Russell Crowe, who's playing a hero journalist in his next movie, was on the Today Show bashing reporters, but, to tell you the truth, his description of the people at movie junkets is pretty apt.

It was one thing for John McCain to ignore Sarah Palin when he rattled off a list of Republican rising stars — "governors who are young and dynamic" — on the Tonight Show.

Guys, he was just arrested barely two weeks ago for punching a prostitute he hired (according to the cops), after the hooker tried to bite his tongue off. Is now really the time to go bragging to the press about how many people your imitation of him is bringing into your Brooklyn and Rockville Centre churched?

Hipster millionaire Jakob Lodwick can't stop seeking web attention. Yet even the dim lights of internet semi-fame drive him up the wall. So he's left to stab in frustration, in the dark.

Yes, pirates are dangerous criminals, blah blah blah. And yet in their home movies, they come off as kind of charming!

OK, Rachel Maddow is officially the last person in the world allowed to joke about the dumbly-named Republican Teabagging parties, as the MSNBC host did last night, at great length.

It's worth remembering the fictional newsman of the moment, Howard "I'm mad as hell" Beale from Network, was actually mentally ill. Now Beale's closest modern analog is himself stumbling toward insanity.

The methodology: Use a fine paintbrush to moisten the middle of your Manischevitz flatbread. Break it neatly in half. And slather it with Nutella.

A vice president in the AP's Chicago office sent WTNQ, a member of the AP, a cease-and-desist letter asking them to stop posting the AP's YouTube videos on its website. Frank Strovel, an employee at the AP-affiliated station, raised a fuss on Twitter, the world's best medium for complaints. That won him an interview with blogger Christian Grantham. Strovel explained that he called the AP executive who had sent the letter, a vice president of affiliate relations, and discovered he was unaware that the AP even had a YouTube channel.

Oh dear. Former Price Is Right host Bob Barker was on the Today show this morning hawking his new memoir, and it seems that he, for a brief beautiful second, almost entered the porn industry.

The conservative press is very upset at this latest Obama GAFFE, in which he does a subservient bow to the king of Saudi Arabia, or maybe just bends down to shake shorty's hand.

What's so amazing that keeps us wannabe-stargazing? I mean, really. What is so amazing? This season is so bland and undercooked. And yet I keep trudging back, grumbling away week in, week out.

Sarah Palin's former future son-in-law, Levi Johnston, hit the Early Show, continuing his soft-spoken media beef with the Alaska governor. He blames his breakup with Bristol Palin, the mother of his child, on the election.

Glenn Beck takes his lumps from Fox News colleagues Shep Smith and Dennis Miller, but that's OK, because the Fox & Friends crew will happily fluff his ego back into shape each morning.

The Feds have accused Robert Allen Stanford of being a mini Madoff, running a multi-billion-dollar Ponzi scheme involving fraudulent certificates of deposit. Watching Stanford on ABC News tonight, it's easy to believe that's true.

"Bathtub IV," above, depicts an operation by the Westpac Rescue Helicopter Service. Loutit filmed both patrols and training exercises; we're guessing this is one of the latter. Either way, the combination of clean beaches and highly skilled first responders only adds to the appeal of Wee Sydney as a vacation destination.

There was a tragic shooting in Binghamton, New York, as the shouty 24-hour news channels all hastened to tell us. One brave Howard Stern fan stood up against the strictures of seriousness and good taste.

This week in press tours: Seth Rogen! Poor guy's been doing the rounds all week promoting his new movie Observe & Report and all anyone wants to talk about is that he lost some weight.

Boy, that Chelsea Handler really nailed scary Twitter-using celebrity mom Dina Lohan on Chelsea Lately! Except for one small problem: Lohan doesn't actually use Twitter.