Al Arabiya reports:

After making it on America's infamous "axis of evil," Syria will now become synonymous with Angelina Jolie's brood as the U.S. actress looks set to adopt a child from the Arab nation despite her partner Brad Pitt's objections.

Uh oh. Apparently, Brad is of the opinion that six kids is enough. The Jolie-Pitt clan currently counts three biological children and three adopted among their ranks, but Jolie has supposedly "fallen in love with" Syria after a recent trip, and insisted on adopting with or without her partner.

OK! Magazine reports that Jolie is adopting a little girl. Metro, a UK-based paper, offers some details from a source:

'He has made it clear that six children are more than he can handle,' claims an insider.

'The idea of one more seemed ludicrous, but Angie is determined to complete her rainbow family', said the source.

However, they also note that only Jolie's name was on the adoption papers for Maddox, who she adopted from Cambodia in 2002, while still married to Billy Bob Thorton. She also adopted Zahara solo, but Brad later legally become father of both kids. So it's possible that Angelina isn't driving Brad straight into Jen's arms with her baby-mania, but we still suspect that's the story tabloids are going to tell.

Angelina Jolie To Adopt Seventh, Syrian Child [TrueSlant]
Angelina Jolie Set To Adopt An Arab Child [Al Arabiya]
Angelina Jolie To Adopt Tot Number 7? [Metro]

Gibson was on the Tonight Show last night and confirmed the existence of his new bastard son, his eighth child. "I guess that makes me 'Octo-Mel'", he sputtered amusingly. Then he stretched out his lips to emulate the crazy, collagened Suleman. And the audience roared.

So we'll forgive the blotto religious zealots, but not the bloat-o fame zealots. Because only one of them gave us Tequlia Sunrise. Only one.

Probably the most troubling thing of all is how greedily we've slopped all this stuff up. But after making celebrity baby covers the biggest sellers for the likes of Us, People and OK!, we get the freakshow news we deserve. Still hungry for more and more babies, we've turned to the circus disaster that is regular lives made alien and shocking when bad choices mixed with a few bits of bad luck and stories were born.

Maybe it coms from exhaustion with all the other media. First it was scripted television shows, and then their high-concept reality descendants. And now we've sifted through every last layer of story until we've gone and found a low, universal denominator. People come out of other people's vaginas sometimes. The more that come out of the same one or the younger the owners of the necessary body parts are, the more we're interested. 220 channels and nothing else was on, so we've settled on the baby zoo currently on display on TLC or sitting in a dimly-lit room across from Ann Curry.

While Suleman's desire to go and get herself knocked up with octuplets when she was already a cash-strapped mother of six probably had far more to do with some murky and deep-seated emotional cataclysms than it did with a desire for fame, the end result has been a raft of high profile TV appearances, implied hopes for a reality series, and a website asking fans or followers or whomever to donate money to this Elephantitis-suffering family. Ms. Suleman has become a rickety celebrity simply by making the wreckless decision to bring many children into this world for whom she had no way of caring. Good for us!

Little Mister Patten may not have been courting fame when he got his young girlfriend pregnant, but now he's likely being paid exclusivity fees by the Sun. And, in the wake of the media frenzy surrounding the unsettling story, two more boys have come forward, claiming paternity of 15-year-old Chantelle Steadman's daughter. There are posed photos of the two boys, aged 14 and 16, on Splash, the photo agency where I find many of the silly celebrity pictures I use for Open Caption.

It had become fairly routine for celebrities to profit off the act of procreation, what with the big glossy magazine industry and whatnot. But now common folks are saying "me too!" and the troubling thing is, if you don't already have a certain degree of popularity, you have to make your babymaking pretty sensational to get any attention. And what's sensational is often ugly. Again these folks probably didn't enter into reproduction with designs on tabloid notoriety, but once the first publicist calls or newspaper camera flashes... Well, the Siren call is tough to resist.

Though humanity has its limits, and the public outcry against Nadya Suleman—and the sad revulsion expressed over the Patten thing—suggests that maybe there is a limit to this mayhem. But we don't suspect it will die down quickly. Prepare yourselves for other strange stories, for other curious and unpleasant parlor tricks of the body. After all, while everything's being torn down around it, Coney Island still has its sideshow.

This will be Hasselbeck's third child, joining Grace and the one who got thrown into Gitmo for headbutting President Bush. The baby is due in August (placing its conception date somewhere between Hasselbeck's incense controversy and The View's last guest appearance by Andy Dick...uh-oh), as only recently did Hasselbeck become aware that her post-election vomiting was likely due to the circle of life. The baby will be named William Ayers McCartney Sheetzucacapoopoo Hasselbeck; send your gifts and donations to SarahPAC.

• The View [ABC]

Boomp3.com

A coy Jennifer Aniston quickly denied the claim that she had babies on the brain while waiting for a friend in a back alley. Aniston chuckled as she discovered the accidental thought bubble above her, saying, “Maybe I should stand underneath a sign that says 'Oscar winner,' or 'cheeseburger.'”

[Photo Credit: X17]

*A Call To The Bullpen is a work of fiction. Although the pictures we use are most certainly real, Defamer does not purport that any of the incidents or quotations you see in this piece actually happened. Lighten up, people ... it's a joke.

Anyway, this will mark TLC's second foray into the overgrown-clan genre. Jon and Kate Plus 8, another show about two parents with way too many babes, has proved successful for the network - even stirring up some controversy from those who believe "raising children is not theater." But why do audiences tune in to see screaming parents and whining tots?

It's the "how the fuck do they do it — and why?" quotient. I mean, these people have got to be straight-up clinically insane, right? How do they pay for all of the spit-up rags and dollies and bottles? How do the husband and wife not kill each other after bickering constantly? (Lots of make-up sex, perhaps?) Why do they want so many kids - are they weird and religious or just super charitable and giving? And most importantly: how the hell did that woman pop so many out? Oy.

Be the answers what they may, the best part about watching these shows has to be that when those sweet 30 minutes are up, you've got to feel so much better about your own spoiled brats. For your sake, we hope there are only a few of them.

• 17 Kids and Counting [TLC]

Everyone in the room at Southwest Mississippi Regional Medical Center in McComb, Miss., pleaded with Jamie Lynn to listen to the doctors — including big sister Britney. Brit had already been with Jamie Lynn for hours, massaging her back as she endured painful contractions. "But she got mad," says the insider. She told Jamie Lynn to "just have a damn Caesarian," as she did.

The girls mother, Lynne, only added to the tension. "Lynne was already angry because her daughter didn't want her in the delivery room at all," says the source. "But she had insisted on being there, along with Casey Aldridge, Jamie Lynn's boyfriend. Jamie Lynn cussed and yelled at her mom, and told her to get out. She cursed Lynne for bringing her into the world to bear such pain."

Jamie Lynn's existential diss notwithstanding, might Britney have soured on the tabloid antics that come so naturally to her family? Nah — most likely, she was pained by the hospital scrubs required in the delivery room; once Britney was allowed to change back into purple Uggs, a muumuu, and a porkpie hat, she promptly whisked babydaddy Casey Aldridge away to "keep it in the family."

• Jamie Lynn Spears' Delivery Room Drama [Star Magazine]

Sure, it's not the most shocking thing to learn that a celebrity with access to the best (and most expensive) trainers from LA to NY can toss out her maternity jeans faster than the rest of us, but this is Jennifer Lopez we're talking about. Not only is Jennifer naturally blessed with a curvier figure (unlike, say, babyweight-dropping poster children like Reese Witherspoon or Kate Hudson), but she just had twins! If she's not on Oprah's couch by the end of this month explaining how the hell she performed this miracle, we're spending the entire month of April harassing her trainer, nutritionist and maybe even Marc Anthony himself to get us some answers.

[Photo Credits: Getty]

• RADIANT JENNIFER LOPEZ BACK IN SHAPE JUST FIVE WEEKS AFTER GIVING BIRTH TO TWINS [Daily Mail]

In the segment above, in which Roberts was about to unveil the very first public image of baby Henry, Hanks spoils the near-holy moment of celebrity-baby-fawning exaltedness with a series of loutish interjections. Still, we must give the actor some credit for being bold enough to speak the truth: The kid's far from the cutest baby we've ever seen.

• The Oprah Winfrey Show

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Who's Cuter? White Or Black Babies? [ViceMagazine]