Is it possible in the year 2013 a singer simulating sex acts on national television will actually be penalized for her behavior?
Before you reflexively answer "No," consider that following her raunchy performance at last month's MTV Video Music Awards, Miley Cyrus has lost her planned cover on December's Vogue.
After the cast of NBC's Today gushed on Tuesday over President Obama's "very fashionable decision" to possibly appoint Vogue editor-in-chief Anna Wintour as an ambassador, on Wednesday, regular panelists Donny Deutsch and Star Jones scoffed at the idea, with Deutsch declaring: "I'm not quite sure somebody who edits a fashion magazine is qualified to be a liaison to one of our biggest allies." [Listen to the audio or watch the video after the jump]
While the morning show's supposed journalists touted the news and made a joke out of ambassadorships being handed out to big Obama campaign donors, Deutsch and Jones, reliable fans of the President, spoke out against the notion. Deutsch took the cronyism to task:
At the top of Tuesday's NBC Today, co-host Savannah Guthrie cheered the news that President Obama may make one of his major campaign donors, Anna Wintour, an ambassador: "Going Vogue? A report this morning that the President could appoint Vogue's famed editor-in-chief Anna Wintour to be his next ambassador to England or France. More on what could be a very fashionable decision." [Listen to the audio or watch the video after the jump]
During a panel discussion later in the show, fellow co-host Willie Geist excused the obvious patronage job: "This is not unusual...I think something like 30% of appointees to ambassadorships are political, as a reward for people who raise a lot of money." That prompted a round of jokes about giving money to Obama to get an appointment. Fill-in news reader Tamron remarked: "[Wintour] raised more than $500,000 for his campaign, so we need to get on the ball....We need to get it going..."
High unemployment? A $16 trillion debt? Rising fuel prices?
Perhaps the real issue of this campaign is that Vogue editor Anna Wintour wants to be appointed ambassador to France. At least that's the suggestion published in two eerily similar articles in The New Republic and The Daily Beast. The rumor (officially denied) is that dahling Anna is growing weary of New York and would like to make a big splash on the Paris fashion scene by showing up there as ambassador to France. Both periodicals not only contain this same theme but even their titles are strangely similar. On top of that the quotes in both stories make one wonder if they are reciting the same information fed to both authors (Noreen Malone of The New Republic and Robin Givhan of The Daily Beast). To illustrate the amazing similarities of both articles, I shall place The New Republic quotes first followed by those of The Daily Beast in italics. First, let us look at the two similar titles:
The New York Times went full Hollywood on the front of Sunday Styles. Jeremy Peters, a political-media reporter for the paper, profiled the imperious fashionista Anna Wintour as "an engaged politico and valuable asset to President Obama and his re-election effort." Wintour, the inspiration for the book and movie The Devil Wears Prada, raised her profile when she released a much-mocked fund-raising video invitation on behalf of Barack Obama: "Power Is Always in Vogue." (Because Wintour edits Vogue magazine, get it?)
Are you rich and famous and very fashionable? Probably not but good news! Anna Wintour, the editor of Vogue magazine, has invited a couple of you peons to experience a momentary thrill in your dull lives by hanging out with the glitterati at an exclusive New York fundraiser for Obama. Here is Wintour, on the heels of yet another terrible economic report, making her offering to briefly breath the same air as the liberal elite:
Hi, I’m Anna Wintour. And I’m so lucky in my work that I’m able to meet some of the most incredible women in the world, women like Sarah Jessica Parker and Michelle Obama. These two wonderful women and I are hosting a dinner along with the president in New York City to benefit the Obama campaign on June the 14th.