Lady Gaga for President. Dammit.

America, let’s get that freak bitch Gaga in the Oval Office. Now.

NY XXXtreme Local: Patrick McDonald

Bravo’s Launch My Line recently debuted, and one of its stars is self-proclaimed dandy Patrick McDonald. We all know that reality TV is more than a little desperate, but I still hew to the line that the medium as a whole is achingly dull, and with at best a trace amount of use as agent for social progress, has no rightful place in a post-Cold War society. In a demonstration of this evidence, I submit this photo of Patrick checking out the merch at the Moschino boutique in the Meatpacking District not long ago.

Looked great in it, but no sale

Because it’s a lot more fun shopping alongside a dandy than squinting at one in between commercials.

NYC WTF

Who are these people and what are they doing on Fifth Avenue?

NYC WTF1

NY XXXtreme Local

Here are just a few recent graphic postcards from the New York City Mayor Bloomberg and Co. would probably rather you didn’t see:

1) A man urinating in his wheelchair at 2AM outside the McDonalds’ on 14th Street and Seventh Avenue. Across the street from a hospital.

2) A homeless man being murdered on the “D” subway train. Grade for subway safety? F.

3) A traditionally dressed and bearded Orthodox Jew walking hastily and adjusting his iPod earbuds. While blowing smoke in the faces of pedestrians behind him.

4) A taxi driver outside his parked cab on Park Avenue and 37th Street, kneeling, perhaps in the direction of Mecca, on a small carpet. That he’s placed on the pavement.

Let's keep it clean, people

5) A sign outside an apartment complex on W. 15th Street that says “Renters Welcome.” Monthly cost of a studio? $3,295.

6) Mice. Over there. Oh, and there, too.

7) French Eurotrash on the northern periphery of Soho acting like…French Eurotrash on the northern periphery of Soho. Hard to watch.

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The Adam Lambert flap: When hypocrisy rhymes with ABC

War in Afghanistan…More Americans on foodstamps than ever before…Goldman Sachs fat cats bursting their buttons at the expense of the middle class (what’s left of it) and now

Adam Lambert falling through the corporate shredder.

At first, these things may seem completely unrelated. But they’re not. Despite America’s inherent good qualities, a traveler from a foreign land could be forgiven for thinking we are a dollar-worshipping, shamelessly consumerist, Puritan lot, hell-bent on ruling the world and then making light of our follies on Saturday Night Live.

Certainly, we are a country where freedom of speech, though enshrined in the Constitution, is not universally adored. This is particularly true where “corporate America” is concerned — where incursions on expression are often whitewashed in a politically correct neo-Yankee Newspeak. I know this isn’t Paris in the ’20s, but golly this is getting boring.

Apparently the execs at ABC circulated a company statement which read in part, “Given the live nature of the American Music Awards, Adam Lambert’s performance, which differed greatly from his rehearsal, caught many, including the network, off guard.”

So a live performance differs somewhat from a rehearsal:
Ooh la la! What an outrage! Strap a scarlet letter (make it an “O” for Original), on the guy (oh, who just happens to be gay), and posthaste!

Say what you will about the song, the voice, or the persona, the performance was rather spectacularly subversive and, note to ABC, this isn’t Saudia Arabia. You want your performers to be robots? Even R2D2 spoke his mind — and wouldn’t you rather be entertained by him/it than some corporate android, or a corporate-cannibalized pseudo-songstress like Britney “allow me to French kiss Madonna on national television” Spears?

Fast forward to two questions I put to ABC spokesperson Patrick Preblick about the whole Adam Lambert dust-up:

1) Does the network’s decision to “not move forward” with Lambert’s appearances signify that at least one of these appearances was already hard scheduled?

Answer: “Yes, Kimmel was already booked.”

2) What is the specific reason for not moving forward with booking Lambert on “Jimmy Kimmel Live” and ABC’s New Year’s Eve special?

Answer: “We have no further comment.”

It’s a good thing, as Thomas Jefferson said, that every man has two countries: his own and France.

Product of Greece: the World’s Most Whacked Softdrink Label

From the country that brought us Aristotle, tastefully pornographic vase paintings and islands whose sole economic purpose seems to be serving as backdrops for silly movies with Meryl Streep, now comes Stala, a mind-blowingly fooktastic [ed. note: there could be children reading!] orange soda that’s redolent of orange blossoms or Clean Citrus Febreze, we’re not sure which. Almost as good? the label, which proudly proclaims: “It is produced and packed in Greece in Tsoykalades Livadias Viotia from Zona Angel.” And: “Consumption at preference before the end that is entered in the lid/neck of bottle.”

Better than Plato

By the way, “It Is Maintained in Cool Part” and “It Is Prepared at the Food of Elikona.” And above all, gentle readers, it is “GASEOUS REFRESHMENT.” It’s Stala time!

How fast can you say “Chelsea is dying”?

The other day I entered an inexplicably popular restaurant and bar on Seventh Avenue to meet an itinerant Monegasque (i.e. from Monte Carlo, you heathen) hotel executive for a drink. He was already seated at the uncrowded bar and was happily nursing a glass of red wine. Of course, he was dressed better than me (hello, European?), but still I was hardly pulling a Hoboken.

God forbid the bartender, if I could dignify the guy standing behind the bar as such, should smile and put forth a brave “What’ll it be?” No, I was steadfastly, studiously ignored for the better part of ten minutes. The way the bar guy was cradling his portable electronic device (not even an iPhone, mind you…what on Earth was I doing here?), you’d think he was hoping it would morph into a thick wad of tips. But finally, I had to shout across the bar, and then suffer the pain of a hopelessly watered down, nine-dollar Malibu and Coke.
Note to Elmo: We are in a little something called a recession. At that point, I felt like the only conceivably just tip would be slapping the indefatigably rude bar person, and not on the ass. For not only was I royally ripped off, but his acid inattention had spoiled the atmosphere, and arguably ruined my evening.

So I felt like making a beeline to a better place on Eighth Avenue, like Ate Avenue, but wait — I think some Republicans, now hiding out in Texas, trashed the economy, and a nice Democrat can’t seem to fix it. Ate Avenue is out of business.

Maybe I would have been better off in Hoboken.

Is this the worst selection of budget hotels ever?

Considering that’s it’s Sturart Emmrich’s choice of budget hotels, in today’s New York Times, the answer is probably yes. Mr. Charming begins with Barcelona’s Market Hotel, a hotel we’ve been recommending to people since before Lady Gaga was blond. The selection of Paris hotels under $150 is, for lack of a better word, dreary. “The key to finding affordable hotels in Paris is to bypass heavily touristed areas like the Left Bank…” Right, so just cross half the city off your list? Interesting, especially when it’s the Right Bank that pulls the tourists (Louvre, anyone?). Mr. Emmrich, get thee to a good guidebook!

Is this the world’s most corrupt capital city?

I think we’ve asked this one before. But the question begs repeating. Our vote goes to Washington, D.C. Just because some Republican top dogs have decamped to Texas or to whatever other wasteland they slithered off to hoard their plundered dough, doesn’t mean the American capital is any cleaner.

As a general rule of thumb, the more ill at ease one feels walking alone in a capital city after the sun sets, the more corrupt it is. Ever strolled past the White House or World Bank on a cool Wednesday night? Bucharest might score more points for charm.

Drug violence leaves two dead in Paris suburb

As reported in Le Figaro. This happened in St. Ouen…a place you probably haven’t spent much time in, but have possibly driven through en route to an airport.