A momentous power summit accompanied last weekend's Kennedy Center Honors, where Barbra Streisand had her first-ever audience with President George Bush. Video from the event features Streisand — a vicious Bush critic who spent much of the recent election cycle as the Obama campaign's Deputy Director of Fundraising Medleys — welcoming the outgoing president to not only within bitchslap's-length, but actually close enough to share a skin-searing bipartisan kiss.

Remember how scientists recently uncovered that 2,700-year-old stash of weed in a grave in China? Well here it is, in all its 2,700-year-old glory. Oldie was sitting on some straight up Kryptonite. Click to enlarge. [Journal of Experimental Botany via Animal]

Retired Minnesota Congressman Jim Ramstad is rumored to be Barack Obama's new "Drug Czar." The "Drug Czar" is the Director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy (the term "Drug Czar" was invented by Joe Biden!), and his or her job is to release crappy PSAs about marijuana. Here is the problem: Ramstad, a recovering alcoholic, not only opposed medical marijuana and supported prosecution of people who use medical marijuana, but he also consistently opposed funding life-saving needle exchange programs throughout his entire congressional tenure. All these policies are in opposition to crazy liberal things Barack Obama said, during the campaign, about how he'd be less terrible re. drug policy.

When Lost first began, it had several things going for it including a strong premise, a diverse cast, and a series of wonderful chests. Sadly, Josh Holloway (tee-vee's "Sawyer") has decided to follow in costar Matthew Fox's lead and mess with his Abbie™-winning torso, and the results became evident this week as he shot an advertisement for Cool Water in Hawaii and revealed this strange new tattoo. Was Holloway trying to one-up Brad Pitt's inscrutable ink, or was he paying tribute to his adopted archipelago in ways that will surely undergo some tectonic shifting over the next decade? A second picture awaits after the jump for those inclined to study the evidence — we're too busy engineering a frantic, preventative letter-writing campaign aimed at Naveen Andrews (no, Sayid, those nipple rings will not look good on camera).

"During presentations at McCann Worldgroup's office in Bogotá, Colombia, staffers have taken to letting a chicken loose to hunt and peck around clients' feet." [WSJ]

After three little earthquakes over the weekend (sadly not of the Tori Amos variety) left no major damage, we feel confident in saying that the apocalyptic front that moved in offshore has safely exited the Southland and is now wreaking havoc on Scottsdale or Tucson. Let those Snowbirds deal with it, you need to find a new director for your vampire movies. Your astrological B.O. predictions after the jump.

The employees of Tribune Co. have plenty of reasons to be infuriated today—they're the ones who own the company through their Employee Stock Ownership Plan, not Sam Zell, who put just $315 million of his own money into last year's $8 billion deal that gave him control of the company. But the bankruptcy filing contains one detail that stands out as the unkindest cut of all: Tribune still owes $11.2 million to the former CEO of Times-Mirror (which Tribune bought in 2000) Mark Willes—a man most famous for massive layoffs and an ethical scandal of historic proportions:

♦ Amusing bits from profile of Marc Jacobs from Rolling Stone, which was reprinted in the Sunday Times: He's now up to 30 tattoos and he spends at least two hours a day at the David Barton Gym. As for his ex, Jason Preston, he has this to say: "I've had boyfriends who were media whores... I don't want to make the same mess again." [Times UK]
♦ If you've wondered why Victoria Beckham's collection of dresses looks like the work of Roland Mouret, there's good reason: Mouret served as Posh's "mentor." [Vogue UK]
♦ Inexplicably, Lindsay Lohan's legwear line is "selling like hotcakes." [NYDN]
♦ Anna Wintour really wants to reiterate that she has no plans to leave Vogue: "With so much uncertainty, one thing is certain: Vogue," read the mag's ad in yesterday's New York Times. [Fashionologie]

Remember how Oprah once threatened to ruin the life of novelist Jonathan Franzen by selecting his book for her club and thereby making him lots and lots of money? Walmart might do the same to Apple's iPhone!

