The move creates a fabulous new ladder of ascent for aspiring young dreamers looking to scale the heights of the LA swanky cocktail party-centric web journalism.

The Grazer Cultural Attaché slot is one of Hollywood's most-fabled sinecures. The job as it, has been described, focuses around bringing in the great thinkers of the land to meet with the greatest producer of our times for a free-wheeling meeting of the minds. Past great minds wrangled over the years are said to include Jonas Salk, Edward Teller and author Malcolm Gladwell as well as less renowned professors and thinktank dwellers who've been wheedled into showing off their knowledge wares beneath Grazer's Beverly Hills throne.

While the responsibility of genius-wrangling has been traditionally assigned to a one (or in recent months, a couple) Imagine employees, former workers describe the process as consuming the entire office, with all employees brainstorming and submitting a list of names for Grazer himself to whittle down.

In May of last year, when Brad Grossman, Grazer's former CA stepped down, an email seeking his successor was widely circulated and reported on. The email contained the following job description:

This person would be responsible for keeping Brian abreast of everything that's going on in the world; politically, culturally, musically... They're also responsible for finding an interesting person for Brian to meet with every week... an astronaut, a journalist, a philosopher, a buddhist monk... There is LOTS of reading for this position! Grazer may ask you to read any book he's interested in. You'll probably get to read about 4 or 5 books a week and you may be required to travel with him on his private plane to Hawaii, New York, Europe-teaching him anything he asks you about along the way... You will also be provided with an assistant... Salary is around $150,000 a year... You will be to Grazer what Karl Rove was to Bush.

The task of finding his own "architect" however, finding a mind worthy of the being his personal Karl Rove, may have been too much for the The Klumps producer. Grazer gave an interview to, ironically, to the Huffington Post last December in which he claimed himself attaché-free. He said:

That was sort of a joke title. I've been out meeting different people, I have a record, for 24 years, of meeting someone every two weeks. It helps inform your filter and hopefully informs your taste. I don't have anyone that's doing that for me right now. I use a couple of my assistants and I just say 'hey, can I meet so-and-so' and then we work on it or I'll call them myself, but I don't have a person that does that any longer.

Considering to whom he was speaking, Grazer may just have been wanting to hide his attaché from Arianna's potentially poaching claws. Whether the title was formally bestowed upon him or not, sources tell us that Silverman, who had been Grazer's assistant, was in fact acting in the Karl Rovean role. For a cultural attaché to leap out of that heady role after little more than a year at most, seems a bit abrupt, but perhaps once you have tasted the air at those heights, it is hard not to climb ever higher, right into the eagle's nest of all showbiz self-congratulation, The Huffington Post.

Arianna Huffington has allowed her editors to run ultra-close ups of the aging body of Vogue's Anna Wintour ("what does she really look like?") and now actresses Lindsay Lohan ("unedited" and splotchy) and Elizabeth Hurley (a bit sweaty). It's a case of her unprofitable company's need for monetizable, non-political Web traffic (read: cheap celebrity clicks) running headlong into Huffington's need to suck up to celebs, who write for her site and come to her parties and help her seem very glamorous.

We won't lecture Huffington on her company's too-often-shoddy attempts to make money in the online publishing racket. At least, not in this post. But we will keep her honest: If Huffington is going to run unedited pictures of others, it's only fair there should be some unedited pictures of her out there.

Click any of the images below to pop-up large, hi-res versions. (Warning, this may slow down your web browser and ruin your lunch.) We've played by HuffPo rules: Posed, red carpet pictures with no editing. We've also excerpted a highlight, as Huffington did with Wintour.

UPDATE: Jessica Wakeman at The Frisky notes that the first chapter of Huffington's book On Becoming Fearless is about positive body image. Plastering someone's picture on HuffPo is certainly one way to nudge that person toward becoming "fearless."

Today's appearance, which involved a discussion of corporate executive "narcissism" and excess spending (see attached clip), should have been jarring for anyone familiar with Huffington's lifestyle and spending habits. The Brentwood, California-based internet mogul might drive a Prius and engage in environmental posturing, but that doesn't keep her from hitching rides on David Geffen's jet; hopping on a private plane with Ari Emanuel and Larry David for the New Hampshire primaries; or cruising around the ocean on Larry Ellison's enormous yacht (partly owned by Geffen).

Such gallivanting must feel utterly natural to Huffington, a former socialite who started HuffPo from her mansion following an eight-year marriage to wealthy oil scion Michael Huffington. Her spending apparently strikes Huffington as something utterly different from what those evil Wall Street types did.

But Huffington's no penny pincher in the corporate suite, either. Her profligate ways became an issue with HuffPo's board, an insider told us. Huffington denied that charge. But there's no question she throws lavish parties, including HuffPo's A-list inaugural ball at the Newseum in January. And with HuffPo's editorial headquarters in New York, she's constantly racking up travel expenses, including that time, notorious internally, when she sent an assistant across the country and back to fetch her passport.

Also, rather than just rent a Gotham apartment, Huffington became a frequent guest at the Mercer Hotel luxury boutique. And her travel preferences are said to be exactingly cushy: First class, aisle, bulkhead seat on a three-class plane only, fully refundable and non-stop. Preferably American or United. (Huffington, to be fair, sometimes relaxes these requirements for a convenient Southwest Airlines hop to San Francisco or Vegas. Southwest has only one class of seating.)

But that's apparently small time, as far as Huffington is concerned, not to mention a royal pain in the neck to her and the editors she has used as personal secretaries. After one infusion of fresh capital, Huffington was heard internally telling staff that everyone's lives would be greatly improved "once we get the jet."

It would seem that was one spending spree that was never approved, and for good reason: It's an absurd idea. Even assuming Huffington Post is on track to more than double last year's purported revenues of $9 million, as one anonymous insider claims, that's not jet money. (Huffington and her spokesman did not answer repeated inquiries on revenue.) At the absolute low end, the cost would start at $3 million, before you get to operating costs which for jet aircraft are typically in the thousands of dollars per hour. Fractional ownership jets also cost in the multiple thousands of dollars per hour to operate, in addition to an upfront fee starting at several hundred thousand dollars.

Not to mention the fuel guzzled by one of these babies each year cancels out the moderate environmental savings produced by a few fleets of Priuses.

To grasp how absurd such a purchase would be for Huffington at this stage of her corporate career, consider that News Corp. chairman Rupert Murdoch flew commercial after he'd already assembled a global newspaper empire and bought the 20th Century Fox movie studio and started the Fox television network. He only switched to a private plane, biographer Michael Wolff has written, after then-underling Barry Diller got one first.

And yet Huffington is lecturing America on corporate excess. Luckily for her, being a hypocrite has never really kept the internet publisher from making her political points forcefully — and often quite effectively. The only question is whether it will keep her from building a real business out of her publication.

(Jet pic: A bargain basement Eclipse 500. By Geoff Collins.)

For the last fucking time, celebrities, vaccines do not cause autism.

It is fine and noble to say "we should look into what (beyond better, earlier detection and diagnoses) is causing all this autism!" and even "we should make sure we are testing these vaccines extensively!" but to just go around shouting, without evidence, and in spite of evidence to the contrary, "VACCINES CAUSE AUTISM" is 9/11 Truther hysterical idiocy at its dumbest.

But hey, all you non-doctors with absolutely no understanding of the scientific method or medical research can just go ahead and keep using your massive platforms to convince parents not to vaccinate their kids, because what is the worst that could happen?

Last week official figures showed that 1,348 confirmed cases of measles in England and Wales were reported last year, compared with 56 in 1998. Two children have died of the disease.

Good work, Arianna, letting this famous person promote his little pet cause on your website, thus is the vast potential of the citizen-driven new media landscape realized.

If you're not familiar with Michelle Williams's tiny indie film Wendy and Lucy, let us summarize: Wendy (Michelle Williams), an impoverished young woman, drives to Alaska with her dog. The car breaks down. Not a whole lot else happens. So when we saw HuffPo blogger Michelle Renee title her newest post, "I Feel Like the Real Life Wendy and Lucy Story," we chuckled to ourselves. "You mean, nothing happens in your life, too?" we wondered. Well, actually, Renee's story is WAY, WAY DIFFERENT:

If the movie plot seems like an unrealistic one, I can tell you it isn't. My life seems like the real life Wendy story as written in my debut book, Held Hostage, which is not just about the crime that devastated my and my young daughter's life. Although a large portion of this true crime release focuses on the violent kidnapping, 14 hour hostage ordeal and my being forced by three masked gunmen (also gang members) to rob a bank to save our life, the aftermath and an incredible road trip from San Diego to Anchorage Alaska is written about in "such rich detail you feel as though you are in the car with her and her four legged companion" as one reviewer wrote.

I don't know what sparked "Wendy" to head for the majestic landscape of Alaksa but what sparked my needing to get out of Dodge was the threat of retaliation looming over our heads after the grand jury proceedings.

We're pretty sure we don't remember that part from Wendy and Lucy...deleted scenes, maybe? Though our favorite part of Renee's HuffPo entry are the random tags:

Broken Open, Dogs, Healing, Held Hostae, Michelle Renee, Michelle Williams, Movies, Movies And Entertainment, Pets, Scared, Wendy And Lucy, Entertainment News

It's a give-and-take, HuffPo bloggers: sure, you might not get pay or health care—but at least Arianna gives you a "scared" tag.

• I Feel Like the Real Life Wendy and Lucy Story [HuffPo]

For some reason, Huffington sees fit to keep granting prime blogging real estate to the wife of Aaron Spelling (best known in her own right for alienating her daughter Tori and demanding a gift-wrapping room in her mansion). First, Spelling got her sea legs by penning an unsolicited, no doubt unread letter to Paris Hilton. This past weekend, on a front page boasting notable names like Cenk Uygar and Robert Reich, Spelling was granted a comfortable berth for her plaintive, empty essay, "Thanksgiving and Then What?" Let's find out what, shall we?

I remember learning in school that America was divided into three classes: the lower, middle and upper class. We all strived to get to the middle class, the signal that we had arrived, fulfilling the American dream.

We don't talk very much about classes any longer, and I don't miss that.

Yes, it's rare to find that kind of talk at the country club! Still, Spelling mentions that this class talk may have been supplanted by this "Two Americas" thing she heard that one presidential candidate say once, the one who cheated on his wife. Maybe that's something worth looking into! Then, Spelling pivots into her next, inscrutable non sequitur.

In California, the maps of the counties that voted for and against Proposition 8 to ban gay marriage was as distinctive as the red and blue states, but most graphic portrayals were in black and white.

Was something lost in her dictation to her loyal maid, Marisol, or is Spelling referring to the Nate Silver-debunked idea that black people were to blame for the passage of Prop 8? No time to find out! Spelling has no more to say on this subject!

The really good America was in full force yesterday. Here in Los Angeles, I saw the wonderful "Father Dollar Bill," the loving name given to Reverend Maurice Chase, who hands out dollar bills (with inflation, now hundred dollars bills sometimes) to homeless and needy people in Downtown L.A. [...] Right nearby are the Skid Row missions and shelters, which serve thousands of healthy Thanksgiving meals to anyone who needs them. The expressions on the faces on the children, senior citizens and everyone else are priceless. It was also encouraging to hear that there were more volunteers than ever before donating their time to prepare and serve the meals.

...Not that she would be caught dead among them, of course. But to hear about it is very swell. Sadly, Spelling has to bum the room out with her closer:

And, then, this morning, on the aptly named Black Friday, the first national story of the day was that an employee at a Walmart in Valley Stream, New York, was, as CNN told me, "trampled by a mob of morning shoppers." There were also reports of shoppers being injured.

I understand political differences. I worship those who donate their time and money to help others. I have no words for the concept of shoppers trampling a store employee and fellow shoppers to make the most of Black Friday.

Apparently not, as the blog ends before Spelling can devote anything more than a recitation of events to probing these issues. Here, though, is a potentially helpful way to make sense of Walmart culture: actually have set foot in a Walmart. Andy Cohen, do you see what you've encouraged?

• Thanksgiving and Then What? [HuffPo]

JOHN Cusack learned he should stick to acting with his first piece for the Huffington Post Chicago - which was "riddled with more errors than the 2006 Cubs," according to one blogger. Cusack, who was writing about his childhood as a fan of the Cubs, the White Sox, Michael Jordan and Walter Payton, managed to misspell the names of three Cubs players and of playwright Eugene O'Neill. Cusack also erroneously stated that Sammy Sosa played for the '89 Cubs. Finally, the "High Fidelity" star described taking the "express" train to Wrigley Field. There has never been an express to Wrigley. Cusack - whose last two movies, "Grace Is Gone" and "War, Inc.," were both anti-war bombs - also described how he would "scrape together $2.50" to go to a baseball game. "Cusack grew up in a massive house on Sheridan Road," said another reader of the Beachwood Reporter Web site. "It's slightly disingenuous to say he had to 'scrape' together $2.50. I'm thinking that wasn't an issue."

Also, is there really any such person as "John Cusack," or is it an elaborate ruse cooked up by "childhood friend" Jeremy Piven? It's no coincidence that you never see the two of them together anymore... could this be the reason that the Piv was shut out of High Fidelity? Were the CGI costs simply too high? When will the Huffington Post renounce the John Cusack-impersonating Jeremy Piven???

[photo credit: AP]

• Cusack's Strikeout [NY Post]
• Bleary-eyed in Bangkok: Daybreak Memories of Chicago [HuffPo]

It is incomprehensible to me that Mrs. Clinton can seriously be touting the notion, with the support of the punditocracy of CNN and Fox, that she is leading in the popular vote and should therefore be seriously considered as the most electable candidate in the November election. ...

[W]hat about us? What about the American people? Haven't we had enough of Mrs. Clinton's mad antics in her pursuit of the realization of venal personal ambition; her "say anything, do anything, no matter what" effort to manipulate our all too willing media to gull this country's populace into believing that her wretched illegitimacy is indeed legitimate. How much mendacity do we have to suffer, how much brazenness do we have to swallow before someone, anyone, has the decency, the common sense, to relieve us of this terrible trifle, this pathetic madness?

Such vitriol — from a Canadian! Anyway, if you're reading this, Kiefer, your Dad's OK. You can pick him up at Arianna's.

• Hillary's Popular Vote Notion only 'Popular' with the Punditocracy [HuffPo]

Here's the actual burn:

Mr. Isherwood, as a critic, will never be noted for his generosity of spirit. He is not Harold Clurman. He tends to be waspish, dismissive, cool, and brittle - as a writer. He can be gratuitously insulting, and his reputation is marred by the general consensus that a good mind is not matched by a particularly big heart. There is a whiff of Grinch in his criticism. Mr. Brantley, more and more seems like a breathless writer of gossip and gush for fan mags, and his intelligence - which again is not in question - seems to fail when it comes down to the big picture. The Times critics present themselves as advocates for consumers, and not as advocates for the theater itself. Unlike Clurman,
Ken Tynan, say, or even Frank Rich, who could be withering but always managed to let it be known that he was passionate for new voices, passionate for promise, and uncompromisingly rigorous, as he is as an op-ed writer on Sundays. Speaking of Sundays, the Times used to have a Sunday critic, but have dropped that, thereby handing a monopoly of opinion to Isherwood and Brantley....

I suggest that the Times critics re-read Tynan, for instance, who was funny and could be ruthless, but was always on the side of the artist, and never innocently hid behind the pretense of being in the hire of the cultural wing of Consumer Reports. All things are connected, Charles (and Ben). Reading your essay yesterday, it occurred to me that you are suffering from that most modern of diseases - a soul-deep isolation, and a growing dislocation — a place from which being a critic of the theater, is dangerous, given how communal the art is.