The story started in whispers at a party. "You worked for Arianna Huffington?" I asked a new acquaintance. "Got any gossip?"

FHM India's December issue features a cover pic of Pakistani actress and reality TV star Veena Malik in her birthday suit, leg and arms strategically placed to cover up her most special places. Malik claims she was digitally undressed—but is she trying to cover up the truth (cue suspenseful sound effect)?

Aspiring serious person Sean Parker celebrated his 32nd birthday by attending a very serious play in New York. Oh, and standing on a table and brandishing a fire extinguisher.

Scandal in the rarefied and ultimately self-satisfied and pointless world of high-end wine reviewing! Jay Miller has stepped down from his job as a wine reviewer for Robert Parker's Wine Advocate, a wine publication which is considered very well-well-well by the la-dee-da set. Miller says his departure has been long-planned. Which is good timing, considering that bribery scandal he's embroiled in now.

James R. Matthews, the Republican commissioner of Pennsylvania's Montgomery County and brother to sputtering blowhard Chris Matthews, was arrested this morning on perjury charges. Yes, Chris Matthews' brother is a Republican politician.

Sure, dating an investment banker seems nice. He's rich! He dresses well! So what if he's married? He takes you out on his boat! And then he follows you to London, breaks into your apartment, steals candlesticks, pretends to be an Israeli secret agent, and puts a tracking device in your bag.

You're not the only one sliding slowly into poverty: Due to new austerity measures, Queen Elizabeth II is taking a pay cut. Her salary, drawn from British taxpayer funds, will be limited to a mere $50 million this year.

This insecure actor ensured that a Twilight actor wasn't costarring in his new movie. This famous family has a bastard child, this actor hates his transgender sister, this family is being torn apart by a gay sibling, and this actress wants to fuck Bradley Cooper. That's so much more fun than all this family feuding.

This is Anthony Miranda, 24, an enterprising but unlucky young Chicagoan who on Friday learned the hard way that choosing your victim is the most important part of any robbery.

WE HEAR that TJ Holmes, CNN's weekend morning anchor, is leaving the network for a new gig, which should be announced in the near future. Know more? Email me. [Photo via Getty]

Lots of people enjoy traveling from their far-flung American hometowns here, to the "Big Apple," the "City That Never Sleeps," a place "Where Stars Are Born," and "You Will Probably Get Robbed." Please, gentle tourists, heed this Public Service Announcement: Do not let anyone "borrow" your credit card, here in "Gotham."

America's youngest LGBT rights supporters are really giving homophobic presidential candidate Michele Bachmann a tough time this week. In this video, eight-year-old Elijah approaches Bachmann while she tries to peddle her broken autobiography to naive South Carolinians and whispers in her ear, "Miss Bachmann, my mommy's gay but she doesn't need fixing."

Why did high school cop Donnie Riggins show up to work on Halloween 2011 dressed up as a ladyparts doctor—complete with "Gynecologist, Dr. Harry Beaver" name badge, fake teeth, and wig? We can think of four possible reasons:

Research suggests that southpaws are prone to schizophrenia, ADHD, dyslexia, mood disorders, brain disorders, and impaired learning, and earn 10% less than right-handed people. For better health and higher wages, try to avoid using your left hand. [Image via Shutterstock]

Andy Cohen began Monday's Watch What Happens Live by exclaiming, "Wow, we got a dead house tonight!" Cohen was referring to his lazy audience, but when considering the fact he was was also sitting next to Real Housewives of Beverly Hills star Taylor Armstrong—whose abusive husband, Russell, committed suicide in August—it's hard not to cringe a bit at his unfortunate choice of words. You'll find that, plus Taylor's candid talk about Russell's domestic abuse and ultimate suicide, in the above video.

Professional troll Herman Cain announced he was suspending his presidential campaign on Saturday after weeks of sexual harassment/affair allegations proved too much for the simpleton to ever effectively deny on television. So on tonight's Daily Show, Jon Stewart sent Cain off in style by mocking pretty much every element of his farewell address.

There is only one accepted portrait of Jane Austen, sketched by her sister in 1810, in which the author of Sense and Sensibility and Pride and Prejudice looks to be extremely pissed off. But Austen scholar Dr. Paula Byrne, who is working on a definitive biography due out some time in 2013, has discovered a portrait in auction, and thinks there is an excellent possibility that the woman in it daintily holding a quill and staring out a window pensively — which, coincidently, is precisely how I look at this exact moment — could be Austen herself.

Early last September, before Occupy Wall Street was even a glint of pepper spray in an obstinate protester's eye, the NYPD were mobilizing against another crowd menace: the West Indian American Day Parade in Crown Heights, Brooklyn. Sure, some officers were spotted getting into the spirit by grinding against paradegoers' behinds, but a far greater number were bracing for the mayhem that frequently accompanies the debauched annual event. This year's parade was particularly violent — there were multiple shootings, resulting in one civilian fatality and an officer wounded in his arm. In the days that followed, New York cops had had enough, and they created a Facebook group to vent their anger. It was extremely racist.

If you used a credit card between the dates of Sept. 21 and Nov. 18th at national restaurant wholesalers Restaurant Depot or Jetro Cash & Carry, then you should probably know that Russian cyberthugs wearing leather blazers and gold chains and stinking of Armani Aqua di Gio are currently selling your information on the black market.

Let's start with the good news: Michelina Lewandowska, a 27-year-old mother from Leeds, England, is physically fine after enduring a 300,000-volt tasering, imprisonment inside a computer box, and subsequent vivisepulture — aka premature burial — all at the hands of the father of her young son. The bad news is everything that comes after the word "fine" in the previous sentence. The father, 25-year-old Marcin Kasprzak, had a simple motive: He had grown bored with her.