When times are tough, Americans don't want television that makes you "think." They want television that's predictable, television that reruns the same god damn stories week after week with absolutely no sense of drama or uncertainty. Because who wants more uncertainty, in these uncertain days? This is why CBS—old, stuffy, worthless CBS—is now the best-rated television network of the fall season, may god have mercy on our souls. Too bad Sumner Redstone can't make any money off it, though! CBS hasn't done this well any time since 1987, before reality TV was invented.

In the same way people thought television and movies and the invention of thumb-twiddling would kill the radio industry, people were convinced the iPod would be the thing that pulled listeners away from commercial radio forever. But they failed to anticipate how utterly lazy and uncultured Americans are! Radio gained millions of listeners last year; young people's time listening to radio rose 11%, while their time listening to iPods dropped 13%. The whelps love Bubba the Love Sponge, or whoever is on "the dial" these days! So then why can't radio make any money?

Once again Howard Stern is fulfilling his mission of delving deeply into the sex lives of our childhood-and more recent-crushes. On the hot seat for tonight's installment of Stern's On Demand show is none other than Marsha Brady, nee Maureen McCormick. As one of the top five teen idols of the late 60's and early 70's, there is one crucial thing the world needs to know about McCormick: Has she had anal? She has! But does she like it? Folks on both sides of the issue are going to have to rework their Marsha Brady fantasies. Clip after the jump. Click to view Also? 34 years after The Brady Bunch went off the air and she is still so amazingly hot! And that's not just nostalgia talking.

So Madonna and her husband Guy Ritchie are finally getting divorced. It's a very shocking thing, since earlier this summer, when reports of a pending divorce surfaced, Madonna's flack assured the world that the couple had "no divorce plans." Could it be that the flack, Liz Rosenberg—a charter member of our list of lying flacks—told something less than the full truth? After the jump, Liz's side of the story, and then the other, more accurate side: We asked Liz Rosenberg about this discrepancy between what she said earlier, and what's happening now. Her answer: "there was no pending divorce earlier this year." So, we asked, does that mean that, for example, the Sun's report that Madonna "initially planned to move back to the US with their three children in July" is false? "yes," Rosenberg replied. Well, how credible is Liz Rosenberg? She told the world in 2006 that Madonna was not adopting a baby in Malawi. Although, of course, Madonna did adopt a baby in Malawi. What else do we know about Rosenberg?

Is People magazine totally in the tank (like Pareene) for John McCain and his non-English-speaking VP lady? We hear that some staff members of the nation's leading smiling-coverperson mag are grumbling that People is giving too much positive press to the Republican candidates—for example, this feature where they ask readers to submit questions for the Palin family, without once mentioning they engage in moose-killing and other scandalous activities! Or this, with a headline quote that will make you exclaim "Har." Besides, doesn't People know that only Angelina Jolie and Jennifer Aniston are qualified to appear on celebrity magazine covers? Science has proven it!: Forbes did an actual pseudoscientific study of a year's worth of celebrity mags and found that Angelina and Jennifer are the two most successful coverpersons. Britney Spears: nobody cares any more. These conclusions could have also been obtained simply by sitting quietly with your thoughts. In any case, the real question is: Is People in the tank? Feel free to email us if you're an employee who thinks so. Though we would remind you of this:

Sharon Waxman is a former NYT reporter who quit the paper to go to LA and make her way on the wild World Wide Web, which has "endlessly rich tools to pursue our craft," etc. She sent out an email today to her Trusted Friends and Colleagues telling them that The Wrap News, "which will have a fresh approach on reporting news in the entertainment industry" (!) and will be a "multi-platform source," etc., is all set to launch in January, and by the way please take a survey. And who will the world have to thank for Waxman's new "news and community resource for entertainment professionals?" Heartless Gawker, which made her quit her real job, allegedly!: Waxman's schadenfreude on our recent layoffs:

Paul Little, a.k.a Max Hardcore, head of the porn company Max World Entertainment and himself a porn star, has been sentenced 46 months in prison by a judge in Tampa. His crime: being too hardcore. The Justice Department got him on obscenity charges, saying that he distributed films in which he "is shown engaging in violent and extreme sexual acts with female performers." During his trial the jury could barely bring themselves to watch the material. So what was in there that was so bad?

Tonight, let's get musical. Awesome, amazing, stupendous, rocking live music moments. That's it. I'm taking my wayback machine to a magical concert in 1973 to get us started.

There was a time when third world countries would rip off any Western product they wanted to. Because how much time were US companies really willing to invest wading through dusty Asian market stalls looking for bootlegs of their precious brand names? But things have changed! As China and India have grown into serious global economic powerhouses over the past decade, they've been forced to respect intellectual property laws in order to maintain good business relations with the West. Which makes this whole "Hari Puttar" thing a bit of a stretch. Warner Bros. sued an Indian film company for making a movie called "Hari Puttar," claiming that it was a ripoff of Harry Potter. They just lost the case in an Indian court. Home team advantage? Actually, when you hear the facts it seems more like sheer bullying or paranoia on Warner Bros. part:

Oh, celebrities - even though US Weekly says They're Just Like Us!, they often seem to inhabit stratospheric heights. Take Oprah Winfrey, for example. She founded that school in South Africa. Her Angel Network raised money for Katrina relief efforts. And who can forget Oprah's Favorite Things!, when she nearly sends hordes of teachers in her audiences into cardiac arrest by giving them free cars and red velvet cupcakes. Well, apparently Opes is just as greedy as the rest of us.Over the weekend, Oprah hit up an Emmy swag suite and - gasp! - actually took something home with her. A purple-grey Lesportsac limited edition bowling style bag designed by Stella McCartney. Really, Oprah? We would've gone for one of these cool hats, like Neal Patrick Harris did. Lookin' good, Doogie. [Photo Credit: Getty Images]

Lately the internet has been "abuzz" with rumors that NBC wants to dump its golden boy chief programmer Ben Silverman. So of course NBC itself has been equally "abuzz" assuring everyone that it wants no such thing! Are they telling the truth? Oh boy, it's time to do some serious parsing of corporate spin: Among the reasons that NBC has to be pissed at Silverman: he hasn't resurrected the network's ratings; the upcoming season of shows has no clear breakout hit; he's a party boy who stays out all night and doesn't come into the office till 11; and he tapped his old friends for important positions they weren't qualified for, which resulted in NBC doing things like paying his deputy's boyfriend $1.75 million to take his stupid show pitch and go away. At a normal job, this would result in your boss hating you. But NBC chief Jeff Zucker couldn't be happier about how things are going!

Fashion tragedy! Halston, the glamorous 70s brand that mogul Harvey Weinstein was planning to revive with relentless sexiness, is not lighting the world on fire just yet. Harvey paid $25 million for Halston last year, but its latest collection got "largely unenthusiastic reviews"—a problem the company decided to solve by reining in its creative director and moving towards design-by-committee. Which always works well in creative endeavors, yes! For Weinstein, Halston so far is just another disappointing investment, along with his "Myspace for Millionaires" and his DVD business. Free solution, Harvey: get them to wear Halston on Project Runway. You can send a check to our office. [WSJ]

Greg Lindsay comes across as an uptight guy. But that doesn't stop him from appearing on television again and again. Indeed, he's the poster boy for go-getters who try on every form of media until they find one that fits best. The former WWD gossip columnist and author of a book about sleeping in airports landed a "memorable" appearance on Martha Stewart's TV show earlier this year. And last night, he was a contestant on Jeopardy! The secret to his publicity, he advised a youngster long ago, is to remember "it's all about the brand called you." And how! Click to watch the clip of Lindsay's, um, uphill battle. And we'll let former Deadspinner Will Leitch finish the story of watching the show with Greg himself:

The Food Network is starting a magazine with Hearst. It will be poetically named Food Network Magazine, and it will feature Food Network people and Food Network food. Appropriately, NBC's weight loss spectacle The Biggest Loser is also cranking out new books and promotions for Rodale magazines Prevention and Men's Health. And Starbucks has decided to start distributing an in-store version of money-losing do-gooder magazine Good. Reading in America: It doesn't happen unless food is involved. [Super Squats says drink your milk.]

The more we learn about the true extent of Seth MacFarlane's empire, the more we become quietly frightened. MacFarlane, the 34-year-old creator of Family Guy, is just about to roll out his huge new online cartoon series in partnership with Google, which will reap him just a disgusting amount of money from sponsors like Burger King. And yes, Family Guy is well on its way to becoming the Simpsons of a new generation. Sorry, haters:

Rob Shuter may be single most well-qualified man for his job in all the celebrity media. His job, of course, is editor of photo-happy, celebrity-friendly, "What interview questions would you like to answer, Britney?" pseudo-magazine OK! But set aside your revulsion at the existence of this pair of celebrity culture warriors, and you come to realize that we can all learn something from the way the man does business. His reputation is (grudgingly) improving along with his personal appearance (pic: old on left, new on right). Shuter told CoverAwards that his magazine is "celebrity-fair." Classic, classic. Break it down: Shuter was a celebrity flack before he came to OK. So when he got the job, some of the esteemed journalists at the magazine were angry at this publicist interloping on their territory. But really, a PR guy is much better suited to the job than someone with a history on the editorial side. The editor of OK essentially works to broker deals with celebrities and their managers and publicists. That was Shuter's gig before, on the other side of things, so he knows just how to make this work. His competitors, who came up as reporters and editors, will never have that experience. He could be functionally illiterate. No problem! Celeb magazines are driven by photos—exclusive photos. Who fucking cares what OK's brain damaged stories say? People want to look at pretty photos of famous people that they can't get anywhere else, and that's what they get from Shuter. Plus, appearance on shows like ET and Access Hollywood usually materialize only after the exclusive magazine deal has been closed, meaning that celebrities have to deal with one of the mags no matter what. And since OK is the friendliest and one of the most financially generous, bingo. Rob Shuter is a shameless man in a shameless job. Many lesser people would be embarrassed to be him. But Shuter can say with a straight face that he's "proud of the product" and dismiss competitors as "haters" and be totally genuine. He's worth every penny. "Celebrity-fair" is the new "right-sizing."

I love that asshole Gordon Ramsay. He combines all the best qualities we seek in television chefs: cooking skills, abusive language, a foreign accent. As well as the occasional tender moment! Kitchen Nightmares, the show where Ramsay travels to nice, homely restaurants in the New York area and berates their owners to distraction before showering them with thousands of dollars worth of new kitchen equipment, is coming back to Fox tomorrow night. And not a moment too soon—with the Republican convention wrapping up, where else will America turn for our televised dose of a blond man with an ill-concealed temper demanding that foreigners accept his help or be destroyed? See the parallels there, zing? Yes. Watch the trailer after the jump; the cockroaches represent Islamofascism:

As you would imagine, it's hard enough for TV networks to come up with marketing campaigns for all their new shows every time the fall season rolls around, because most of the shows are doomed to be failures. Which ones? Hopefully not the ones you, network marketing person, came up with the campaign for! Promotions are always a balancing act between enthusiasm and tempered expectations. But this year the networks are having a slightly different problem: they don't even have enough material on many new shows to make ads for them. Thanks, writers' strike!

Remember LonelyGirl15, that fake-ass scripted YouTube series that got really popular for a minute when everybody thought it was real and turned into a media phenomenon? Well it's coming back in a major way! Which means its rabid fans are still lurking out there, and have been doing who knows what for the last several weeks waiting for this. "LG15: The Resistance" (*chuckle*) will debut 12 new weekly episodes next month, produced by a CBS-funded firm and "integrated" with advertisements. Resist, yes. The show's promo—a total ripoff of those 'Anonymous' anti-scientology vids—after the jump.

Several months ago, Brad Pitt fired his flack. His other half, Angelina Jolie, doesn't have a dedicated, full time PR rep herself either. The fact that the couple generally gets great press anyhow raises the obvious question: if Brangelina doesn't need a publicist, who does? The nuanced answer has to do with the changing nature of the celebrity media and the shifting balance of power among various types of Hollywood insiders. The blunt answer is, "Very few Hollywood people need flacks any more." Disintermediation is the new black! When you think of celebrity media today, think of two words: OK! magazine. Its entire business model is based on working *with* celebrities to come up with the nicest, most agreeable presentation possible. OK! is so celebrity-friendly it is edited by a former celebrity flack.