Lindsay Lohan could be a trailblazer

Since the much-hyped Marylin Monroe spread seemed to do a lot more for the magazine than it did for the model, Lindsay Lohan has devised a new plot to get herself back into the cultural conversation she has been slowly slipping away from.

She is attempting comeback as a "serious" and "mature" actress. And is, apparently, enthusiastically offering up the full frontal in her next movie -- in which she plays a "nymphomaniac waitress" -- even though producers merely requested a topless scene.

Not so long ago Lohan was resistance to celluloid nudity. In her last cinematic bomb she played a stripper, but didn't show anything you wouldn't see during a trip to the beach.

According to "insiders" Lohan believes that since she will be getting naked in a low-budget "indie" film, the nudity is automatically classier than if she was showing naughty parts in a big budget production. It's sort of a variation of the the old "it's not whoring if you do it for free" logic, only Lohan is actually getting paid around 100,000 dollars for her exposure.

If this actually does work look for there to be ramifications in every day life as more and more woman who want to be taken seriously and appear mature start wearing really skimpy outfits to work and having sex on the first date.

Naked = page views

Ever wondered what naked pictures of Lindsay Lohan are worth? We now have of an answer: 20 million page views, the number New York magazine's Lohan/Monroe spread captured on Monday and Tuesday.

That traffic represented a 2000 percent increase over what the site got the same time last year. Not only that, but New York sold 500 more subscriptions than they would in a typical week. I guess there are folks under the impression the naked troubled starlet as an iconic sex symbol who slept with Kennedys and died young will become a trend for New York. (Kirsten Dunst as Jayne Mansfield? That's got to worth at least 10 million page views.)

But what did we learn from this web-metric aided social experiment? Well, that exponentially more people will check out a magazine that doesn't usually show naked people when it does display naked people. And that Lindsay Lohan has an inordinate number of freckles. Two things everybody already knew.

Idle threat of the week

Yesterday things got not safe for work in a 1962 kind of way, as New York magazine released a Lindsay Lohan photo spread mimicking the famous nude pics that were taken of Marilyn Monroe six weeks before her death.

They even dusted off the same photographer -- Bert Stern -- to do the shoot. You can see for yourself how Lindsay's pics match up against Monroe's. I personally give the edge to Marilyn, despite her severe handicap of being 15 years older and about to die. I will acknowledge Lindsay does a solid job of establishing, once and for all, the real and spectacular nature of her breasts.

We all knew Lindsay was going to end up being featured naked sooner or later --she had been already been teasing a nipple here and a pantyless crotch there. But it is a little surprising that she has chosen to make her first foray into "intentional" nudity in such a historical context.

It almost suggests she will inject a sense of maturity into her inevitable future bouts of being naked. But, nah, there are too many loose cameras floating around these days for that to hold. If Lohan is able to avoid Monroe's fate and survive the next six weeks, she is still in line for the trashily porntastic future we have all envisioned for her. And Lindsay's feign that she's going to do it all classy is the Idle Threat of the Week for February 12th to 18th.

Finally, there is a reason for "extreme" sports

Sometimes, when chatting with a girl I have just met, I like to keep things interesting by saying I am a race car driver. This tactic works particularly well in the Northeastern seaboard of the United States, where the chance of a female knowing anything about motor sports is close to nil.

Unlike with the other professional sports, there isn't a certain look that would disqualify the average person from claiming he drove fast cars for a living. And, although the chicks are basically in the dark about the race car game, most will have suspicions that it is both dangerous and lucrative -- two qualities many women value in a man's profession.

If pressed for details, I will go on about tire testing and meeting with the crew and having to be in Indianapolis on Wednesday. It always helps when this conversation goes down in a crowded, noisy room where it is hard to hear what the other person is saying.

I often suspect my new friend is on to me, but she admires the sneakiness of my strategy and the entertaining manner in which I stick to it.

So I was pretty happy with the whole race car driver thing until last night, when I was watching TMZ on TV. There was a segment on Lindsay Lohan's new boyfriend -- the one who she met in rehab and is always described as being a "professional snowboarder." Apparently this has rankled the pro snowboarding community because none of them have ever heard of the guy. A popular snowboarding website even challenged him to provide evidence that he competes in pro events or receives money from a sponsor.

Now I'm sure he does at least own a snowboard -- much like I own a car. And therein lies the brilliance of his ruse. While my trickery has a shelf-life of hours, because he put himself into the nebulous, under-the-radar world of extreme sports he was able to be linked to one of the most scrutinized people on earth for almost a month before being revealed a fraud.

