SURPRISE: MAINSTREAM MEDIA UNDERHANDED! "'Hillary Rodham Clinton is still seething about losing the nomination.' 'Michelle Obama doesn’t like her country and is an angry black woman.' 'Bill Clinton continues to dis Barack Obama privately.' While hardly definitive, that’s some of the undercurrents swirling in much of the news coverage — particularly television news, some say — at the Democratic National Convention. 'I’m just amazed at the negative coverage, all the negative innuendo of things that do not exist,' former Clinton adviser Terry McAuliffe told Daily Variety. 'It’s all press invention.' … A veteran network producer said she has been 'mesmerized by the negative coverage. It’s unbelievable.'"

If there's one thing in which Us Weekly shouldn't be involved, it's politics. So, naturally, the magazine has decided to judge the candidates based on their fashion — because the state of the country doesn't matter if Barack Obama and John McCain aren't looking good.
The target this week is Obama, who had the audacity to bicycle around Chicago in "ill-fitting jeans, a tucked in golf shirt and big tennis shoes." The horror! Us' fashion police weigh in:
Although Hillary's made some major fashion faux pas in the past (anyone remember a certain wedding dress?), we wouldn't see her in a pair of pegged acid washed jeans, peddling a bicycle built for two with Bill.
Hilarious. Also, in case you were worried, "The Obama Girl won't be singing about this!"

Gina Gershon is lying in the same bed as Bill Clinton. But not in the way you think!
In fact, if you were thinking that way, then you’ll understand the whole reason Gershon is complaining about Todd Purdum’s Vanity Fair article in the same way Clinton was: Because she claims the insinuations made about her – that she enjoyed the romantic company of the ex-president – aren’t true.
Bill Clinton went off on an Obama supporter who interrupted a speech he was giving in West Virginia yesterday.
With the support of a cheering crowd, the ex-president shouted down a silvery, batty old woman who attempted to declare that, as First Lady, Hillary Clinton didn't work for universal health care as hard as she and Bill claim.
Of course, the woman deserved to be silenced, because she doesn't really know what the hell she's talking about. Now, had she screamed, "You would have had a better chance at getting everyone in the nation health insurance if it hadn't been for your shady-ass real estate deals with the McDougals," then we might have gotten somewhere. Isn't it funny how the loudest ones are usually the dumbest ones, too?
• Unfortunately, the tolls of the campaign trail do not care how inopportune the moment. [NYP]
• Nicely done, E!. [DListed]
• From behind, Matthew Perry looks like Mel Gibson. [PS]
• 23-year-old Scarlett Johansson is said to be engaged, meaning 25-year-old Scarlett Johansson is going to be divorced. [HT]
• At this point, a faux hawk is actually worse than a mullet. Perhaps it always has been. [ICYDK]
• Mena Suvari makes Beyond Thunderdome cute [INO]
• Matthew McConaughey gets some shirtless stretches in before some shirtless running. To be followed by a shirtless dinner and some shirtless Cranium. [CityRag]

Madonna has decided to put her celebrity clout behind Hillary Clinton in the '08 presidential election, presumably because she's critically read about and agrees with the Senator's past policy decisions and ideas for the future. Then again, it could be because all of Madonna's Malawian charity missions have been supported by Bill Clinton's foundation, but she would never admit that, so let's just go with that first one!

Italy's Zach Braff (also Anne Hathaway's boyfriend), Raffaello Follieri, is now firmly in the sights of the Clinton hit squad after reportedly swindling off more than he could launder in a shady deal that included everyone's favorite scumbags: politicians, church officials and greedy, greedy dickheads.
…Mr. Follieri struck his deal with the investor. A Yucaipa partnership where Mr. Clinton served as a senior adviser formed a joint venture with the Follieri Group. Yucaipa agreed to invest as much as $100 million into the venture to buy church properties for redevelopment as mixed-income housing units, community centers and retirement facilities, among other things.
Mr. Follieri moved his business operation into leased office space on Park Avenue. He employed Filipino nuns as receptionists and installed a small altar in one room, according to people who visited the office. He began renting an "extremely costly" penthouse, complete with a staff that included an executive chef, the Yucaipa lawsuit says. Although it was supposed to be for the joint venture, Mr. Follieri moved his personal effects there and appeared to take up residence, the suit says.
To be exact, this "'extremely costly' penthouse" was being leased for a disgusting $40,000-a-month.
Unlike this messy maze itself, the end result is quite simple: "Mr. Follieri is now searching for new investors." Good luck with all that.



