Karl Rove sits atop many lists. This week, it's New York magazine's media popularity contest for pundits. (Immediately below Rove? Rush Limbaugh.) Too bad New York, while writing about "opinionmongers," doesn't understand "pundits" are the people doing the commentary, not reporting the hard news, so it's a bit ridiculous to see names like Tom Brokaw, Bob Scheiffer, or even Andrea Mitchell on here. [NYMag]

According to a handful of Elle staffers we've spoke with in the past few weeks, the magazine's editor, Robbie Myers, is actually pretty well liked by many on the masthead. Sure, she has her flaws ("What's with the constant giggling?" snipes one; she's always in a "shitty mood," counters another) and we've been fed plenty of anecdotes to squeeze her in to some Jossip copy, but might Ms. Myers actually be running a fashion magazine and have the respect of her staff? Pity, then, that in New York's feature this week about the feud between soon-to-be-ex-Elle staffer Nina Garcia and fashion news director and Stylista face Anne Slowey, Myers didn't get to have her say. Though quizzed by the article's author (Gawker Media's Moe Tkacik) about Project Runway and Stylista, Myers wasn't asked about the supposed bad blood between her two minions. And that doesn't sit well with her: "That story is full of quotes about why I did what I did, how could they possibly know why I did anything or what motivated me to do anything in my job, unless they ask me? Even if someone else where to speculate about why I did something, the fact that nobody called me even to fact check it is egregious." (Myers has written us notes before, saying some of our coverage hurt her, too.) And there's the rub: Tkacik is, by profession, a blogger (from Jezebel to Gawker in some twisted job hijacking involving Radar), and we're trained not to ask those type of questions that might have you confuse us with journalists. But if her work is going to appear in New York, well, perhaps it should have met higher standards — and reported all sides of the story. By not doing so, well, this mini scandal stays alive.

A naked Lindsay Lohan and an adulterous Eliot Spitzer helped New York magazine actually increase newsstand sales. [Folio]

Jonathan Van Meter's New York magazine cover story this week about plastic surgery — really, is there more to be said about people in this city having work done? — had, like anesthesia gone wrong, one unexpected side effect: outing an anonymous source who plans to get plastic surgery for her 60th birthday. It didn't take much sleuthing to finger the woman as Elle publisher Carol Smith. Gracefully owning up to the detective work, Smith says her face lift will have to wait; she's moving apartments.

Clay S. Felker, who started New York magazine as a standalone title with the $1 million severage he received from the New York Herald Tribune, where the publication existed as an insert, has died. He was 82. [WaPo]

How many Barack Obama magazine covers can qualify as rip-offs this week? So far, our tally is at two.

CONTINUED »

One of New York magazine's five questions with Gov. David Paterson: "Yeah?" [NYM]

If this New York magazine cover is any indication, Gossip Girl is the second coming of Jesus. Jessica Pressler & Chris Rovzar make the case that this show, despite the lackluster ratings, is a game changer. They even give their reasons in listicle format!

We're going to do one better: We're gonna refute each bullet point. In listicle format!

CONTINUED »

For a magazine run by celebrated homo Adam Moss, New York isn't doing much for gay authors. [The Gay Recluse]

Somehow Village Voice editors convinced Michael Musto it would be a good idea to reimagine Lindsay Lohan's insta-classic New York magazine photo shoot by having its own gossip columnist vamp for the camera. Shockingly, the idea turned out to be not half bad: Naked Musto isn't entirely as unappealing as some thought.

CONTINUED »

A naked Lindsay Lohan caused New York magazine's website traffic and newsstand sales to spike, so just imagine what a naked Michael Musto will do for the Village Voice's numbers. Musto, the weekly's longtime gossip columnist, will spoof Lohan's Marilyn Monroe photo shoot "posed in a blond wig, biting at a pink scarf." Shame they already give VV away for free, 'cause that paper is gonna fly off the freebie kiosks like, well, the Learning Annex's course listing. [P6]

New York magazine's publicist Serena Torrey, who you probably heard from already about Sunday's Oscar party at Spotted Pig – which we're totally disinvited from this year – is on the defense after Keith Kelly reported a few facts about the pub's recent misfortunes. Even though "Web traffic" (pageviews? unique visitors?) on nymag.com is up 2000 percent from last year, as Torrey claims, newsstand sales dwindled 7.8 percent in the second half of 2007, Keith reports. NOT FAIR!, argues Torrey.

"In fact," she whines in to Romenesko, "New York raised newsstand prices by 25% in July 2007 AND we cut draw by more than 2%. We planned and budgeted for a much more dramatic falloff in newsstand sales (which represents only 5% of our circulation to begin with) in the second half of last year; 7.8% falloff was a major victory — as was getting our bulk to 48k (down from twice that two years ago)." See how anything can become good news?

"WNYC Public Radio, New York magazine, Viacom, CBS Radio, and movie mogul Harvey Weinstein’s company have recently taken office space in Hudson Square, joining Community Media L.L.C., publishers of Downtown Express, The Villager, Chelsea Now, Gay City News and Thrive NYC." [DE]

While Portfolio's Jeff Bercovici wonders whether last week's New York profile is what motivated Matt Drudge to cancel his radio show (it wasn't; turns out, Drudge made that call before the article ran), it's clear the Internet's most pernicious link publisher wasn't happy with it. And not just evidenced by his refusal to participate.

As a New York letter to the editor (or "Comment," as Adam Moss calls them) reads this week: "Among his quarks, blogger Matt Drudge is known for linking to stories that mention his name. But not always: He has yet to link to "Watching Matt Drudge," by Philip Weiss, which is bad, since the salient fact about Drudge is that he drives traffic."

The conflict of interests in Lloyd Groves's profile of Col Allan extends even further. A tipster writes in,

The New York Post editor has many MANY (I mean like 10-15) emails from Lloyd Grove begging for a job here after he was fired from Daily News.

Apparently, Grove's emails went unanswered, and he had to settle for writing at a magazine whose demographic reads the Times.