As a nation watches its doomed, sweet princess finally laid to rest, we'd like to take a moment to recognize a news organization that has gone above and beyond the call of duty in its efforts to bring us as close to Anna Nicole Smith in death as it did in life. That's right, we're talking about "Entertainment Tonight," whose selfless shelling out of millions of dollars to purchase footage (and the free "bonus" interviews that came along with them) of Anna and family resulted in one of television's greatest moments: the airing of the C-section that brought little Dannielynn Hope Marshall Stern into the world. Well, that close relationship has paid off. We hear that "E.T." has been allowed to attach a CasketCam—a videocamera that puts you right in the middle of the action—to Anna Nicole's burial box. We don't know about you, but we'll be watching "E.T." tonight. Tackiness on a scale this grand must not go unrewarded.

Each week, thousands of reader comments are rejected by our sharp-eyed hall monitor Intern Kaila. In honor of today's closing ceremonies for an American icon, we have selected some of the most interesting rejected comments concerning the late Anna Nicole Smith. Please bear in mind that all these comments are real, and that individuals actually sat down and typed them out, sometimes even spell-checking them first. We may mock our regular commenters on occasion, but you guys are positively Shakespearean compared to these folks. Take a look:

If you awoke today to find an eerie hush having fallen across the land, and the morning drive unsettlingly devoid of other commuters, fret not—the apocalypse is not yet upon us. One of its more significant, prophesied signs, however, is. ("And she shall come down from Mexia, bedding men of all ages; and she shall plug diet pills; and she shall lose one child and birth another, immaculately; and a former Guns n' Roses guitarist shall see her into Heaven." Trimspa 6:18 ) At this moment, Anna Nicole Smith's remains are parked outside Mount Horeb Baptist Church in Nassau, awaiting her long overdue funeral; if you are not doing so already, get thee immediately to nbc6.net's live feed (a reportedly $5000 investment that quickly pays for itself in emotional dividends), where you can telerelay your final respects. Goodbye, America's fun, busty, methadone-pickled rose.

• Brangelina doing Vietnamese this time. [Us]
  

We here at Defamer are fully aware that the public may have long since reached its saturation point with Anna Nicole Smith death coverage, and that nothing short of a decomposed Smith knocking from within her casket during her "over the top" Bahamas funeral, then climbing out to perform a surprisingly on-key rendition of "Don't Cha" for the gathered guests, would warrant mentioning. You may be amazed to learn, however, that there are fascinating, still unexplored avenues to this bizarre tale, even if they only exist on alternate-reality planes. Without further ado, then, we proudly present for you some hot Howard K. Stern-on-Larry Birkhead slashfic action:

• The fake magazine inside GQ is sponsored by J.C. Penney. It's also called MANdatory. [AdRants]
  

In a National! Enquirer! Exclusive!, the pioneering periodical, which long ago perfected the winning tabloid formula of sketchily sourced celebrity exposés interspersed with white trash recipes, reports that the autopsy performed on Anna Nicole Smith revealed the cause of her death to be pneumonia. Drugs played a part only so much as the prescription meds she was washing down with contraband SlimFast shakes were masking the illness's potentially fatal symptoms:

Christ-crazed director James Cameron isn't the only one who's been fondling holy relics lately. Post goss dowager Cindy Adams was recently up to her wizened elbows in Annanicolania, and she wants to tell you about every last speck of methadone-scented pocket lint. "I have just seen Anna Nicole Smith's diaries. I held them in my hands... I leafed through a brown leatherette book stamped "Business Cards" that held her Vickie Lynn Smith driver's license in Texas. I rifled through canceled checks and receipts..." She goes on to describe the diaries' contents—Anna drank with Mom and mispelled lots of words!— and then starts asking the tough questions. "And why must the players in this drama all have three names—Anna Nicole Smith, Howard K. Stern, Dr. Robert....?" Maybe there's a clue at the bottom of Anna Nicole's purse, Cindy.
Anna Nicole's Diaries Found [NYP]

Despite Post columnist Linda Stasi's impassioned plea—"Don't give this man a TV show!"—it looks as if teary Anna Nicole judge Larry Seidlin might succeed in extending his fifteen minutes. In a letter obtained by the South Florida Sun-Sentinel, CBS Saturday Early show senior producer Michael Rosen praises Seidlin's "compassion" and says he "would love to discuss ... the idea of being our judge on a new segment, 'Morning Justice.'" Well, we know that mourning justice is exactly what we'll be doing if Seidlin accepts. Hi-o! Now CBS ombudsboy Brian "Nonstopoli" Montopoli is doing his best to sink that offer from the inside—through the almighty power of his lil' blog. Ooh, the CBS producers must be quaking!

Sandi Powledge may have been—ok, definitely was— "the furthest thing from glamour" when she met Anna Nicole Smith in 1991. But, according to the Houston Chronicle, that didn't stop the pair from embarking on a "tumultous love affair" that began in Texas, endured through Anna's rise to Playmate of the Year, and was finally ended by Anna's drinking and her inability to stay monogamous. "She was just hungry for love, hungry for approval—just like a bucket with a hole in the bottom," Powledge says. Oh, Anna! If only things had gone another way. But alas, Sandi Powledge just couldn't fill your hole.

Did former Anna Nicole Smith assistant Kimberly Walther actually ramble on "her blog" about Howard K. Stern's guilt, as Page Six reported this morning? Apparently, we were all naive to think so. Entertainment Tonight will feature an interview tonight with the formerly purple-haired, still Anna-tribute-tattooed lesbian, in which she supports Howard K. Stern's paternity claims and maintains that she "would never think that [Howard] would do anything to harm either Daniel or Anna." The weird thing is, we kind of believe her. Would a woman with a tattoo of Anna Nicole Smith lie? We'll find out when we get ours!

KimberlyWalther.com is a fake, at least according to Anna Nicole Smith's bob-headed assistant Kimmie herself, who tells Entertainment Tonight that the vitriolic website bearing her name and accusing Howard K. Stern of plotting Anna's death is the work of an impostor:

In the off chance you haven't been furiously clicking the refresh button on your browser for the past hour or tuned into CNN's round-the-clock coverage, we thought we'd update you on the latest developments in the Anna Nicole Smith body custody trial, wherein a seemingly pre-menstrual Circuit Judge Larry Seidlin delivered a weepy-yet-wise ruling that awarded Anna Nicole to none of the major players, but to Dannielynn's guardian, thereby bringing her daughter that much closer what every little five-month-old girl wants: The rapidly deteriorating remains of their birthing vessel:

We know you are way too classy to care about the ongoing Anna Nicole circus. We know! But loony judge Larry Seidlin just keeps giving us new reasons to care: crying, calling Anna Nicole's mom Virgie Arthur "mama," and generally being nuts. And now, he's just announced a verdict in the highly important 'who gets to decide where the body is buried' aspect of the case. (Seriously, what?) And this is how he prefaced his announcement that Dannielynn (well, Dannielynn's temporary legal guardian, Richard Milstein) would be awarded custody of the body: "I'm going to pronounce the disposition of this case. I hope that when you hear it, you handle it with the respect and dignity Anna Nicole will want." That lady's watchwords, right there.

As Virgie Arthur, Larry Birkhead, and Howard K. Stern have it out in a Broward County Circuit Court in Fort Lauderdale over the fate of Anna Nicole Smith's estate, baby, and rapidly decomposing remains, one person who can stay silent no longer is Kimmie Walther, who won our hearts as a regular fixture on The Anna Nicole Show with a combination of her butch charms and unflappable loyalty to her boss, as demonstrated by the Anna Nicole tattoo etched on her arm. On kimberlywalther.com, Kimmie rails against who is emerging as the real villain of this tale, hurling a list of questions and accusations at Smith's former puppeteer/lawyer/non-binding life partner:

• Above, Good Morning America Weathergay explains Crisco—uh, it's moisturizer!
  

By way of update on the Anna Nicole Smith situation: Yes, still dead, as the voodoo priestess that TMZ has contracted to temporarily resurrect her, Weekend at Bernies II style, to lead them to Dannielynn's real father has so far failed to achieve any positive results with his black magic. Until their midwife of darkness succeeds in reviving Smith, they'll have to settle for Anna Nicole living on only by means of the constantly surfacing videos like the one that aired on Fox News Channel last night, reminding us of the tragic starlet's endearing love of heavily self-medicated clowns.

Strangely non-evil Us Weekly editor Janice Min is ticked that TV news has gotten all tabloidey:

Part one of our long national nightmare is over. According to CNN, Anna Nicole Smith is being embalmed right now, as lazy Manhattan lounges about in a post-Pastis stupor. There was a slight hitch yesterday, when the first funeral home's embalmers refused to sign confidentiality agreements and were sent packin'. Good thing! As if there's any way that pictures of Anna Nicole Smith's decomposing body won't published on the internet in the next 36 hours. Blech.

The spectacle of Anna Nicole Smith's death may one day become the source material for a hit megamusical, peopled with a colorful cast of characters that includes newly materialized long-lost relatives, horny Bahamian immigration ministers, flamboyant entertainment medicine practitioners, nervous diet pill executives, and a massive chorus of potential babydaddies. Right now, however, there's nothing hummable at all about the ugly tug-of-war underway for Smith's estate, a legal nightmare that the court-ordered release of her 2001 will has done little to clarify: