In all the furor over Tal Fortgang—the privileged white Princeton freshman who wrote so passionately about how he's not a privileged white guy—no one, not even the New York Times, noted that his post was made possible by a conservative group that bankrolls and grooms college kids for right-wing leadership.

The lives of great figures often resonate with the lives of the ordinary multitudes who admire them. Here's a roundup of some people who found Margaret Thatcher inspirational, and even sympathetic. Truly, the story of the Iron Lady contained a piece of everyone's story.

Three years ago, New York Times media reporter and occult career-bender David Carr was taking a tour through South by Southwest and asked the festival's film person what movie he should see. She tipped him off to a movie called Tiny Furniture and he fell in love. He gave the movie and its creator/star, a 23-year-old woman named Lena Dunham, 1,000 words in the Times.

TIME Magazine has named Rihanna, the wallpaper-y popstar who recently collaborated on two sexy songs with the man whose savage beating of her face resulted in injuries police called "horrific," one of 2012's most influential people.

Today Lady Gaga unleashed her newest single, "Edge of Glory" to a flurry of internet squealing. To me it sounds like she traded in ripping off Madonna and went right for another '80s icon: Pat Benatar. There's even a sax solo!

The overwhelming reaction to Lady Gaga's new single, "Born This Way," is that it's a rip-off of Madonna's "Express Yourself." Rihanna has just been sued by photographer David LaChapelle for using images inspired by his own in her video for "S&M." Where is the fine line between inspiration and theft?

A pair of scientists proved that having millions of followers on Twitter doesn't mean you're influential, about anything, ever. Whatever, I bet nobody follows scientists on Twitter, anyway. Rigorous quantifiable data? TL;DR, bitches! [NYT]

Machine-like purveyor of conventional media wisdom Howard Kurtz takes on the DC press corps' most important question today: Hey, is Politico's Mike Allen really Washington's Most Important Journalist? Or might that Most Important Journalist be [my name]?

Anna Wintour has come up with a genius way to save the dying fashion business: Why doesn't everyone just collude on prices? So what if it's illegal? She has "friends in the White House."

The DC-NYC-LA power nexus craves lists that rank the politico-media elite, and we've got the most important one of all: Matt Drudge's favorite personalities/targets, ranked by the number of times their names have appeared in his headlines since 2002.

Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull star Shia LaBeouf was arrested early this morning in Hollywood on suspicion of driving while well 'faced. "The 22-year-old actor was the driver of a vehicle that was involved in a 3 a.m. collision at a street intersection in Hollywood, Los Angeles County Sheriff's Sgt. Scott Wolf said. 'It was immediately apparent to officers responding on the scene that LaBeouf was intoxicated and he was subsequently placed under arrest,' Wolf said."

How would you spend your days if you were a young millionaire college dropout with a failed fashion line and with not much to do aside from the occasional Vogue covershoot? If you're an Olsen Twin, there's one surefire way to pass the time and re-establish your street cred: write a Very Important Book! Everyone's favorite munchkin moguls are set to release Influence, a coffee-table book that's being published by Penguin's Young Adult arm. Following in the footsteps of powerhouse literary talents Nicole Richie (The Truth About Diamonds) and Paris Hilton (Confessions Of An Heiress), the tiny duo wrote a book in which they interviewed "the most interesting, challenging, creative people we know — the ones who helped pave the way for us and our generation." Who are these illustrious figures? Well, let's just say their tricks aren't for kids.