mansion after they were all kicked out following the Dec. 5 altercation between Barron and blogger Ray LeMoine. LeMoine, who with a group of promoters rented the house with the Palm Beach scions, told Page Six: 'One of our young DJs is a Palm Beach winter resident. He told us that two of his friends, Remington and Morgan, wanted a Star Island mansion for the art fair and had about $15,000-25,000 to cover their friends. We found the mansion . . . It was settled that they would take most of the bedrooms for three nights minimum at $10,000, and we would cover the deposit and our share.' 'When Morgan got to town, he said he only had plastic, which wasn’t accepted by the house manager. We tried to hit a bank but there was more excuses — Morgan forgot his ID. Remy landed and the excuses kept coming. Then there was the drama with Barron, and they all split. They stopped taking our calls.'" (PageSix)

"Recent challenges in exporting energy to Europe have made an orientation toward Asia more desirable for Moscow. Russia's economy depends on hydrocarbon exports, and while Western Europe is attempting to become less dependent on Russia by seeking new energy sources, Asian markets have large and indiscriminate appetites for energy. Although Russia's focus in Asia traditionally has been on China, Japan and South Korea, it also has ties to Southeast Asia, which remains a strategically significant -- though not absolutely essential -- area for Moscow's efforts to extend its influence and energy exports eastward. Notably, Moscow recently struck a spate of energy and defense deals with Hanoi in an effort to strengthen their relationship, open up new markets for Russian energy and balance against China's moves in Central Asia. Moscow's moves into Asia through Vietnam are proceeding piecemeal, paralleling Russian moves elsewhere in the region.More than 70 percent of Russian territory lies in Asia. Siberia and the Russian Far East -- sparsely populated regions holding significant mineral and hydrocarbon resources -- border China, North Korea, Mongolia and Kazakhstan and have a 4,500-kilometer (2,800-mile) Pacific coastline. Russia's Asian interests also lie to the south, in the former Soviet republics in Central Asia. Russia remains influential within these states and, under Vladimir Putin's leadership as president and prime minister, has made efforts to secure its southeastern flank anchored by the Tien Shan mountains. However, Russia's influence in Central Asia faces challenges from China, which naturally looks westward to extend its influence.Central Asia is not the only area where Russian and Chinese interests collide. The Asian giants' relationship has long been tense, with Sino-Soviet border disputes erupting into violence several times during the Cold War. Russia and China clearly defined their borders in 1991 but have remained in competition abroad. Russia also has a history of conflict with Japan. The countries have been longtime rivals in the northwestern Pacific, and Japan defeated Russia in the Russo-Japanese War in 1905. In the final years of the Soviet Union, Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev began orienting his foreign policy toward Asia in response to a rising Japan. Putin has also piloted a much-touted pivot to Asia, coinciding with renewed U.S. interest in the area, and hosted the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in 2012 in Vladivostok, near Russia's borders with China and North Korea. Russia's efforts in Asia have been limited by the country's more direct interests in its periphery and in Europe, but Moscow recently has been able to look more to the east." (STRATFOR)

"Oprah wuz robbed! America’s favorite talk show goddess was expected to swan through awards season—and maybe even take home her second Academy Award—for her fierce, semi-frightening performance as Forest Whitaker’s boozy wife in Lee Daniels’ The Butler. But the Oprah Express seems to have derailed this morning, when Winfrey failed to score a nomination at the Golden Globes. She was crowded out in the Best Supporting Actress category by Jennifer Lawrence (American Hustle), Lupita Nyong'o (12 Years a Slave), Julia Roberts (August: Osage County), June Squibb (Nebraska), and surprise nominee Sally Hawkins (Blue Jasmine), who appears to have stolen Oprah’s seat. Serious Oscar-watchers scoff at the idea that the Golden Globes are a predictive indicator for who will succeed at the Academy Awards After all, unlike the Oscars, which are voted by some 6,000 members of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, the Globes are chosen by a handful of foreign “journalists,” some of whom seem more interested in padding their guest list with A-listers than recognizing the year’s most accomplished performances. And yet, for that very reason, Oprah was considered a mortal lock to score a nod. After all, who wouldn’t want Oprah at their party?" (VanityFair)

Charlie Gasparino Versus Me

During this season of holiday bonuses, of libertarian wind, this kind of set me the fuck off.

Charlie Gaparino, Twitter

Now: Journalists and writers have been going through a rough time. We all know this. The profession, whether or not you agree with a particular writer's political bent, is pretty noble. We convey information and are trying, mightily, to navigate the Charybdis of celebrity gossip and the scylla of cat gifs. The fourth estate and all that. How does one convey accurate and important information in an age when people would rather look at Kardashian listicles? So Gasparino tweeting that, smarmily, drove me a bit crazy. I lost my temper online. The cowboys who nearly brought the global economy to its knees were feeling their oats, and it was up to me to slap them back down to size in the digital arena. And respond I did:

@RonMwangaguhung3 Dec

is there a bigger douchebag in the media biz than @CGasparino ? #bluster #choleric

To which he replied:

@CGasparino3 Dec

@RonMwangaguhung ill be REALLY pissed if i lose this contest keep my updated on what you find out through your rigorous reporting today

Oh, it's on: IT'S ON LIKE GRAY POUPON! Enter into the gladiatorial arena The Corsair. To give Gasparino a little credit, however, he is clearly a superlative example of thumotic overreach -- the guy is spirited in his defense of all of capitalisms excesses. He is more in tune with Ayn Rand than Pope Francis, That having been said, he is quite brave to get into a Twitter spat out in the Wild West when laboring under the rubric of a mega-corporation. Most television personalities don't get into public Twitter spats with nothing to gain and everything to lose. So -- kudos; kudos senor dickface. To which:

@CGasparino3 Dec

@TheLimerickKing @RonMwangaguhung i hear im still in the lede

My answer:

@RonMwangaguhung3 Dec

@CGasparino In the lede, ensorcelled in your own crass

Okay, I had lost my temper at this point. I was swinging wildly -- but connecting. An overhand right here; a left cross there. To which he circles back to his whole journalists-don't-make-a-ton-of-money thing, answering:

@CGasparino3 Dec

@QuestandFaith @RonMwangaguhung either that or he's looking for work

As a freelance writer with some regular gigs, I am always looking for more work. But Gasparino, again, seems to have this smarmy idea that money equals victory. "He who dies with the most toys wins." There is some intellectual coherence to this -- if you are a true materialist there is some logic in saying that financial success is the meaning of life, that which allows one to live most comfortably, most protected from hazard, and fuck everyone else. In fact his initial tweet -- attacking journalists because they don't make as much as his expense account -- heralds that sort of smarm-philosophy. The thing is, Gasparino is extrapolating his world-view, projecting it onto his environment. No one enters the writing profession to become rich. That, in essence, was what made his first tweet sound so ridiculous.

Then:

@CGasparino3 Dec

@BigDinHB @RonMwangaguhung not(sic) if you cover "culture politics"

I do not cover "culture politics." My Twitter profile says" Ugandan born, Brooklyn based writer on media, culture politics" But it should read "media, culture, politics" -- there was a missing comma. Mistake. But I am a little puzzled, to be frank, by what Gasparino means by "culture politics." I will not entertain the possibility that good old Charlie was getting a little racial there in a roundabout greasy sort of way.

He signed off, finally, tweeting:

@CGasparino3 Dec

my last nasty tweet before i hit the gym: did @businessinsider attract any bidders on "small biz saturday? (btw i do luv u guys)

In conclusion I cannot fail to note that it is just perfect that Gasparino signs off by going to the gym. Killing endangered species would have been better by a half, but beggars cannot be chasers. To tweet that he, the Gaspariner, a knuckle-dragging, over-macho swine, needs to pump some iron after a twitter spat is golden. That gym will smell just a little muskier as a result of our combat.

It was fun, a learning experience. My Twitter follower count grew. Got some virtual high-fives for standing athwart the libertarian wind. Those who know me know that I don't easily lose my temper. But Gasparino exemplifies everything I stand against. He may be rich, but, as evidenced by the above exchange, money can't buy class.

Pope Francis is the Time Magazine Person of the Year

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Media-Whore D'oeuvres

"It’s right to view the Tea Party’s members and fellow travelers as fixated on domestic politics and policy. But it’s wrong to reckon that they will fail to have a serious and invariably disruptive impact on future foreign policy. Indeed, their power is likely to grow, despite their defeats in October over the federal budget and the debt ceiling. Their sway will mount because they still face little effective opposition from within the Republican Party in most parts of the nation. And there is little doubt about the damage they can and will inflict: They will threaten what remains of the Republican Party’s great tradition of internationalism and further strain the ability of any U.S. President to conduct diplomacy, to negotiate, and to compromise. To Tea Party members, these three staples of a successful foreign policy are akin to unilateral disarmament. Republican and Democratic internationalists should not console themselves because of the apparent divisions among Tea Partiers over foreign policy—the seeming divide between unashamed isolationists like Rand Paul and unabashed hawks such as Ted Cruz. It would be wrong to bet on those differences marginalizing the movement’s impact. More likely, the Tea Party’s varying messages will fuse into a reborn and more potent form of hawkish isolationism.  This fusion will be reminiscent of Barry Goldwater’s brief triumph over Nelson Rockefeller in the race for the 1964 GOP presidential nomination, during which Goldwater warned against foreign entanglements, but applauded General Curtis LeMay’s nuclear 'bombs away' prescription. After Goldwater, the traditional Republican thread reasserted itself for more than two decades, led by Richard Nixon, Henry Kissinger, George H.W. Bush, James Baker, George Shultz, and Brent Scowcroft. Their realist policies and shrewd agreements with adversaries defined Republicanism abroad. The new hawkish isolationism, however, will reassert itself in the 2014 congressional races and in the 2016 Republican presidential primaries. The Tea Partiers proved their power in earlier elections when they toppled conservatives like Utah’s Bob Bennett and Indiana’s Richard Lugar. The latter represented Republican internationalist realism, and his defeat was devastating, symbolically and practically. The Tea Partiers are now gunning for others formerly considered conservative stalwarts, such as Mitch McConnell, Lindsey Graham, Lamar Alexander, and Thad Cochran, four senators rightly seen as at least semi-internationalists. The fight to retire those four is just the beginning. Heritage Action—the political arm of the Heritage Foundation run by former Republican Senator Jim DeMint—recently had its best-ever fundraising month. Sitting on that cash is not in the cards. And as increasing numbers of Republican officeholders face defeat because Tea Partiers deem them RINOs—'Republicans in Name Only'—it is probable that traditional conservatives under attack will seek a form of cheap grace. If they continue to oppose fiscal hostage-taking, they will likely attempt to 'get well' with the Tea Party by endorsing its opposition to free trade, immigration reform, and attempts to resolve disputes involving Iran, Syria, and China with diplomacy.Tea Party isolationism is just a somewhat new variant of the old Robert Taft position." (Democracy/Les Gelb & Michael Kramer)

"Mike Tyson's new memoir Undisputed Truth has been steadily climbing its way up the best-seller lists here and abroad the past couple of months. It's full of highs and lows, sex, drugs, celebrities, money, violence, jail, and pathos. But the man who shaped the raw material of Tyson's turbulent life and made it into a page-turner is Larry 'Ratso' Sloman. A legend in his own right both from his youthful days at National Lampoon and chronicling Bob Dylan's 1975 Rolling Thunder Tour for On the Road With Bob Dylan to his most recent fame as a collaborator on the best-selling autobiographies of Howard Stern and Anthony Kiedis, Sloman is more than a hired hand brought in to 'ghostwrite' a story ... DH: How did you come to work on this book with Mike Tyson? LS: I wrote him when he was in jail. I sent him a copy of Nietzsche's autobiography, Ecce Homo, and he read it. DH: Why that book? LS: I wrote him a letter [in 2004], and I said listen, you know, this book helped me get through a lot of tough times. I know you're going through a lot of shit. I don't believe you raped that girl, and if you ever want me to write your memoir let me know. Four years later I got on my agent to explore doing Tyson's autobiography because to me he's not only the most interesting sports figure of all time, but one of the most celebrated people of all time. The process of getting the book was hilarious. They interviewed about twenty people and they got it down to two. They flew me to California, and that's where I met Mike the first time, at the Four Seasons hotel. And I said, I don't know if you remember, but I sent you a book when you were in jail, Ecce Homo, Nietzsche's autobiography. He goes 'yeah I read that book, Nietzsche was an interesting character. He died in 1900, he was insane at the end of his life.' I described my process of working with writers, to get the best out of them, and the interview was over in about twenty five minutes. And  his manager said "anything else, Mike, any other questions?' and I'm about to leave and he goes, 'Hey Ratso, why did you sent me that Nietzsche book, did you think I was Superman?' ... DH: From the book, it seems like Tyson gave away money without abandon. LS: That was Cus again. You see, Cus was a socialist. He detested Reagan. Cus also had the same problem with money. But Cus saw money as a vehicle of social change. His idea of how to do that was the black churches. He said, 'Just think, Mike, when you make all this money as a heavyweight champ, you can give the money to black churches, they're gonna help the people.' Well, Mike went right to the source, after he was champion he'd go back to his neighborhood. He's the most beloved--you go to any ghetto in America, Mike Tyson is god. Because he'd go hang out -- every day he'd go with $200,000 in cash, and by the end of the day, he had given it all out to people on the street, or to a homeless guy he'd see. He goes back to his old neighborhood and looks for his mother's friends and would just 'break off' money. He called it 'breaking off.' DH: Can you estimate how much he gave away over the years? LS: I would say tens of millions." (David Hershkovits)

"Christmas for me, the individual, the son of, was always a wonderful time of the year, despite the day’s inevitable domestic drama. This day was full of excitement for the new, the changing, the seasons and the colored lights. Children have a special talent for absorbing this part of it naturally. All of those moments promise the best part of ourselves, and especially in the I don’t fault my mother and father, in retrospect, for I can see they were, like all of us, victims of themselves/ourselves. “Their own worst enemy” was, and remains, the operative phrase. Their legacy of domestic turmoil – especially heightened during the holiday season – comes with riches, however: I was determined to always enjoy this time of the year, no matter what. And so it has been. When I’ve lived in a house, I had a tree. A nice one, full and tall. In California with cathedral ceiling, the tree was 12 or 14 feet. In Connecticut, 8 or 9. In New York on East End Avenue, I don’t have a tree. I don’t especially miss it because it would only mean mischief for one of the quadripeds I live with – namely Madame; and I go to many houses and see many wonderful trees. However, I also love all the trees I see through the windows and in the stores and the lobbies. All that light suggests to the child in me the possibility that the world will really be At Peace even if for a millisecond. I’m not naïve but I said possibility. Even for a moment.The trees are the symbol of that for me. Now more than ever." (NYSocialDiary)

"Enchanté: I eventually made it to New York City and partook of a fine evening with the tycoon and the movie producer. At one point I found myself explaining my recent unseemly conduct. I plead my case, I had a reason, albeit flimsy, why I was so keen to attend that Palm Beach Thanksgiving party. I explained that I was curious to see a certain someone who shall remain nameless. I just had to see f...or myself. Crucial statistics for my Large Animal Research Station. I trust my motives were understood and I was pardoned. Sure enough I had gathered some raw figures for crunching, the coltran of data. I truly was the last guest to leave. I am a person of extremes. If I show up at all I tend to overstay my welcome. In truth, I did not want to exit the magnificent pile by the sea. Secretly, I was hoping to be offered a wing. I was there adorned in my orange shawl from Walgreens. I’ll bet nobody else that night sported anything from Walgreens. Not even their cosmetics. I was a parrot fish out of water on some deeply fundamental levels. Did anyone notice my ‘all wrong’ thing, I think probably. But all this was mere foreplay as it neatly trickled into the richly random resurrection of Rachel. Regarding the word she uttered I had to ask her as I drew a blank, but it was, “Enchanté.” Which was almost right, but not. Because she never told me her name. There was nothing yet to be ‘enchanté’ about, as there’d been no introduction. Hence the drawn out awkward silence, like a couple of gun slingers on a dusty noontime western Main Street. A full day later, when we reviewed this unplanned pregnant meeting, Rachel admitted she didn’t immediately reveal her name because she was considering her options." (Christina Oxenberg)

"Since the De Beers monopoly ended in 2001 the market has changed. Russia, Australia, and Canada have made significant diamond discoveries, and investment-grade diamonds will likely be available on the NASDAQ stock exchange in 2014. The diamond’s star would appear to be on the rise.
The Cullinan diamonds belong to the British Crown, though these days it’s not only the British royal family who own the big-name diamonds. Provenances change. New diamonds come into play. One is larger or more expensive than the next, from the Taylor-Burton and the Darya-ye Noor to the Hope and the Koh-i-Noor.Like celebrated thespians, diamonds compete for top billing. In the style of Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor, important men give important women important diamonds. Liz Taylor was a superstar with a diamond to match her degree of celebrity. Diamonds are badges in the hierarchy of monied kin and their spectacle of richesse. Some wear their bijou better than others. For some they represent a promise. Diamonds are bequeathed by countries to heads of state. They are worn by rappers, queens, and swaths of women on Park Avenue. They are worn like stardust: big diamonds, little diamonds, new diamonds, old diamonds—ornaments for all the important people.
Yet there seems to be more to a diamond than meets the eye. More than Cut, Clarity, Carat, and Color. More than its fiscal value. Something beyond the love or beauty it seeks to enhance. They say diamonds are forever. We know they are at least a billion years old, so perhaps they are indeed eternal. We must not forget that no two diamonds are alike, which makes each diamond special and unique." (Mandolyna Theodoracapoulos)

"At my Harlem office, the headquarters of the Clinton Foundation, several portraits that have particular meaning to me are clustered together on a prominent wall, next to a small conference table I use to meet with staff and guests, including a daguerreotype of Abraham Lincoln and a photograph of Martin Luther King Jr. at the Lorraine Motel, in Memphis, on the last night of his life. There are also three photographs of Nelson Mandela, two taken during his presidency, and another, more pensive one taken after he left office. At home I have a picture of Mandela walking arm in arm with me outside his old jail cell on Robben Island. I treasure all of these photos because of what Mandela has meant to South Africa and the world. I’ve told this story about a thousand times, and I’ll keep telling it for the rest of my life, because it’s so unforgettable. In 1998, I made the first visit by an American president to South Africa. By then President Mandela and I had become friends. We had met during the Democratic convention in New York in 1992, and I had hosted him at the White House in my first term. After we toured Robben Island, I told Mandela that on the day he was released from prison, after 27 years, I had awakened Chelsea, who was then 9, so she could watch him walk to freedom. I told him I knew he was a great man to have overcome his anger enough to invite his jailers to his inauguration and put the leaders of previously pro-apartheid parties in his government. Then I asked, 'But when you were walking to freedom, didn’t you hate them again?' With wonderful candor he replied, 'Of course I felt old anger rising up again, and fear. After all, I had not been free in 27 years. But I knew that, when I drove away from the gate, if I continued to hate them, they would still have me. I wanted to be free, and so I let it go.' Whenever I feel anger and resentment rising inside myself, I try to think of what Mandela said, and follow his example. We’d all be a lot happier if we could do that." (Bill Clinton)

"Leaving the Gutfreunds, I walked over to 825 Madison at 69th Street where Dennis Basso was hosting a cocktail reception to celebrate the grand opening of his new flagship townhouse. Big crowd, as you can see." (NYSocialDiary)

Media-Whore D'Oeuvres

"Not so long ago, Hillary Clinton was being lauded as an exemplary secretary of state. After four years and nearly a million miles logged as America’s top diplomat, she stepped down to a torrent of praise. 'The most consequential secretary of state since Dean Acheson,' enthused Google’s Eric Schmidt. 'Stellar,' pronounced Bloomberg’s Margaret Carlson. Even Republican Sen. John McCain, while criticizing her response to the killing of U.S. officials in Benghazi, went out of his way to compliment her 'outstanding' State Department tenure. That was then. When the Atlantic published an admiring 10,000-word profile of Secretary of State John Kerry the other day, the surprise was not so much that the author, two-time Pulitzer Prize winner David Rohde, found himself impressed by the headlong diplomatic forays of the peripatetic Kerry, but the downbeat assessment of Kerry’s much more reserved predecessor. The headline? 'How John Kerry Could End Up Outdoing Hillary Clinton.' A few days later, the New York Times chimed in with an article on the 'tough comparisons with Kerry' Clinton is now facing, summing up the debate as one over whether she was anything more than a 'pantsuit-wearing globe-trotter' in her years as secretary. All of which yields the question: Was Hillary Clinton in fact a good secretary of state, and will her record as a diplomat matter if, as expected, she runs for president in 2016? As Bill Clinton might have said, it depends on what the meaning of good is. Certainly, even many of her most ardent defenders recognize Hillary Clinton had no signal accomplishment at the State Department to her name, no indelible peace sealed with her handshake, no war averted, no nuclear crisis defused. There are few Eric Schmidts out there still willing to make the case for her as an enormously consequential figure in the history of Foggy Bottom. Where the debate tends to rage is over why that is so, especially now that Kerry is taking on diplomatic challenges that Clinton either couldn’t or wouldn’t—from negotiating a potentially historic nuclear deal with Iran to seeking a revived Mideast peace process—and political rivals in both parties return to thinking of Clinton in the hypercharged American political context and not so much as the tireless, Blackberry-wielding face of global glad-handing. I asked an array of smart foreign policy thinkers in both parties to weigh in, and they pretty much all agreed that Clinton was both more cautious and more constrained than Kerry. Their argument is over whether and to what extent that was a consequence of Clinton herself, the limits placed on her by a suspicious and eager-to-make-its-mark first-term White House, or simply it being a very different moment in world politics." (Politico)


"It was Wednesday, I went to Michael’s. I tell myself and others that I do this because it’s helpful in coming up with material for the Diary. This is true, It is also a habit, even a compulsive habit. It’s Dave’s chance to get out in the nabe. All my life, I’ve made a habit of going to one eating place or another, be it for lunch, for breakfast, for dinner. It started in college where we all met at the campus coffee shop, where life began. It’s a kind of a security blanket maybe, where the surroundings and the faces are family, a community. All of these places are troves of all kinds of information – about the people, about other people, about local attitudes, opinions to the eternally curious. Tales from the past pop up, and the boy’s eyes are poppin’ while he sits in the middle of it, and takes it all in. A lot of us are like this. It’s a front row seat at the Human Comedy, as well as an inside track on the vibe. Right now the vibe is deeply affected by, among other trenchant matters, the shorter days. My lunch partner reminded me of this natural meteorological phenomenon. For the next fifteen days, it will progressively get darker earlier. When I was a kid there was a lot of snow on the ground just about at this time. That affected the light too, and picked up the night sky. Of course here in the city the lights are on everywhere all the time. Meanwhile, the Michael’s reservation list, jammed with busy people, out of towners, high mucky-mucks and media moguls as well as their editors, agents, designers and flacks. It was one of those busy Wednesdays where there is a lot of clatter and din. It was crowded and the holiday decorations – swags of pine boughs and big bright red ribbons – made it feel smaller, cozier. Bonnie Fuller was at Table One with eight or ten men and women for one of Fuller’s luncheon confabs where she invites people who are involved in the media industry and actively affecting changes digitally, etc. I asked her why she did this regularly. She said it was a good way to meet and introduce people in other parts of the business; and to learn about what is going on and how it all is changing. All the time. Because tech means change, and media is at the center of it. So now you know. A new kind of networking; a sharing of the wealth. Fuller’s guests were Adam Braun, William Launder of the WSJ; Ed Daman; Valerie Salembier, Asst. Comm. NYPD; Leslie Hall of IcedMedia; Caroline Waxler festival director of Internet Week New York; Jenny McIntosh; Jodi Applegate; Norman Pearlstine who came by and took a seat; and Penske Media Vice Chair, Gerry Byrne." (NYSocialDiary)


 "I’m in an extremely happy state as I write this because a young Englishman flew over the ocean just to have lunch with me and ask for my daughter’s hand in marriage. This is how things used to be done, but alas no longer. I will not reveal his name until it happens—I am very superstitious—but suffice it to say he went to Eton and Oxford, comes from a fine and very old English family, and has a beautiful sister who is happily married (but unfortunately not to me). So in this pleasant state of mind, I’m only going to write about nice things. Up to a point, of course. Such as what good things one reads in the dear old Speccie, which I get one week later than the rest of you. When my son, a German Expressionist painter now living in Paris, besieged me twenty years ago at age twelve to buy a Basquiat, I dismissed his advice as the impressionable foolishness of extreme youth. Basquiat to me was a horrible graffiti showoff for whom Andy Warhol had a crush. I predicted he would disappear the day, night rather, he overdosed. Which he did—overdose—but reading about the arts in these here pages two weeks ago, I learned a thing or two. Like to listen to a 12-year-old who also painted graffiti and had met Mr. B, for starters. I could have bought him for peanuts, and although he still doesn’t race my motor one bit, I could have sold him for 48 million big ones and gone whoring downtown. In this pleasant state of mind, I’m only going to write about nice things. Up to a point, of course. Lesson number one: Listen at times to 12-year-olds. Lack of experience in the ways of the world can be enlightening as well as profitable." (Taki)

Wired 9th Annual 2013 Pop-Up Store Opening

Ned Reedus of The Walking Dead

Last night the Wired Store opened its 9th annual pop up store in New York ( much thanks to Jason Chupnick for the invite). It was the place to be for people of a certain tech pedigree, although Cat Marnell was turned away at the door, and tweeted about it with the hashtag #confusedhumility. The DJ -- who was very nice, even letting us check out the Grace Jones album cover (remember those?) he was playing -- was LCD's James Murphy. I walk in and Norman Reedus -- one of my favorite characters on The Walking Dead -- was standing by the entrance. Was way too nervous-- shy? --  to act like a fan; an opportunity missed, alas.

Among the crowd: J Million and Yummyana, Michael Kauffman, Sami Deluxe, Caitlin Fitgerald, Aya Cash, Katrina Bowden, DJ Tim Martell, Kiely Taylor, the Mueller Brothers, Kelly Bensimon, and Jordan Rudess of Dream Theater.

Of all the cool gadgets I was the biggest fan of the sweet 2014 Corvette Stingray and the insane game installation.

The Wired pop up store is at 353 w 14th street in NYC and will be open Tues.-Sun from 12-8 p.m. through Dec. 22nd. It is a great place to buy high end electronic presents for the gadget lover you know.

Media-Whore D'Oeuvres

"Once again I was expected in New York City, this time for a Thanksgiving feast with old friends, including the tycoon and the movie producer. With Satie playing loud and me skipping around my 220 sq ft home in Key West I was attempting to pack, but instead I was futzing. As is my neurotic way I frequently check my social medias, and lo, what did I see but a message from great friend photographer Patrick McMullan. A Thanksgiving party at Terry Kramer's in Palm Beach. I chucked my suitcase into my car, drove past the Key West airport and doffed my hat, and sped north. I had done the unthinkable, the unpardonably rude, and accepted the better offer. My New York friends were not amused. You lose some. I picked up Patrick in Miami and the fun began. First the festive meal in the monolithic moorish Kramer palazzo, where the guests were a mix of impeccably turned out society types and celebrities. Our gracious hostess sported thick ropes of diamonds, like a rap star. After midnight, and the last to leave, we returned to Miami to Patrick's bayside balconied flat. With many friends visiting for Art Basel we played Gin Rummy with a pack of invitations. The fun lasted a week. But one night we met up with friends and friends of friends at a restaurant. Upon arrival we went through the ritual of greetings and introductions. Except for one lady who only smirked at me. I told her my name and waited but she continued to smirk. I felt awkward. The lady cocked her head, and grinned. I began to wonder if I was missing something. Still she remained silent, she only pursed her lips. I was entirely puzzled. She just didn't look remotely like anyone I knew. Was she playing with me, was she having a stroke? Time ticked and we grinned oddly at one another. At last she spoke. Just one word, a French word, though she was clearly not French. The single word without context meant virtually nothing. Yet something about it snagged me, caught my full attention. Watching her intently I rolled around the sound of her voice, matching it up against the files of my memory banks. The tone triggered something, nagged at me. But now that voice was in my head, and it caught me short. Tugging an implausible idea into view. Shy to even dare, because I was unsure, I mouthed at her, 'Rachel?' Very slowly she nodded her head, affirmatively. I was shocked." (Christina Oxenberg)

"There were more private jets than commercial ones at Palm Beach airport over the weekend as social swells descended for Thanksgiving and beyond. Bentleys clogged the streets, restaurants including McCarty’s were packed, and residents including the Koch brothers, Pauline Pitt, Tinsley Mortimer, Architectual Digest Editor Emeritus Paige Rense, Terry Allen Kramer, Mellon heiress Frances Scaife, and John and Marianne Castle were all spotted. Jell-O heir Orator Woodward had a lavish 80th birthday party thrown by wife Maureen at their mansion near the Everglades Club, we hear. Among 100 guests were Somers Farkas, former water-skiing champ Dick Cowell, and Texas oil tycoon John Terwilliger. Guests received a gift-wrapped package of Jell-O on their way out." (PageSix)

Media-Whore D'Oeuvres

"As former secretaries of state, we have confronted the existential issue of nuclear weapons and negotiated with adversaries in attempts to reduce nuclear perils. We sympathize with the current administration's quest to resolve the Iranian nuclear standoff through diplomacy. We write this article to outline the options as we see them emerging from the interim agreement for a policy based on the principle of 'trust and verify.' For two decades, American presidents from both parties have affirmed that the U.S. is unalterably opposed to an Iranian military nuclear capability. They have usually added a warning to the effect that 'all options are on the table' in pursuit of this policy. A clear trans-Atlantic consensus, a decade of International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) reports and six United Nations Security Council resolutions have buttressed this position. The interim nuclear deal with Iran has been described as the first step toward the elimination of Iran's ability to build a nuclear weapon. That hope resides, if at all, in the prospects of the next round of negotiations envisaged to produce a final outcome within six months. Standing by itself, the interim agreement leaves Iran, hopefully only temporarily, in the position of a nuclear threshold power—a country that can achieve a military nuclear capability within months of its choosing to do so. A final agreement leaving this threshold capacity unimpaired would institutionalize the Iranian nuclear threat, with profound consequences for global nonproliferation policy and the stability of the Middle East. For 35 years and continuing today, Iran has been advocating an anti-Western concept of world order, waging proxy wars against America and its allies in Lebanon, Syria, Iraq and beyond, and arming and training sectarian extremists throughout the Muslim world. During that time, Iran has defied unambiguous U.N. and IAEA demands and proceeded with a major nuclear effort, incompatible with any exclusively civilian purpose, and in violation of its obligations under the Non-Proliferation Treaty in effect since 1970. If the ruling group in Iran is genuinely prepared to enter into cooperative relations with the United States and the rest of the world, the U.S. should welcome and encourage that shift. But progress should be judged by a change of program, not of tone. The heart of the problem is Iran's construction of a massive nuclear infrastructure and stockpile of enriched uranium far out of proportion to any plausible civilian energy-production rationale. Iran amassed the majority of this capacity—including 19,000 centrifuges, more than seven tons of 3.5%- to 5%-enriched uranium, a smaller stock (about 196 kilograms) of 20%-enriched uranium, and a partly built heavy-water reactor that will be capable of producing plutonium—in direct violation of IAEA and Security Council resolutions. Efforts to resolve this issue through negotiation have a long pedigree." (Henry Kissinger & George Schultz)

"In the fifties, a bunch of rock stations got caught taking money from music producers to give their artists airtime. The'Payola' scam, as it was called, was sufficiently outrageous to become a major national scandal. Last month, Washington Post reporter Erik Wemple reported that Politico's Mike Allen is running a similar scam — accepting lucrative payments from advertisers and lending his editorial voice to hyping, and sometimes parroting, their agenda. Given the relative importance of national politics vis-à-vis rock music, this struck me as a potentially career-ending revelation. Instead, Politico has ignored the report and carried on as if nothing at all were amiss. But Politico couldn't avoid all interviews forever, and in the course of appearing on 'The Brian Lehrer Show' to hype Politico's new Capital New York venture, CEO, former editor, and Allen co-author Jim VandeHei was asked about the payola allegations. His reply is a comical stream of evasive tripe .." (NYMag)

"With Edward Snowden becoming a leading candidate for Time magazine’s Person of the Year, it is important to remember that he is the central character in not one but three distinct stories: 1) the story of what his disclosures tell us about the US government’s surveillance system, 2) the story of what the treatment of him and the reporters publicizing his disclosures says about attitudes toward whistleblowing and First Amendment protections, and 3) the story of the rapidly changing power dynamics in the age of digital media.The first two stories have been fairly well covered. From the first story, we now know that America’s 'collect it all' government is vacuuming up massive amounts of data and surveilling millions of people in real time — all in a way that regularly violates the law. We also know from the first story that top government officials lied to Congress and that those officials have provided no evidence proving their surveillance programs have thwarted terrorist attacks. From the second story, we know that the government’s move to punish Snowden exposes a blatant double standard about leaks and represents another front in an unprecedented war on whistleblowers. We also know from that second story that the Obama administration is waging a similarly unprecedented war on journalism. Far less examined, though, is the third story about what all this exposes about the revolution happening inside the Fourth Estate. This little-discussed story is most easy to see in the differing reactions to the two print reporters with whom Snowden chose to work — Glenn Greenwald and Barton Gellman." (Pando)

"This past week, the Telegraph of London ran an obituary of the 4th Earl of Dudley, known to many as just plain Billy Dudley, who died on November 16, a little less than two months from his 94th birthday, and exactly two years to the day of the death of his wife Maureen, Countess of Dudley. The Dudleys were very popular on this side of the Atlantic. They visited New York fairly frequently, which is how I met them. Billy was one of those British gents who always had a smile with his hello, and a twinkle in his eye that implied laughter was on the way. Maureen, as she was known to friends, was warm and friendly, and like her husband was glad to see friends. I always had the feeling they were glad to see me. The feeling was mutual. I mention this because we were really just acquaintances. I think that it was probably true, however, because they were the kind of people who did like people and were glad to see them. Such personal generosity is not as commonplace as you might think it should be or would be with the Very Social animals who inhabit this world, and particularly the world where the Dudleys held some sway –in New York and London. I hadn’t seen them in a few years. Maureen died of cancer two years ago at 78, and had been ill for at least a year before. Although I knew Billy only from the few times we had dinner together in New York, he was one of those people who always shared the pleasure of his company. In reading the Telegraph obituary, and then re-reading the Telegraph’s obituary of Maureen, which was published at about this time two years ago, I got a much stronger sense of these two friendly people, and insight into them and their relationship. Firstly I knew very little about their past lives because it never came up. The prominence both experienced in their young adulthood was before my time." (NYSocialDiary)

"The Four Seasons Restaurant was particularly packed with power brokers on Tuesday afternoon. Spies at the legendary lunch spot saw former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger chowing down with Blackstone group co-founder Pete Peterson, while IAC chairman Barry Diller was dining nearby with former General Electric chairman and CEO Jack Welch. And at a round table in the middle of the Grill Room, among the male machers, was a 'very, very, tiny-looking' Sarah Jessica Parker, who was having lunch with seven other women. Gwyneth Paltrow’s mom, actress Blythe Danner, posted photos of the restaurant’s signature pink cotton candy dessert on her Instagram feed." (PageSix)

"Yesterday, I went down to meet a friend for lunch at Michael’s. Peggy Siegal was throwing one of her stylish movie-promo lunches in the Garden Room. The restaurant dining room is now fully swagged in pine boughs and red ribbons and there is something cozy and festive about it an LA/NY sorta way. This is happening all over town now. Peggy said to me: 'Guess where I spent Thanksgiving?' I thought, oh well, here it comes ... Peggy gets around (the world). 'Where?' I said.'Martha Stewart’s.' 'In Bedford?' 'Uh-huh.' Martha told me last week at the Tiffany lunch that she was having her Thanks in Bedford and cooking. 'So was it fantastic?' (It would have to be, no? I mean: Martha Stewart?) 'Uh-huh ... amazing ...' Peggy then went on to describe some of the items on the menu. You know it was exquisite. The thing about Martha is she personally likes it like that; it’s not promo; it’s solid Martha. My lunch partner, hearing the conversation, then pulled out a picture (on his cell phone) of the house he owned in Bedford, not far from Martha. It was beautiful, stately, MGM movies mansion.  Wow. Did he still own it? No, he sold it because when he was first going out with the girl who would become his wife (number two) and they were getting serious, she said 'you’re not going to keep the house, are you?'  So he sold it. For a lot more than he paid of course. But he loved it and still misses it. He and the lady did marry, and are now divorced." (NYSocialDiary)

Media-Whore D'oeuvres

"Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton’s political marriage is about to be put to the test.
For five years their unlikely alliance has gone, by and large, smoothly. He has benefited from a widely admired secretary of state whose presence in his administration helped unite the party after their 2008 combat. She has burnished her foreign policy CV and taken a break from the political grind as she mulls a second run at the White House. But Obama’s own recent difficulties, combined with the swirl of attention around Clinton and her intentions in 2016, is threatening to alter those dynamics — in ways that aren’t helpful to either of them. Obama needs his party’s attention devoted to helping him salvage the final three years of his administration. But Democratic donors and activists say the growing anticipation around a possible Clinton administration three years out could accelerate the president’s arrival at lame duck status. The more Obama is viewed as a has-been, they say, the harder it could be for him to rally the party to fight for his agenda. For Clinton, the rising 2016 speculation — which she is not actively trying to suppress — could force her to make uncomfortable choices sooner than she’d like about whether or how to distance herself from the president. The problem is that at this point neither Clinton nor anyone else knows whether Obama will recover from his worst stretch in the White House and right his second term, or whether he’ll stumble to the finish line, leaving voters with a hangover for which they won’t see her as the cure.
Obama and Clinton are both swimming against the same strengthening current, said Ed Rendell, the former Pennsylvania governor and ex-chairman of the Democratic National Committee who was a strong Clinton ally in 2008. 'She wants to stay under the radar screen and he wants her to stay under the radar screen' so the focus is on his agenda rather than the next election, said Rendell. 'It’s a mutual thing.' Yet while the extended Clintonworld is concerned about how she will deal with Obama’s record, she is showing signs of positioning herself as the inheritor of the Obama tenure —she backed him on the decision to seek congressional approval to bomb Syria and has been quiet on controversial issues like the botched Obamacare rollout. Obama aides have helped feed that perception with comments anointing Clinton as the all-but-certain nominee if she were to run.
Clinton’s close association with Obama could deprive any serious primary challenger of oxygen but become difficult in a general election if voters are looking for change. 'Hillary Clinton is the life raft on Obama’s sinking ship: Obama’s troops would be a lot less likely to abandon ship if she wasn’t around,' said Republican strategist Alex Castellanos.He added, 'Hillary has to separate from Obama to win the general election but has to hug him close to win the nomination. If she leaves any room in the primaries between Obama and her own candidacy, she creates an opening for Elizabeth Warren. It’s going to be a tough call to figure out how close to hug the leper.'" (Politico)

"Following yesterday's fatal Metro-North accident in The Bronx, Gov. Cuomo was front and center to address the media at the scene but Mayor Bloomberg was nowhere to be found for more than 12 hours. While there are larger priorities than seeing the mayor as emergency workers toil away in the background, it was simply odd not to hear from Bloomberg when elected officials – including Westchester County Executive Rob Astorino – spoke out about the deadliest rail crash in the city since 1991. In a 12-year tradition of ducking and covering, the mayor's press secretary yesterday morning wouldn't say where Hizzoner was at the time of the derailment – pointing to Bloomberg's public schedule for yesterday, which only included a taped radio address. But the worst-kept secret in City Hall is that the mayor – via his private plane -- often goes away on weekends to his home in Bermuda. Considering how Bloomberg likes to boast that he's never gone on vacation since becoming mayor, this flies in the face of good PR. Rather than acknowledging that he sometimes leaves town, the mayor insists that his private time is his private time and the public doesn't have the right to know where he is when he's off the clock. But the challenge of being mayor of New York City is that you're never really off the clock; it's the most public job north of the White House. And it's simply jarring and a little weird not to see the mayor on TV when disaster strikes and then there's no explanation forthcoming about his absence. The mayor insists that he's not a first responder, that his job isn't to fix the railroad or put out a fire. And while that may be true, to be mayor of New York isn't to just be a good city manager; it's to lead. Although he's been in office since 2002, Bloomberg has never really embraced the part of the job that had La Guardia reading the funny papers to kids on the radio during a newspaper strike or Ed Koch cheering commuters as they crossed the Brooklyn Bridge during a transit shutdown. Bloomberg's efforts at fulfilling that role have been half-hearted and mostly fallen flat. While not everyone can be a born hugger or a great quarterback, the policy of not saying where the mayor is during his 'private time' serves neither the public well nor, ultimately, the mayor." (Bob Hardt via The Awl)

"A sensational note written by Rupert Murdoch’s ex-wife Wendi Deng that reveals she had a ‘crush’ on Tony Blair has been found, it was revealed last night.The note was written before media tycoon Mr Murdoch filed for divorce when he discovered Ms Deng had spent weekends with Mr Blair at Mr Murdoch’s homes.A well-placed source said the document was written in the form of a note by Ms Deng to herself in which she expressed her ‘warm feelings’ for the former Prime Minister.In further dramatic developments surrounding the feud between the two men – who forged one of the most powerful media and political alliances in British post-war history – The Mail on Sunday can reveal that Mr Blair was forced to stay away from the world’s biggest media conference after Mr Murdoch objected to his presence. It has also emerged that Mr Blair, 60, and Ms Deng, 44, met on a superyacht owned by music billionaire David Geffen without Mr Murdoch’s knowledge.The new revelations follow our expose last week of the ‘terminal’ rift between Mr Murdoch and Mr Blair over Mr Blair’s ‘multiple encounters’ with Ms Deng, including three overnight stays at two of  Mr Murdoch’s homes behind  his back.Mr Blair and his office refused to comment, leaving it to unofficial sources to ‘categorically deny’ rumours of an affair with Ms Deng.The Mail on Sunday made it clear last week that we have no evidence of an affair between them. That remains the case.Our report last week, which stated Mr Blair and Ms Deng’s stays at Mr Murdoch’s two homes in California had led to the rift between the two men, has not been disputed by either side." (DailyMail via the awesome Paula Froelich)

"Peter W. Kaplan, the former editor of the New York Observer, passed away after a battle with cancer Friday. He was 59. As The Observer’s editor-in-chief from 1994 to 2009, Kaplan took a paper with a small circulation and revolutionized the field of journalism, whether people knew it at the time or not. He crafted a voice among his writers that was in turns sophisticated, sarcastic, erudite and honest, a legacy that can be seen nearly everywhere in media today. The writers and editors who came of age under Kaplan represent a veritable checklist of journalistic success stories, including the gossip columnist Frank DiGiacomo; the New York Times editor Alexandra Jacobs; the New Yorker staff writer Nick Paumgarten; Choire Sicha, the founder of The Awl; Candace Bushnell—whose column Sex and the City, which Kaplan named himself, became a pop culture sensation even as the paper that printed it remained relatively obscure; and scores of others. There are few publications in New York City—either extant or extinct—that do not bear at least some of his influence. Writers talk about the old Observer as if it were a sacred religious text. Under Kaplan’s tenure, the paper became nothing short of the best kept secret in New York. Its subscriptions never rose much above 50,000–this is true to this day; a spike in circulation, as one former writer speculated, was likely the result of a new crop of young talent moving to the city to try to make it in media. Still, the influence the paper had among the people who controlled the power in New York was incalculable. 'The paper got talked about by the people in New York who do the talking,'  said Michael M. Thomas, a columnist who predated Mr. Kaplan, having been around for The Observer’s founding in 1987. 'I remember once I wrote something in the paper and it irritated Jimmy Robinson who was then the CEO of American Express. And he called me up and yelled at me and I said, ‘For chrissakes Jimmy only 12 people read this newspaper.’ And he said, ‘Yeah and I’ve heard from all 12 of them.’' (Observer)

"Since its founding in 1968, New York magazine has served as a prototype of literate, high-tempo publishing, using its weekly cadence and location in one of the world’s cultural capitals to usher in a new, more intimate and frank approach to what a publication could be. Using the tenets of so-called New Journalism, the magazine helped popularize the knowing, skeptical voices of writers including Tom Wolfe, Jimmy Breslin, Gloria Steinem and Nora Ephron. It was the birthplace of both Ms. Magazine and the concept of 'radical chic.' Now, this magazine that has been at the vanguard of Manhattan publishing for almost five decades is acknowledging that the cutting edge is not necessarily a lucrative, or sustainable proposition, at least on the same schedule. Beginning in March, New York will retreat from its long-standing status as a weekly and come out every other week instead. Along with the closing of the printed Newsweek and the planned spin-off of Time Inc., which includes the weeklies Time and People, the move to bi-weekly publishing represents the end of an era and underscores the dreary economics of print and its diminishing role in a future that’s already here. The change will beget misty eyes from magazine geeks — myself among them — while other consumers will shrug and dive into the ever-changing web version of New York magazine that shows up in their browser." (David Carr)

"Thanksgiving; Giving Thanks, American-style. Aside from the traditional national holiday weekend festivities, many Americans who were in the mood -- according to media reports -- experienced the pandemonium of what is bizarrely (not to mention ominously) called Black Friday, a fairly new and peculiar American shopping rite where massive crowds engage in chaotic, often violent behavior in stores and shopping malls in quest of fantastically under-priced pieces of merchandise like wide-screen TVs. This year the jostling brought about at least one death, not to mention all kinds of physical injuries. On a more somber note that underscores the senseless tragedy of violence for one family and the entire nation, a friend of mine visited the gravesites of our fallen President John F. Kennedy, his wife JacquelineRobert, at Arlington National Cemetery." (NYSocialDiary)

"Journalist and bon vivant Steve Garbarino and his book 'A Fitzgerald Companion' will be toasted Monday night at the Upper West Side townhouse of 'Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil' author John Berendt. Those expected include 'Mayhem' actor Dean Winters, Reinaldo Herrera, Cynthia Rowley and Bill Powers, Marisa Marchetto, Departures’ Julian Sancton, DuJour’s Jason Binn, Observer alum George Gurley and Spencer Morgan, Gay Talese, Paul Sevigny, T magazine editor Deborah Needleman, Off Duty/WSJ editorial director Ruth Altchek and Steve’s wife, Maddy Simpson. The party comes on the heels of a bash at Garbarino’s 'third home,' the Chateau Marmont, on Nov. 18 attended by Tommy Chong, among many others." (PageSix)