I am race car driver no more. Next time I claim pro snowboarder, or pro skateboarder, or pro mountain climber or pro whatever-the-kids-with-the-oversized-t-shirts-and-trendy-backwards-hats are.

You never know, maybe one day a pro blogger will do the trick. But until then I'm going to need to get me one of those long wallet chains.

I'd like this "Manny being Manny" thing to catch on

Boston slugger and honorary Valley Girl Manny Ramirez was at it again yesterday. Stating that if his Red Sox weren't able to come back from their 3-1 deficit to the Cleveland Indians it wouldn't be "like the end of the world" because "who cares."

Well the fervent Red Sox Nation cares, and they can't be too happy with their star player's nonchalance. Then again, anything Manny Ramirez says can be easily dismissed as just another case of "Manny being Manny."

As I've opined before, the appeal of such a line of reasoning lies largely in "Manny being Manny" being so fun to say.

That in mind, are there any other public figures whose intentions and activities we can peg exclusively to a simple, phonetically pleasing reduction? I nominate the following:

Rudy Giuliani

Every day Rudy Giuliani confirms what his critics can't stop screaming about: This is one weird hombre. When he's not answering phone calls from his wife in the middle of speeches, or discussing Martian attacks with ten year olds, Rudy turns to rhetorical excess, spitting out head-scratchers such as "I gave my blood for the New York Republicans" or "the American economy is the last best hope of humanity." Yet the more the public sees of Rudy, the more they don't seem to mind his idiosyncrasies. So the next time Rudy says or does something odd -- probably while wearing his third wife's panties -- instead of obsessing over how it's going to play in the flyover states, remember -- it's just Rudy being Rudy.

Lindsay Lohan

Today we have reports that, while rehabbing in Utah, Lilo had crazy stairwell sex with a pro snowboarder type, breaking up his engagement back home. If true, this would be at least the second marriage Lohan has destroyed while she was getting dry over the summer. One can only imagine the number of relationships she has been able to effect outside of rehab, where there aren't strict rules against sex, and everyone's judgement is clouded by the drugs. Many would argue this makes Lindsay a bad person. I say the responsibility lies with all the women foolish enough to allow their man to go be housed in the same rehab facility as Lohan. Or, for that matter, to live in New York or Los Angeles. The Mean Girl's star can't help herself. It's just Lindsay being Lindsay.

Vladimir Putin

Buoyed by a huge influx of petrol dollars, all Russian President Vladimir Putin seems to be doing these days is engaging in cold-war era saber rattling and thinking of clever ways to beat the Russian constitution and declare himself president for all of eternity. Putin is also known to molest young boys in public squares, and is increasingly cozing up to Iran, the arch-enemy of the United States. But don't worry, George W. Bush, the great seer that he is, once spotted goodness behind Putin's ice blue eyes. So until the tanks roll into Hungary, there is no need to restock the old bomb shelter. It's just Pootie being Pootie.

Lindsay Lohan just got really expensive

There hasn't been a lot of news about Lindsay Lohan lately, which is too bad. Forced to focus on other things, our media have been trying to sell us on a character like Mahmoud Ahmajinejad. The Iranian President might share Lindsay's tendency for loopy delusions, but he completely lacks her spectacular breasts. (And his name is maddeningly hard to spell.)

The reason behind Lindsay's untimely absence is she has spent the last month or so at the Cirque Lodge, a rehabilitation facility in Utah. Despite sharing half of its name with a Vegas show, the Cirque Lodge seems to have somewhat of a restrictive stance on paparazzi.

But don't worry, 52 pages of divorce papers filed in Savannah, Georgia last week have clued us in to what Lindsay has been up to during her summer vacation: Having sex with someone else's husband.

Stephanie Allen fingers Linsday as the other woman in her doomed marriage to Tony Allen, the front man of a rock band called "Dead Stay Alive." I've never heard of the group, but I bet they have a kicking Myspace page.

Lindsay and Tony Allen met while they were both rehabbing at Cirque Lodge. While Tony denies their relationship was sexual, there have been reports of Allen being overheard bragging to friends about bagging the actress.

The catch is wronged wife Stephanie Allen is heir to a 1.4 billion dollar fortune, having something to with packaging and McDonald's.

Meaning sleeping with Lindsay Lohan could cost another human being over a billion dollars.

Whereas just a few months ago if you had yourself a band with a kicking Myspace page you could have probably slept with Lindsay Lohan for a couple grams of coke and false words of praise for "I Know Who Killed Me."

So don't let them tell you going to rehab and trying to clean yourself up won't improve your worth, self or otherwise.

