40 Million Dollar Man Frankie Muniz alarmed Malcolm in the Middle fans everywhere today when he casually announced on Twitter that he had suffered a stroke.

Well here's a story that is bad from every angle; a multi-faceted diamond of misery.

Arizona governor Jan Brewer has left the state on "official business," but her aides refuse to say where she's gone.

Twinkie maker Hostess pissed off a lot of reasonable people by not only cutting worker pay while leaving the CEO's pay untouched, but also giving executives $1.75 million in bonuses at the same time they are liquidating the company and laying off 15,000 workers. That's some brazen shit. More enraging is how typical such behavior is.

It appears as though the Petraeus affair isn't quite over, after all. In today's Washington Post, Bob Woodward broke the news that in spring of 2011, Fox News head Roger Ailes attempted to persuade David Petraeus to run for president if Obama didn't appoint him Joint Chief of Staff, telling the then-general that News Corp head Rupert Murdoch would "bankroll" the campaign.

If you were wondering how Parks and Recreation could top cameos from Joe Biden and John McCain, here's your answer: Newt Gingrich will make a guest appearance on the show sometimes later this season. What's more, the the casting was a complete coincidence. As the Indianapolis Star reports, the Parks and Recs crew were filming in the St. Elmo Steak House in Indianapolis when the former presidential candidate and Speaker of the House strolled in for lunch.

We can probably go ahead and add this to next year's Gift Guide for People Who Still Read Books: Dick Cheney is writing a book about his many, many heart surgeries (and five heart attacks). The former vice president is co-authoring the book with his cardiologist, Dr. Jonathan Reiner, and his daughter, Liz Cheney.

The void in Congress left by Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr., who resigned last month after spending the second half of 2012 bouncing in and out of mental institutions and bars, is vast. And the bar is high for a candidate to meet the expectations of Chicago voters, who resoundingly re-elected Jackson less than four weeks ago even though he had disappeared without a word for five months and was under federal investigation for campaign finance violations. Luckily for Chicagoans, convicted sex offender and former congressman Mel Reynolds is bravely stepping into the breach.

While the people you follow on Twitter have been eager to let you know how warm it is today, it looks like we're in for a long, hard winter. Why's that? Well health officials say we're already seeing a spike in flu cases, several months early.

You'd think that after 4chan founder Christopher "moot" Poole was voted 2009's Most Influential Person in the World thanks in overwhelming part to a flood of 4chan users looking to game the system, Time magazine would quit handing the decision to Internet users.

American states, counties, and cities routinely offer huge tax incentives and subsidies to private businesses in order to lure those businesses into locating themselves in a particular place. Spend a little to get a lot, the theory goes. Priming the pump of economic development, etc. The problem is that what is supposed to be spending for the public's benefit in fact benefits only private corporations. And it should be outlawed.

Buckingham Palace has confirmed our friends Bill and Kathy are having their first child, according to the AP. Here's the statement:

The New York Times, like the rest of the newspaper industry, went through a painful series of buyouts after the 2008 financial collapse exacerbated the already ongoing collapse of the newspaper industry. In 2009, they cut 100 positions. In 2011, they had 20 more buyouts. This morning, they announced they want 30 more.

Ricky Gervais is one of the most hated entertainers in America. Remember when he hosted the Golden Globes and was super horrible to everyone? Yeah, kind of unforgettable really.

The Supreme Court met Friday to discuss the possibility of hearing arguments for two high-profile cases concerning gay marriage (one for California's Proposition 8 and the other for the federal Defense of Marriage Act), but "surprised" everyone when they made neither a decision nor an announcement by the end of the day.

Bret Easton Ellis, the American Psycho writer and professional crazy person, is a pretty notorious tweeter. He's yelled at Lindsay Lohan for not showing up to set on time, defended Paris Hilton after she said most gay people "like, die of AIDS," and has told bullied kids to toughen up.

The American Psychology Association voted to finalize entries for the fifth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders yesterday, ending the last of several commenting periods open to the public, so if you were hoping to send them any recommendations I hope yours got in under the wire. There hasn't been a new edition since the release of the DSM-IV in 1994, which may not seem that long ago, but consider that Adderall did not yet exist at the time and the A&E Channel was still years away from its hit "Watching People With Largely Untreated Mental Illness Suffer in Their Homes" series lineup.

A thorough, deliberate hatchet job is a thing of beauty and a joy forever. It is for this reason no one could remove their eyes from Pete Well's review of Guy's American Kitchen & Bar last month; it is for this reason that Adam Mars-Jones was given an award by newly-minted Hatchet Job of the Year for dismantling Michael Cunningham's (of "The Hours? They should call this thing The Weeks!" fame) new book, By Nightfall, earlier this year.

Crumbling Time-Prince Jude Law wants the world to know he's perfectly happy to at long last to look like a disgusting skin monster just like everyone else. With his recent conversation with T Magazine ("Who Are You Calling Pretty Boy"), Law has finally completed the ancient ritual of the Aging Male Beauty interview, declaring his utter relief to have finally slid into human levels of attractiveness.

Kansas City police are currently investigating two shootings that took place this morning. They say a Chiefs player shot and killed his girlfriend at their home and then headed to a practice facility where he committed suicide.