The Daily Beast, the website overseen by Tina Brown and backed by Barry Diller, has launched. [The Daily Beast]

♦ Good news for downtown hipster boys: Chloë Sevigny is expanding her Opening Ceremony clothing line to include menswear. [Nylon]
♦ Just because you're a celebrity doesn't mean that your clothing line will be successful, points out WWD: Scarlett Johansson and Mandy Moore both have failed attempts behind them. But Mary Kate and Ashley Olsen, because they were apparently blessed at birth with the ability to mint money, have ever expanding fashion companies. [WWD]

Have you heard about the salon in Midtown that offers Botox in 30 minutes or less? SmoothMed has been open for more than a year now, but if you're interested in seeing how some New Yorkers spend their lunch breaks, the video is after the jump. Now you know why your boss occasionally comes back to the office in the afternoon with a puffy face and she's also unable to express any emotion.

Tina Fey has sold her first book—a collection "of humorous essays in the style of Nora Ephron"—to Little, Brown. [NYO]

♦ And some have suggested that no one wants to ring the closing bell these days? Bobby Flay turned up at the NASDAQ this afternoon to handle the honors as part of the promo campaign for the New York City Wine & Food Festival. [Eater]
♦ A first look at Chloe on Ludlow Street. [GS]
♦ Recession special! The five-course game dinner at Daniel is $495 per person. [Zagat]
♦ Comfort food: It's what's for dinner. [NYDN]
♦ Anthony Bourdain's fantasy party? A barbie with Marco Pierre White and Keith Richards, among others. [P6]
♦ A look inside the new Magnolia Bakery in Rockefeller Center. [Eater]

Something else to add to the myriad reasons why the financial industry has collapsed in on itself: According to new research published in Science magazine, when faced with a situation that you have little control over—say, picking the right stock—otherwise rational people become superstitious and trick themselves into "seeing and making connections that do not exist." The study's co-author Jennifer Whitson observes that given the current precarious state of the market, traders "may grasp at any type of pattern that will make them feel better." So if, on your way home tonight, you see a guy in pinstripes and suspenders avoiding the cracks in the sidewalk and touching every second lamppost, you'll know why.

Oops! Citigroup's marketing department had already started running ads announcing the purchase of Wachovia when it found out this morning that the bank was backing out of the deal and selling itself to Wells Fargo instead. [AdAge]

Since the real scale of the economic crisis became apparent, we've all been forced to witness—and sometimes make—some major sacrifices. Vacations canceled, subways instead of cabs, no nice restaurants or new clothes. But that doesn't make it any the less heart-rending to hear about people, not in some third world country, but here, in America, who are reducing the budgets of their interior designers. The poor designers are having to use cheaper materials, haggle with contractors, and are even—the horror!— buying furniture from chain stores. So let's pray even harder for a swift turnaround on Wall Street, because no one became a high-end decorator so that they could shop at Crate & Barrel.

♦ Last night's face-off between Sarah Palin and Joe Biden generated the highest ratings for a debate in 16 years. [THR]
♦ SNL has booked Queen Latifah to play debate moderator Gwen Ifill tomorrow night. [People]
♦ What does Palin have to say about Katie Couric? Nothing good. [HuffPo]
♦ CNN incorrectly reported that Apple CEO Steve Jobs suffered a heart attack. [Reuters, SAI]
♦ Fox Business hit a ratings high on Monday—a scant 81,000 viewers. [NYT]
♦ Google may hire an ad agency for the first time. It's had discussions with Wieden + Kennedy and Ari Merkin's Taxi New York. [WSJ]
♦ Jesse L. Martin is in discussions to star in a new NBC drama called The Philanthropist. [THR]
♦ The Economist is stamping its brand on pizza boxes. [NYT]

The National Organization of Women, which successfully convinced New York magazine and the New York Press to ban ads for escort agencies last year, has a new target: amNewYork. The group is protesting the free paper's "Feeling and Looking Good" section, which is devoted exclusively to ads offering "massages" by Asian women. The paper says the ads are for legit businesses. And how does amNewYork verify which of these services are on the up-and-up and which ones offer naughty extras? "We visit," says the paper's publisher, Terry Jimenez. Well, isn't that a nice job for some amNewYork staffer! [City Room]

Remember that decaying Greenwich mansion that was put up for auction a couple of weeks ago? It sold. Apparently, only one bidder showed up and he walked away with the property for the asking price of $2.5 million, which is just $200,000 more than what hedge fund scam artist Michael Lauer paid for it in 1999. [NYDN]

