Ah, Ted Turner: media baron, CNN founder, and lover of everything Russian. And abortions. Man, does that guy love abortions like you wouldn't believe.
Turner, who owns half the state of Montana, was on Tavis Smiley on Tuesday to espouse some of his more "controversial" beliefs (like women in developing nations should have access to birth control and sexual education?) and so naturally Tim Graham is getting crazy-psycho over at Newsbusters over Turner''s support of eugenics family planning.
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60 Minutes wasn't all Chinese e-waste fights this week. There was also a short profile about media person Ted Turner, and how he doesn't hate Rupert Murdoch anymore and sometimes they lunch together. On human blood. Because they are both vampires.
Pro Tip: If you don't have 12 minutes to spare, let alone 60, watch the opening segment and then skip to 3:20 where Turner talks about how getting beat with a wire hanger a child made him a better person.
• Remember that time after Lindsay Lohan's second (or third?) DUI arrest, when a tearful Lindsay Lohan assured us that wasn't her coke sticking out of her pants pocket and, come to think of it, those weren't even her pants? Well, apparently some court actually bought it.
• Political consultant Roger Stone is axed by state Senate Republicans for ringing up 83-year old Bernard Spitzer and politely suggesting that his son is a "phony, psycho piece of shit."
• Feeling overworked and underpaid recently? Then, you'll be disgusted to learn that the dumb one from The Hills is banking somewhere between $10K and $20K a week. Even worse? Wounded Iraq vets are pulling in approximately $460. A month.
• When he lived above the CNN center in Atlanta, Ted Turner reportedly used to parade around the newsroom in his special post-coital bathrobe. Sexy time!
"Put down your cup of coffee or you might spill it," Butler, 62, wrote to his graduate students and fellow professors at Florida State University in Tallahassee. "Elizabeth is leaving me for Ted Turner."
So begins the note from Pulitzer prize-winning author Robert Butler to (seemingly) everyone in his email address book, informing them that his twelve-year marriage to Elizabeth Dewberry is officially over, no thanks in small part to the overactive libido of billionaire mogul Ted Turner.
'But why?' you might ask, ignoring the inherent weirdness of announcing your impending divorce via mass email, and the obvious answer of "Um, because he's a multi-billionaire." To which Butler would, apparently, respond, "because the media mogul resembles the grandfather who molested her as a child."
Okaaay!
• We're going blase Jane style and reporting this news two days after the fact. Jane mag's EIC Brandon Holley is engaged. Congrats! (We bet it was the yearbook photo that won him over.) [FBNY]
• PETA has a new cause: keeping the bison safe from Ted Turner. [Page Six]
• Britney Spears dumps yet another manny. She obviously would prefer to have a woman helping her, but (as dumb as she is) she probably realizes that Kevin Federline would knock the girl up in a week. [Star]
• Gabe Sherman is really, really serious about running. Almost as serious as he is about reporting. Just something to consider on you cigarette break. [Slate]
• When a little girl is five, she can run around without a shirt and not be considered "sexy." That's what it means to be a kid. Then again, maybe Cindy Crawford should be protecting her daughter from skeeves like Lloyd Grove. [Lowdown]
• Barbra Walters wants more money for her book. Yet, as Page Six points out, you did get a lot of money without a sex scandal. Shit, we really hope that doesn't mean one will be revealed. [Page Six]
• Even wax museums recognize Britney Spears' downward spiral. [TMZ]
• Jared Leto spends 30 seconds coming out of the closet. [Mollygood]
• Ted Turner is tough. He doesn't just talk trash, he actually picks it up, too. Can you guess who's a bigger bitch than Katie Couric? [Lowdown, (last item)]
• Jake Gyllenhaal's latest dinner date? Jennifer Aniston. Seriously, that boy better not go all Ashton Kutcher on us. [Star]
At first glance, we thought maybe Ted Turner was driven so mad by the media and President Bush that he finally ended all the pain. "Blasts himself," however, just means he's kicking himself for losing control of CNN.
Hey, you never know. If Ted Turner had shot the president, the media would likely shrug it off, say ah, Turner beat us to the punch, and go back to the stories they care about. Like Jill Carroll's release.
Is Ted Turner allowed to quit Time Warner? He like, is Time Warner. Well, we guess he is, because uh, he just did.
We all watched in a jaded haze while "Captain Outrageous" went from "The Mouth from the South" and eventually to "The owner of everything the public consumes." And now, it is the end of the Turner era.
Turner's departure comes during another difficult stretch for Time Warner. The company just this month ended the public battle with Icahn, in which the investor at times called for board to be replaced and the company split into as many as four independent corporations.
Basically, the old man was phased out, deemed as unnecessary as Paris Hilton at Sundance. But, we bet good ol' Ted is happy to get back to his days of yachting and checking his Friendster messages.
Ted Turner to leave Time Warner board [Rueters]
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