Second Lady Lynne Cheney's got an Op-Ed in today's Times called A Revolutionary Christmas Story.

Malcolm Gladwell is on fire!

The Times has a riveting little story that reads like a corporate thriller. Wait, it's more like an allegory about our image obsessed culture. Actually, it's a love story like Romeo and Juliet. No, it's more like a David vs. Goliath tale. Or one of those yarns about a passionate, eccentric inventor. You know what, it's a children's story about being rejected for your looks only to have your inner-beauty discovered.

This week, Intern Alexis goes to work on a cryptic and ultimately lazy edition of the New York Times Book Review. Since the Times is clearly phoning it in for the holidays, we were going to let Alexis off the hook—but she actually found this edition of the Review to be rather enjoyable after we gave her some Christmas crack. Once she was tweaked, we couldn't stop her from writing if we tried. After the jump, Alexis' weekly analysis of what you should pretend to be reading.

Clearly, we need to spend more time looking at photos of beautiful women in their pantyhose, since, as yet another kind reader tells us, the photographers of both Lohan and McPherson were drawing from this image of Brigitte Bardot.

From ABC.com:

This had been bugging us since we saw Lindsay Lohan on the cover of Entertainment Weekly two weeks ago and we were sure we'd seen that pose before. We thought maybe it was a vintage Ann-Margret shot or an old cover of Esquire, but we couldn't track it down.

You thought Christmas was Saturday, but today's inane press event trifecta has us thinking the Santa came to New York a little early:

As everyone knows, not having a date on New Year's Eve sucks. What, you didn't know that? Well, The New York Times' Nancy Rosen reports that in The Fate of 'the Date', so it must be true.

Drudge is reporting on an alleged controversy surrounding the Robert Smigel cartoon from this week's Saturday Night Live that depicted Rush Limbaugh filling in for Santa Claus during an OxyContin hallucination.

You can count the number of articles in which Bonnie Fuller and Eric Alterman are both quoted on one hand. But, then, there are few subjects for which the world (minus Tucker Carlson) are unanimous: Jon Stewart is awesome. So, so awesome!

In this weekend's Times Magazine, Lynn Hirschberg profiles Newmarket Films' president Bob Berney and looks at the challenges he faces marketing The Woodsman, a film in which Kevin Bacon plays a pedophile. Here's Hirschberg on Berney's strategy:

Last night, Henry the Intern almost didn't make his scheduled exploration of Tina Brown's intellectual swamp because of some sort of "family gathering." Obviously, if you're a Gawker intern, this sort of family crap is an unacceptable excuse, so we sent our Hungarian negotiators over to Henry's place to "talk" with his parents. Funny: after a mere 10 minutes alone with our people, Henry's family allowed him to catch up on his quality T-Bro time. And it's a good thing, too, as this week Tina welcomed the triumphant return of serial slapper Stanley Crouch and plays Six Degrees Of Kevin Bacon. Henry's report after the jump.

Unlike SOME PEOPLE, we think before we publish:

· Blogger 'Old Hag' goes completely buck wild on this week's book announcements. [Old Hag]
· The Observer has some fun at Cargo's expense [NYO, PDF]
· Howard Stern is an 11 year-old girl. Sort of. [USA Today]
· 'Person of the Year' Again? [TIME]

Our nerdy yet popular sister site's guest editor points us towards a Drudge item that all but announces that Bush and/or Bush and Rove will be the 'TIME' "Men of the Year." Well, that's a fine fuck you, i'n it?

We hear former New Jersey governor Jim McGreevey may have lined himself up with a new gig as a columnist for a certain "is he, or isn't he" glossy. No, not Sweet Action, silly! Details!

As we recounted yesterday, Scott Peterson's mistress, Amber Frey, has signed up to write a book for Judith Regan, publisher of Howard Stern, Jenna Jameson, Wally Lamb, and others. While it's a total drag that for the rest of her she'll be known as "Scott Peterson's mistress, Amber Frey," it is an awesome honor to be a published author. She should be psyched!

Soho is officially over. First the pioneers and artists were squeezed out, and now even a bona fide master of the universe, Rupert Murdoch, has been priced out of the trendy neighborhood.

While we sift through various reports of women stealthily handing out Gucci bags to certain Cond Nasties (Questionable gifts? Huh?), let's take a moment to gaze at the official holiday gift from publisher SI Newhouse: