Oh hey, looks like now that someone knows he'll never be president, he's relaxing a bit. John Edwards, the man who became a fiery populist in 2007 or so but still could not interest voters, is in a spot of trouble! Drudge: "NATIONAL ENQUIRER CATCHES JOHN EDWARDS AT BEVERLY HILTON." Now. Matt won't say what he was "caught" doing, but we hear he was with a lady. Sigh. This is going to make us look quite the fool for being skeptical of those last Edwards rumors. Ha ha oh shit, the Enquirer story is up and it involves a LOVE CHILD.

Apparently some CBS execs saw their foreign correspondent Lara Logan on The Daily Show last week, and, like thousands of young men across the nation, they said, "who is that cutie?" It turned out she already worked for them! But because she insisted on reporting depressing news from depressing places like Afghanistan and Iraq, she never made it on-air. That will change! A CBS press release says Ms. Logan will now be "CBS News' Chief Foreign Affairs Correspondent and will be based in Washington, D.C." Effective immediately! Now Ms. Logan can shoot herself in the head when she's forced to watch the news they show us here in the states. Oh, and also, did you know she is a HOMEWRECKER? Oh ho ho yes she is.

I love it when know-it-all techies compare Valleywag to the National Enquirer. The Enquirer is the most thoroughly factchecked publication in its genre, unless you include People. Former NYT legal reporter David Margolick wrote, "it stands head and shoulders above them all for aggressiveness and accuracy." The Enquirer has been all about the facts for 30 years now, ever since a major change in modus operandi after a series of libel charges and a damaging 60 Minutes exposé. You'll probably sniff, "I don't read it." Then you don't know what you're talking about, do you?

• Don Imus' contract with CBS said: "Services to be rendered are of a unique, extraordinary, irreverent, intellectual, topical, controversial, and personal character." Legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin thinks that makes Imus's $40 million lawsuit against CBS a bit more plausible. [CNN]
  

Hey, bored this afternoon and armed with the technical know-how it takes to set up a free email account? Well, congrats: you are officially invited to participate in a fun round of Fuck With The National Enquirer. Those supersleuths came across a definitely not long for this world blog by one 'Mal Lane,' who seems to be the Trinity University student who shared something even better than sex — ;) — with Vince Vaughn, inciting the rage of tragic forever-singleton Jen Aniston. Well, the National Enquirer found an innovative way of contacting Mal: via the comments of her blog!

On Star's website:

• After breaking up with her boyfriend Harry Morton, rabid starlet Lindsay Lohan enlisted Paris Hilton's ex, Stavros Niarchos, in a complicated plot to make Morton jealous and win him back. Her scheme? Be photographed together. Lindsay, you brilliant minx! Too bad it didn't work. Meanwhile: the Chateau Marmont is finally getting rid of Little Miss Liability. [Page Six]
• Fox News DC bureau chief Kim Hume stepped down last week, supposedly because her husband, Fox News anchor Brit Hume, is an arrogant prick. The two bickered so much that they both independently called head therapist Roger Ailes to complain about one another. [R&M]
• A court throws out David Gest's $10 million lawsuit against his ex-wife, Liza Minnelli, after he's unable to prove that her beatdowns caused him chronic headaches. [NYDN]
• Disappointed to learn that he has no money without Whitney Houston, a ride-less Bobby Brown asks television producers for a new car in exchange for appearing on urban cable network One. [Lowdown]
• Don't buy that tweed blazer from Ralph Lauren; it probably has bedbugs stuffed in its sleeves. [Page Six]
• Star Jones sues the National Enquirer for claiming that her husband, Al Reynolds, is gay. Why is she inexplicably determined to continue the charade for no good reason? Unless, God forbid, she actually doesn't know about Al. [TMZ]

• Just like Britney Spears told Matt Lauer she wants to start her own magazine, houseboy Kevin Federline says he'd like to start a publication that "comes out after all the tabloids." He'd call it The Real, and we're already vying associate editor position. [R&M (last item)]
• Are Heath Ledger and Michelle Williams leaving Brooklyn? Fucking Ratner, driving away all the good celebs. [Daily Telegraph]
• Kirsten Dunst manages to not get wasted at a recent Chanel function. When free clothes are on the line, the girl knows to keep her shit together. [Page Six]
• Jessica Simpson isn't helping OK! magazine's circulation: her most recent cover sold less than Vaughniston and Britney issues. [Lowdown (2nd item)]
• The National Enquirer EIC David Perel thinks there's a conspiracy theory against the magazine, run by an evil multi-celeb terror cell and led by Britney Spears and Kate Hudson. [TMZ]
• Steely Dan emerges from obscurity to accuse the makers of You, Me and Dupree of stealing from their Cousin Dupree song. [Fox411]
• CBS quickly goes about the business of erasing Dan Rather from its history books. [Page Six]

• By pursuing a libel case agains the National Enquirer in UK courts, Britney Spears wins over the tab's claim that she and Kevin Federline are splitting. The British and Irish editions will print a rare apology, which is all fine and good — but why the hell hasn't she sued Bazaar over that frightening cover shoot? [R&M (last item)]
• Aspiring pop singer and experienced Lolita Diana Bianchi can't carry a tune. God thing she still has a future serving as some sort of twat. [Lowdown]
• Justin Timberlake tries to convince the world he's not a pussy by proclaiming that he's "done way too many drugs." [Spin]
• Film critic Joel Siegel walks out of a screening of Clerks II, deeming it smut. The scene that set him off involved a discussion of a woman performing sexual acts on a donkey, which obviously brings up a lot of painful memories for Siegel. [Page Six]
• E! censors Voice gossip Michael Musto when he appears on The Simple Life to interview Paris Hilton. The offending phrase: "Are you a fag hag?" Apparently network execs didn't want anyone to even raise the issue of Hilton's hagginess. [Page Six]
• John Cusack scores a restraining order against his stalker who, we'll have you know, does not appear to have used the Stalker Map to harm Lloyd Dobler. [Reuters]

• Stolen photos from Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie's baby shower have made their way to the web, prompting lawyers to do their threatening, lawyerly thing. The images may be illegal, but is it so wrong that the people want to see Brangelina wearing the Laurel Touby fertility costume? Marvel at the image here. [TMZ]
• Nicole Kidman and Keith Urban tie the knot; Kidman wears 80's throwback gown by Balenciaga. [Us Weekly]
• After learning that her interview with Matt Lauer didn't do much to help her image, Britney Spears hires someone to take classy pictures. Alas, the pics and an interview were sold to OK! for a mere $5K — much less than Britney's $200K asking price. Only K-Fed fetches that kind of money nowadays. [Page Six]
• Arnold Schwarzenegger and Sylvester Stallone bend to blackmail from the National Enquirer. [R&M]
• Steven Soderbergh's former agent, Pat Dollard, more or less calls George Clooney a pussy. [Page Six]

• The National Enquirer finds itself getting sued, yet again — but this time it's not Tom Cruise unleashing the lawyers. It's little Lisa Turtle (aka Lark Voorhies), who is suing for unspecified damages after the rag quoted a source as saying she was bipolar and addicted to cocaine. Honestly, she did look a little tweaked when she and Screech did "the sprain" dance. [TMZ]
• Britney Spears suspects hubby K-Fed may be the source of leaks to the tabloids. He may not be the best husband for her, but Federline sure is loyal to America. [Scoop]
• Shiloh Jolie-Pitt's grandfather, Jon Voight, launches a public campaign to see the new baby. Considering his contact with the press was a major reason behind his estrangement with Angelina Jolie, this strikes one as a not-so-good plan. [Lowdown]
• Three Days of Rain may not have been stellar, but was it really so bad as to kick Julia Roberts down to the new face of Avon? [Page Six]
• Nobody's quite sure whether or not Anna Nicole Smith is pregnant, particularly because she's yet to figure out how to pee on a stick. [R&M]
• Details gives a rundown of the city's most hump-friendly public restrooms; the Plumm, Bungalow 8, and Bar 89 make the list. And yet there's no mention of the bathrooms at the Christopher Street Pier. C'mon, Details. We know you know. [Page Six]

And the next AMI shoe to drop: The National Enquirer is headed back to its old stomping grounds in Florida. Along with the move, it gets a new editor-in-chief as David Perel replaces Paul Field, who was imported from London a year ago. So much, it seems, for CEO David Pecker's year-old plan to consolidate all his pubs — tabloid and non-tabloid (less-tabloid?) — in a Manhattan headquarters. More TK from AMI this afternoon?

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The National Enquirer is busy flacking a big Star Jones story the supermarket tab is breaking today, and we admit we're intrigued. But we're also sort of at a loss: Should we be joking about the fact a secret breast-lift procedure nearly killed her? Or that her husband, that not at all gay Al Reynolds, couldn't be at her side because he was in another hospital, across the country, after falling at the gym?

The new National Enquirer is out today, and the granddaddy of the gossipy celeb rags is quick to lay its own claim to Us Weekly's Nick-and-Jessica-split scoop: The Enquirer suggests it's the supermarket weekly's photograph — the one above (click to enlarge it) — that actually caused the breakup:

• Madonna continues to dominate the Gay circuit with talk of Broadway. She claims to have material for a musical, the very thought of which could cause Chelsea to spontaneously combust. Go slowly, Madge. [Scoop]
• When thugular rapper 50 Cent was shot 9 times, the incident gave him the necessary street cred. But if the shooter was nicknamed "Hommo," does that render all cred moot? [Page Six]
• Nicky Hilton, Kimberly Stewart, and Bijou Phillips brave Hurricane Wilma to attend the opening of an envelope in South Beach. [R&M (bottom of page)]
• The National Enquirer finally dumps Anna Nicole Smith's attempt at a column, presumably because it was utterly incoherent save for the pictures of her dog. [Page Six]
• Like all reality show winners, the Apprentice's Kendra Todd has an engorged sense of self-importance. Made in her mentor's likeness, we suppose. [Lowdown]

[Click to enlarge.]

If you're anything like us, you've only been paying attention to whether or not Demi Moore is pregnant when the celebrity weeklies tell you to. Right now, most stalkerazzi diaries are telling us to pay attention to Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie's quest to build an exotic, sexualized Brady Bunch, but for some time American Media Inc.'s Star was hell-bent on convincing the world that Moore was carrying Ashton Kutcher's seed. Now, the latest issue of AMI's National Enquirer is reporting that Moore suffered a miscarriage. Demi herself, on the other hand, says that all of the above are completely fabricated and untrue: No pregnancy, no miscarriage. But since when do we listen to what the actual celebs have to say?

Ex-Talk Editor Tina Brown predicts the future of tabloid journalism: "The National Enquirer in the next five years is going to have a field day with Saddam sightings. The 16 lookalikes will keep showing up in smoky caf s in Cairo, crowded mosques in Jakartaa paramilitary version of Where's Waldo?"
Will Saddam fade away like the Cheshire cat? [Times]

Ex-HBO honcho Michael Fuchs has agreed to back Maer Roshan's new mag, Radar, after American Media, which owns The Sun and the National Enquirer, backed out. We're guessing this means Radar will be "Spy meets Vanity Fair meets Harper's with a pinch of the Enquirer thrown in for good taste."
Radar catches Fuchs [Keith Kelly - Post]