Uh oh. Vandalism where The Other Half lives has gone wild, now that an obscure, strange, alien symbol has been incinerated into a lay of grass in the Hamptons! Prey tell, what it is?! Or who?

It has been days since Empress Sarah Palin quit Alaska, forever. And no one yet knows why! Her "explanation" lacked, uh, actual coherent reasons. But there are theories.

The utterly stupid, ridiculous clusterfuck that's in Albany is the perfect example of why some citizens decide not to pay their taxes. Someone finally realized as much, so they're not getting any more money until they get back to work.

Lovable crazy blogger Andrew Sullivan is not worried about our new digital-age medieval society. He thinks it is probably a good thing that no one is getting paid to write words, anymore. In fact, he would write for free!

Bernie Madoff is about to experience what it's like to have his life's worth taken out from under him. A judge entered a preliminary order today to yank everything he's got, and then some. He's absolutely finished.

The Boy with the Yellow Rose was all set to meet Megan Fox on the Today Show this morning, but Michael Jackson's death nixed that. All's not loss: our tipster who found the young lad is now $5,000 richer.

Blubbering controversialist and "real American" Glenn Beck has no reason to cry, which he fakes doing, all the time, to make money. According to Forbes, Beck made $23 million in the last 12 months.

The seemingly-populist, very evil Bank of America is a hive of rat bastards, and anyone that's ever done any kind of business with them will understand this sentiment. But they're now taking mercy on their sad, recession-hit customers.

On Friday, noted blogger Mickey Kaus decried the Obama administration's attempts to prolong the inevitable death of shitty car company GM. No one even wants their depressing cars, he noted! On Sunday, it's the fault of "unskilled workers making $28 an hour who have bankrupted their employers."

General Motors is bankrupt. Whoops. It was probably going to happen no matter what, but lots of people hoped that bankruptcy would remain a threat that would encourage everyone to band together to save the company. Who is to blame for the death of the American auto industry?

Oh, good, Morgan Stanley just hired a financial analyst who had to quit the NFL two years ago because he'd had too many concussions to continue playing. Wayne Chrebet, welcome to the Moldaver Group wealth-management team!

Las Vegas is taking their federal stimulus money and using it to deceive tourists into thinking things are okay. By putting homeless people in concrete boxes until they're homeless again. Nice. [Las Vegas Sun]

So Norm Coleman would like to use campaign funds to pay legal bills in connection with that weird suit-buying oil exec scandal. Did you know that it's very expensive to not respond to media inquiries?

Short answer: No. Longer answer: Sorta. The New York Times ponders the important question today, as the singing competition show's ratings drop but its revenues continue to skyrocket.

Socialist tax-and-spender Barack Obama wanted to cut $17 billion worth of important, life-saving government programs, but some congressmembers are finally standing up to him.

The huuuuuge Fortune story on Bernie Madoff asserts something that should seem obvious: maybe some investors knew there was something fishy going on! Also, Bernie is nuts. He dropped trou in the office!

To answer Time's headline: NO. Mark Penn should not get paid. He should be put in a box with insects. But apparently that is not an option!

Salon's Cary Tennis and Slate's Prudence both hand out advice. Today, they happened to answer the same letter from a guy conflicted about spending his inheritance from grandma. Let's compare and contrast their responses.

Oh, hey, John Paulson, who made TEN TRILLION GAZILLION DOLLARS betting that every bank in the would would fail, just bought a gold mine.

After a pretty disappointing opening weekend, the cult comic movie — which was hyped as the next Big Cultural Thing — is struggling to avoid a second-weekend box office collapse. So they've begun to beg.