♦ Guy Ritchie and Madonna's marriage came to an official end in the High Court of London courtroom this morning. Neither "Ciccone ML" or "Ritchie GS" actually showed up in person for the proceedings, but Madonna had drinks with ex-husband Sean Penn on Wednesday night, possibly as part of an early celebration. [People, The Sun, P6]
♦ The longest pregnancy in history is finally over: Ashlee Simpson and Pete Wentz welcomed a son named Bronx Mowgli Wentz into the world last night. Yes, that's Bronx Mowgli. [People]
♦ According to The Sun, Michael Jackson has converted to Islam and has changed his name to "Mikaeel." [The Sun]

• Michael Jackson is a secret Muslim who is actually called Mikaeel, meaning angel of Allah, after the pop star rejected the name "Mustafa," which means chosen one. In a few days Jackson will appear in London court, where an Arab sheikh is suing him for seriously breaching a multi-million-dollar contract. Related? Who knows. The headline? "The Way You Mecca Me Feel." [Sun]

The recession didn't put a damper on Sol Kerzner's plans to throw one of the most lavish parties in recent memory. The South African casino mogul threw a $25 million fête in Dubai this evening to celebrate the opening of the Atlantis, his $1.5 billion hotel on the man-made island of Palm Jumeirah. (It's modeled on his Bahamas resort by the same name.) A long list of stars put in appearances (Lindsay Lohan, Mischa Barton, Robert De Niro, Charlize Theron, Mary-Kate Olsen, Albert Hammond Jr., Agyness Deyn), Kylie Minogue was paid in the neighborhood of $4 million to perform a 60-minute set, and a bunch of famous chefs (like Nobu Matsuhisa) were responsible for assembling the menu. Now Kerzner just has to figure out how to get people to rent rooms that begin at $800 a night (and go up to $25,000) and he can start making his money back. [WSJ, Daily Mail]

♦ The Ashley Dupre press bonanza begins: In her first print interview with People, which hits newsstands on Friday (the same day she'll appear on 20/20), Dupre says she's just a "normal girl" who has "a lot of depth," and that she feels sorry for Silda Spitzer, but doesn't blame herself for Eliot's downfall. [People, NYP]
♦ Are Gwyneth Paltrow and Chris Martin splitting up? The two have spent very little time together since this summer, and now she's become "very good friends" with Fontainebleau hotel owner Jeff Soffer. Gwynnie reportedly spent time with Soffer (and his Bentley and yacht) this past weekend in Miami. [P6]
♦ Britney Spears is supposedly dating a 27-year-old model named Marco D'Angelo who she met through friends in Las Vegas. [Star]
♦ It looks like Anne Hathaway is attracted to lovable losers, since people who know her new boyfriend, actor Adam Shulman, say he's an "opportunist" who "went after all the heiresses" when he was a student at Brown. [P6]

Back at the start of 2006, Gawker ran one of those classic shock-starlet items that just tends to stick with you: Lindsay Lohan and new best friend Kate Moss, doing their part to prop up the Colombian economy, stumbled into a New York bar bathroom, whereupon Lohan reportedly asked if anyone had a Sharpie. Someone did. She then wrote something not very nice about Scarlett Johansson, which, according to photographic evidence, went something like, "Scarlett is a bloody cunt / L / Peace and love / [illegible] / fucker." Almost three years later, Scarlett was asked to address the vulgar communiqué in an interview with Allure

[Actress Lindsay Lohan outside of a English nightclub called Faces yesterday; image via INF]

♦ Is Kate Hudson trying to steal Alex Rodriguez away from Madonna? She was spotted with her "arms completely wrapped around" him at a party in Miami this weekend. But she might just be trying to steal Jason Statham away from his girlfriend, since the two were seen downing dirty martinis together. [NYDN, P6]
♦ A PETA activist pelted Lindsay Lohan with a bag of flour at an event in Paris on Saturday. Sam Ronson responded by dissing the activist on MySpace: "My dog is far more civilized than that person." [People]
♦ Kanye West was arrested in London on Friday after an altercation with a photographer. Now he's suggesting the entire episode was "bogus," and has upset some Brits by comparing himself to Princess Di. [People, The Sun]
♦ Sarah Palin may collect a $7 million advance if she writes a book. [MSNBC]

[Actress Lindsay Lohan with security detail in London; image via INF]

• Brad Pitt said it was uncool for ex Jennifer Aniston to say his wife Angelina Jolie is uncool. Or, as he puts it, he was "totally thrown." [Sun-Times ]

♦ Things are going from bad to worse for Damon Dash and Rachel Roy: Three months after a bank foreclosed on their two Tribeca condos, Dash's Chevy Tahoe was seized this week after he failed to make the monthly lease payments. Does this mean he's already lost his Maybach? [NYDN]
♦ Lindsay Lohan and Samantha Ronson were supposedly getting engaged yesterday. Today the relationship is supposedly "heading for choppy waters," because Lindsay wants to "explore her heterosexuality." [The Sun]
♦ How is Lindsay's publicist explaining her client's description of Barack Obama earlier this week as the country's first "colored President"? She says no one knows what LiLo really said, since it was "unintelligible." [MSNBC]
♦ Katie Holmes is supposedly refusing to move back to LA after she's finished on Broadway. Why? Because she doesn't get dragged to as many Scientology events when she's in NYC. [NYDN]

[Lindsay Lohan and her deejay girlfriend Samantha Ronson (who was doing a show called "Fuck Rehab") in London yesterday; image via Bauer-Griffin] es-ki-mo's new line beats the original, Cheeky!

• Kanye West is astounded by the lack of sober judgement and integrity in the MTV Video Music Awards. He thinks they're fixed! The cable network is shocked he would question the ethics of the "MTV Academy." [Sun]

♦ Remember last month when Gwyneth Paltrow said she was trying to be supportive of her good friend Madonna during her divorce? It seems Madge was less than moved by the gesture and now she's warning Gwyneth to keep her mouth shut and "say nothing about me or my divorce." [National Enquirer]
♦ Meanwhile, Madonna has supposedly been telling a "close pal" that Alex Rodriguez sends her poetry and "has the heart of a poet trapped inside an insanely gorgeous body." [P6]
♦ Lindsay Lohan and Samantha Ronson are supposedly planning to "officially get engaged" while they're in Paris this week. [The Sun]
♦ Now that she's back from London (where she reportedly brought 20 pieces of luggage on a three-day trip), Mariah Carey is supposedly organizing her holiday vacation to Aspen, where her plans include rolling around in the snow in a red bikini and decorating her bedroom to look like the North Pole. [MSNBC, The Sun, P6]

[Lindsay Lohan and girlfriend Samantha Ronson (not pictured) arrive in London today; image via Bauer-Griffin] Aaron Altman's new line beats the original, "Yeah It's Pretty Much The Same. We Just Go Like This."

One way to not have an intelligent discussion about race these day is to use the term "colored" to describe black people. It's antiquated and grampa-ish, like saying "Oriental" or "cripple." I think you're allowed to say "person of color" but not "colored." (Right?) So it's too bad to see that some big-time celebrities are using the term while trying to sound progressive and One Worldy. Both lesbians and the British alike. Perpetual blog fodder actress Lindsay Lohan used the term on Access Hollywood recently when talking about Barack Obama. She was well intentioned, saying "It’s an amazing feeling. It’s our first colored president," but... yikes. And then current James Bond actor Daniel Craig said that the world is ready for a "coloured" Bond now that Barry has taken the highest office in the land. We'd maybe expect this from old timers like Elaine Strich or the ghost of Charlton Heston, but coming from young Lindsay and Daniel? We expect more from a Sapphist and a limey, honestly.

Though Lindsay Lohan has recently revealed herself to be a stickler for semantics, we have a feeling there's a word or two in her recent interview with Access Hollywood that she might want to take back right around now.Maria Menounos quizzed the part-time actress on her reaction to Barack Obama's historic victory, and Lohan (clearly still reeling from the use of Homer Simpson's makeup gun) obliged with warm, hoarse words about "our nation's first colored president." That is maybe not how we would have put it, but neither would we have starred in the Chris Parnell vehicle Labor Pains. Someone's gotta be at the vanguard! Clip below:

We're not sure what was going on in Lindsay Lohan's drug-addled mind when she described Barack Obama as our first "colored President" in an interview with Access Hollywood's Maria Menounos. But we're going to take this as a sign that she's gearing up for an appearance on the fourth season of Celebrity Rehab with Dr. Drew.

• Us Weekly issued a formal retraction saying Guy Ritchie is not sleeping with actress Kelly Reilly. Was apologizing to Reilly "for any potential embarrassment" the gossip may have a caused a big passive-aggressive dig at Ritchie? Just asking! [Us]

When disco people did that weird basketball referee "traveling" motion dance and licked their cocaine-stained gums while a sparkly disco ball twirled overhead, they probably felt like the party would never stop. But stop it did, in grinding and ugly fashion, when the hedonistic days of Studio 54 ran headfirst into a very un-far-out recession in the early 1980's. Some twenty-five years later, we find ourselves in a similar situation. The early aughts saw the rise of the Tara Reid and Lindsay Lohan mentality, one that celebrated and encouraged hard, rusty-jointed partying (and simulatneously loved to condemn it). Sure there was a war on and the world seemed to be ending, but when one thing ends another begins, and these folks wanted to hurl themselves, underpantsless crotches first, into the big new whatever. And now... well, now we're staring down the barrel of a serious recession, Crazy Britney is dead, and Zac Efron and Vanessa Hudgens, a Rooney and Garland for the iGeneration, are puttin' on a show to the glittery tune of trillions of dollars. Like the dirty bliss era of disco before it, is this new party era being killed by a recession? We think so!

Lindsay Lohan's career path may be studded with recent missteps (Labor Pains and a stint on Ugly Betty cut short with just one majestic eye-roll from America Ferrera, to name a few), but if there's one thing that actually seems to be going well in Lohan's life, it's that whole "dating Samantha Ronson" thing. Not only did it appear to inspire near-sobriety and some cogent blog posts, but it also repelled sleaze-meister Joe Francis, breaking him of his addiction to girl-on-girl action forever. So, how has Lohan shown Ronson her thanks? With a couple of cagey disavowals in the new issue of Harper's Bazaar, of course: