We went to baseball camp one summer but we only made it through half of the first day. The morning was all sunshine and great American past-time, but after lunch they hosed down second base and wanted us to practice sliding. In mud! We were horrified, and we walked home crying. Note to kids: do not wear brand new Paper Denims to first day at baseball camp.
• An socio-anthropological examination of the JAP and her fitness habits. Naturally, the gym bag is the heaviest weight she lifts. [Fake Jew]
• Anna Wintour acknowledges the un-chicness of Mastic, her vacation town. And yet she continues to own property there. The mind boggles! [The Beach]
• The city passes its "Imette law," inspired by the murder of Imette St. Guillen, who's believed to die at the hands of an unlicensed bouncer. Clubs must now enact all sorts of new safety measures — none of which, you know, will actually prevent a some girl from getting wasted and getting in trouble. But nice of them to try. [NYP]
• Two days after Christina Alisio told the Post that she'd slept with philandering Met Paul Lo Duca, she's hired counsel to go after the media outlets who didn't make her look as hot as she'd have liked. [Philadelphia Will Do]
• The Wives and Girlfriends (WAGs) of major English soccer stars are redefining white trash, wearing high-end apparel bought with their own money and angering designers who hate to see their work on such middle-class bodies. Aw, poor Posh. Then again, maybe we're kind of into the WAGs because they're not an American property. If they were "ours," we'd probably hate them too. [Telegraph]
• The Week is doing kind of well. No, seriously. Don't laugh. [Folio]
• Who isn't working for Radar? It's just as commonplace as using the subway. [Belle in the Big Apple]
• Cocaine + hipsters + Mexico City = obligatory American Apparel reference. [LA Weekly]
Saul Chernick wants to put ads in the Village Voice and on Craigslist offering individualized tattoos for Jews based on their religious experiences. He wants to conduct interviews, design the tattoos, go with participants to get inked and document the entire process as a work of art.
In some bizarre meta-commentary on the whole Mel Gibson controversy, Newsweek has created a parody column by a character they're calling "Rabbi Marc Gellman." The character is apparently supposed to display every negative stereotype associated with Jews. After the jump, we introduce you to this edgy new satirist.
Cry havoc, and loose the dogs of Photoshop. Sure, we thought we'd leave Mel alone today after a brief Swayzing, but a reader sent this delightful Gwyneth-inspired illustration to our westie cousin Defamer. And it seems only right to share here, though we note that Mel is missing some kind of Israeli neckwear to complete the picture. More permutations on this theme may also be submitted for further consideration.
• Jennifer Aniston's publicist denies Us Weekly's report that Aniston and Vince Vaughn are engaged, but he's made a lot of false denials before. Wait, does this suggest that publicists are merely paid liars? No. Can't be. [Us Weekly]
• Maxim's girl of the day: Floyd Landis. Ain't she a looker? [Maxim]
• New Observer owner Jared Kushner puts in 20-hour days. Doing what? Marveling at his fortune? Showing off how freakishly tall he is? [OAN]
• Old man Larry King drives like...an old man. [TMZ]
• After 20 years of sobriety, Robin Williams falls off the wagon and into rehab. It's the circle of celebrity life. [AP]
• Pity the Harvard freshmen who get Kaavya Viswanathan as their student advisor. Though she surely could offer guidance on how to get that creative writing assignment quickly completed. [IANS]
• NB to beauty bloggers: do NOT trust Allure. They will take your words regarding your favorite mascara, and they will destroy those words. No respect. [Beauty Addict]
• Is E! gossip Ted Casablancas getting the Star Jones treatment? We hope not, 'cause Giuliana certainly isn't any Barbara Walters. [Media Mob]
• Mel Gibson loves the girls in Philly. A little too much, perhaps. [PhillyNews]
• PowerHouse Books starts a magazine featuring content from PowerHouse books, creating an "indie media clusterfuck." Ooh, the clusterfucking means they're mainstream now. Congrats. [Animal]
• Our Los Angeles brother Defamer imagines the TomKat-n-Suri photoshoot for Vanity Fair. Chilling. [Defamer]
• Contrary to popular belief, keeping kosher does NOT protect you from tapeworms. [NYT]
• Neighbors say that Mel Gibson's seven kids are "holy terrors," running wild and toilet-papering all kosher homes along the Pacific Coast Highway. [Page Six]
• Meanwhile, the prosecutor who filed DUI charges against Mel Gibson, Ralph Shapiro, has been removed from the case, presumably because he is a "fucking Jew." [TMZ]
• And finally, you just might be able to listen to Mel's anti-Semitic rant on your cell phone. Best ringtone ever. If you're in Beirut, we mean. [Scoop]
• The online profile belonging to Diana Bianchi, the girl who slept with Christie Brinkley's husband Peter Cook, reveals that she's a bit of a skankypuss. We're just as shocked as you are. [R&M]
• Because of the weight he gained for his role in Chapter 27, Jared Leto developed gout. Next, he'll get scurvy to score a part in the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise. [Page Six]
• Daily News gossipette Lloyd Grove is back! And writing about Tori Spelling! We missed your banality, darling. [Lowdown]
• A gentleman caller comes looking for Star Jones' "husband" Al Reynolds at 4 AM and rings the wrong buzzer (thus the whole world knows). Also not helping Al's case: running around in Spandex. [Page Six]
• Mel Gibson doesn't hate Jews who are female, 23-years-old, and "fetching." [R&M]
• Penelope Cruz, always willing to lend her name and questionable credibility to Tom Cruise, claims to have seen "beautiful" baby Suri. [AP]
• Maria Menounos: the next Cindy Adams? [Page Six]
• Brad Pitt sings about how he wishes he worked in Midtown. The man's intelligence is just stunning. [Us Weekly]
It's been hard to concentrate today, what with the tension surrounding rehabbing actor Mel Gibson's DUI and subsequent anti-Semitic remarks. We just don't understand. Why did Mel say such mean things? How could he? Aren't movie stars supposed to be nice? We're heartbroken and confused. Thankfully, there's always a ridiculous flack waiting around the corner to help us all make sense of the situation:
In keeping with our coverage of the Fabulous Life of Jared Kushner, the 25-year-old son of disgraced Jersey developer Charles Kushner and spanking-new owner of the Observer, we've a confirmation on the identity of his girlfriend. She's Laura Englander (Brown '03), daughter of Wall Steet demigod Israel Englander, who runs Millennium Partners, the $5 billion hedge fund that has attracted the attention of Attorney General Eliot Spitzer. And when this adorable young couple makes love, they do so on piles and piles of pillow-soft cash.
• Anti-Semite Mel Gibson had been deeply depressed before he was arrested for his DUI; the incident was "a death wish." Alas, Gibson may still be alive, but no doubt he really killed his career. 50% ain't bad for an alchy. [Deadline Hollywood]
• But seriously, he's NOT an anti-Semite. He's just really, really pro-Jesus. [AP]
• Hard Rock heir Harry Morton lost his sister to a drug overdose, and he'll be damned if he loses his girlfriend Lindsay Lohan to the same fate. Hope Harry's been working out, because it's going to take some muscle to pry that twenty out of her nose. [R&M]
• When Diana Bianchi slept with Christie Brinkley's husband Peter Cook, nobody won — except for Fawn Gettling, a video studies major at the Art Institute of New York City who made a quick bundle with a documentary she'd made about a then-unknown Bianchi and her struggle with anorexia and bulimia. [Page Six]
• A waitress claims that restaurateur Brian McNally hit her after she threw a glass at him. Of course, they were fighting about Israel and Hezbollah, so this is all perfectly understandable. This war really does serve as the universal excuse. [Page Six]
Say what you will about Nikki Finke, the woman's got great journalistic instincts. In the wake of the Mel Gibson furor she contacts Rabbi Marvin Hier, dean and founder of the Los Angeles-based Simon Wiesenthal Center. Toward the end of the interview, Finke asks the rabbi if he would assist Gibson in changing his anti-Semitic attitudes. Hier responds:
In case you're wondering about the average Us Weekly reader — and really, who isn't? We're always asking ourselves, Who the fuck reads this? — let's look at the comments section from the Us blog post about Mel Gibson's anti-Semitic tirade. The readers respond:
• As you've no doubt heard, Mel Gibson was arrested Friday for drunk driving down the PCH in Malibu, at which point he announced that "fucking Jews" were "responsible for all the wars in the world." He also made it clear that he owned Malibu, called a female officer "sugar tits" and threatened to fuck everyone within earshot. The police department may have tried to hide the inflammatory report, seeing as they're such big fans of Braveheart. [TMZ]
• 26-year-old Band-Aid heiress Casey Johnson plans to adopt a baby from Kazakhstan and dress her in "the cutest leopard baby bikini." Babies sure are neat toys! [Page Six]
• Paris Hilton lookalikes are trashy, mildly psychotic — just like the real thing. [R&M]
• Tori Spelling and her husband love nothing more than a night in with some microwave popcorn and a copy of Black Cock Invasion II. [Page Six]
• On August 14, Boy George will perform his community service (for reporting a false break-in) by cleaning the streets. As extra punishment, they'll likely send him to Chinatown. [NYDN]
A Russian bookstore in Brighton Beach has been greeted with local protest after it was discovered that the shop carried anti-Semitic books, going so far as to display one, titled The Jewish Question in Russia, in its front window. Owner Vladimir Trainin, who has since disposed of the books, claims to have no idea that his shelves were stocked with the offending material, noting that he's a Jew (self-hating, naturally). The books in question included Why America is Dying, The Myths and Truths of Jewish Pogroms, Jewish Society Coup and, our personal favorite, What We Don't Like About Them — no word on whether the store was carrying all 17 volumes of that one.
Last year, Sikh station agent employee Trilok Arora and others sued the MTA over its requirement that they wear the MTA logo on their turbans. Arora still refuses to wear the logo and only pins it to his turban when ordered by a supervisor. Unfortunately he was photographed during one of those logo-wearing instances, and he's found himself pictured in his MTA turban in a brochure outlining MTA dress codes. Arora is embarrassed to have emerged as an unwitting poster boy for a policy he's against; the MTA, however, stridently monitors the proper appropriation of their logo. But we think these two can meet each other halfway:
