Madona has a heart of gold. If majority of people can keep house pets & treat them like family members, then what's wrong adopting Malawian boy, David Banda.

Realizing that perhaps a single emotional Oprah appearance that betrayed her stouthearted, fake-British composure was not quite enough to completely reverse the public's lingering impression that her recent African charity efforts amounted to nothing more than a calculated and self-serving toddler-snatching, Madonna has reemerged on the U.S. media circuit to plead her case. Talking to Meredith Vieira yesterday, the frequently becameltoed Queen of Pop explained that when she realized that the child who captured her heart on videotape and whom she began to brazenly adoption-stalk (or something to that effect) had a living parent, she first pledged her material support so that he may raise the child himself. He then proudly refused the offer, paving the way for a no-strings, guilt-free baby purchase:

By now, it's likely you've come across the likes of Baby Jake, the telegenic toddler who has achieved a certain measure of notoriety due to his being relentlessly pimped out on BuyJake.com as a tiny, human billboard by what we'll assume is either an opportunistic parent, or the Gypsy carnie who won him in a high-stakes game of bocce ball. Now comes word of a huge development in the ongoing Baby Jake saga, as he tells us in his "Blog to Fame!" (pause to shudder at inevitable prospect of 2024 Entertainment Tonight segment entitled, "Baby Jake, All Grown-Up: The Road Back From Hell,") that noted baby welfare advocate Oprah Winfrey has made a sizable monetary offer to ensure Jake never has to again endure being painted to resemble a Jack in the Box Bacon 'n' Cheese Ciabatta Burger:

Us mag kindly supplies this photo of Madonna arriving at "the airport" in New York today with her recent Malawian acquisition. Note the Kabbalah-fied red string on little David Banda's wrist, said to ward off the evil eye, bad luck, unfortunate publicity, etc. Three cheers for prescience! Talk about too little, too late though.

In today's New York Times, Alessandra Stanley points out to us the uncanny parallels between the television appearances by Madonna and George W. Bush.

Whatever you thought of Madonna's appearance on Oprah yesterday, it seems to have subdued the outrage somewhat, filling in the comic frame images we've been seeing lately of the pop icon on her dark-baby shopping spree with at least a few dialogue bubbles indicating she hasn't completely lost her mind. We were too transfixed by her accent to really form an opinion on the matter—could that possibly be what humans will sound like in 500 years?—but others were far less indecisive. A Madonna-on-Oprah fallout round-up:
· Leading the "screw Madonna and Oprah and their army of motherfucking hair and makeup people and their misguided, self-serving Third World charity efforts"-cavalry is the NY Post's Andrea Peyser, who questions Oprah's softball-lobs (but that's what Oprah does!), as well as Madonna's sniveling condescension towards David's "simple man" father. Worth a read—if only for the anti-Oprah blasphemies. Heavens! [NY Post]
· The "simple man," meanwhile, is now claiming he's worried the controversy— including the last chapter where he expressed genuine surprise that goodbye meant forever— would cause the rich white lady with man-muscles to back out of the agreement. [ABCNews.com]
· Reuters managed to get a quote from the father as well, in which he stated his clear opposition to the consortium of 67 Malawian human rights groups seeking to legally block the adoption. And to this we say: There's 67 Malawian human rights groups? [Reuters]
· And finally, to end on a cheerier note, CityRag blog offers a quick, inexpensive and easy costume idea for Halloween: "Celebrity Baby Smuggler." [CityRag]

Andrea Peyser is back on the Madonna beat, ripping the "sluttish superstar"'s recent Oprah appearance. Peyser, whose deep concern for all things African has been the main emphasis of her advocacy journalism lo these many years, has little sympathy for either Madge or Oprah ("For half an hour, one know-nothing celeb egged on another to spin a tale of saving the African continent. Disgusting.") but she's particularly offended by what she sees as Madonna's condescension towards her recently-adopted child's father:

Moments ago, the all-too-familiar image of Madonna's moving lips were beamed across the West Coast, explaining to Oprah Winfrey in deliberate and measured fake-British tones the exact circumstances surrounding the newest, hastily absorbed member of her family, little Malawian demi-orphan David Banda. And while the many details tumbled forth almost too swiftly to fully retain—David was abandoned! Malawi has no written laws! "Confessions on a Dance Floor" makes a great stocking stuffer this holiday season!—Whitney Pastorek of Entertainment Weekly's Popwatch blog was luckily there to liveblog the entire exchange. Some highlights:

If Oprah Winfrey's audience members are good for one thing—besides screaming as if their heads were on fire whenever brought into direct contact with swag—it's blabbing about the goings on inside the top-secret celebrity visits they were explicitly instructed not to blab about. So even though the talk show host's high-profile interview with a fellow zillionaire feminine icon with a God complex is not set to air until Wednesday, we get to find out today what was going through Madonna's with her recent adoption-cum-PR fiasco:

One day we will all be able to look back with a smile on the maelstrom of controversy that surrounded little David Banda, Malawi's most adorable demi-orphan, and the strange, leather-bodiced witch-lady who swooped in suddenly to spirit him away. (Perhaps it will require the part-time children's author adapting the entire series of unfortunate events into yet another whimsically illustrated bedtime story.) But as in all classic fairy tales, things tend to get darkest right before the "happily ever after" part, so it's somewhat befitting that the child's very much alive and increasingly media-friendly father has distressingly announced that he had never intended to give his son up permanently. From the NY Post:

Liz Smith plays defense for Team Madonna today, opening her column with this gem: "IT'S HARD for me to understand exactly what it is Madonna has done personally to all who are so violently critical of her recent plunge into Third World child-caring, money-giving and adoption. The press continues to turn her into a monster."

• African baby collector Madonna decides to cut crucifixion from NBC special, will flush Koran down toilet instead. [Page Six]
  

Fresh off her defensive insistence that adopting David Banda was perfectly legal and had nothing whatsoever to do with any large, money-crammed envelopes she shoved under the door of a government office's men's room, the New York Post reports that Madonna already has her eye on a matching accessory.

• This is what happens when you tell him "Band on the Run" is rubbish. [TMZ]
  

So how did you celebrate 300,000,000? While our man Coop wondered what language his future adopted African baby would learn in school, Matt Drudge went for the poetic with a serene picture of Earth, perhaps hinting the impact overpopulation would have on our delicate planet.

Far be it from Madonna to accept delivery of her new child in tight-lipped quietude. On her way to getting David Banda fitted for his very own red-string bracelet, the singer paused long enough to deliver a stiffly worded written statement, bursting with cautious legal flavor, in which she claims the adoption was many months in the making and insisting that she followed all the appropriate procedures in expanding her brood.

The one-year old boy Madonna has been trying to adopt from Malawi — despite laws that prohibit the nation's young from being clutched to the ample bosoms of foreign women with proven conic-bra proclivities — officially arrived today in England, where he will soon take up his role sitting quietly in a playpen while Madonna spends eight hours hotboxed in a yoga class. The pop star's newest youngling, David Banda (whose full name semi-aptly anagrams to "Diva, and bad"), apparently survived his baptism by paparazzi, which came after the eager photogs failed to be fooled by his lack of conspicuously oversized sunglasses.

• Thanks to Madonna, a Malawian boy can now look forward to a life of bad food, gloomy weather and falling short in international sporting contests. Hope he enjoys the in-flight champagne and prawns. [Guardian]
  

We're not sure if it's her recent penchant for flaunting the quality of her bikini wax in unitards and fishnet tights, or the people of Malawi's collective disapproval of the way her name and Guy Ritchie's can't be adorably bastardized into a single noun. (Maguy? Gadonna? Madochie? No.) Either way, though, the denizens of the African nation still have their knickers in a toddler-sized wad over the Material Girl's so-far successful attempts to thwart local laws and adopt a one-year old — a fiery panty-fervor that's been exacerbated by news that Baby David's departure from Malawi coincided with a conveniently timed $3 million donation to help HIV-infected kids: