"Preppie rapist" Alex Kelly was set free last week, but the residents of the Connecticut community where he'll live with his parents have some concerns about his possible recidivism. They're nervous. They've got a case of the "RAPE JITTERS" actually. Don't you hate it when you get the "RAPE JITTERS"? Best Post headline ever. [NYP]
The New York Post is all a-flutter today over how Brooke Astor's daughter-in-law, Charlene Marshall, "burst into laughter" when a Post photographer introduced himself to her yesterday, because of their funny "Bad Heir Day" cover. "We're A Hit With Mrs.," is the story's headline. We're surprised they went that far to promote themselves, since Mrs. Marshall is carrying yesterday's New York Sun in the accompanying photograph. (And on top of that she is carrying what looks like her husband's indictment, which strikes us as a bit callous, considering how hard she's hee-hawing away, but who's really keeping track?)
Today's best Post headline: MAN SLAIN BY WIFE'S 'LOVE GAL.' Sure, it's a fairly traditional "married woman slashes throat of her alleged lesbian lover's husband" story, but it's a top-notch use of inexplicable scare quotes and an incomprehensible descriptive phrase for the relationship between victim and killer. Good work, guys. [NYP]
When we informed you yesterday of the lawsuit against the New York Post brought by Maximilia Cordero—the woman who might have been born a man (but she says not!) and who might have been raped by "billionaire financier" Jeffrey Epstein when she was underage—we apparently made some mistakes, according to her lawyer and live-in ex-boyfriend, William Unroch. Unroch wrote us yesterday to request a clarification, and his letter is posted below.
Maximilia Cordero, alleged underaged sexual assault victim (who was allegedly born a man) of alleged billionaire pervert Jeffrey Epstein, is now suing the New York Post, according to Radar, for allegedly smearing her and not disclosing after their countless quotes from Epstein flack Howard Rubenstein that he is also the New York Post's publicist. Epstein, former alleged Radar investor, allegedly raped Maximila "Ava" Cordero and also allegedly wore lipstick and asked to be called "Janice."
"The lawsuit by former book publisher Judith Regan against News Corporation, parent company of "fair and balanced" Fox News, has a certain similarity to the Iran-Iraq war: it's hard to work up a rooting interest in either side," writes Richard Aregood in today's Guardian, but he then goes on treat her claim that her firing was motivated by a conspiracy to effect a Giuliani White House more seriously than most have. And then there's this zinger: "In discussions over an anti-Regan article in the New York Post that Regan says was totally fictional, her complaint alleges that the [News Corp] lawyers acknowledged that the article in question was per se defamatory, but they offered her a dubious reassurance: "No one believes what they read in the New York Post."
Well lookee here! Turns out we weren't too far off with our predictions that the recent price increase at the New York Times might have kicked off a circulation drop. According to the Audit Board of Circulation's six-month report for the period ending in September, daily circ at the Times fell 4.51% to 1,037,828—with Sunday circulation nosediving by 7.59% to 1,500,394, "at least partly due to a price increase," according to Editor & Publisher. Not that we're saying we told you so.
Dear Cindy Adams, OMG, we just adooore your column! We just want you to know it's such a relief that not everyone is taking this whole PC craze so seriously. Like, in your column today? In the Post? Where you're talking about some Hamptons shindig? You know? It's just so refreshing to know you're still using the word "Oriental" to describe people, not just antiques or hotels. It reminds us of the last time you stood against the tide of progress and cultural evolution? When you described Chinese-American actress Anna May Wong as an "Oriental beauty"? I mean, we totally didn't care that you spelled her name "Mae," either. Now don't you go changing, Cin. Love, Your Fans.
Hi-rez satellite imagery used to be used exclusively for good, noble purposes, like raining down high-quality American bombs on worthy targets and showing Saddam Hussein's trailers of doom to the U.N. But now, thanks to the anti-American weirdos at Google, anyone can access these sensitive images for whatever foul purpose they can conceive. And Palestinian terrorists the Al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigade are reportedly using Google Earth to target a beleaguered Israeli city with crude rockets.
So typical for New Yorkers to think that everything comes down to money. The New York Post's late-to-the-game article on Facebook this morning had just one interesting, unreported tidbit among the rehash: The stakes in Microsoft and Google's race to invest have been raised to as high as $1.5 billion — or 10 percent of the company, valuing it at $15 billion. Frankly, I'm skeptical. While Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg would be stupid not to take all the money he can off the table, his outside investors — a list which includes Peter Thiel, Sean Parker, and Accel Partners — don't want their stakes diluted that much. Selling off that large a chunk of Facebook would shrink their collective holdings — as much as 27 percent of the company, we hear — down to less than a quarter. That's just one reason why money doesn't matter as much as the Wall Street set would have you believe.
According to a stunning Post exclusive, the NYPD pretty much operates like last week's wacky Onion story about an "entire precinct made up of loose cannons." They obtained the 2006 annual report by NYPD's Internal Affairs Bureau, and they make the most of the alternatively hilarious and creepy findings. Cops are all stealing from dead people and doing drugs and coercing women into having sex with them.
New York Post nutcase Andrea Peyser is titillated by the sight of a humbled Foxy Brown arriving at a Brooklyn court (from prison) to plead not guilty to her third phone-related assault. Brown's drab jacket and plaid pants (H&M!!) and "matted" hair excite Peyser to a degree that few cut-down-to-size "divas" could hope to match. Also, this is maybe the single horrifying sentence written in any newspaper in America today: "She also carried no BlackBerry, no $1,500 Louis Vuitton satchel—and revealed nothing of the precious nipple we've come to know and love."
Post dating columnist Mandy Stadtmiller (catch her live on stage with Star Editor-at-Large Julia Allison this Wednesday!) approaches something like self-awareness in her most recent column: "Simply wanting sex, simply wanting not to be murdered by a psychopath and simply wanting to avoid all things explicitly Ayn Rand neatly summarizes the maddening experiences of the modern single woman in New York City. And, of course, there's me—nauseautingly, wincingly, shut-the-hell-up-already -about-my-smug-nascent-perfect-relationship me." There is, Mandy! There is always you! [NYP]
Call us sentimental, but when you're reviewing the closing chapter in Pulitzer-winning American author Philip Roth's decades-long love affair with himself (aka Nathan Zuckerman), it's less than classy to suggest his literary climax has so failed you that the man ought to investigate erectile dysfunction drugs. Was Michael Weiss really all that surprised by Exit Ghost's "self-referential, filth for the sake of filth" nature? It's Roth, for chrissakes. We think recent Dartmouth grads yearning for National Book Awards of their own would really do well to keep their Roth reviews out of the tabloids until they've produced something slightly longer than blog posts and freelance pieces for Slate. (Uh, yes, we will make every effort to heed our own advice—until it's slightly more profitable to part with our own integrity, at which point we will gladly excoriate our own dirty narcissistic heroes for a $125 and a byline.)
Probable non-billionaire money manager and massage enthusiast Jeffrey Epstein "has agreed to plead guilty to soliciting underage prostitutes at his Florida mansion in a deal that will send him to prison for about 18 months," says the New York Post. He'll also get some quiet house arrest time. The Post claims that the feds will drop their own investigation for his pleading guilty to the Florida state charges. Could be true! Since the feds don't ever talk, and Epstein's main lawyer didn't talk, we assume this was all put out by PR man Howard Rubenstein, in an effort to get it out early and make it blow over. This still is shocking—is Jeffrey Epstein really gonna go to jail, with Clinton-hating Ken Starr and his entourage of lawyers working on his behalf? Travesty! This is not supposed to happen to the rich!
New York Post media columnist Keith Kelly called the New York Sun "unwanted and unread" last year, but apparently his bosses don't agree. The Post extended offers within the last two weeks to four top Sun editors and at least one reporter. Sun flack Michael Moi confirmed that all five turned down the tabloid, which boasts a mostly-paid daily circulation of more than 720,000, in favor of the Sun, whose combined circulation was 106,000 in June, according to the Certified Audit of Circulations. "We're flattered that the Post is interested in our talented staff," Moi told us. "We're even more flattered and honored that each of them chose to remain a part of the New York Sun family." When even daily exposure to Ira Stoll's neoconiacal (Not a word! But so fitting!) cackle isn't enough to bring people over to your side, you know you've got a serious recruiting issue.
The New York Post has really taken Ed Klein's talking points from his Katie Couric bio to heart: "Katie Couric has gone from a cougar to a dove. The 'CBS Evening News' anchor with a penchant for dating younger men has come out criticizing the war in Iraq—and her predecessor, Dan Rather." See? She's a nutty hussy! After her husband died, she dated more than one person! So she can't possibly have any of these wildly radical opinions like "people in this country were misled in terms of the rationale for this war." Someone should totally dunk that communist traitor witch and see if she floats!
Soooooo, not to belabor the point, but, since we can't stop staring at it, what was the thinking behind the Page Six Magazine again? The market isn't exactly screaming for another comic-book weight celebeauty title, especially one as confused about its target audience as its ads indicate. (Are we upmarket? Jaguar! Coach! Maybe we're downmarket? H&M! Marshall's!)
"PROTESTING PLANS by Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to lay a wreath at the World Trade Center attack site, the New York Daily News told the Iranian president in a headline to "Go to Hell." A Politics & Economics article yesterday incorrectly said the headline was in the New York Post." Nice to see the folks at the Wall Street Journal trying to give credit to their new fellow employees at the Post. Given the way the News has been destroying its competition in the front-page outrage department, the Post needs all the help it can get. [WSJ]
Trouble in paradise for Post dating columnist Mandy Stadtmiller and her preppy BF? In this week's episode, Mandy notices him checking out another girl. And then the tears roll down. "I don't trust him, I tell him. I'm afraid that he just wants a trophy girl, and that's simply not me. I need someone who cares for me on a deeper level, someone who will be there for me no matter what. He tries to take off my sunglasses, and I resist, not wanting him to see. 'I can't believe it,' he says softly, 'a serious conversation with Mandy Stadtmiller.'" Is this the end for the happy couple? Of course not. "About Last Night" is like "Entourage"; everything always works out for everyone at the end. [NYP]