Children are the new insanity defense

About five years ago getting married became all the rage. Celebrity weddings got even more important, and the masses were entertained (sort of) by movies such as Just Married or American Wedding.

Weddings remain trendy to this day. But now so is the next step: The baby making. And not just in its always popular euphemistic form. These days the tabloids track the famous as their bellies swell with new life, and then celebrate famedom's latest additions, whether it comes through natural birth, adoption, or suspicious circumstances involving the church of Scientology.

The wedding craze has led some to wonder if brides and grooms are getting hitched more for the glory of embroidered invites, pasta stations, and gift registries than the more (neo) traditional reasons of love and companionship. Likewise, now that the movie Knocked Up is a hit, and hip new parenting websites have stormed the Internet, we are hearing more and more about a practice called competitive birthing.

The theory goes that in affluent neighborhoods -- where birthrates are higher than in middle class communities -- would-be career-women-cum-homemakers are trying to out do the Joneses not only with that new luxury hybrid SUV in driveway, but with that gaggle of children in the backyard.

Interesting as it might sound, this seems a bit off. The more logical explanation is simply the extra bedrooms and more money for college the rich can afford is what accounts for the difference in birthrates between the wealthy and the middle class. Just like prudence and the ability to plan ahead explains much of why the middle class have fewer children than the poor.

If the number of children in the richest couple percent of households is increasing in relation to itself -- and some surveys suggest it is -- this probably has more to do with the country club set now including a greater percentage of Catholics, Mormons, and religious Jews than it does an emergence of a children-as-status-symbol ethos.

Nevertheless, there may be something fishy going on with birthing, and, as it always does in this space, it starts with our celebrities.

Nicole Richie just escaped serious punishment for auto-crimes far worse than Paris Hilton's by getting herself knocked up and appearing pregnant in front of the judge.

Now the latest rumor in the where's-Lindsay-Lohan mill is that, wherever she is, the troubled actress is with child.

Maybe not such a bad move, as Lindsay will also soon be seeing a judge with her freedom very much in jeopardy.

So while I doubt there is much of a societal move to equate children with a house in Nantucket, I do think we could be on the verge of viewing the miracle of life as a get-out-of-jail-free card.

If this trend catches on, God help us with the demographic nightmare to come.

Carjacking is back and cooler than ever

Carjacking -- or at least the hysteria surrounding carjacking -- came into and left prominence during the mid-nineties. If memory serves, much of the attention was triggered by a series of deadly attacks on German tourists driving rental cars in south Florida. But the nation soon tired of hearing about carjacking, and returned to focusing on old favorites like child molestation. Sadly carjacking was relegated to just a lonely column on a Department of Justice crime report -- no different than illegal logging.

That all ended today when we were treated to the details of not one but two carjackings. And not just any carjackings, these were celebrity carjackings!

We begin with the increasing bizarre case of Lindsay Lohan. There is now a claim that the car Lindsay used for her crime spree was, like the pants she wore, not her own. The GMC Denali belonged to a young man with the unusual name of Dante Nigro. Oddly, Nigro is a white fellow, but his friend and eventual co-hostage is black, which comes into play later.

It was by invite of the boyfriend of one of Lindsay's assistants that Nigro came to the fateful party where Lindsay was testing the sensitivity of her SCRAM bracelet. The same assistant whose argument with Lindsay launched the high speed car chase.

A dispute which took place in the parking garage of the apartment complex the party was being held, and resulted in Lindsay's assistant quiting and fleeing in a car.

Through a series of events I will let young Dante explain, Lindsay was then able to wrestle the keys and the car from Nigro, before taking, at speeds of up to 100 MPH, Nigro and his African American buddy unwillingly along on the harrowing pursuit of her former assistant.

Finally, when pulled over by the law, Nigro alleges Lindsay jumped out of the car and immediately offered up the hopeful defense: "I wasn't driving the black kid was."

Meanwhile, over in Bel Air yesterday, the carjacking shoe was on the other celebrity foot. Prince Frederic von Anhalt -- who you may recall from such scandals as Anna Nicole Smith's posthumous baby poppa drama -- was driving around in his Rolls when he was robbed at gun point by three women bandits.

Were these sexy women bandits? We don't yet know. But we do know Von Anhalt, Zsa Zsa Garbor's ninth husband, was wallet-less, watch-less, key-less and naked when police found him. Although the highway women didn't actually take his fine luxury automobile, so it wasn't actually a carjacking. Which is fine really, because von Anhalt isn't actually a celebrity. And, furthermore, isn't actually telling the truth. Speaking of which, I don't much trust that Dante Nigro's story either.

But who cares? I was getting sick of the celebrities and their paltry DUI auto crimes-- it's like there's a new one every day. Boring. It's about time they took it up a notch. In word or deed.

The grassy knoll strikes back

It's almost like, these days, you can't log onto your computer and go to a popular video sharing site and type in a phrase like "September 11" or "Princess Diana" or "Apollo Moon Landing" without having some wild eyed lunatic get up in your face, spouting crazy talk about how everything you previously thought was wrong, and it all goes back to a secret alliance between the Saudi Royal Family, the Zionists, Cheney and Tom Cruise.

Well the Lohan camp also just wants "the truth to come out," and had the good sense to dispatch a wild eyed "family insider" to Entertainment Tonight for the purpose of setting the record straight on the beleaguered actress's DUI and coke arrest. All the goodness is documented in this two minute clip, but I've summarized the key points of lunacy for those in a rush or who are easily hypnotized.

* Lindsay's "maternal" instincts kicked in once she noticed one of her younger assistants was "disheveled." Which explains the early morning car chase through the streets of Santa Monica. Yet . . .

* "We don't know if Lindsay was behind the wheel. Nobody actually saw Lindsay driving!"

* While the "insider" conceded Lindsay had fallen off the wagon in terms of the demon rum, she strenuously denied the drug allegations. Explaining away the inconvenient truth that there was cocaine found in Lindsay's pocket by claiming "apparently Lindsay's wasn't even sure whose clothing she was wearing."

It is in the last point I realized what a sophisticated spin machine the truth as it appeared to be is up against. Because the basis for any effective conspiracy theory is a statement which is at first absurd, but, upon deeper reflection, becomes a little less absurd.

So yeah, the "those aren't my pants" defense against a narcotic possession rap is usually as probable as the one about the dog and the homework. But is it that improbable that Lindsay Lohan put on the wrong pair of pants?

I blame Oliver Stone.

Lindsay Lohan got in trouble last night

If you are like me your morning has become paralyzed as you await the latest details of Lindsay Lohan's latest arrest. It is no surprise that it was the unholy trinity of alcohol, cocaine and-insisting-to-drive-your-own-car-even-though-you-are-a-celebrity-of-financial-means-who-everybody-knows-is-always-drunk-and-has-a- bodyguard-and-an-entourage-that-could-surely-drive-you-even-if-you-don't-want-to-hire-a-proper-chauffeur that did her in. To top it off, it appears Lindsay had the poor judgement of drawing attention to herself by participating in a late night high speed car chase -- as the chaser.

On one hand I am little disappointed. I was sincerely hoping Lindsay was going to use the challenge of wearing an alcohol monitoring ankle bracelet (which apparently doesn't work) to take getting high to new and undetectable places, and not fall back so quickly on the old standbys. On the other hand I really like Lindsay's mugshot. I already know I am way in the minority here -- and man, people can be cruel -- but, I ask, what exactly do you want a drunk coked up girl to look like at 2:30 in the morning?

What I see in Lindsay's freckled face is the gaze of slightly confused compliance that has had men feeding women inebriants since the beginning of time. When you hate on Lindsay's mugshot you are only hating on humanity.

Lindsay's arrest came right on the heels of her being arraigned for her last alcohol/coke/car incident. Meaning, if she is held to Los Angeles County's Paris Hilton standard, she is going to be going away for a long time.

But at JSB we've always held Lindsay, who's cute and possibly talented, to a higher standard than Paris --that do-nothing space alien looking creature. So, as Lindsay begins what is sure to be a meticulously documented journey through our criminal justice system, I'm pulling for Lindsay to outdo Paris in every way.

Sure, that could mean a display of dignity and genuine regret. But what's fun about that?

I think the words "legendary implosion" are sometimes thrown around too lightly in these times of hype and hyperbole. But if the very, very latest report -- that Lindsay was chasing down the mother of her assistant who then called the police because I assume she feared Lindsay was trying to run her down -- is true, we may well be headed in that heady direction.

But will they call her Lucy or Eve?

We've all heard about how the giraffe got its long neck. While it might not actually be as simple as a need to reach high hanging food -- maybe, given its already long legs, the giraffe developed the long neck to allow it to graze grass comfortably -- somewhere in the story of the giraffe and the elongated neck is an illustration of what the godless and unsympathetic like to call evolution.

Lately there has been speculation in some scientific quarters that, through the magic of mutation, evolutionary changes can occur faster than previously thought. Meaning the design of your biology might reflect some of the challenges your ancestors faced thousands of years ago. Not just hundreds of thousands of years ago

Which brings us to Lindsay Lohan. If you think Lindsay was sober during her 45 days in rehab think again. According to Star Magazine:

She uses ‘whippits,’ the tubes that you buy that contain nitrous oxide. She mixes that with the cold medicine Coricidin. Together they get you really wasted. At first, the counselors couldn’t figure out how she was getting high, but then they found the cold medicine and whippit containers under Lindsay’s bed.

Pretty clever. I mean the part before she hid the evidence under the bed. While I was aware of the recreational qualities of cold medication and whippits separately, I had never heard of anyone mixing the two. It's possible Lindsay invented the combination herself.

As for post-rehab, Lindsay has already volunteered to wear an alcohol monitoring bracelet. Who's to say, if she continues to feign sobriety, and is forced to keep shunning the traditional staples of inebriation, what cocktail of household products she will come up with next to get herself lifted? At this point we can only speculate upon the strange and fascinating ways Lindsay's body will mutate so it can properly synthesize Windex and apple seeds into euphoria, joviality and nudity.

But in a few thousand years, when the oceans have overrun the land -- yet instead of fretting about the indignity of drinking their own urine our descendants live in a state of perpetual bliss due to a potent intoxicant made from seaweed and positive thought -- they will know whom to thank.

For every season . . .

Last December I was kind enough to predict ten news stories for 2007. Some have come to be, some might still, and some will not. Yesterday one of my prognostications hit its mark when Lindsay Lohan turned 21.

Given her lifestyle, it was no slam dunk that she would enter her 22nd year, but Lindsay eased into her big day with a month and a half of rehab. The flip side to this cautious maneuver is that instead of something innovative, like a group sex tape or the mainlining of Ajax, the highlight of a birthday spent boringly with her family and a few friends was a brand new iPhone.

This dull passage of time ceremony reminds us that Lindsay is just one speedball or religious awakening away from leaving a great void in the Internet. And that's not even getting into the fact she is aging at rate between that of a normal person and Robin Williams in a creepy manchild movie.

Luckily, the experts say, there may be another young Long Island-born former child star actress/singer waiting in the ranks to replace Lindsay if something terrible should happen. Her name in Hayden Panettiere and, unless you watch the show Heros, you probably don't know who she is.

Hayden, who was number six on FHM's list of the sexiest woman of 2007, has an older reality TV star boyfriend, enjoys the nightlife and is quite photogenic. She is especially fond of being photographed licking a variety of different objects that aren't usually licked.

Panettiere turns 18 next month. That means come August, by some mostly imaginary barrier of self-regulation that the Internet doesn't even really follow because it is already full of pictures of Panettiere suggestively tonguing really odd things, Hayden will be able to be covered with the same all-access vigor the Lohans of the world are blessed with.

It would be awesome if the Interent had two out-of-control hot young actresses from Long Island to help power it. Not only that, it would mean, like with kidneys, if one of them were to fail we would still be OK.

What Murdoch's Journal would really look like

There is widespread speculation that if Rupert Murdoch is successful in his bid to buy Dow Jones the quality at the financial information firm's flagship publication, The Wall Street Journal, will suffer.

A lot of this is based on Murdoch's stewardship of his lone American newspaper, the New York Post.

While the New York Post is renowned for its clever pun-filled headlines -- which have been just as successful in branding entire nations as weasels as they have getting the Yankees back on the winning track -- the Post isn't known for the kind of vigorous reporting the Wall Street Journal excels in. Of particular concern, if Murdoch takes over, would be the future of the Journal's award winning China coverage.

Since Murdoch is a media mogul with newspaper holdings all over the anglosphere, I don't think it is fair to judge him on one newspaper.

Another of Murdoch's papers, News of the World, happens to be the biggest selling English language newspaper on the planet. Despite this, I hadn't even heard of the Sunday tabloid until I was exposed to it about a month ago through its spectacular coverage of Lindsay Lohan.

Mind you, this a London based paper, and the Brits have their own young out-of-control drug taking celebrities, like Amy Winehouse, to keep them entertained. In the age of shrinking newsrooms, I don't think anyone would blame News of the World if it were to limit its Lohan coverage to wire stories.

But instead, staying true to its name, News of the World's commitment to a story nine time zones away has put it at the forefront of all the bawdy details in the life and times of Lindsay Lohan. A month ago it was News of The World that first showed us the pictures of the former child star inhaling cocaine in a Los Angeles night club bathroom. Then, last week, it broke the disturbing images of Lindsay engaging in dangerous knife play with MTV personality Vanessa Minnillo.

