Pop Torn: 10 pieces of cultural ambivalence
This week we're on the fence about: Rob Lowe as Drew Peterson, Shia LaBeouf's film about Marilyn Manson, and more!
By Drew GrantTopics: Pop Torn, Bristol Palin, Celebrity, Documentaries, Drugs, Lady Gaga, Sex, Sex Education, Twitter, Viral Video, Television, Entertainment News
Casey Anthony. Rupert Murdoch. South Sudan. OK, have you got that out of your system yet? Good, because it’s time for our weekly roundup of the cultural news that will really have you going “Oh. That’s… weird?” Continue if you dare.
1. Lady Gaga’s dark secret: Biographer Ian Halperin is telling the world that Gaga is a sick drug addict who is obsessed with her weight. OK, but is she really bisexual??
2. Bristol Palin questioned on “stolen virginity”: Barbara Walters calls out the memoirist for her description of her first time having sex with Levi Johnston. Walters: “It must have been OK, because you kept on having sex with him, yeah?”
3. Rob Lowe as Drew Peterson in a new Lifetime movie:
Apparently it took nine hours to do this amazing makeup transformation… of affixing a fake mustache to Lowe’s face.
4. The return of the eHarmony cat lady: Once more, with feeling! (And keyboard cats.)
5. LeAnn Rimes back to being semi-nude on the Internet: But this time it’s OK, because she’s tweeting about her curves while in a bikini. Now no one will dare call her skinny!
6. Shia LaBeouf is directing a Marilyn Manson documentary: Three-part question here. Why is Shia LaBeouf directing a Marilyn Manson documentary? Why is there a Marilyn Manson documentary being made? And why did he announce this on “Regis and Kelly”?
7. Chilling exposé on “Tiny Belly” Internet ad:
I’m not going to lie, this is a very good investigative piece, but I honestly assumed that all of these kinds of ads are scams. It would be kind of weird if it turned out that someone was actually trying to give away a completely free weight-loss system via annoying Internet pop-ups.
Poor Neil. I kind of want to pair him up with the whiz kid from “Magnolia” and have them hang out and be best friends and sing Aimee Mann songs together.
9. They are recasting the baby from “Modern Family”: The twins who played Lily are getting dumped, probably for the Olsens.
10. What infamous dictator does this bug look like?: I’m going with Pol Pot.
Drew Grant is a staff writer for Salon. Follow her on Twitter at @videodrew. More Drew Grant.
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Lisa Montgomery embraces her nephew Thursday after a tornado tore apart her home in Cleburne, Texas. The twister killed six people and destroyed entire swaths of the North Texas town.
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Jack McMahon, the defense attorney for abortion doctor Kermit Gosnell, speaks outside the Criminal Justice Center in Philadelphia Tuesday. His client was convicted of killing three babies in his clinic, and will serve multiple life sentences.
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A photo taken Monday captures Vice President Joe Biden's response to a Milwaukee second-grader's innovative proposal to end America's epidemic of gun violence. This guy!
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Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., flanked by a grouper-eyed Michele Bachmann, addresses the IRS' admission that it targeted Tea Party groups in advance of the 2012 election. In an op-ed for CNN Thursday, the Kentucky senator slammed the president for his faux outrage.
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Ousted IRS chief Steven Miller is sworn in on Capitol Hill Friday. Miller testified before the House Ways and Means Committee on the extra scrutiny the agency gave conservative groups applying for tax-exempt status.
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Attorney General Eric Holder pauses as he testifies on Capitol Hill before the House Judiciary Committee Wednesday. Holder is under fire, among other things, for the Justice Department's gathering of phone records at the Associated Press.
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O.J. Simpson sits during an evidentiary hearing at Clark County District Court in Las Vegas, Nev., Thursday. Simpson, who is currently serving a nine-to-33-year sentence in state prison for armed robbery and kidnapping, is using a writ of habeas corpus to seek a new trial.
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Major Tom to ground control: On Sunday astronaut Chris Hadfield recorded the first music video from space, a cover of David Bowie's "Space Oddity."
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When it rains it pours. President Barack Obama speaks during a news conference Thursday with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, inexplicably inspiring an #umbrellagate Twitter meme.
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A smoke plume rises high above a road block at the intersection of County A and Ross Road east of Solon Springs, Wis., Tuesday. No injuries were reported, but the the wildfire caused evacuations across northwestern Wisconsin.
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