Saturday, January 21, 2006

Everyone wants to be a player

Bin Laden Starts Book Club, Vows to Crush Oprah:
When Usama bin Laden, in his most recent threatening audiotape, recommended William Blum’s five year old book, The Rogue State, its sales rank on Amazon.com jumped from 209,000 to 20. That success has launched a new business for al Qaeda that could challenge the dominance of Oprah Winfrey in the book club industry.

Members of Usama’s Book Club will receive personal recommendations from the charismatic leader, as well as the opportunity to review the club’s latest featured selection every 30 days “at no risk to life or limb, as long as you keep the book and pay the invoice.”
...
“My mission is to make this the biggest book club in the world and get people reading great books again,” said Mr. Bin Laden on a reel-to-reel tape recording released today. “This is the first step in our ultimate plan to crush the billionaire imperialist infidel Oprah Winfrey, Allah be praised, and to take the reins of power myself as America’s media darling.”
And speaking of overweight, overwrought media darlings, how about that epitome of class, Star Jones?
Star Jones has told viewers that the war on terror is nothing more than a clash of male egos between President Bush and Osama bin Laden, the NEW YORK POST reports.

Yesterday, the co-host of ABC's THE VIEW told viewers during a discussion of bin Laden's latest audio tape:

"You know what? At some point, one of these men has to put it back in his pants and zip up the zipper."
I guess ole Star knows a lot about negotiation from her commercial promotion of her own wedding at every opportunity. She also knows a bit about sexual commentary from trying to convince folks that the guy she signed to marry her isn't gay. Maybe they sucked out her brains by mistake when they did the liposuction?

Of course, my fave Star Jones story is her wrangle with PETA to keep them from using rotund drag queen, "Flotilla DeBarge," in a parody of the porcine princess:
If you’re a woman, being mistaken for an enormous transvestite is probably not the most flattering thing in the world. Some might even try to do something about their current look so that they do not look like an enormous transvestite. But since that would mean less snacking on sticks of butter, Star Jones is just gonna sue everyone in sight. There’s almost nothing about this story I understand and even less that I care about. Choosing who to root for between PETA and Star Jones is like choosing what color mouse trap to put my penis in.