That's right: the three-year battle over massive Brooklyn development project Atlantic Yards is over. Forest City Ratner's $4 billion project was approved yesterday by a state oversight board, clearing the way for groundbreaking this January. Construction on the Nets arena, the main "it'll bring jobs and revitalization to Downtown Brooklyn" centerpiece of the developers' plan, will culminate in Fall 2009. The Post's rah-rah article quotes ACORN executive director Bertha Lewis as saying that "The Atlantic Yards project represents a historic 50/50 comittment to affordable housing," — uh, not quite. While the number of planned market-rate rentals and and "affordable" rentals is equal, there are also 1,730 market-rate condos planned — and only 200 "affordable" condos. The entire project is slated for completion in 2017. We don't know about you, but for us, that coincides with the period of our life when we thought we'd be throwing in the towel on being cool and succumbing to Bugaboo-trundling through tree-lined brownstone streets. Guess we'll be trundling our Bugaboo through Portland or something.

State Approves Major Complex for Brooklyn [NYT]
The Nets Win [NYPost]
Here Come The Nets [NYDN]

• Ron Burkle and Eli Broad getting more details about Tribune, LAT. [LAT
  

Remember when we mentioned the rumor that scandalous fired publisher Judith Regan had once traipsed through the halls of her old UWS apartment building, replacing the scrolls inside her neighbors' mezuzot with torn-up dollar bills? Today, the Times reiterates the story, adding the salient detail that she was investigated and reprimanded by HarperCollins three years ago for bragging about it to her staff. Uh, so much for the Forward's whole "the one allegation that had never appeared on her rap sheet" thing. The Times caps the story by reminding us that Judith maybe kind of has had an eensy problem with ethnic slurs for years and years:

Q: How many words does the Times need to convey the concept of "dick in a box?" A: 28. In describing Saturday Night Live's groundbreaking "end-run" around FCC censors (posting an uncensored version of a sketch on YouTube themselves instead of waiting for someone else to do it; whoa), here's how they categorized the main, uh, thrust of the video:

• Dean Baquet wins the coveted Observer Media Mensch of the Year award. This follows hot on the heels of a bunch of other bullshit made-up media awards by organizations you've barely heard of, and comes a day in advance of our naming Chris Mohney's right testicle Gawker's Blog Ball of the Year. [NYO]
  

Today's Times takes a look at the newly refurbished Situation Room, "the presidential decision center under the West Wing that Hollywood imagines as a high-tech beehive of activity, where presidents command covert operations around the world." Even better,

• Federal government trying to make Times op-ed page less boring. [NYT]
  

Yesterday we learned that, contrary to all of our assumptions, Judith Regan's offensive comments during her last-straw phone call with HarperCollins lawyer Mark Jackson were anti-Semitic, not cock-size related. Today in the Times, Jackson accuses Regan of saying, "Of all people, the Jews should know about ganging up, finding common enemies and telling the big lie," and of saying that Jackson, ICM lit agent Esther Newberg, HarperCollins' executive editor (and Deadspin soccer columnist!) David Hirshey and HarperCollins' president Jane Friedman "constitute a Jewish cabal against her."

After Times culture reporter Lola Ogunnaike was suspended in October for appearing as a guest host on The View without her editors' permission, we wondered whether this meant fewer fawning profiles of Scott Storch and Flavor Flav. But after a nearly monthlong break, Ogunnaike's been back with a vengeance—and it seems as though she's been taking lessons from Thursday Styles trend-manufacturer Stephanie Rosenbloom.

"The Ethicist" is Randy Cohen's long-running advice column in the New York Times. Each week, Gabriel Delahaye's "The Unethicist" will answer the same questions as "The Ethicist," with obvious differences.

Did you ever wonder who DJs society events attended by the likes of Alexandra Kramer, Serena and Samantha Boardman, and of course "the young lady known to some as the Tinz (that's Tinsley Mortimer, or Mrs. Robert Livingston "Topper" Mortimer, to you)" ? Yeah, neither did we.

The weird story of Yoko Ono's extortionist driver Koral Karson gets even weirder today, as more details about the contents of the photos and tapes he was blackmailing her with are revealed. In the Times, we learn that one of the tapes featured Sean Lennon describing his dead father "with an obscene anatomical term." (Guesses?) And from the Post, we learned that Karsan claimed to be Ono's lover, and that the photo in question featured Ono in a "revealing nightgown." We also learned about disappointment.

Remember back on November 26th, when Yoko Ono took out a $42,000 full-page ad in the Times proposing that December 8, the anniversary of her murdered husband John Lennon's death, be deemed an official day of forgiveness and apology? "Every year, let's make December 8th the day to ask for forgiveness from those who suffered the insufferable," Ono wrote. While some people might have taken her plea to heart, at least one guy didn't: her driver, Koral Karson, who picked that day to confront Ono with a photo of herself in pajamas and a tape of her "expressing her personal opinion on people and events," as well as a letter detailing his grievances. Then, on Tuesday, Karson met with an Ono lawyer and demanded $2 million, threatening to kill her and Sean Lennon (oh no! Not Sean!!) if his demands weren't met.

Entertainment mogul David Geffen, a longtime suitor, has made a $2 billion cash offer for the Los Angeles Times. This complicates not only owner Tribune Co.'s attempt to sell itself as a whole (rather than individual papers or assets), but also the hopes of fired LAT editor Dean Baquet for an eventual return. No formal offers for Tribune Co. have materialized, despite vague interest from various parties, including billionaire duo Eli Broad and Ron Burkle. Baquet supposedly wants to meet with Broad and Burkle to pitch himself as a valuable addition to their hypothetical team, even as speculation grows that he'll take a job at The New York Times rather than wait around much longer. Castle drama alert: Will Baquet scheme with NYT publisher Arthur Sulzberger Jr. to defenestrate current NYT editor Bill Keller? (Check that dry mention of Keller's retirement age.) But assuming no formal offer gets made for the whole enchilada, Tribune Co. probably can't afford to leave Geffen's gay mafia money lying on the table for long.

• The Chandler family, former owners of the Los Angeles Times, are unhappy with the way Tribune is selling itself off. [NYT]
  

It's been awhile since we've reveled in the wise words of Jenny 8. Lee, she of Man-dates, multi-city birthday extravaganzas, and books about the history of American Chinese food. But fear not, Jenny-watchers: She's imparted her wisdom to that august trade association, the Publishers' Publicity Association. We can all rest a little easier knowing that she "would like it if publicists married pitches w/trends in society." Sure does make pitching the Styles section a whole lot easier, doesn't it? More of her publicity needs and wants after the jump.

We're excited to start reading Nerve publisher Rufus Griscom (center)'s offshoot parenting web magazine, Babble, because it is obviously going to be sooo awesome. Just like Nerve, it aims to appeal to that elusive "urban hipster" readership. ("It's a very valuable psychographic in that the urban hipster lifestyle is something that a lot of people aspire to, even if they don't technically live it," says a marketing exec quoted in the article) and to shatter taboos. Like, for instance, the taboo around being a decent fucking human being:

"The Ethicist" is Randy Cohen's long-running advice column in the New York Times. Each week, Gabriel Delahaye's "The Unethicist" will answer the same questions as "The Ethicist," with obvious differences.

Yesterday's Times article about the 'competition' between so over it's cool again Williamsburg and forever on the cusp of cool Long Island City was predictably point-missy, given over as it was to seeing how the neighborhoods' respective gentrified amenities ("eclectic Thai restauarant" "pet boutique") stacked up against each other. However, since the germ of the article was a debate on messageboard queenswest.com, where "more than a dozen" users from LIC weighed in on their neighborhood's merits, we thought we'd compare queenswest.com with Williamsboard to see if we could settle the coolness issue once and for all. Here's an excerpt from the queenswest convo:

• Plucky Canadian feminist Rachel Sklar (happy birthday, kiddo!) confronts Vanity Fair editor Graydon Carter about that Chris Hitchens "Bitches Ain't Funny" column. Carter pal Kurt Andersen defends Carter's right to run a whole bunch of crap in his magazine without reading it first. [Observer]