Michael Wolff is Vanity Fair's media columnist and the author of a brand new book about Rupert Murdoch. He's also a man with inside info and impeccable sources. "My 83-year-old mother (today is her birthday) in New Jersey has just called me to say that she has just heard through sources who must remain anonymous, though she hinted at friends who have children who might or might not know people in the State Department, that George Bush is back on the sauce and Laura is getting ready to leave him." [Newser.com]

In case you've missed it, photos of the Obamas in their hotel room first hearing the results of the election. [Flickr]

Exposing a Checkered Past [TMZ]

As Candace Bushnell continues promoting her latest novel One Fifth Avenue, more unsuspecting journalists are emerging from interviewing her vaguely traumatized, wondering what she has to be so temperamental about (other than the fact that her obsession with glitz and shopping is suddenly anachronistic) and especially now that the whole will they-won't they make the SATC sequel juggernaut is underway. But as an Independent reporter discovers, there's not much you can ask Bushnell without getting a testy reaction.

Oprah Winfrey may still be celebrating Barack Obama's triumph Tuesday, but hopefully her good mood won't be ruined by the bad news this morning: Hearst, Oprah's magazine partner, has announced that O at Home, the shelter-focused spinoff of O, The Oprah Magazine, is shutting down. Guess Michelle Obama will have to look elsewhere when she starts thinking about redecorating the White House. [Mixed Media]

♦ Now that Julian Schnabel has reduced the price of his penthouse triplex at Palazzo Chupi, it only makes sense that the price of the two-floor duplex right below has been cut as well. Once on the market for as much as $32 million, it can now be yours for the bargain basement price of $23 million. [Curbed, Corcoran]
♦ Golfer Greg Norman's ex-wife Laura Andrassy collected $103 million in a divorce settlement earlier this year. Now it looks like she's spending some of it. Andrassy is reportedly paying $7.55 million for a 0.92-acre property in Southampton where she plans to tear down the 3,500-square-foot home to make room for a bigger one. [WSJ]
♦ Steven Gidumal, co-chief investment officer at Resurgence Asset Management, has paid $4.1 million for a three-bedroom condo at 1 River Terrace in Battery Park City. [Cityfile]

Skittish art collectors with shrunken fortunes continue to balk at the prospect of picking up expensive artwork: At last night's sale of impressionist and modern art at Christie's, works by Matisse, Monet and Renoir had no takers, and the auction house's owner, French billionaire François Pinault, looked on as sluggish bidding led to lots going for bargain prices or not at all.

Diane von Furstenberg is blogging—sort of. In the most recent entry on the DVF website, she welcomes the Standard Hotel to the meatpacking district (which, in case you haven't heard, is a "new luxe hotel" that's "minimalist chic but with a downtown NYC twist.") We're going to go ahead and place the blame on her assistant, though, for referring to the hotel's owner as "Andre Balaz." [DVF.com]

Filmmaker Morgan Spurlock is 38 today. Joni Mitchell is 65. Reverend Billy Graham is 90. General David Petraeus is turning 56. Former Brady Bunch star Christopher Knight turns 51. Lost star Yunjin Kim is 35. Interior designer John Barman is 59. And twin actors Jeremy and Jason London are 36. Weekend birthdays after the jump.

Mayor Bloomberg wants to discourage people from using plastic bags when they shop at grocery stores. So he's proposing a 6-cent tax on every bag, a fee that city officials argue could generate as much as $16 million a year. Just wait until the mayor goes food shopping for the first time in years to show off the reusable bags he's suggesting the public use. He won't believe how much milk costs these days! [NYT]

♦ Kim Cattrall and Sarah Jessica Parker are apparently incapable of getting along: A day after Kim confirmed that there will be Sex and the City sequel, Parker told fans "not to get their hopes up" and that "Kim is excited, but all the deals are not yet done." [Daily Star, People]
♦ It looks like spending time in court, soup kitchens, and sanitation departments hasn't helped Naomi Campbell much. She infuriated passengers on her flight back from London on Tuesday by cutting in line while going through customs at JFK. She swears it wasn't her fault because it was the airline that offered her an escort. [R&M]
♦ Ian Schrager is getting married next Saturday. The bride-to-be is a ballerina named Tania Wahlstedt. [P6]

♦ Employers cut 240,000 jobs in October, bringing the year's total job losses to nearly 1.2 million. The unemployment rate is now 6.5%, up from from 6.1% in September. [CNNMoney]
♦ Why has the market been falling sharply in recent days? One reason is that hedge funds have been selling billions of their holdings to meet demands for cash from their investors and their lenders. [WSJ]
♦ Citigroup is reportedly planning another round of layoffs. [DB]
♦ Ken Griffin's Citadel says his fund lost about 22 percent last month. [NYP]
♦ The evidence is largely anecdotal, but it appears there's been an increase in suicides related to the financial crisis. [NYT]

So much for Daniel and Isabella. "Barack" is poised to become a big baby name thanks to his victory on Tuesday. A number of new moms in Kenya have reportedly named their newborns after the President-elect in recent days, and it isn't just limited to Barack's first name. "Michelle" is expected to grow in popularity, too, and one South Florida couple even named their son "Obama" on Wednesday. [Reuters]

♦ The first looks from Thakoon's Target collection are online, and they're very Talitha Getty. [Nylon]
♦ Stay far away from 52nd and Fifth this evening, unless you want to catch the desire to wear candy-colored velour: Pamela Skaist-Levy and Gela Nash-Taylor are throwing a launch party for Juicy Couture's new store. [Page Six]
♦ It's not only Lindsay Lohan who has seen the potential in leggings: The spring lines from labels like Rodarte and Threeasfour feature printed, cut-out or slashed leggings. [stylefile]
♦ Fashion designer Lisa Perry, lover of all things '60s (and wife of hedge funder Richard), is opening a store in SoHo tomorrow. [The Daily]

If Toyota's "Saved By Zero" commercial makes you want to hurt yourself, or someone else (not to mention has ensured you'll never buy a Toyota as long as you live), you're not alone. The "Stop Playing Toyota's 'Saved by Zero' Commercial" group on Facebook now has 2,394 members. [AdFreak]

♦ Momofuku's David Chang is opening a "bakery and milk bar" in the next few weeks. It'll offer up a selection of flavored milks, soft-serve ice cream, and desserts. [Eater]
♦ The West Village restaurant Charles, which opened less than a month ago, has already lost its chef, John McAllister. [Feedbag]
♦ Former Tia Pol chef Alex Raij plans to open a tapas bar on Ninth Avenue this fall. [The Feed]
♦ Frank Bruni weighs in on Irving Mill and says he feels "blessed" by new chef Ryan Skeen's beef cheek and fatback hamburger, although he's pretty unimpressed with everything else. [NYT/Diner's Journal]
♦ A guide to the best Cuban food in New York. [NYT]

Not only did the Dow plunge another 400 points today, the Department of Labor reported that the number of people collecting unemployment has reached a 25-year-high. Some of the local companies that announced layoffs today: Hearst, Time Inc., and Steve Cohen's SAC Capital. [CNNMoney]

Craigslist has agreed to crack down on the sex workers who use the site's "erotic services" section. That this news came about an hour after it was announced that Eliot Spitzer would not be prosecuted for having sex with prostitutes? A delightful coincidence! [NYT]

Time to give out the award to the first world leader who came up with something quasi-racist about Barack Obama following his victory on Tuesday. Italy's Silvio Berlusconi described the President-elect as "young, handsome and tanned" at a news conference today. (Of course, Sarah Palin had some color in her cheeks, too, but that was for other reasons.) By Berlusconi standards, this is pretty mild stuff. This is the same guy who turned up at the New York Stock Exchange and suggested Americans consider investing in Italy because "the secretaries are beautiful." Video of his remarks (in Italian) after the jump. [Guardian]

Sarah Palin says she plans to return the six-figure wardrobe that got her into so much trouble in the run-up to the election. But she's already had to part ways with another campaign perk: the plane that jetted her around the country over the past couple of months. The Embraer E190 that the McCain campaign leased from JetBlue to fly the Wasilla hillbillies from place to place touched down in Anchorage yesterday to deposit the governor in her home state. It's now on its way back to New York where it will be stripped of its McCain/Palin logo and rejoin JetBlue's fleet of jets based at JFK. At least now there's a very good explanation if you happen to come across a Neiman Marcus shopping bag stuffed under your seat.