This week's revelation was a bevy of all-new well-sourced Lindsay tales, including the time she tried to sex Mariah Carey and, most shockingly, an account of a dangerous encounter she had with a drug dealer. Lindsay, who was meeting with the coke peddler behind a bush somewhere in Beverly Hills, got the idea she was being sold short and began viciously beating the culprit. Eventually the dealer was forced to draw his gun, but this didn't stop her rampaging fists, and it was only after Lohan's bodyguard tackled the armed man from behind that the situation was defused. What an exclusive!

Obviously The Wall Street Journal covers different subject matter than News of the World does. But reporting is reporting. Through hard work and paying generous sums of money to sources, Murdoch's News of the World has been able to improbably corner the market in Lindsay Lohan, a slight girl who conducts her business in the shadows of bushes far, far away.

I'm sure the same strategy of reporting could work for covering China, a far off but giant country with its own appropriately scaled shadowy dealings.

As Paris returns to prison, JSB ponders infinity

I think it's safe to say the three queens of pop culture are Lindsay Lohan, Britney Spears and Paris Hilton. Since I often cover pop culture on this space, I end up spending a lot time writing about the slutty triumvirate. I don't mind writing about Lindsay -- in fact I find her fascinating. I'm more neutral on Britney. As for Paris, every time I type her name I die a little bit inside.

Maybe that's because Lindsay is a legitimately talented actress, and Britney was a perfectly passable pop singer, while Paris has no discernible talent and, in my opinion, isn't particularly attractive, sexy or less than completely evil.

Anyway, in times like these, you have to write about Paris because she is where it's at. My favorite message board post to any Paris story that is prominently positioned on a mainstream media website is "why are you writing about Paris Hilton WHEN THERE IS A WAR IN IRAQ!!!"

This comment has always made laugh because, due to the virtually unlimited bandwidth of the Internet, it is possible to cover all sorts of stories at once. So scroll down and get your Iraq war fix, dolt.

That's not even why it's funny anymore. I think it's safe to say, by any legitimate measure of significance, Paris Hilton is now more important then the Iraq war or the presidential campaign or global warming or anything else the shrill message board ombudsmen whine for more coverage of.

Answer this: Can any of those "important" stories simultaneously shut down the news cycle and make a complete mockery of our criminal justice system -- all the while screaming for their mother like a spoiled five year old deprived of pie? I think not.

Paris is big. Bigger than the geographical Paris. Probably bigger than France. Maybe bigger than Japan. So big it hurts my head to think about it. The same way it hurts when I ponder the universe.

So I've given up. I now just accept Paris for what she is. Something I will never understand. Something that looms above and about us all. And, ultimately, something that gives me comfort.

*Yup, that's the grainy photo currently on the front page of every newspaper website in the world.

** Speaking of that photo, it turns out it was taken by Nick Ut -- the same guy who took the super famous Pulitzer Prize winning naked running napalmed Vietnamese girl photo, almost 35 years ago to the day. As a witness to history, the dude's like Forrest Gump!

It's all fun and games until a jugular vein gets nipped

And then it is a bloody mess. More staged and dangerous hijinks from America's favorite celebrity train wreck not in a Los Angles County correctional facility. The photo, the latest leaked image of Lindsay Lohan "out of control," would be quite sexy sans the unsettling presence of her right hand. Which she appears to have swiped from a hard-living woman three times her age.

Irony and the Celebutante

Years ago I had a job that required me to speak on the phone with regular folks from all over the country. Once during a conversation with a woman from Minnesota I said something which I don't recall exactly, but I do have a very clear memory of her deeming whatever it was sarcastic and then deriding me for my "East Coast sarcasm."

Being that it was a sales call I seriously doubt what I said was actual sarcasm -- which, by definition, contains ridicule -- and it more likely fell under the large umbrella of irony. (Sarcasm, a specific type of irony, would be saying "yeah, you're really good at that" when you don't mean it, while general verbal irony would be declaring "what a nice day we are having" when it is raining.)

This common mistake in identifying a rhetorical device aside, I have, years later, come to the realization that the simple Upper Midwesterner was correct in her criticism. There is way too much irony in our society and it is hurting our young people.

Case in point: Young person Lindsay Lohan.

Lindsay has just been through a week full of cocaine-induced automobile accidents and well-photographed incidents of passing out and vomiting. While Lindsay watchers everywhere are blaming her bad luck on bad parenting, sycophantic older friends, bars that serve minors, and even the hard charging redhead herself, I point the dirty stick straight at irony.

Take a look at this video, in which Lindsay encourages kids not to drink and drive. Then check out this photograph (scroll down) of Lilo passed out with a AA medallion marking 30 days sober around her neck.

Now why, when prompted to say something to the masses, would a giggling Lindsay, of all people, choose to warn against driving under the influence? Likewise, who wears a sober medallion while bar-hoping?

The answer is she does both for the sake of irony, and the warm embrace of laughter and acceptance that the device brings to a member of a generation living in perpetual fear of being caught saying what they really mean.

Unfortunately Lohan, like many young people, is doing irreparable damage to herself on the way to the punchline.

Lindsay Lohan is proof positive that irony is killing our children. Seriously.


On a related note, don't be surprised if Lindsay moves to Italy.

Big brother is you

It was the rapper Mike Skinner who best summed up the down side to the proliferation of camera phones when he pondered, lyrically, "how the hell am I supposed to be able to do a line in front of complete strangers when they've all got cameras?"

Poor Lindsay Lohan got caught in the snare of a similar riddle when pictures of her partaking in young Hollywood's favorite bathroom vice appeared in a British tabloid over the weekend. In this case, Lohan's lawyer blames an "alleged friend" for the capture and release of the incriminating images. Which come at a time Lindsay has a new movie out and is trying to gain traction as a serious and reliable actress.

We already have one foot in the swamp of our Orwellian destiny and, unless you insist on checking out books on radical Islam before buying massive amounts of fertilizer, it has nothing to do with the government.

Today, big brother might only be concerned with our coke-sniffing or daughter-berating celebrities, but who knows what tomorrow brings? A beast made from the sum of our predilections and fears has the capacity for a wide range of interests, if given time. And, since such an all-encompassing beast is unlikely to be killed, time is what it has.

Alec Baldwin continues to be not nice

I haven't had a whole lot to say about the Alec Baldwin daughter-trashing incident because I've been trying to give Alec the benefit of the doubt. Reason being he's developed into a such a top-notch scene-stealing actor and, quite frankly, I live in fear of the collective powers of the Baldwin brood. Anyway, if you only listen to the first 30 seconds of Alec's two-and-a-half minute ass-straightening, swine-equating tirade it's not that bad.

But Alec lost me with today's (taped) apology. So he goes to Dr. Phil to work out his rage and daughter-hatred issues? I don't even think this Phil is a real doctor. In fact, if memory serves, he was some sort of cow wrangler until Oprah found him and unleashed him upon the world.

Sometimes, during a basketball game, a streaking jump shooter will pull up for a ridiculously long shot. They call that a heat check. Well Dr. Phil was Oprah's heat check. And after he found the target, the daytime talk queen strutted around the court safe in her knowledge the housewives of America have an insatiable appetite for any trash she decides to throw up.

But enough about Phil, the real problem here is Alec. By eschewing proper rehab he is clearly trying to conduct his public rehabilitation on the cheap. What's that about? It's almost like he is saying he doesn't love his daughter as much as Mel Gibson loves not hating Jews, or Mark Foley loves not buggering pages, or Lindsay and Britney love being quasi-respectable celebrities with all their naughty parts covered.

Actually, that is exactly what he is saying. Jerk.

Note: The picture above is not from a cinematic release. It's the inevitable result of an officer of the law's misguided attempt to tell a Baldwin what's what.

Save Lindsay

I haven't been writing much about Britney Spears or Lindsay Lohan lately because they both seem really out of control and I think one of them may die. I would feel bad if that happened, not because I have made fun of them in the past, but because I would just feel bad.

Not so bad as to cry, or otherwise upset what I was previously doing . . . so let's just put it this way: If Lindsay or Britney was found face down in an alley behind the Hyde, I'd feel worse than I would if I read about thousands of horrible torturous deaths in Darfur, or wherever else people are dying and we're famously not paying attention to.

There has been much speculation, of late, that the root of Lohan's self-destructive behavior lies in her "party mom."

Dina Lohan, 44, has been dubbed such because she is always out partying, and pulling party moves like way too many trips to the ladies room and public engagement in inappropriate -- even for today's pornified standards -- sexual contact.

Mrs. Lohan vehemently denies she is a "party mom, and told Harper's Bazaar:

Listen to me: Lindsay would drag me, literally drag my loser butt (to a club) and say, `I need you to know who these people are. . . She's in such a whirlwind; she's in a tornado. I mean, we're talking serious earthquake, you know?

We do know. But, while we can all sympathize with a woman who's birthed a magnet for natural disaster, the fact remains poor Lindsay has a father in prison and a mother who blames her own nightlife excess on her daughter. It is a dire situation for the star of Herbie Fully Loaded.

And there is not a whole lot any of us can do. It's probably best just to talk to your friends about how it's making you feel. Wallow in the sadness of life. Emote. Keep your fingers crossed.

