When a GQ profile quoted Michael Douglas as taking a petty swipe at everyone's favorite globetrotting altruists Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie ("I don't know about Brad Pitt, leaving that beautiful wife to go hold orphans for Angelina. I mean, how long is that going to last?" were his reported words), it instantly became the diss heard round the world. But the impressively bearded actor has gone on the record with Extra, claiming that the quote was entirely fabricated:

This week's New York magazine wades knee-deep into the Messiah-level anticipation accompanying the impending birth of Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie's forthcoming biological offspring, the perfect being expected to emerge from Jolie's womb, cut its own umbilical cord, and toddle off into the world to take care of the business of saving mankind. No one stands to profit more from the infant's arrival than the lucky paparazzo who first captures an image of the graced rugrat (assuming, of course, that the new parents don't sell the photo themselves and donate the money to their favorite charity), and one of the photographers plays out the "bleak scenario" that could unfold in the event of a Paris-based (where the couple now has an apartment) birth:

The image at right is not, of course, of Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie bringing home the world's sexiest baby. Instead, the disturbing image is from New York's cover story about the paparazzi scramble to score a photo of the forthcoming baby "that Jen wouldn't give Brad" (yes, a celebrity weekly editor actually said that).

Less than a month ago, reporters desperate for Brangelina copy swarmed the shores of Italy's Lake Como, hoping that the couple would show up to George Clooney's villa and oblige the tabloid press's thirst for a "surprise" wedding. But it seems that the globetrotting lovers have recently zigzagged to Namibia, where local journalists tracked them down in short order:

We never thought that we could get past the genetic perfection, the ready-made, multiculti orphan family delivered by one of the hottest women on earth, or the immense wealth and fame long enough to actually feel sorry for Brad Pitt, but we do. Doesn't the poor guy realize that no matter how many times he mentions that Frank Gehry's his hero or lets it slip that he's helping to design the bitchin'est casino in all of Las Vegas, the architecture industry is just using him for his body?

Glinty-eyed imparter of Hollywood movie wisdom Morgan Freeman is seeking to raise funds to erect a monument to Martin Luther King, Jr. in Washington D.C. Celebrity pals Brad Pitt and Laurence Fishburne have each donated a motorcycle for a charity auction, while noted hog enthusiast Ben Affleck is selling two. From the auction website:

Because no blemish, eruption, shaving mishap, ingrown hair, minor laceration, or any other maxillofacial impact with potentially chilling cosmetic consequences for one of Hollywood's most perfect faces must go unreported, we give you this claim—and immediate publicist denial—of the alleged, tragic bruising of Brad Pitt:

It should go without saying that there is no better or more reliable source for information on celebrity-related happenings in our Hollywood backyard than the British tabloid press, who gleefully re-export star-dirt to filth-craving American consumers. The Sun UK provides the obligatory biweekly report on the state of Jennifer Aniston's healing process, which if this report is to be believed, has finally advanced to the "selling Brad Pitt's old clothes" phase:

The mere possibility that Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie might want to make their orphan-sharing plan a little more official at George Clooney's (that guy again?) villa on Italy's Lake Como has sent the celebrity-stalking press scouring the nearby town for evidence of the supposedly impending, super-secret nuptials. And while the locals are either sweetly naive or playing it coy ("We don't have any bookings under their or their agents' names, maybe because it will be an intimate celebration," Reuters reports a luxury hotel flack as saying, as if the couple wouldn't check in under names like "Rodney Washboard" and "Elvira Hotpants"), reporters find themselves killing time in hopes of hitting the jackpot:

A little trash talking and competition between celebrity UN spokespersons is nothing new who could forget that regrettable 1976 gala podium hair-pulling incident between Shirley Temple Black and Audrey Hepburn? but when UN Messenger of Peace Michael Douglas recently took a swat at UN Goodwill Ambassador Angelina Jolie, he took things a step too far, dragging her innocent assortment of adopted orphans and their proud new dad into the ugliness:

• Best actor loser Joaquin Phoenix is looking for a loft in Tribeca. Considering the dude's two twitches short of a breakdown, we think this could be a lot of fun. [Page Six]
• New York Oscar parties kind of suck when all the good people are actually at the Oscars instead. [Gatecrasher]
• Inspired, no doubt, by the butt-clenching success of Jake Gyllenhaal and Heat Ledger, Brad Pitt considers going Gay for an upcoming role. [R&M (2nd item)]
• Upon learning that the gift bags at a luncheon contain a $1000 diamond bracelet, Jersey girl Tara Reid swipes as many as she can. Life after Taradise ain't easy. [Page Six]
• Warren Beatty grills Lloyd Grove about his lovelife. [Lowdown]
• Jessica Simpson thinks the whole world is out to get her. Paranoia is so sexy, no? [Scoop]

• Diet-pill whore Anna Nicole Smith heads to the Supreme Court today for a hearing regarding her gazillion dollar inheritance case, in which she is fighting for the money she rightfully earned by fucking her ancient, wheelchair-bound husband. In a perfect world, Smith will eschew all legal professionals and argue her case all by herself. Then we could die of happiness. [IMDb]
• Today in Lindsay Lohan's vagina: Wilmer Valderrama, 5:30 AM, Soho Grand. [Page Six]
• P. Diddy, currently in Rio de Janeiro for Carnival, was seen going into a venue known for its budget hookers. It's nice to know that despite his extraordinary wealth, the man still keeps things frugal. [Scoop]
• When it came time to file the divorce papers, did Nick Lachey lie about the date of separation from Jessica Simpson? If it means he could share in an extra $1 million of Simpson's cash, then of course he did. [Media Takeout]
• Lizzie Grubman and fiance Chris Stern are rumored to have their wedding scheduled as soon as the end of the month. Which would be tomorrow, right? [R&M (last item)]
• Because Brad Pitt morphs into his lovers, his latest role is as a United Nations-loving do-gooder. If Kofi Annan loved The Mexican as much as we think he did, Pitt's en route to becoming a Goodwill Ambassador. [Page Six]
• Donald Trump shames a Mar-a-Lago guest into tipping two employees who recovered her $2 million dollar bracelet. [Lowdown (last item)]

The Defamer Special Real Estate Correspondent returns not with a walkthrough of an open house offering a glimpse of how the other half lives before upgrading their living quarters, but with an exciting opportunity for those employed by (or perhaps merely dabbling in) the exiting celebrity-stalking industry. Less than $5,000 per month will get you within telephoto lens range of one of the tabloids' favorite photographic subjects:

· Like her famous adoptive dad Brad Pitt, little Zahara Jolie-Pitt has a hard time turning her thoughts into recognizable words. But when he took her to the Eiffel Tower, the clever toddler still managed to communicate to her father that she recognized the place where Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes pretended to get engaged.
· Worker #3116 has 12 reasons why he'd be a better Bond than the naked guy.
· We'd forgotten that Matt Damon essentially dumped Minnie Driver on Oprah's show, but ABC News reminds us about some particularly soul-crushing celebrity break-ups.
· Britney Spears' bad taste in gurus is surpassed only by her unfortunate choice in baby daddies.
· Finally, some proof that at least two people have seen Firewall.

• Hip-Hop mogul Damon Dash keeps the area around 89th Street and Central Park West safe for his son, whose cell phone was stolen by local "thugs." Next up, Dash will work on eliminating gang activity outside Dylan's Candy Store. [Page Six]
• Jennifer Aniston and Brad Pitt settle the details of their divorce: He gets the production company, she gets the house and the bloated alcoholic. [IMDb]
• Model Molly Simms is reportedly unhappy with her picture in the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue. As it turns out, most women don't enjoy looking like Vegas hookers. [Gatecrasher]
• Rapper Eve falls for Teodorin Nguema Obiang, the son of Equitorial Guinea dictator Teodoro Nguema. Spending Christmas on Paul Allen's yacht, however, makes it easy for to Eve to forget that whole torture situation. [R&M]
• Because he knows how to read, Henry Rollins is a threat to Australian national security. [Page Six]
• Chelsea Clinton lays low with her new boyfriend, Goldman Sachs banker Marc Mezvinsky. Not that we were particularly intrigued by the whole situation. [Lowdown]

• Lindsay Lohan and mother Dina bond by watching naked women slut it up in the Hotel Gansevoort's hot tub. All tuckered out from that maternal quality time, Lohan took frequent trips to the bathroom with Nicky Hilton. Just another Monday afternoon, we're sure. [Lowdown (last item)]
• Billionaire and professional divorcé Ron Perelman has allegedly been pursuing a lookalike of estranged wife Ellen Barkin (but, of course, the new version is younger), which is making Barkin behave like a rabid dog. [Page Six]
• Unfortunately, Brian Quintanta — the man who scored a restraining order against Paris Hilton — might be the only person on earth who lies more than the heiress herself. [R&M]
• Brangelina rents a highly-secure apartment in Paris to hold them over while they search for a proper sex fortress in the South of France. [Page Six]
• PETA takes aim at VP Dick Cheney, who just shot his hunting buddy. Republican cronies deserve to be ethically treated, too? [Scoop]
• Shannen Doherty, who cares little for "right of way" or some such garbage, slams her Range Rover into a civilian's car. First Brandon crashes his racecar, and now Brenda does this. It's been a rough couple of seasons. [TMZ]

We're a little bit surprised that a member of the usually profoundly vicious British tabloid press would waste its time fawning over Brad Pitt's parenting skills, but News of the World did just that, praising Pitt for being "completely at ease" with "no awkwardness" while helping adopted son Maddox pilot a radio-controlled car in Paris recently (pictured above). Have they already forgotten last summer, when an eager, attentive Pitt was introducing his little buddy to the exciting world of extreme sports in a pretty transparent attempt to impress Maddox's mom? Now that the thrill of humiliating ex-wife Jennifer Aniston has faded and given way to mundane trips to the park and having to pretend to care about totally boring economic forum bullshit, Pitt could already be disillusioned with his role as family man and might looking for an exit strategy. Unless Pitt perks up and enthusiastically offers to renew his bond with Maddox by taking him out to learn how to hunt Parisians for sport, Jolie might be wise to keep a set of emergency dehyphenation papers handy.

A first viewing of this Maddox Jolie tattoo, inspired by the pic at left and inked onto the forearm of some guy in Texas, resulted in a queasy feeling that an A-list child abduction was about to go down. However, we quickly realized that this is not a mere ransom note that will need to be lasered off before a kidnapping trial, but a celebration of our society's foremost celebrity refugee and his infectious let-the-good-times-roll, sure-my-mom-is-nuts- but-I-still-like-the-fucking-mohawk-OK? attitude. Soon, this image of young Maddox will supplant the eternally urinating Calvin as the standard icon of rebelliousness on countless mudflaps and window stencils across the country, prompting his mother, equal measures sad at the loss and happy to begin the hunt for a new adoptee on the cutting-edge of cool, to abandon the overexposed toddler in the line at a truck-stop Hardee's.

• Bad news: this year's Fashion Week must go on sans fancy Kohler toilets. The usual crappers have been replaced with mere Porta Potties, which flooded at Kimora Lee Simmons and John Varvatos' shows. Presumably the plastic crappers couldn't withstand the force of mass purging. [Gatecrasher]
• What did Aniston know and when did she know it? The debate rages on as to when Jennifer Aniston was informed of her ex-husband Brad Pitt's procreation with Angelina Jolie; the latest rumor is that she got just one day's notice, via Pitt's publicist. You didn't expect him to tell her without his mouthpiece, did you? [Page Six]
• Of course Catherine Zeta-Jones' gay rugby movie has Alan Cumming attached. It can't exist any other way! [R&M (last item)]
• Good Morning America executive producer Ben Sherwood is rumored to be facing a forced exit, presumably because he couldn't handle being less pretty than Diane Sawyer. [Lowdown]
• Life after losing on the Apprentice involves little more than returning dirty clothes to angry saleswomen. [Page Six]

At this point on a Friday afternoon, we're willing to turn off the bullshit detector for a moment and wallow around in some street-quality British tabloid dirt. Stop, drop, and roll, sickies: