· RIP Paul Newman, dead at 83. Remember him fondly here. · One press release, a "leaked" e-mail and an ill-conceived $1 million bet later, Harvey Weinstein and Scott Rudin settled their Reader kerfuffle. · Rest assured that when Heather Locklear finally tells her story about that crazy night in lock-up, it won't be to US Weekly. · This week in speedy recoveries: Travis Barker went home, DJ AM went out. · Anne Hathaway may not be game for anal sex, but she's up for David Letterman's BDSM any night of the week. · Wrestler Oscar-hopeful Mickey Rourke had a resolutely healthy perspective on his comeback: "You change, or you blow your fucking brains out." Amazing! That's just what our therapist told us! · We heard the four most dreaded words since "Verne Troyer sex tape": "Britney Spears sex tape." Meet the director if you must. · Ricky Gervais may or may not be a "fat idiot," but in any case remember: It's glandular, you cunt. · Fireworks on The View were brought to you this week by Bill Maher, Barbara Walters and, naturally, Elisabeth Hasselbeck. Twice. · You are cordially invited to the grand opening of Tyler Perry Studios this weekend in Atlanta — black tie and picket sign required. · Sharon Stone's maternal instincts were proven to be about as sharp as a Botox needle. · Mad Men and Pushing Daisies would be happy to trade in their Emmys for few million more viewers. · Speaking of Emmys, Survivor is already a front runner to nab next year's first-ever prize for Outstanding Performance by a Penis in a Reality Competition Show. · Joe Biden may be bitter about SNL's ongoing snub, but perhaps there's consolation in Homer Simpson's support.

Comedy goddess Tina Fey isn't the only funnylady who can pull off a mean Sarah Palin imitation. Harry Shearer-of The Simpsons, This is Spinal Tap, SNL's male synchronized swimming movie, and just about every other funny thing in the last 30 years-has just written and posted this fun song, "Bridge to Nowhere." It stars his wife, actress Judith Owen, whose Palin is spot-on and will make you eat the nearest hunk of rusted iron when you reflect that they are singing about a real candidate for a real fucking office. And try not to remember that John McCain will probably die in office when you watch this, coz that lessens the funny. Update: God you guys are hard to please! Now there's video of drunk-ass monkeys after the jump!! Click to view

Here is a clip of everyone on TV trying desperately to explain Sarah Palin's lousy, winky, over-rehearsed debate performance. All of them say she was "folksy," a useless term that means she drops her g's when she speaks. That is literally all it means. Well, that and "she is a little dumb and a very nice example of the kind of condescending to rural voters and poors that we always admonish in Democrats and always celebrate in Republicans." Hey, click on this and watch astute political analysis by people who are very secure in their high-paying jobs! (Thanks, Intern Chris Person!)

If you don't believe Google should buy a few 30-second TV spots to hawk its Chrome browser, watch Google's VP of Search Products and User Experience try to explain Chrome to the semitechnical viewers at CNBC. The whole thing falls apart into a meandering talk about faster JavaScript rendering, overlaid with a chart of Google's waffling stock price — the real reason Mayer is on CNBC. I doubt investors changed their GOOG valuations based on Mayer's promise that in the future, crashing one tab in their browser won't take down the whole thing.

From megastars like Matt Damon to Cutting Edge alums like D.B. Sweeney, it seems like every celebrity in Hollywood has an opinion about this November's presidential election. Earlier this week, actress Jessica Alba decided to muzzle herself if that's what it would take to get America to vote (an enticing motivator, though perhaps not as compelling as keeping Diddy out of sight forever). Now, a curiously able-to-speak again Alba has decided to pay it forward, muzzling other celebrities like Heroes star Hayden Panettiere and 90210's Tristan Wilds (is this because he made out with Dakota? Is it?!). Props must be paid to Alba, whose maniacally enthusiastic pitch should probably shoot to the top of her reel. Extra points if she can sew Dane Cook's lips shut next time! The clip, after the jump:

For much of tonight's debate, Sarah Palin avoided any spectacularly obvious stupidity and Joe Biden steered clear of any casually offensive statements. Then came "Say It Ain't So, Joe," an attempted cute catchphrase deployed by Palin that not only failed spectacularly but which was also followed by a cascade of other dumb attempts at adorability. The Republican vice presidential nominee then looked increasingly like the end of Tina Fey's most recent impression. She winked! For the second time in the night! She called her own joke "lame" and tried to laugh at it.

· Excuse the brief Defamer PSA, but please do your part on behalf the local medical professionals being cruelly stiffed by Medicaid — especially Dr. Richard Frankenstein, who's featured in today's accompanying news video. He hasn't paid his nurse Igor in months. [KABC] · At least until Diablo Cody pawns her Oscar, Letters to E.T. is hands-down the standout thrift-store find of 2008. [The Plog] · And until we can get our fall fashion guide in order, we'll pass you off to LA style authority "VideoJew" for the season's essential couture tips. Take it away, Jay! [Jewish Journal] · Looking for alternate view on yesterday's Watchmen preview you read about here earlier? No? Oh. Well, just in case. [Thompson on Hollywood] · We could take or leave Steven Soderbergh's four-hour Che after seeing it this week, but don't accept our word for it: AFI Fest will host its West Coast premiere at Grauman's Chinese. Tickets go on sale Oct. 10. [AFI Fest] · Anyway, what are you still doing here? It's Palin time! [Vice-Presidential Debate]

Funny because it's true: Web-video comedienne Kara Luiz's "I Google Myself" aptly charts the YouTube's generation self-obsession. The best part: A blog post about the video is already the No. 2 Google result for Luiz's name.

The inclusion of a woman on a major party's presidential ticket is unprecedented... for the Republicans. The Democrats did it back in 1984, when Walter Mondale selected Geraldine Ferrarro for his suicide mission against Reagan. Ferraro was considered risky due to her inexperience, but her selection and her brash, confident campaigning bumped Mondale way up in the polls. The VP debate that year pit George H. W. Bush, who'd been in Washington for years in various positions of authority and who was considered something of a foreign policy expert, against Ferraro, who'd only been in the House of Representatives for a couple years. The result? See for yourself in the clip above, in which Ferraro fights back against condescension from Vice President Bush. Think of it as a preview of tonight's Biden/Palin debate, except for the fact that Ferraro is smart and can speak English.

Famous actresses should really write something into their contracts that says that in the case of their ex-boyfriend being arrested for international money-laundering and fraud, all mandatory TV interviews for a new movie can be postponed at least until his trial is over. Anne Hathaway already had to face David Letterman's questions about her ex, conman Raffaello Follieri, and today she had to go on Good Morning America to explain what she "learned" by dating an Italian hustler. Uh, not to do it? Click to watch her speak poignantly enough to live up to GMA's standards of public purging. [The saddest part of all is that the movie she's promoting, "Rachel Getting Married" is absolutely terrible. Epically grating. I even got free tickets, but Jesus. It's not worth the headache, Anne.]

Because Google cares about the children, it has asked a bunch of Hollywood celebrities to create a public service announcement urging young folks to vote — for Barack Obama, against California's Proposition 8, and for San Francisco's Proposition K. Kidding! We just tried to slip the decriminalization of prostitution in there in the hopes you'll be confused and think your Googley overlords publicly endorsed it (but lord would it ever piss of the evangelicals, bless their little hearts). No, it's all very superficially bipartisan. It's also four and a half minutes long, two minutes of which attempt lame reverse psychology and the rest bad to middling attempts at humor, finishing with Dustin Hoffman creepily flirting with some young production assistant. So far? 172,325 views. But hey, that'd be enough votes for Prop K to win!

For American presidential campaigns, the run-up to any televised debate is nothing so much as an exercise in managing expectations. Your opponent is fearsome and will probably crush you. Your own candidate will be lucky to form a single coherent sentence. Then, after the debate, you can spin a weak performance as a come-from-behind victory. In this little game of flackery, Sarah Palin could not be better positioned for tonight's face-off against Joe Biden. The Republican vice presidential nominee is up against a respected lion of the senate. Severe economic anxiety has put her ticket nine points behind in a new poll. The debate moderator has a big crush on Barack Obama. And, most importantly, a series of disastrous interviews with Charles Gibson and especially Katie Couric has made Palin look like an uninformed, inarticulate embarrassment. You can watch the complete lowlights in the attached video, including Palin's failure last night to name a single Supreme Court decision other than Roe vs. Wade. But keep in mind that the worse Palin looks now, the better she'll likely appear, to some key voters, tomorrow morning.

· Some genius isolated David Lee Roth's grunting, squealing vocal track from "Runnin' With the Devil" and posted it to YouTube, finally converting the world's four remaining Van Halen-haters to rabid fans. Expect an acapella holiday album by the end of the month. [GiggleSugar] · Michael Bay is getting better and better at Twitter these days. To wit: "Shia cried more today. Especially compared to yesterday." Who knew? Thanks for the heads up, Mr. Lisanti! [Twitter] · And the winner of Harvey Weinstein's $1 Million Charity Sweepstakes is... the Robin Hood Foundation. Which, coincidentally, has expressed an interest in helping market Zack and Miri Make A Porno. Small world. [Page Six] · Good news from the Joan Hyler recovery front: The critically injured manager/producer today spoke her first words since the car accident that sent her to the hospital in August. [Care Pages] · Ahhhhhh!!!!! Lasers! [Tumblr]

After the landmark ratings success that was the 2008 Summer Olympics, NBC was anxious to capitalize on the momentum they had built leading into the fall. However, despite all that promotional exposure, Beijing Ben and the NBC team haven't yet been able to convert in the ratings department: Knight Rider tanked, Chuck and Life both saw their ratings dip from their 2007 premieres and The Office could only muster a third-place finish in its lovey dovey season premiere last week. However, there is a bright spot; the network has gotten big bumps in both the awareness and ratings department thanks to the white-hot star power of homegrown talent Tina Fey. While fans will have to wait until the end of the month for 30 Rock to return to the air, NBC has been satiating America's desire to see its new Emmy sweetheart by repeatedly trotting her out during its late night lineup. She has appeared as Sarah Palin on SNL not once but twice and, last night, she made a cameo appearance along with Julia Louis-Dreyfus in a bit that can only be described as the ying to Ricky Gervais' and Steve Carell's faux Emmy duel yang. Watch NBC's clear cut MVP hitting another one out of the park after the jump.

Though Ellen DeGeneres still hasn't announced a major donation to the campaign to fight California's homophobic Proposition 8 (despite hosting a fundraiser for the animal rights-friendly Proposition 2), she at least denounced the proposition last night while guesting on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno. Even Leno himself got into the act by spreading a queer-friendly message of tolerance — one he no doubt hoped would erase memories of the time he badgered Ryan Phillippe to give the camera his "gayest look." Noting to DeGeneres that he spends a lot of time in West Hollywood, a surprised Leno called it, "the nicest area, the cleanest area, the safest area!" Is it the most "articulate" area, too, Jay? [The Tonight Show]

David Letterman naturally wanted some dish last night on Anne Hathaway's train-wreck of a relationship with Rafaello Follieri, the Italian con-man doing time for fraud, conspiracy and money laundering. He had complimented her at length, agreed to show her clip and phrased his questions politely. But the starlet became exasperated only one-minute into the good stuff. "I'm just kind of promoting my movie," she said. Ha ha ha, um, no. You don't get to sweep the imprisoned swindler ex under the rug. And no one cares about the movie anyway. By getting testy — at one point Hathaway asked Letterman, "Do you want to know his shoe size, too?" — Hathaway is just keeping the issue hot and herself entangled in Follieri's scandal even longer. Cringe at her battle with reality in the attached video (click the thumbnail to watch).

So it turns out that the same night James Cramer was bragging about foretelling the Wall Street meltdown he was in the midst of a colossal fuckup. The CNBC host on September 15 recommended shares of Wachovia as a safe haven from the financial panic. Cramer took comfort in the words his former Goldman Sachs boss Robert Steel, who earlier in the show said his company Wachovia had "a great future." "You're a reassuring face," Cramer told him. In between, a CNBC promo promised "Fast, accurate, actionable, unbiased" advice. Wachovia of course went to liquidate at $1 per share Monday, less than a tenth of its value when Cramer recommended the stock. Cramer quickly apologized Monday night. "I wasn't skeptical enough," he said. It's all in the video after the jump.

Sarah Palin spent some more time with Katie Couric, her new undermining roommate, who seems to have accumulated like 20 months worth of interview material, all of it horrifically damaging to the Republican vice presidential nominee. This time around, Palin couldn't name any newspapers or magazines she regularly reads, except for "all of them," which she clarified to mean whatever four-year-old copy of U.S. News she finds in the waiting room at her dentist's office. Then she didn't know what the morning after pill was. Katie was like, "whatever, I'm so out of here." Then Palin said she "loved" her lesbian friend, and Katie got excited again, about seeing Palin naked and "unfiltered" at the big debate. When will Palin finally vote Couric out of her sorority house and end this embarrassment? Cringe for her in the attached clip (click the video icon to watch).

· As repurposed porn goes, the accompanying video is perfectly suitable for work. But we still don't think we'd chance your boss seeing how one of its stars plays animated maracas. We're just saying. [Diesel] · If IMAX has in fact jumped the shark, Michael Bay will make it the most awesome fucking shark-jumping you have ever seen. [Movie City Indie] · OMGZ first pictures of the farmhouse where Tarantino's gonna shoot Inglorious Baszzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz [Tarantino Archives] · Word of the day: "Australiagasm." We've never had one ourselves. [The Film Experience] · Critics may be lapping up awards-season fare, but frankly, we've been in the mood for "a better kind of suck." And... eureka. [AICN] · If you can't decide which of the eight versions of the new Iron Man DVD you'd prefer, someone's done your homework for you. [Hollywood Newsroom]