In your cheery Wednesday media column: our nemesis Martha Stewart's magazine implicated in decoration-for-prestige scheme, iTunes for magazines is coming, your weekly layoff roundup, and the Search Engine Media Wars heat up.

POLITICO EXPOZAY: Our archnemesis Martha Stewart('s magazine, Martha Stewart Living, along with several other home decorating magazines) is involved in a scheme to "decorate" various rooms in the US State Department building. In bed with the warmongers, eh Martha? Why don't you just go over to Afghanistan and start kicking over mud huts one by one, yourself? Eh? We dare you to respond. Dare you!


Hey, that breakthrough new "iTunes for magazines" online magazine store thing that the world has been waiting for is close to happening, and Conde Nast, Hearst, and Time Inc. will all put their magazines in there, so you can buy them, on the internet. I am "going rogue" and saying that not too many people outside the magazine industry will care about this, at all.


Keith Kelly has this short week's layoff tallies, so far: 25 at Time Inc., some of whom we mentioned yesterday, and the prospect of up to 100 layoffs coming to Playboy following their deal to outsource non-editorial duties to AMI. Also, nearly 80 edit layoffs at the Toronto Star. This holiday season is shaping up to be just as merry as last year's, for the media!


The Denver Post and the Dallas Morning News are reportedly considering joining the Search Engine Media Wars and pulling their content off of Google. This would have an even more minimal impact than if News Corp. does it, so no biggie.