So Joe Scarborough was on his MSNBC show this morning complimenting the Obama team for not going around "saying 'fuck you.'" The problem here, Joe, is that you actually said "fuck you" on air, which you're not supposed to do. Rather, you are supposed to indicate the foul word with a placeholder such as "bleep you" or the more edgy "F-you." But then you'd sound like a serious nerd. On second thought, Joe, just keep on doing your thing. Click to watch the historic video clip of Joe Scarborough, television host, saying the f-word, which leads to Time magazine's Jay Carney grinning outlandishly like a third grader whose best friend just called the teacher a "doo doo head."

"When is the right age to get married?" was the question on Today this morning. "I dunno... when did you get married?" Vieira obliviously asks Matt Lauer, who's been divorced once, and whose second wife split from him while she was pregnant (and filed for divorce in 2006) before they eventually got back together. Awkward! Hilarity ensues.

["Gossip Girl" actress Chace Crawford arriving in Nice, France (how faaaaaabulous!) yesterday; image via Bauer-Griffin]

How did Veronica Hearst (excuse us, Veronica DeGruyter Beracasa de Uribe Hearst, aka Fabiola's mom), get through three rich husbands and still wind up $45 million in debt? As Vanity Fair's Vicky Ward discovers, the talents that enable one to ensnare wealthy old dudes don't necessarily include financial acumen. In 2000, Veronica persuaded her husband Randolph Hearst—whom she'd married in 1987 when he was 72 and she was a once-divorced, once-widowed, forty-something mother of two—to pay $30 million for Villa Venezia, a 52-room, 28,000-square-foot Florida mansion.

The MTA says it is now facing a $1.2 billion deficit in 2009. So how are agency officials going to solve the problem? They may raise fares in the near future, naturally. [City Room]

I am back from vacation! I don't know why I'm exclamation marking that, because it's actually just kind of depressing! In honor of my return there is a blind item bonanza after the jump. We have a Lehman Brothers wife going on a shopping spree, a billionaire trying to sex it in the bathroom, PageSix using cutesy quotation marks to describe gay marriage!!!!!, one about Scarlett Johansson probably, and a bunch about some other people. Read them and discuss while I lie here on the floor, dreaming ever still of California! Sob! 1) "Which wife of a top Lehman executive went on a $132,000 shopping spree at the Americana Manhasset Mall the day after her hubby filed for bankruptcy?" [P6] 2) "Which skirt-chasing Euro-billionaire tried to share the bathroom at Rose Bar with a young businesswoman who rejected his offer to perform a disgusting act." [P6] 3) "Which hot downtown eatery employs a manager who's notorious for hiring and promoting women she can sleep with, despite the fact she's "married" to another woman?" [P6] 4) "Which Obama-loving actress got extra-frisky on Election Night? After a heated debate with a conservative bartender in West Hollywood, she invited him back to her place for a good old-fashioned, bipartisan romp in the sack." [NYDN] 5) "This married A list country singer has a very jealous wife. She has toned it down lately might it come raging back when she discovers why her husband saw a doctor twice while he was on the road recently." [CDaN] 6) "Which A list action star is paying big bucks to an unknown female actress to be his girlfriend for the next two months while he is doing press for his new film. He wants a girlfriend to talk about and not the increasing questions about his sexuality." [CDaN] 7) "Two singers. One male, and one female. Yes, they are a couple but not in the same group. He has been a solid performer for a few years. Her? Not so long, but a much bigger name. Well as much as the two profess their love for each other you may think it must be just a perfect relationship. It was until she started sleeping with her agent whenever she can ditch the boyfriend." [CDaN] 8) "Which A-lister demanded all air hostesses [Ed. note: That's classy talk for stewardess!] dressed in sexy lingerie while serving him on his flight to Monaco? The scruffbag also insisted male cabin crew be removed from the flight." [Mirror] 9) "Which TV series is so full of big egos that it may doom the show? 'Each actor is crazier than the next,' whispers a staffer employed behind the scenes at the sophomore drama, 'and they all pretty much hate each other.' The male lead can’t stand his love interest, and their lack of chemistry together is obvious to viewers. The good news is the nightmare may soon be over for all concerned, because although the show enjoys a rabid cult following and solid critical support, its ratings are such that a third season is looking very unlikely." [BlindGossip] Also, SERIOUSLY PAGE SIX, IN THESE TIMES?? I LOVE YOU, RUPERT!!!

Justin Timberlake and Jessica Biel leaving Southern Hospitality on Second Avenue through the back door ... Nicole Kidman getting lunch with a friend in the West Village ... Hilary Duff and boyfriend Mike Comrie arriving at their hotel ... Liev Schreiber and Naomi Watts pushing baby Alexander in a stroller ... Natalie Portman taking her dog for a walk in the rain ... Jessica Alba going to dinner at Via dei Mille on West Broadway with daughter Honor and other family members ... Katie Holmes and Suri leaving the Union Square Greenmarket .. Eva Mendes on the set of her new film ... country singer Taylor Swift arriving at her hotel ... Brooke Shields buying toys at FAO Schwarz ... and Keira Knightley and boyfriend Rupert Friend hugging in Central Park.

Malcolm Gladwell has a new book coming out next month, have you heard? Outliers, for which Little, Brown reportedly paid $4 million, may be his most ambitious book or his least, according to New York, which takes a look at the cult of Gladwell in this week's issue. Among the things that you may be surprised to hear: The "rock-star" staff writer at The New Yorker has an "aversion to midtown" (which is where the Condé Nast-owned title happens to be located), but the magazine happily uses a courier service to correspond with him.

You just don't expect this sort of thing in small-town Tennessee: a columnist for the Murfreesboro Post has—we think it's safe to say—won the prestigious "Most Racist Newspaper Column About Obama's Election" contest (edging out Maureen Dowd). Columnist Stephen Lewis' "Ode To President Obama" keenly dissects our new commander in chief's ascension "To a deee-luxe pimp pad" in Washington, through the prism of The Jeffersons. Sing along, race-mixers!:

♦ Hedge funder James Torrey and his wife Podie Lynch have put their duplex at 131 East 66th on the market for $14.5 million. The Obama fundraiser (and father of New York PR queen Serena Torrey) says the couple is now planning to downsize to a smaller apartment. [NYT, Corcoran]
♦ Exis Capital founder Adam Sender has listed his three units at 15 Broad Street for $10.995 million, after picking them up for a total of $8 million in June 2007. [NYT, PDE]
♦ More than a year after going into contract on a condo at 247 West 46th Street, Rosie O'Donnell has closed on the two-bedroom apartment for $1.97 million. [Real Deal]
♦ German film director Werner Herzog paid $630,000 for a one-bedroom pied-à-terre at 7 East 14th Street. [Real Deal]

It's been a month since Tina Brown launched her Barry Diller-backed website, The Daily Beast. But it appears the massive budget for the new launch—reportedly $18 million over three years—didn't create room for a fact-checker on staff. The Smoking Gun reports that Brown's site was fooled by a Canadian college student who posed as Jay McCarroll, the winner of the first season of Project Runway, when he submitted a design for a burlap dress for Michelle Obama to wear to the Inaugural Ball.

France's First Lady Carla Bruni, who's never met a spotlight opportunity she didn't like, is eagerly joining her husband Nicolas Sarkozy in praising the Obamas. Mrs. Sarkozy said in a TV interview that she "can't wait" to meet Michelle Obama: "To see this couple go to the White House is just magnificent." The Italian-born former model/actress also told a French newspaper that Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi's comments about Barack Obama's "tan" made her "pleased to have become French." [People, TFP]

Just which elite private school the Obamas pick for daughters Malia and Sasha Obama has turned into "one of the most closely watched contests in Washington," according to The Atlantic. Sidwell, Georgetown Day and Maret are considered the likeliest options, and Sidwell is the frontrunner since it has a history of presidential offspring (Chelsea Clinton and Tricia Nixon) and Hunter Biden, the vice president-elect's youngest son, happens to go there. The chance they'll send them to public school? "A long-shot scenario." [Atlantic]

30 Rock's Tracy Morgan is 40 today. Mets GM Omar Minaya is 50. Nobel Prize-winning economist (and NYU professor) Robert Engle turns 66. Society staple Lauren duPont is 38. Doubleday publisher Stephen Rubin is 67, as is CUNY chancellor Matthew Goldstein. Actress Heather Matarazzo is celebrating her 26th. Grey's Anatomy star Ellen Pompeo is 39. The rapper Eve is 30. Former CNN anchor Aaron Brown is 60. Film producer Roland Emmerich turns 53. Brittany Murphy is 31. And Sinbad turns 52 today.

♦ Madonna's neighbors in her Central Park West building aren't happy that she has turned her seventh-floor apartment into a music studio. (It was originally supposed to be an office for Guy Ritchie.) Now she stays up all night blaring music and practicing for her shows. [NYDN]
♦ Alex Rodriguez is thinking of following Madonna on tour next month when she plans to make stops in Brazil, Chile, and Argentina. [R&M]
♦ Is Jennifer Aniston secretly leaking pregnancy and marriage rumors about herself to the tabloids as a way to steal attention away from Brangelina? [MSNBC]
♦ Friends of Padma Lakshmi want everyone to know she is not a gold digger. She's a "hard-working, self-made woman" who just happens to only date extremely wealthy, older men. [P6]
♦ Peaches Geldof and Max Drummey's 97-day-old marriage may already be on the rocks. [The Sun]

"'There are several of our imprints who are eager to talk to Governor Palin,' Random House spokesman Stuart Applebaum said." [Post, Previously]

• Fameball and celebrity spawn Peaches Geldof, 19, was shocked to learn her secret wedding to musician Chester French, 24, may not, in fact, "last forever." In fact it may not last 100 days, pending the results of yet another secret getaway. [Sun]

♦ Citigroup is in talks to buy a regional bank, says the WSJ. Which bank it is they're planning to acquire isn't clear. [WSJ]
♦ The bailout of AIG that was originally going to cost $85 billion and was later revised to $123 billion? Yea, well, now it's $150 billion. [WSJ, Bloomberg]
♦ October was another down month for hedge funds: Since the beginning of September, the average fund has shed 10 percent. [NYP, Bloomberg]
♦ The man who may go down as the hedge fund industry's big winner in 2009: Jim Chanos, whose Ursus fund is up 50 percent so far this year. [NYP]
♦ Asian stocks rallied on Monday after China announced a $586 billion bailout package. [Bloomberg]

Had Ted Turner's old rival Rupert Murdoch just issued an "autobiography" written by a former lieutenant, as Ted Turner has, one suspects it would not have been embraced so eagerly by sympathetic journalists at 60 Minutes, the Times, the Wall Street Journal and even AP, which meditated whimsically on the CNN founder's chapter titles. Maybe that's because the News Corporation chairman still enjoys the blood sport of media feuds in his old age, coordinating multi-outlet attacks on relative small fry like Keith Olbermann, while Turner is in the business of moving on — and making plenty of media friends in the process. He has forgiven Murdoch for what he suspects was the hiring of private investigators to prove him insane in the 1980s, as he explains in the attached 60 Minutes clip, and put behind him the loss of $7 billion, a devastating divorceand a bad prescription for Lithium.

Desperate mogul Sumner Redstone may be able pay off some of his $1.6 billion in debt before half of it comes due in December. The solution: Sell off Midway Games, money-bleeding maker of classic arcade hits like Rampage, Spy Hunter and Mortal Kombat. Some $800 million in cash infusions for Midway were a major contributor to Redstone's debt and pissed off daughter Shari, according to the Wall Street Journal, which reported Monday morning that Shari just resigned as chairwoman to Midway, signaling a sale may be in the works.In addition to Midway, the Redstones are said looking to unload their slot machine company. What the hell is divorced ole Sumner supposed to do for fun??