"Who's the gay rapper?" It's been a parlor game in hip hop for years. A short and incomplete list of some of the most common names tossed around: Kanye West, Puffy, Jay-Z, Lil Wayne, Common, and, of course, lisping, yoga-master rap mogul Russell Simmons. While there are plenty of rumors for each one, most of those guys are suspected, honestly, because of their fashion sense (except Lil Wayne, who kissed a guy). Or because somebody's homeboy's cousin knows this cat who Puffy tried to do a three-way with. Innuendo is king. But now a formerly closeted gay MTV music executive named Terrance Dean is about to release a book—which has been anticipated for more than a year—that he says will out the gay rappers once and for all. Don't be mad, y'all! This could be the chance of a lifetime for one lucky closeted homosexual.

A new book called Chalked Up by ex-gymnast Jennifer Sey appears to confirm what many of us have long suspected: gymnastics is a weird and creepy sport. Not the tumbling and flipping part; that's cool enough. But the entire gymnastics complex that takes little girls and hammers them into world class athletes with eating disorders is a little sickening. And all those middle-aged men coaching—what are they doing there? I choose to sweepingly judge the lot of them as shady characters. Sey's experiences, related in a new interview with Salon, certainly reinforce that impression:

Assuming he has his way with Newsday, the News Corp. chairman will soon have THREE waiver requests pending with the FCC on new cross-ownership rules. "The architect of the rule, Kevin J. Martin, the chairman of the commission, has made clear that there is a strong presumption against granting waivers... It is unclear whether Mr. Martin will still be running the commission when it decides how to proceed. The agency might not complete its review of the renewal of the broadcast licenses and waiver requests before next year, and many officials expect Mr. Martin to leave the agency after the arrival of a new president in January." [Times]

Word emerged Tuesday on Rupert Murdoch's handshake deal to buy Newsday, and there was talk about Daily News owner Mort Zuckerman dropping out of the bidding for the Long Island tabloid. But the Times today said Zuckerman is expected to make a counteroffer next week, while Jared Kushner's Observer Media Group may submit a joint offer with Long Island television provider Cablevision, which had dropped out of the running. "People in both the News and Observer camps say they were shocked to learn of the handshake deal with Mr. Murdoch... because they had been assured by Tribune's bankers that they had until next week to submit offers," said the Times. Perhaps Tribune chief Sam Zell, who like Zuckerman is a real estate mogul come to media later in life, understands instinctively that Newsday is best off in the hands of Murdoch, the deep-pocketed lifelong media mogul. Here's how Lloyd Grove compared Zuckerman to Murdoch as he was leaving the former's employ as a gossip columnist in 2006:

Iron-fisted Adweek editor Alison Fahey has been promoted to publisher and editorial director of the brand, and the magazine has brought in Mike Chapman, a veteran of eMarketer and The Economist Intelligence Unit, to oversee the newsroom. But Chapman will report to Fahey, meaning she's still ultimately in charge of the beleaguered reporters' lives. Theory making the rounds: Nielsen, which owns Adweek, wants to make the magazine more data-heavy (which is Nielsen's forte, and perhaps more palatable for a company coming off a round of layoffs), as opposed to journalism-heavy. [Adweek/ Adverganza]

When park-cruising meth-head CNN correspondent Richard Quest wasn't busy with rope tricks, he was pouring forth more innuendo-laden quotes on his globetrotting assignments. Here, Quest makes Anderson Cooper, the third most powerful gay man in America, break out into an embarrassed fit of giggles with his salutation: "As Dame Helen Mirren famously said when she picked up her Oscar: I give you...the Queen!" Cheerio, indeed!

Click to viewRichard Quest, the Brit-accented CNN correspondent arrested in Central Park last week with meth in his pocket, a dildo stuffed in his boot, and rope tied around his genitals, apparently has a good deal of training in rope tricks. Click to watch this clip, in which he shares his terror while performing "the Professor's Nightmare Rope Trick"—he just can't get the rope where he wants it to go! "We count to three, and we blow hard. We blow hard!" Impeccable foreshadowing in almost every line.

In a cost-cutting move that is, frankly, kind of sad, the DC bureau of the legendary Hearst Newspapers chain has moved into the same office space as McClatchy's DC bureau [E&P]. "They just have a small area in the back of our offices, they have three rows of work stations," a McClatchy manager said. Your front line watchdogs of democracy, ladies and gentlemen. Among the new denizens of the cramped, back office workspace is 87 year-old Hearst columnist and prime Bush tormentor Helen Thomas. She really deserves better. But, death of print and all that. Below, a classic news conference clip of Thomas questioning the president about the Iraq war, to his discomfort.

So! Tonight! Pennsylvania's Primary! The current CW sez Clinton will win—her internal numbers have her 11 points ahead, public polling has a slightly narrower margin. But she needs a HUGE win to, uh, overtake Obama in the popular vote. The delegate thing? Well, that's a much harder gap to close. Hey, remember how Hil was inevitable? Anyone? It was less than a year ago that she was the unstoppable presumptive nominee. What happened? We went back in time, with our magic Googling time machine, to dissect 18 months of campaign spin, media narratives, and pundit bullshit to figure out how Senator Hillary Clinton went from our next President to this increasingly desperate-looking figure.

The nether regions of the magazine world are truly a strange place. An upcoming book called Bad Mags is a collection of some of the most "strange, bizarre, and peripheral" magazines of the last 50 years—obscure fetish porn, occult titles, true crime, punks, horror, aliens, serial killers. Awesome. We've combed through hundreds of titles to bring you the ten weirdest, dirtiest, and/ or most intriguing magazine covers there are. They're all below—some are NSFW, but all are worthwhile.

So, major music magazines: are they in trouble or what? The music industry is driven by young influencers, who are some of the most tech-savvy people in the world, meaning they're turning away from print magazines in droves, if they haven't already. In addition to that, the majority of major music magazines are crap. Ad revenue at most of them plummeted in the first quarter: Blender's revenue was down 9%; Vibe's was down 19%; and Rolling Stone's was down 27% (Spin was up 27%, huzzah). But savvy managers like Blender publisher Ben Madden aren't concerned, because they know that you all turn to them when you want to real authentic info, man:

Chest support theft report! Victoria's Secret is known as a BRA store, but is it also a ROB store? Long Island mom of four Katerina Plew says VS gave her the screw after they refused to meet with her about her idea for a new convertible bra, then ripped her off after the tipoff! The company's Very Sexy 100-way strapless convertible bra is really her own patented design, sez Plew—who sued! Now there's a legal meetup over the regal C-cup, cause the inventive mother is offended, brother. The two sides are taking their strapless tort back to court. It's a nuclear showdown on this brassiere throwdown! After the jump, compare Plew's patent plans with Victoria's Secret's own product: great minds think alike, or a thief in the night?

AngryJournalist.com, the rant-based website that serves as an online barometer of the journalism zeitgeist, has started selling t-shirts. Why is this bad? Well, it means that the site's founders have been thus far unable to properly monetize their online content. Of course, they're journalists (not really, but it sounds better)! Coincidentally, that's about the level of insider joke that you'll find on their t-shirts, as well. Still, we'll be buying the "Print Is Dead" one for Nick Denton to wear triumphantly to media parties. Click through for a few more examples, or visit the crotchety store here.

"Star New York Ranger and man-about-town Sean Avery is out to build up his résumé this summer - by interning at Vogue... He wrote a letter to Anna Wintour expressing his desire to work there... Avery likely will work with a variety of editors, including European editor at large Hamish Bowles. There's also talk of him working at Men's Vogue. And the spokesman claimed that, like most interns, the 28-year-old Avery will be expected to do traditional assistantlike tasks." [WWD]

Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. is about to buy Newsday for close to $580 million, and pull off a neat trick in the process: bringing profitability to Murdoch's other, cash-bleeding tabloid, the New York Post. By combining the Post and Newsday into a joint business venture, Murdoch stands to "wipe out as much as $50 million in annual losses News Corp. now incurs on the Post, with the combined Newsday-Post operation earning roughly $50 million," according to a Wall Street Journal source. The sale price represents a significant premium over the $350 million to $400 million price put forward by one newspaper analyst. The whole transaction is dependent on regulator approval, which is no sure thing. Assuming the deal goes through, it will be interesting to see how Newsday's headlines, front page and overall tone evolve, since the joint venture is not limited to back-end business operations but includes editorial resources as well. [WSJ]

Katie Couric is the only evening news anchor who has not hosted a Democratic presidential debate in this election cycle, and there have been 21 debates, so that's kind of sad. What's sadder is that it looks like the CBS Evening News anchor might never get to host a debate, ever. First it was the writers strike that got in Couric's way, then Hillary Clinton rejected her first proposed date, April 19, because it was on the first day of Passover. Then Couric came up with a date that worked for Clinton, April 27, but now the Obama campaign says that won't work, probably because it's the Islamic day of elitism and Obama will be burning a flag in a madrassa to celebrate.

Which is funnier: hippie college kids engaging in a weed smoking festival, or the local paper trying to cover that event in respectable language? You decide! In honor of 4/20, 10,000 kids at the University of Colorado hit the quad for a massive smoke-out, and the Boulder Daily Camera was on the scene to record all the magical high-ass quotes that spilled forth from the participants. Here is just one, from freshman Emily Benson: "We're at the starting point of a movement," she said. "This is a big part of the reason I applied here — for the weed atmosphere." Ha, yes you did! And there are so many more:

The Village Voice is getting staples and going full-color in May. Also "navigation tabs added down the outside of every page to mark each section and the newspaper will get more convenient in size." Which means it's shrinking! Anyone know how small? Anyone care? [VV]

Is CNN for real? The headlines on its website — "Minced onions force emergency landing" — cause some to wonder if its Atlanta-based producers aren't having a jape at the expense of news junkies. Now, an expansion into selling T-shirts confirms that CNN is laughing at us, not with us. Capitalizing on the trend of mass-personalized e-commerce, CNN.Shirt lets readers pick any recent headline and put it on a T-shirt. As blogger Andy Baio notes, the feature is easily manipulated, allowing users to construct any story they want and get it printed. But why bother making up the news when CNN shows just how much stranger truth is than fiction?

Those young reporters at the Cypress Bay High School newspaper who are starring on the new MTV reality show "The Paper" better straighten up and fly right before they learn some hard lessons that grizzled journalism veterans already figured out, according to Middle Tennessee State University newspaper writer and senior journalism major Andy Harper. These kids should have known that journalists are here to relay the hard news, not mess around with this reality TV thing—a genre in which "everyone loses." Indeed, they could have asked senior journalism major Andy Harper for a bit of advice before they went and let their on-camera kissing and alcohol sipping leave their "byline tattered with a mixture of mud and shame."