• Did Kelly Killoren Bensimon ask her boyfriend to lie about getting beat up so she could use it as a PR ploy to "better her chances of being asked back" on Real Housewives next season? That's what her bitchy co-stars are saying as part of a PR ploy to get the attention turned back on themselves. [NYDN]
• Estée Lauder CEO William Lauder is being sued by Taylor Stein, who gave birth to his baby in 2007, for stopping child support payments. [P6]
• In an interview with Matt Lauer, Michael Phelps says he made a "bad mistake" in South Carolina, although he's still not saying what this mistake was. [People]
• Lindsay Lohan has settled the lawsuit filed by a woman whose $11,000 coat LiLo took from 1OAK last year. Also: She left her poor bodyguard stranded in Las Vegas earlier this week. [P6, P6]

• Investors are finding "wisps of hope" in the current not-so-bad economic news, so the three-day winning streak on Wall Street may continue today. [DB]
• AIG reached out to Warren Buffett twice before ultimately collapsing. [BN]
• Citigroup is looking at adding four new people to the company's board. [WSJ]
• Ken Lewis seems to be sending signals he wants out of BofA. [Dealbreaker]
• H. Rodgin Cohen is out of the running to be deputy Treasury secretary. [DB]
• There's already chatter that Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner may get pushed aside in favor of—yes, you guessed it—Steve Rattner. [BI]
• How bad is it for hedge funds? John Paulson was up 38 percent last year and he still lost 16 percent of his assets during the last half of 2008. [Portfolio]
• Two things you never expected to see: A meek, frightened Jim Cramer on national television. And a comedian talking about CDOs. [The Daily Show]

Bernie Madoff was locked up in a jail cell last night. But David Patrick Columbia has a photo of Bernie the evening before, when he was sitting in his penthouse and facing the prospect that this would be his last night in his own bed. Note the lack of the going-away party. It was just Bernie in his easy chair, watching TV. We'll go ahead and assume his first night behind bars wasn't quite as leisurely. [NYSD]

• Paris Fashion Week came to a conclusion today with a memorable show by John Galliano and Marc Jacobs' collection for Louis Vuitton, which, shockingly, only started seven minutes late. [NYT, Telegraph, WWD, WSJ]
• Want to see Project Runway return to the air? Heidi Klum suggests demonstrating outside Harvey Weinstein's house. Good idea![MSNBC]
• Retailers are pushing designers to reduce costs in the hopes consumers can be convinced to pay full-price again. [WSJ]
• Heard on the Runway, the Journal's fashion blog, may be over. [NYM]
• The Jonas Brothers are launching a clothing line. Sweet! [Racked]
• Zooey Deschanel has debuted her sunglasses line for Oliver Peoples. [NYDN]
• Shepard Fairey is crafting Saks' new ad campaign. [FWD]
• Need some couture for your dog? Here are some places to start. [Pipeline]

• Rumor has it Iacopo Falai is in "early talks" to open up a space inside Andre Balazs's new Standard Hotel in the meatpacking district. [Eater]
• Chocolate Bar will reopen in a new West Village location on April 28. [NYO]
• The price of certain French cheeses quadruples on March 22. Ouch! [TONY]
• Tim and Nina Zagat are launching a new food website. And The Atlantic is launching a new food "channel" tomorrow. [GS, AdAge]
• Korean food is taking over America, apparently. [WSJ]
• Sign 'o the times: Arby's first Brooklyn outpost is opening in the landmarked space formerly occupied by steakhouse Gage & Tollner. [NYDN]
• Chefs Daniel Boulud, Floyd Cardoz, and Marco Canora discuss the biz. [GS]
• Matt Oliver, doorman at M2 and brunch at Merkato 55, chats nightlife. [BB]
• Bourdain on Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares: "It's a circus of cruelty, like shooting fish in a barrel with a cut-down 12-gauge shotgun. There's no cooking. It's just a bunch of dimwits—the lame, the halt and the delusional." [EMD]

It sure is nice to see positive news for a change! Stocks advanced for a third straight day with the Dow Jones Industrial Average closing up 239 points. One reason for the boost: People are shopping again! Actually, they're not really shopping; they're just cutting back a little bit less than they did before. Retail sales "only" dropped 0.1% in February, according to the Commerce Department, compared to a 1.8% drop in January. Keep it up, people! You'll put a smile on a sales associate's face and you'll be rescuing the country. Oh, and you'll be taking home a new suit or pair of shoes, too, which is always nice. [CNN Money]

When someone sees another person break the rules and get away with it, does that inspire them to commit wrongdoing themselves? When people like Allen Stanford or Bernie Madoff are arrested, does that encourage people to play nice? These were the sorts of questions that a group of researchers at the University of North Carolina and Duke set out to answer.

Met Museum Plans Major Layoffs [NYT]
The Met Drops a Cool Million for an Old Master [NYM]

What do you know! Everyone's favorite "broker to the stars" Jared Seligman turned up on Open House NYC to share some tips on how to increase the value of your apartment before putting it on the market. So what words of wisdom did he have to impart on the world? Clean up any clutter, fix your broken appliances, and remove the food from your kitchen, a task that is no doubt easier to handle when your clients include people like Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen who don't eat to begin with. [LXTV via Curbed]

We think you'll agree that this recap of Bernie Madoff's appearance in court today—which is narrated by a Brit and was broadcast on Al-Jazeera—is far more entertaining than the one you'll be seeing on American cable news networks this evening. [Al-Jazeera]

Could it be there's a vast conspiracy underway to sully the reputation of Ms. Olivia Palermo? Yesterday an anonymous tipster informed us that he/she spotted the young social/reality TV star at a certain discount clothing chain. Now Racked.com has several compelling reasons why this person's account may not have been entirely truthful! And here we were hoping that Olivia had suddenly caught on to the fact we're in the middle of a recession. [Racked, previously]

All Tricia Walsh-Smith coverage [Cityfile]

• Jim Cramer hits The Daily Show tonight. And in what can only be interpreted as an effort to dial down the ass-kicking headed his way, Cramer is now claiming Jon Stewart is "his idol." Good luck with that there, Jim. [HP]
• Should CNBC's Erin Burnett really be making appearances on Donald Trump's Celebrity Apprentice? Maybe not: "NBC keeps testing the limits between news and entertainment in pursuit of cross-promotional synergy." [NYT]
• "Sully" Sullenberger has scored a two-book deal worth $3 million. [TDB]
• Ann Coulter "has been especially noisy in her self-promotion lately," which may have something to do with the fact her book isn't selling. [Portfolio]
• More and more TV shows are working the recession into storylines. [ABC]
• These are dark days for the newspaper biz, as you've probably heard. [NYT]
• More on Ross Douthat, the conservative blogger who has been hired by The New York Times to take over Bill Kristol's Op-Ed column. [E&P]
• Post staffers reflect on the life and times of Braden Keil, the paper's real estate columnist who died on Tuesday and who will be very much missed. [NYO]

It was reported several weeks ago that Peter Madoff—brother of the newly imprisoned Bernie and his long-time business partner—had transferred ownership of his $4.6 million Palm Beach home to his wife right around the same time the Madoffs learned that their firm was under investigation. We have the documents below to prove it, if you're interested in seeing what may very well be entered into evidence at some point in the future.

Açaí berries: From the sexy diacritical marks and uncertain pronunciation to the Amazonian rainforest provenance to the claims that açaí will make you skinny, beautiful, healthy, and basically immortal, it's hard to believe that the shiny purple fruit wasn't actually dreamt up by a major corporation's PR team in order to exploit our gullibility as consumers. More than $106 million was spent on açaí last year, Nicholas Perricone sells an açaí supplement, Mehmet Oz endorses açaí, and Oprah, Sumner Redstone, and Rachael Ray have all been reported to be fans at one time or another. Is it any surprise to learn that there's scarcely any scientific evidence for the multitudinous benefits that have been touted?

Jennifer Lopez heading into the Bowery Hotel for dinner with Benny Medina ... Bill Cosby walking down East 74th Street ... Drew Barrymore arriving at JFK ... Moby hanging out with friends at the Cooper Square Hotel ... Hugh Jackman taking his daughter for a walk in the West Village ... Justin Timberlake and Jessica Biel on their way to the gym in Tribeca ... Tyra Banks standing around with her crew downtown ... Ne-Yo leaving his hotel in Midtown ... Sarah Jessica Parker walking in the West Village ... Nick Cannon leaving Barneys on Madison Avenue ... Jude Law partying at the Box ... and Jay-Z leaving the Waverly Inn.

With Bernie now behind bars, perhaps you were thinking this would be a good time to issue your sympathies to Ruth Madoff, who will be sleeping alone tonight in the couple's Upper East Side penthouse for the first time in months? You bet it is! To make your job easier, we created a pre-printed postcard for you. All you have to do is print it out, slap on a stamp, and you're good to go. You're welcome!

Worried about holding on to your job? You may have to lie, cheat, and flirt your way into your boss's good graces, or risk being the sucker who goes about their work with honesty and integrity only to get canned! In a new survey of American workers, 40 per cent of respondents aged 18-34 said they would happily act immorally or backstabby in order to stay employed, and a quarter said they would outright lie. We assume that they also lied about whether or not they'd flirt with the boss to get ahead, since only 4 per cent copped to this, which is an implausibly low figure, even if you don't count the time-honored tradition of dressing slutty to advance your career as flirting.

No Sex At Soho House... [Guest of a Guest]