The $700 billion bailout package has passed the House. President Bush says he'll sign it later today. [NYT, CNN]

This isn't a great day for Dick Fuld, the CEO of Lehman Brothers who watched his firm go up in smoke a couple of weeks ago: As if leading the investment bank into bankruptcy wasn't bad enough, today he's packing up his corner office to move to the Lehman office building on Sixth Avenue that's home to the firm's admin and tech support groups. It's been a wretched few weeks for Fuld. But we're also guessing it isn't that much fun these days being Richard Fuld III either. Dick's youngest child, 23-year-old Richie graduated from Middlebury last year. (His father serves on the school's board of trustees.) While it can't be easy watching your dad get pummeled by the press, here's hoping his dad's downfall doesn't tarnish his rep with the ladies or put an end to his very active social life. Photos of Richie chillin' with the babes and drinking beer after the jump.

Remember how Citigroup was supposed to buy Wachovia earlier this week for pennies and then it was announced this morning that Wachovia had actually changed its mind and decided to sell itself to Wells Fargo? Yea, well, now Citigroup is majorly pissed and is threatening Wachovia with a lawsuit. [Dealbook]

Britney Spears getting out of an SUV at JFK ... Sarah Ferguson signing copies of her book at Borders ... Taylor Momsen on the Gossip Girl set ... Katie Holmes and Tom Cruise leaving their apartment with Suri ... LL Cool J reading to kids as part of a charity event in Rockefeller Plaza ... Candice Bergen walking by herself on the Upper West Side ... Calista Flockhart outside the Letterman show ... Leighton Meester posing for photos at a domestic violence awareness event in Union Square ... Elizabeth Hurley entering her hotel on the Upper East Side ... and Sean and Robin Wright Penn holding hands outside the premiere of What Just Happened.

That ridiculous solid gold statue of Kate Moss was unveiled at the British Museum yesterday. Weighing 50 kg and insured for $20 million, it's thought to be the largest gold statue since ancient Egypt. The sculptor Marc Quinn says that he chose his subject because Moss "is the only person who has the ubiquity and silence that is required in an image of divinity, that has been created through time, so that we can project onto it." We think he means that a coke-snorting, hard-drinking, skeevy musician-shagging, multimillionaire clotheshorse is the perfect icon for contemporary Western society, which is, of course, true. [Independent]

These three women were all once married to prominent local politicians. Know who they are? Answers after the jump.

♦ James Fairchild—the son of John Fairchild, the founder of Fairchild Publications—and wife Whitney have sold their third-floor apartment at 1 Sutton Place for $9 million. [Cityfile]
♦ The buyer of Max Mutchnick's two-bedroom West Village apartment is sports mogul Randy Lerner, who owns both the Cleveland Browns and the Aston Villa soccer club in England. [Cityfile]
♦ Mariann Florio, the widow of former Condé Nast CEO Steve Florio, has put her waterfront house in Key Largo on the market for $8.9 million. The Florios paid just $4.8 million for the six-bedroom Mediterranean mansion back in 2001. [WSJ, Sotheby's]
♦ Interior designer Lorraine Kirke has slashed the price of her 7,000-square-foot East Hampton home twice since first putting it on the market for $14.5 million last year. It's now down to $11.5 million. [Newsday, Sotheby's]

New York restaurateurs may be panicked about the economy, but all is well in Qatar! This week it was reported that the Four Seasons in Doha will be home to the latest incarnation of Nobu. (A Dubai outpost opened earlier this month.) Gordon Ramsay is supposedly looking at two different sites in town for an eatery he has planned. And when Doha's new W Hotel opens in a couple of months, Jean-Georges Vongerichten's Spice Market will be located in the lobby. Less exciting news, at least as far as New Yorkers are concerned: "Bollywood legend" Asha Bhosle has also opened a high-profile restaurant in Doha, and a branch of the Hard Rock Café is coming, too. [The Penninsula via Luxist]

There's a question that's been troubling us all—perhaps on an unconscious level—and poor Heather Locklear's predicament has brought it to the attention of two of the world's finest philosophers: The Daily News' folksy addiction experts Dave and Bill. So why do famous people spend huge amounts of money on rehab, only to continue getting bombed? It's their "dangerously inflated egos," apparently, which stand in the way of "the healing powers of anonymity and group morale" enjoyed by people with regular-sized egos at 12-step programs.