On Labor Day the The New York Times reported that the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), an “influential pro-Israel lobby group,” was pushing Congress to bomb Syria. By the time the story appeared in Tuesday’s newsprint edition, however, all references to AIPAC had been quietly excised. The websites NewsDiffs and News Sniffer show that the piece was entirely rewritten, more or less. What happened here?

In your finally Friday media column: Jay Carney is an absolute firecracker, big changes at Ebony and Essence, Michael Calderone moves to HuffPo, Jay Rosen opines at length, and Bill O'Reilly does something good for once in his miserable life.

It's August 20th: our RSS feeds have slowed to a crawl and everyone else is at the beach. But the political-media outrage machine carries on. ABC's Jake Tapper, MSNBC's Dylan Ratigan, Touré and Malcom X all need a vacation.

"Someone in our art department knows someone at Campari," shrugged a Radar staffer when asked why Radar was co-hosting a party at the Campari gallery in Soho. "Hey, where's Balk?" I rolled my eyes at him. "So are you really upset about him leaving?" the Radar staffer persisted. "Yes, he's like a dadbrother to me," I told him honestly. "But I'm sure he'll have a great time working for you guys. He loves this kind of thing." The Radar staffer was just perspicacious enough to realize that I was being sarcastic. He shook his highball glass, which contained Campari. "Hey, free drinks." Laurel Ptak took photos so you can see just how wrong this scene is.

Book parties tend to be circle jerk affairs: sordid Chardonnay-and-canapé-fueled minuets of self-congratulation. Last night's New York mag Look Book book party at Bergdorf Goodman, however, was amazingly a creative act. Characters who'd otherwise only rub shoulders when on adjoining pages were actually in the same room with each other and in some cases even talked! This was great! And Nikola Tamindzic found that these people were eager and comfortable photographic subjects.

Round midnight at 21st and 10th, the Conde Nast Rock and Republic pre-party was ending. Great hives of inebriated party-people heaved out, wobbly on margaritas and spike heels, into the waiting Conde Nast town cars. Then we saw Nicole Brydson, the Observer's gal on the fashion streets. She and her Nat Sherman cigarettes were with Observer media reporter Michael Calderone and Brooklyn Paper's Adam Rathe. Page Six's Corynne Steindler was talking urgently into her phone. They were going to Pete Wentz's party at Tenjune.

Hot Village Voice news from the Post! Apparently, no one outside of the hallowed halls of the Columbia School of Journalism wants to work for the struggling paper.