HSBC bought all the ad pages in this week's issue of New York magazine, remarkably outbuying all those CBS and and ABC attempts to do the same in People and TV Guide, respectively. Hey, people are still talking about the time Target bought all the ads in The New Yorker a couple years ago!

Still, the HSBC (which, it bears mentioning, is not an American bank so you'd probably be safer there then your current 10-year plan of stuffing hundred dollar bills into a coffee cup under a floorboard) bought the most ad pages (24 total, including web splashes), and spent the most money on their campaign.

So at this point, is it even worth mentioning that the ad-monopoly is affecting how magazines do business, and not necessarily for the better?

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Liz Claiborne Inc. has hired celebrity designer Isaac Mizrahi to work on the Spring 2009 line of women's clothing. Claiborne, the fashion retail giant who, like most of its competition, has watched its accounting ledger bleed more than it would like, hopes adding Mizrahi's name will help them get out of a rut that has the company pulling in half what the dollars they earned less than a decade ago ($1.2 billion in 2000) and "barely break(ing) even."

So they went for change. So desperate to shake things up, Liz Claiborne (the company, as opposed to Liz Claiborne Inc., which owns the Liz Claiborne brand as well as several others) didn't even care that Mizrahi's deal with Target, though over with, precludes him from publicizing his new gig until after the new year. Perhaps they also didn't take into account that Mizrahi's name has become synonymous not with his expired signature line of clothing, but with Target's "cheap-chic" clothes that have mass appeal. Like Vera Wang, he's completely saturated his brand — for the low end.

And though Mizrahi can't even talk about the Claiborne deal publicly, he does have Claiborne duties, which involves unveiling his creations at a media event next month, and taking embargoes to the extreme:

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Target, the chic alternative to Wal-Mart, is having a little trouble pleasing investors in this economy: Profits slipped 7.6 percent, which to us actually seems pretty respectable, given Americans' decreasing amount of disposable income to spend on Clybourn Loft Chairs. But they're doing anything they can to attract your last penny, which means they're launching the "new Go International private label collection next month, followed by new designer partnerships in October with Jonathan Saunders for apparel, Anya Hindmarch for handbags and Sigerson Morrison for shoes." And how will they get the word out about their new brands? By launching four pop-up stores, or "bullseye bodegas", in Midtown, Union Square, Soho, and the East Village. They will open on Sept. 11, just in time to put a literal target on NYC.

Target is hip, Target is classy, Target has an alternative French pronunciation.

But let’s keep it real. Even though the ads imply a certain consumer lifestyle, if you’ve ever actually been inside a Target, it’s not all that different from Wal-Mart. So isn’t it any surprise that for all their youth appeal, Target actually doesn’t care about youth culture?

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Michigan's native son, Mitt Romney, had some words with AP reporter Glen Johnson over lobbyists' role in his campaign. The actual fight is a little elementary school—"did so" "did not"—but the South Carolina Target has all the atmosphere of the Atlantic Yards one.

Clips like this make us realize that War Room would have been twice as long if Bill Clinton had ran in the YouTube era. We're sure he said some inappropriate things to reporters in between charming the pants off of them.

Is Rachel Ray's magazine not fully meeting your need to leaf through obnoxious B-List lifestyle bull? Well, step right up, Isaac Mizrahi. That's right, now that Mizrahi has grabbed enough celeb tit and launched his Target line for chubby girls, he introduces Isaac's Style Book.

In a world of crashing magazines, Mizrahi apparently thinks his mag will hold up. Then again, it will be free and passed out in department, so, there's really no actual competition in that category. Except the Macy's catalog. So, ff you can hold down the vomit long enough, we'll tell you what you'll find inside the pub.

Isaac’s Style Book will “investigate the meaning—and idiosyncrasies—behind fashion, cooking, travel, home decor and any of the subjects one associates with the word lifestyle," according to a news release. It also will offer how-to and do-it-yourself articles.

In the DIY fashion section, there will be an "essay" on making your own jeans and a piece on what a bitch dinner parties can be. Basically, it's all about how you don't need nice new clothes or friends. You have Isaac, your new $19.99 chunky belt from target, and the new Jessica Simpson CD. What more could you possibly need?

Target Designer Mizrah Launches Style Mag [Folio]
Isaac's New Gig [Fashion Week Daily]

Like Apple's one-time-only "1984" ad, Target's 18 pages of illustrated ads in the August 22 New Yorker are being billed as single shot only. (That's buzz building, knocking.)

The cheap chic retailer will be the magazine's first exclusive sponsor in its 80-year run, calling on artists like Andre Dubois, Milton Glaser and Robert Risko to ink the social climbing campaign that kicks out any competition from the issue.

As for the New Yorker, their first missive is to ensure their code of ethics is paramount — and that you and all of its literati readers are well aware.

For those worried that The New Yorker may be blurring the line between editorial content and commercialism, executives of the magazine and Target offered reassurances that there would be no equivalent of The New Yorker mascot, Eustace Tilley, staring at a butterfly through a monocle covered with a Target bull's-eye.

"The editorial integrity of our product is a big thing," David Carey, vice president and publisher of The New Yorker, said in an interview at his office in Times Square.

"People often say, 'We'd like to do something in The New Yorker that's never been done before,' but we have high standards," Mr. Carey said. "There are some ads we don't accept if they break the format of the magazine."

Because seriously, you actually think David Remnick is going to allow more than a few inches of editorial devoted to Target? Oh good, now you're thinking like us!

Last week's Calvin Klein live billboard freakfest in Times Square was just one of a series of out-of-the-box marketing gimmicks, the New York Post tells us. And we're about to see quite a few more, including Target's attempt to bring the catwalk to the sides of buildings.

But clothier Esprit, apparently, called dibs on this stunt first.

Earlier this week, cheap-and-chic superstore Target presented New York's first "vertical fashion show." Instead of strolling down a horizontal catwalk, model/acrobats attached to harnesses appeared to dance down the face of Rockefeller Center.

When German clothing company Esprit heard about it, executives were supposedly less than pleased.

Esprit, which is making a push in New York with four new stores, says it has been planning not one but six vertical runways down the sides of the Time Warner Center scheduled for early September.

Esprit is blaming its former marketing company for giving Target the idea. But we're going to go ahead and place the blame on gravity for ensuring plenty of Flickr-enabled gawkers.