Apparently, when defamed Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich claimed he had considered Oprah Winfrey for Barack Obama's Senate seat, it was part of a three-way fantasy involving himself, the talk-show queen and her "best friend" Gayle King. Because on a radio show this morning, Winfrey said had she seen his proclamation on Good Morning America, she would have fallen off her treadmill.
And if that had happened, we all likely would have felt the ripple effects.
Certainly, had the Blagonator helped usher in the Big O to Congress before his likely impeachment, that would have been the hastiest pre-exit maneuver since George Bush pardoned Scooter Libby before departing the Oval Office.
Lots of Big Os to take in here actually. Maybe that obscure semantics synchronicity is actually what the disgraced state leader was going for.
Well, ladies and gents, we can now move ahead toward a time of economic prosperity and racial harmony, because Barack Obama has been sworn into office. What's that? You're still unemployed and your boss keeps referring to you by prejudiced terminology? Oh, bummer. Guess one man can't change everything.
But even if you haven't been swept up in Obama-as-Messiah fever (ironic given his presidency signals an end to high government as guise for holier-than-thou demagoguery), we can all agree it was pretty sweet to see George W. Bush (and don't call him Prez) sent off on that helicopter one last time.
Not as sweet as seeing the likes of Mike Myers and Cameron Diaz get sliced and diced by the Razzies of course. So without any last-minute presidential pardoning, here are the top 5 things we learned this week.
5. Katy Perry may pretend she likes to kiss girls and is preciously cute when calling other people gay, but apparently she'll settle for nothing but the straight dish when tabloids report on her sex life, or lack thereof.
4. Britney Spears is somehow being raked over the coals for the suggestive phonetic pronunciation of her new single. Meanwhile, no one raised an ounce of cain over Van Halen's non-too-subliminal epithet placement within the titular acronym of their 1991 album. Guess parents were less afraid of Sammy Hagar gettin' their teenage tots in a heated lather.
Welcome to NCDSUV's splenetic, embittered new weekly feature, Overdressed & Underclassed, which with each installment will dissect a different aspect of celebrity fashion with the enthusiasm and exactitude of a taxidermist suffering from the second clinical phase of rabies (caution: We have reached the contagious stage).
Beltway insiders seem to approach getting dressed as a way to: A. avoid indecency charges and B. To protect themselves from the elements. A "quirky" D.C. gal may be seen traipsing through Capitol Hill clad in a purple pinstripe suit from Anthropologie with some swingin' sky-high Prada pumps, instead of the de rigueur gray pinstripe suit from Ann Taylor Loft paired with Easy Spirit flats, much to the consternation, stifled envy and shock on the parts of the less stalwart.
But change is coming to Washington, along with (we hope) a new epoch for fashion forwardness. President Barack Hussein Obama's inauguration seemed to signal, among other weightier things, a much easier era for the eyes. Here's the eight fashion highlights from Tuesday's ceremonies.
8. Laura Bush The former First Lady's outfit epitomized what we all hope we'll be saying "farewell" to: frumpy grey pantsuits and boring heels; drab grey political horizons and boring heels (of the human variety).
7. Jill Biden After so recently thrusting her well-shod foot into her mouth on Oprah (Biden claimed that Obama had offered her husband a choice of jobs as either Veep or Secretary oO State, forcing his staff to go into spin mode), I expected Biden to slip on something decidedly understated. In stark contrast to everyone else's relatively muted swearing-in duds, she opted for a fiery orange-red jacket paired and a pair of hot-stepping black leather boots. It looks like we will be able to expect all manner of exciting fireworks from Biden. And just think: It was her husband everyone was worried about. Go, Jill, go: This administration has to give Saturday Night Live something to work with.
6. Aretha Franklin The Queen of Soul's rendition of "My Country 'Tis Of Thee" was almost as thrilling as the farcically bad, but oh so delectably good, massive, yodeling, rhinestone-studded bow plopped on top of a chirping church mouse of little grey hat. Sing it, lady!
5. Senator Ted Kennedy The senator, who has managed to continue his duties in recent months despite his bout with brain cancer, collapsed at the Capitol after suffering a seizure on the day of the inauguration. He's reportedly on the mend, and we hope as optimistic, jubilant and celebratory as he appeared to be at the inauguration in his jaunty fedora and dapper sky-blue silk scarf.
Yes, this is my life: Scouring the wires for stories about adolescent celebrities because I missed the boat on formerly teenaged Hollywood elite getting busted for assault, like loathsome Kelly Osbourne.
But alas, aren't those preciously lucky daughters of Barack Obama, Malia and Sasha, the luckiest little twosome on earth? Because while their mother, Michelle, was giving daddy his first presidential knob-polisher, they were having their hormones manipulated via a visit from The Jonas Brothers last night.
Unbelievable. I get within 100 feet of the White House fence and am considered a threat to national security, but slap on a tux and single a few Disney-friendly ditties and you're ushered in like Secret Service to make an inaugural bid for the hearts of the two most powerful pre-teen girls in the world.
During today's inaugural luncheon for President Barack Obama, Senator Ted Kennedy apparently suffered a seizure and was removed from the premises.
No further details about the incident or his condition are known at this time, but the venerable Congressman and health-care-reform warrior was, of course, diagnosed with cancer last May.
It's an auspicious beginning to Obama's tenure in the White House, but well wishes go out to Kennedy and his family.
January 20. Every four to eight years, depending on whether there's a second term, it becomes the day that a new
president is sworn in. And today, Barack Obama, the 44th (and first
black) president will be the focus of the whole world's attention. It
also happens to be my birthday.
It always seemed like people who were
born on Christmas had it bad. They have to share their
b-day with Jesus, and frankly who are you compared to the son of God?
But let me tell ya, it's nothing compared to sharing yours
with the biggest historical event of our lives.
Quick news flash, in case this small detail has escaped your attention, despite its corresponding event poignantly taking place the day after Martin Luther King Day. And, oh, regardless of it coming on the heels of domestic economic collapse and international diplomatic uncertainty that stems almost exclusively from the errors of George Bush's administration.
But, just in case you spent the last two-plus months stuck in a water-logged airplane floating atop the Hudson River's surface, Barack Obama is being sworn in as our President tomorrow. And Bush will spend his remaining days in a manic, Richard Nixon-like stooper of self-doubt and bullish, unapologetic self-assuredness.
I could overstate the siginficance of the precipice we're currently perched upon, but I'm just going to use the final pre-Obama NCDSUV post to let us all take a deep, collective breath and soak that in.
Ohhhhh yeah. It's like taking a bubble bath in a tub of Democracy, ain't it? Just make sure to keep it out of your eyes. That shit burns.
Welcome to one of NCDSUV's favorite daily features, where we acknowledge another turn of the calendar for a member of Hollywood land, even if it's a celebrity who often goes overlooked by the rest of the blogosphere, and regardless of whether we have a huge affinity for their body of work.
On Friday, we raised a spike-bedazzled leather birthday fist for glam-punker David Johansen. Today, we raise a leather fist armed with a spike for a horrible man whom we can all agree to despise, proving we have something in common after all.
Ah, the innocent days of 2008. When recession, war and high-profile celebrity deaths became the glue to bond us together like societal Siamese siblings. But now it's 2009, a whole new era, a whole new ballgame. And not just for Washington, who will call Barack Obama their overlord, or the New York Yankees, who will take the field with C.C. Sabathia and Mark Texeira and still manage to lose the pennant to smaller-budgeted organizations.
It is the final stand for celebrity land in a decade that has alternately enthralled and repulsed us. It is a time for Hollywood to make its mark on culture and the planet at large, and really give 'em the good stuff we all cream for in the tabloids.
And we got off to an intermittently intriguing start, thanks largely to the birth of what could have been the First Granddaughter-in-waiting, and a certain wayward actress' parent who may love his share of his daughter's spotlight more than the woman herself. So without any pregnant pauses, here's the top 5 things NCDSUV learned this week.
4. Paul McCartney may have had to navigate Heather Mills' body sexually despite her prosthetic leg, but at least he didn't have to stick around till midnight to ritualistically spray-tan the thing.
A couple months back, NCDSUV began broadcasting a new feature known as Just Because, highlighting something inane, obscurely amazing or just plain jaw-dropping from the outlines of pop culture and viral content.
These differ from, say, insanely retarded local ads, or eccentric YouTube karaoke performers,
which can be grouped into their own self-referencing regular
spotlights. Nor do they need to be burdened by standards of timeliness
or having been as-yet-unearthed.
They are the standalone wonders of the cybersphere that made us all
get a computer in the first place, and occasionally need to be inserted
into a day of normal online programming. Just because.
So while the last installment of Just Because celebrated the late Estelle Getty's giddy inhabitation of wiseass Golden Girls matriarch Sophia Petrillo, today we hop in our pop-culture time machine to 1994, and in recognition of Barack Obama's impending inauguration, revisit an unforgettable moment in political-office swearing-in history, and its 14th anniversary.