There are two Paula Abduls: The first, a fierce and focused businesswoman, overseeing a growing multimedia empire bolstered by her stratospheric visibility on American Idol. The other is tanked, and the one we actually care about. You rarely get just one or the other, mind you, but instead a glorious spectrum of increasingly blurry...how do you say...shades of Paula.

Every major media enterprise is looking to cut costs these days. One way film studios can consider trimming some fat: By replacing really expensive actors (like Penelope Cruz) with much cheaper alternatives (Paz Vega), who look similar enough that the audience will barely notice the difference. [Empire via Buzzfeed]

Canceling year-end parties is a hot holiday trend. But Yahoo executives, even as they prepared to put 1,500 employees on the street this week, greenlighted a bash for the troubled Web giant which took place Saturday. The theme: gambling. Appropriate!

Sad news for crazy people: the Supreme Court decided not to hear an emergency call to intervene to stop Barack Obama from assuming the presidency, on account of how he's secretly not a citizen. The nut who brought the suit "also contends that two other candidates, Republican John McCain and Socialist Workers candidate Roger Calero, also are not natural-born citizens and thus ineligible to be president." Even David Horowitz has had enough of this nonsense. (This nonsense sponsored by Alan Keyes.) [AP/Yahoo]

Though David Letterman's held a late-night career for almost thirty years, he's rarely had as many consecutive buzz moments as he did in 2008. Whether he was expertly dissecting reality show stars, driving the nervous star of Twilight to a pipe for solace, or launching the full-scale Letterman/McCain War of '08, the ornery talk show host never lost his ability to fluster guests into their weirdest possible publicity stops. Thanks to video editor Richard Blakeley and intern Stacey Fitzgerald, we've assembled eight of the most magic moments in one clip. Vera Farmiga, don't fret: there's always next year.

Dear readers: you may have heard that Sam Zell's Tribune Company recently filed for bankruptcy. Do not be alarmed! Just because the company is drowning in $12 billion in debt with few prospects for a revival of its fortunes is no reason to believe that it's anything but "business as usual" at the trusty Tribune. When Zell bought the company last year, employees were assured, "Going forward, employees participating in the [Employee Stock Ownership Plan] will be invested alongside Sam Zell, one of today’s most successful investors." Awesome! And the company has already assured everyone that there's no need to get upset by today's unfortunate, catastrophic turn of events:

What's hip hop impresario Russell Simmons up to these days? The same as usual, apparently. [Bauer-Griffin via Bastardly, previously]

There's something about that wily British press that can extract a flat-out mea culpa from interview subjects where hundreds of American journalists have tried and failed. Frost did it with Nixon, and now the Daily Mail does it with Lynne Spears, mother of Britney. No doubt, a ragtag group of journalists and producers got together for months poring over their strategy, and now, finally, they have given Lynne the cross-examination she never had, producing the apology an entire country had been clamoring for:

So much for Andre Balazs's plans to open an outpost of the Standard in the meatpacking district this week. HotelChatter is reporting that the launch will be pushed back by a week "unless a miracle happens." [HC]

The Tribune Company, owner of the LA Times and Chicago Tribune, has filed for bankruptcy. Bummer. Pretty much everyone saw this coming. The company is $12 billion in debt, its revenues are going steadily downward, it's been having round after round of layoffs, and it's run by an angry (but honest!) billionaire gnome and a Ron Jeremy doppelganger of questionable sanity. Its papers will keep publishing, but working journalists are sure to get even more royally screwed before this is all over—their pension plan actually owns the company. Key details below:

Last weekend, we reported that the Shiba pups that warmed our hearts through this cold, grey fall were about to be shipped off to human families. A cursory look at the puppycam this morning revealed only three dogs left, although some may be outside. What is the only thing that will help? NEW PUPPIES. Videogum has complied by locating a fresh-baked batch of Inus. Aww, they were nursing a couple minutes ago!