End of the year crystal ball time

There is not a whole lot going on in this meat-in-a-holiday-sandwich of a week. So it seems like it is a good time to either reflect upon what happened in 2006, or predict what is going to happen in 2007. Since the former would take a lot research and a good memory I have decided on the latter.

But with a twist. I'm not necessarily predicting the big events that will shape our world in 2007. This is a list of ten topics that I might blog about, and you might read about on jsb in the coming year:

Celebrities adopt Eskimos

We'll start with the no-brainer. As global warming hysteria heightens, your better A-listers will fly their private jets to the North Pole and begin adopting/kidnapping Eskimo children --ostensibly to save them from drowning. In their new Malibu homes these young Eskimos will teach their assorted third-world siblings all sorts of new words for snow.

Many academics and public intellectual types will predict the decline of American power without offering up a remotely plausible alternative to it

Didn't it take like hundreds of years for Rome to fall? And the fall of the Roman Empire was supposedly fun. Come on public intellectual types, we're not even having fun yet! On a related note, the rest of the world will continue to adopt our trailblazing bad habits. Since they have already discovered the fat, the lazy and the violent, 07 will be the year the foreigners learn the thrill of over-hyping fake negative trends. In other words, there will be a lot of discussion in strange languages about Crystal Meth epidemics and how there is suddenly too much religion in public life.

This Obama fellow will get press

Having weathered the Obama hype and the Obama backlash, we are now entering the Obama backlash, backlash. The only place we can go from here is Obama backlash, backlash, backlash. And so on. If you are scoring at home, it's good for Obama when there is an even number of backlashes.

Surprise Major League Baseball dopers revealed

I'm not going to even try to dissect the legalese, but it seems like we are now on a path to where the names on the 100 plus positive drug tests from 2003 will be revealed to the public. It won't be much of a surprise if someone like Roger Clemens is on the list, but what if -- and this is based on nothing -- a Derek Jeter pops up. No matter what, we will be forced to rethink our animus towards Bonds and McGwire.

Beauty queens go wild

Not only -- with Miss America and Miss USA -- are there 100 state title holders, but many smaller municipalities and organizations crown beauty queens. What better way to promote tourism to Hillsborough County, FL then by having a smoking-hot Miss Hillsborough County simulate oral sex on random people in a crowded bar, and then post the photos on the Internet with links to other Hillsborough County attractions?

War will be more entertaining

2006 was all about wars in Iraq and Lebanon, and people seemed too invested to really sit back and enjoy the fighting on TV. I'm thinking a crazy, fun, hopefully intercontinental war will pop up in '07. Like maybe South Africa and Chile go at it over water rights. Speaking of which, I see that Ethiopia is currently attacking other nations. Remember when the Ethiopians were a bunch of stick figures, too weak to swat the flies away from their faces. So we send them food and money and this is what they do with it? That Sally Struthers is full of crap. I'd like to see her at The Hague, encased in glass.*

Joe Biden runs for President

I know, he already announced he was going to, but I hope, hope, hope Biden lasts the whole year. In this Youtube era of quick soundbite gaffes, Biden is the only politician we have who brings the length and breath of an old fashioned orator to his potentially offensive statements.

Jeff Garcia and Donovan McNabb have a quarterback controversy

This is predicated on a deep Eagles' run into the playoffs -- so I guess I'm predicting that too. Because, let's face it, everyone loves a quarterback controversy. I can't remember the names of my close friend's girlfriends and wives, but I remember small details of the great Danny White/Gary Hogeboom QB battle of '85. A Garcia/McNabb controversy would be especially fun because it involves the black-hole-like negativity of Philadelphia sports, race and, if Terrell Owens puts his two-cents in, sexual preference.

Lindsay Lohan Turns 21

I remember I stopped drinking two weeks before I turned 21 so it would be special. Actually, that had more to do with me losing my wallet and catching pneumonia. It still worked. I wonder how Lohan will prepare for her big day on July 2? I can only imagine what kind of partying will take place when it comes. Really, I can't even imagine. But I've circled the date on my calender.

Matt Drudge will be obsessed with weather systems, natural disasters, student-teacher sexual liaisons, Hillary Clinton, Israel, nuclear proliferation, stupid criminals and phallic symbols

And it will be the first site I check every morning, and refresh religiously all day.

Just like with my football picks, I implore you not to use these predictions in wagers involving currency, or your good word.

* It turns out Ethiopia is using their new money and robust health to gratefully attack our enemies for us. So I take back my negative implications. Sally Struthers is still full of crap though. Unless she has been working for the CIA all this time ...