Yesterday, we received a poem from someone calling themselves Romantic Danzig, titled "poem for Jessica Joffe because she blocked my email." Whatever! But then we received separate information that Joffe, the glam writer (Vogue! Glamour! Observer alum!) and former Banana Republic model had broken up with scruffy "difficult to work with" NYC musician Ryan Adams. She has been credited with helping Ryan overcome his substance abuse problems. (As you might remember, he's prone to piss-drunk Internet ramblings). The poem, totally/probably written by Ryan, follows—along with his touching explanation.

Details editor Dan Peres—not gay but ok with that, unrepentant douchebag and totally ok with that—just had a kid! Peres' son, Oscar Dallas Wynter Peres, was born Monday and will be impeccably groomed. [WWD]

Flackers, a word? You will almost certainly be fired should you use the slug "LOONY-BIN-RALLY" on a press release about a march for mental illness. Yesterday, Philadelphia Daily News columnist Dan Gross reported that a PR Newswire employee had done just that, prompting her dismissal and a pleading correction from the company, which distributes press releases to over 4,000 news aggregators. How did the company stumble across the faux pas? Why, News man Gross called in the tip himself! Filling a regular column is hard. "PR Newswire deeply regrets an error that occurred yesterday in a news release, re-sent below," the correction reads. "PR Newswire understands that such terminology feeds the prejudice and discrimination associated with mental illnesses and will take steps to ensure that nothing like this occurs in the future." Thing is? The original wasn't wrong, per se. After all, it was a rally for a loony-bin. Full-blown insensitivity, on the other hand, typically warrants something a tad weightier. Like a press release. Release after the jump.

The Freelancers Union—whose ranks include non-staff writers and photographers—issued another sincere apology this afternoon via email for badly-communicated changes to member insurance earlier this month. "The past six weeks have been some of the toughest in Freelancers Union's history," it reads. Funny, union members were just saying the same thing about the last six weeks of their lives! Email after the jump.

Oprah Winfrey, who some of you might know as both a popular talk-show host as well as the name behind Hearst's O, the Oprah Magazine and O At Home, is starting a cable channel. It's called "OWN: The Oprah Winfrey Network," with Discovery Communications. Is she going to do it right this time?

Who needs a YouTube channel when you can have your own cable network? Estrogen-drenched media mogul Oprah Winfrey has formed a cashless 50-50 joint venture with Discovery Communications to launch the Oprah Winfrey Network in mid-2009. The channel will replace the Discovery Health channel and, in exchange, Discovery will operate the Oprah.com website. With her name all over the network — and her aspirations for global dominance spelled out in the channels acronym — Winfrey appears fully committed to this latest venture. Unlike her last cable channel, Oxygen.

MSNBC's appeal to block Nevada courts from forcing them to include magical elfin candidate Dennis Kucinich in tonight's debate is going before the Supreme Court right now! But we have no idea what network to turn to for coverage, as no one wants to report a story about the UFO-riding leprechaun with the only consistent voting record on the war. [Media Mob]
Update: The ladies of The View side with Dennis. Even Elisabeth! [NYT (last graf)]

Remember Kristina Stewart Ward, the "No Sex and the City" editor—and Mormon!—who wrote about being a total contradiction in terms in Vogue last month? She's back in circulation, in her old position as editor of ritzy summer-only Hampton Style, nudging aside Portfolio contributor Deb Schoeneman. Are Mormons taking over the whole world? Not really, but it sounded dramatic.

Writer Joanna Goddard is working on an article for New York magazine on—get this—New Yorkers who wear one color exclusively. But she needs your help! One assumes that all the men in black have already reported for duty, as this email pleads for those who wear only green. Click to view this vital memo!

MSNBC's website is linking Hillary Clinton's name to her campaign website, which takes readers directly to a donation page. Odd behavior, and, as far as we know, unprecedented for other candidates or other online news sources. But Hillary's an odd candidate for favoritism from the network that gives us cheek-pinchin' Chris Matthews. We'd say it might be how they got the Meet the Press sitdown but the easiest way to get Hillary on your Sunday morning show is to have a Sunday morning show. [MediaBloodhound]

Yesterday we heard the Village Voice newsroom might be headed for another round of budget cuts. Last year the paper saw quite a bit of editorial turnover—at least 15 staffers we can think of quit or were let go. In December, the paper fired its new art director. But any additional cuts coming down the pike are likely to come instead from the business side of the weekly, which recently made employees skittish by dismissing a well-liked and longtime support staffer. Rumors of further downsizing are afoot. Stay tuned.

Previously: Village Voice Fires Art Director

Jeff Bercovici went to an advance screening of the upcoming viral-marketed New York-destroying moster film Cloverfield. The still-unnamed monster of the film apparently causes a bit of destruction to the hideous Columbus Circle Time Warner buildings. "But bear in mind that Cloverfield was produced by Paramount, which is owned by Viacom. Coincidence," Becovici asks, "or corporate wish fulfillment?" We're guessing filmmaking. Viacom's building does not look like it'd be awesome to knock over. [Portfolio]

Walter Bowart, an "alternative journalist," died at 68 yesterday. At first, we weren't sure what an alternative journalist was, but then we finally remembered! A brief history: there used to be a whole array of "publications," printed on paper, that different people wrote (LA Free Press, Rat Subterranean News). They weren't paranoid about pissing off advertisers or publishers, which often led to interesting, if not always lucid, writing. (It didn't lead to much advertising, though!) Bowart, for his part, founded the East Village Other in 1965, publishing until 1972. The paper was "so countercultural that it made The Village Voice look like a church circular," writes the NYT. An East Village Other report on an event called "Woodstock ‘69" follows.

If you wanted to hear Katie Couric say "oh shit oh shit oh shit oh shit oh shit," Harry Shearer has the video for you. With the cameras sending live feed directly to Shearer's magic satellite, you are there as Katie preps for her New Hampshire primary election night coverage, bitches about the mic, repeatedly adjusts her top, announces the death of America's mayor, and says, of John McCain's wife, "she looks like a husky." Watch the whole clip below and fall in love with Katie all over again. [MyDamnChannel]

Jeff Bewkes ("pronounced byu-kiss"), Time Warner's new CEO, is nuts: ''A former colleague describes Bewkes, 55, as a quasi hypochondriac who fastidiously washes up after shaking hands ('If you've got a cold,' says the colleague, 'Jeff won't come anywhere near you') and can expound learnedly on the relative merits of various antibiotics.'' Who else is weird like this? Howard Hughes was an obsessive-compulsive, and Donald Trump famously won't shake hands either. Haven't they heard? It's the money that's dirty! [NY Mag]

Trump Tower Soho isn't the only major new building in New York to fall into perilous disrepair of late. Last month, a couple of pedestrians walking by the New York Times' fancy-pantsy 8th Avenue building caught the wrong end of falling window glass from the skyscraper, broken by high winds. Two weeks later, sidewalks were shut down by falling ice that had formed around the building's ceramic rods. Then last Wednesday, seven windows on the 22nd, 10th and sixth floors were shattered by strong winds, prompting a Friday visit by the Department of Buildings.

The Louisville Courier-Journal has been accused by irate readers of "pushing the ol' homosexual agenda" for publishing this photo of two Louisville Cardinals baskeball players totally being gay with each other. The paper's ombud says there will be no apology and asks what is so wrong about publishing photos of hot student athlete-on-student athlete action. [Courier-Journal via Romenesko]

In the October Playboy, Keith Olbermann called Fox News "worse than Al Qaeda." The letters page in this month's Playboy "is littered with negative reaction to the Olbermann interview," according to TVNewser. Except for the positive one Playboy editor Chip Rowe solicited from the lady who runs an Olbermann fan site! The letter's author blogged about it, possibly unaware that she was embarrassing the respected titty mag. [BloggingOlbermann.com via TVNewser]

Everywhere we turn we see another network news anchorwoman sporting the exact same long-layered take on the post-Rachel Green do. Does Fox News have only the one style consultant? If you looked at the cable network's anchors (from l-r) Lis Wiehl, Dagen McDowell and Cheryl Casone, you might think so. Alycia Lane may not have abided by the CBS code of conduct, but she certainly toed the coiffure line. CNN Headline News anchor Linda Stouffer and colleague Carol Costello flaunt the style, along with CBS News' Hannah Storm and MSNBC's Contessa Brewer. Longer hair can make you look younger (what woman in TV news couldn't get behind that concept) and both focus groups and the men in them tend to appreciate lengthy locks (Case-in-point: Felicity's post-shearage ratings nosedive. What? You know you watched it once.) Still, when we flip on the tube, it's getting harder and harder to shake the feeling that we're catching the tail end of a Central Perk coffee klatch.

"There needs to be a [late, influential New Yorker film critic] Pauline Kael of the Internet. People need to write critically about this thing," says New Republic editor Lee Siegel. (As you might remember, he was once suspended for a little stunt where he commented anonymously on his own essays, via the Internet). He's basically unimpressed by the entire Web and wrote a book, Against the Machine, on this topic. "What the Internet's doing is professionalizing everyone's amateuristic impulses. Everybody wants to jump into the big time and be recognized ... they're not taking the time to just have fun." Is this true? Discuss! Also, if anybody would like to apply for the new position of "Pauline Kael of the Internet," please send your resume our way! [NY Mag]