Before anything else: Let us bow our heads in prayer to St. Ronald Reagan, the dead host of tonight's debate in California. Our Lord, Ronald Reagan, hallowed be thy name. You are the man. What was that movie you were in? Amen. Now let's get out there and kick each other's asses!

Today we learned that the USPS, you know where the mail comes from, will soon be broke. Yikes! Should we help it? Save it? Rescue it? No, says one commenter.

Uber nerd website ArsTechnica has one. Amazon is guiding web savvy writers toward them. And now even the electronic newspaper of the future, the Huffington Post, has one. Meet the so-called "book," heir apparent to the future of media.

Last week, Republicans complained about the date of President Obama's jobs speech to Congress and got the White House to move it to the next evening. The resolution of this conflict has allowed Republicans to move on — to making new excuses about why they won't show up anyway. One will be busy tweeting in his office! Another has to host a party. But really they all just hate Obama, which is fine.

The jokers in La La Land are going after yet another childhood favorite. Also today: good news for two TV shows, great news for two actors, and sexy news for theatergoers.

According to a new report by the National Research Council, NASA needs more astronauts. C'mon, what are you waiting for? It's not like there are any jobs here on earth.

NBC News' chief foreign affairs correspondent Andrea Mitchell took to the airwaves today to announce on MSNBC that she's been diagnosed with breast cancer. But doctors caught it early, she said, and she has "a terrific prognosis." She'd like you to get screened for breast cancer, which seems like a reasonable request, if you are a lady.

On Saturday, August 27 Forbes writer Brian Capozzi stared furtively into his computer's screen. "This is a test... Do not publish," he typed. He typed it again and again. He typed it until the page was full, and then he set it to "preview," and then— Oh no. Oh fuck. Oh no no no no no no FUCK.

Fashion's Night Out can be so tedious: the crowds, the celebs, the free champagne, the lack of sales. God, it just seems like too much bother. We're going to skip it altogether, but in order to do so we need your help. Join our Scavender Hunt, take pictures from the event, and you can win cash!

Here's a fun exercise in "Hey, whatever happened to…?" After seventeen years of nonstop blowjob jokes, Monica is still unemployed and alone, living in her parents' houses and relying on her family's money, according to the National Enquirer. (So take it with a cigar tube of salt.) Since her handbag line never took off, she is reportedly considering a wildly incongruous career in PR. The Daily Mail reports,

There were no black riots or white kids getting beat up for Matt Drudge to scare white folk with today, but it's OK, because Barack Obama wants to spend $300 billion on a jobs program and that black lady is going to eat it all.

Drinky ladies! Fewer smokers! Cheaper hospitals! Zombie mutants! Frozen athletes! Gay health! Cancer survivors! Pregnant painkillers! And you don't need no blood thinner girl, you look fine! It's your Wednesday Health Watch, where we watch your health—relatively painlessly!

Since this is Back to School time, we asked for all of your horror stories from those school days, school days, good old golden rule days. We were shocked by the number of gross, embarrassing, depressing, and hilarious tales that we got. But there can only be one winner.

It's time for another Republican presidential debate tonight, like the fourth of 'em or something like that! And after tonight, you'll have to wait a whole five days for your next opportunity to watch them babble strange collective nonsense again. So what should we expect from tonight's gathering at the St. Ronald Reagan of Reagan Presidential Library in California? Here's the "insider's take."

Hey, look at that, the Hudson River is running red. According to so-called scientists, this is just red clay from upstate that was washed into the river by Hurricane Irene. Or demon blood. Could definitely be demon blood.

Bruce Springsteen’s The Rising has become, as the tenth anniversary of the attacks that inspired it approaches, the closest thing we have to an official soundtrack to 9/11. It is the “soaring musical statement” of that day’s impact on our national psyche, according to the Philadelphia Inquirer’s music critic. New Yorkers selected it in a poll conducted by WNYC as one of the top three records they want to hear on the radio on the anniversary. High school teachers are using it to evoke the visceral pain and confusion of that day for their clueless students. The problem with this is that The Rising is a terrible, bad, no-good record that cheapens us all.

A "strong quake" (possibly measuring 4.2 on the Richter scale) has been reported in the Indian capital city of New Delhi. This news comes on the same day as a terrorist bombing in the city killed eleven people. [Reuters]

In your soggy Wednesday media column: More Reuters poaching, a PR liar called out, America's Most Wanted returns, ad spending forecasts decline, and Felix Salmon does more stuff, somehow.

Mall security is the worst, always kicking you out of the food court for not buying anything, then filing a suspicious activity report with the FBI. Private security officers have been trying to do counterterrorism at the Mall of America, with predictable results.

Facebook's profits are on track to reach nearly $1 billion this year, Reuters reports, as revenue doubles. Selling your private moments to advertisers has never been more lucrative.