Robin Williams....censored tonight at the Oscars. ABC has refused to let him sing a cartoon ditty that made fun of Rev. James Dobson and his SpongeBob SquarePants criticism. Then it refused his proposed changes. [link corrected]Here's what happened:

Overnight, Mr. Shaiman and his partner, Scott Wittman, dashed off a mock exposé of the dark underbelly of cartoonland for Mr. Williams to deliver, over a gospel-music groove, as if he were a full-throated preacher inveighing against other newly-discovered sinners in the nation's midst:

"Pinocchio's had his nose done! Sleeping Beauty is popping pills!/ The Three Little Pigs ain't kosher! Betty Boop works Beverly Hills!"

The she-pundit with long blond hair has been censored by her own publishing syndicate.

Writing in her February 23 column for Universal Press Syndicate, Coulter observed, among other things, that Guckert/Gannon was a better reporter than The New York Times' Maureen Dowd and his "only offense is that he may be gay." Nothing unexpected there, but Coulter also wrote: "Press passes can't be that hard to come by if the White House allows that old Arab Helen Thomas to sit within yards of the president."

Fox News Anchor Sean Hannity has added a dating service to his website.

Welcome to Hannidate 2005, where you may find your perfect match through Hannity style romance. Be sure to click on each icon to see a full size picture and full description:

Think Progress has some clips from it, and wants you to know they are not parodies.

I think the idea is a winner. In fact, after reading about it, I went and bought the domain name DateLeft.com . I'm willing to sell it, any takers?

Unfair Witness has some photos up of Jeff Gannon on his radio show at RightTalk.com.

Several TalkLeft readers have sent e-mails this past year telling me that TalkLeft is re-directed to RightTalk.com. It isn't, but I figured out that these readers transposed "lefttalk" for "talkleft." If you go to "leftalk.com", you do go to RightTalk.com.

Now what does a right wing radio station need with a name like LeftTalk?

by TChris

The President's past drug use (like the past drug use of everyone else lucky enough to avoid arrest) is no big deal, although his hypocrisy on the subject is hard to stomach. Of greater interest -- at least to the Washington Post -- is the decision by most of the domestic mainstream media to downplay the story while the foreign press finds it noteworthy.

The divergent coverage of Bush's apparent drug use is a textbook study in the difference between the international online media and their American counterparts. On the issue of youthful illicit drug use, most U.S. news editors -- liberal, conservative or other -- defer to Bush in a way that their foreign counterparts do not.

Also interesting is the disparate domestic coverage of President Clinton (who never inhaled) versus President Bush (who never admits he inhaled). Can the difference be attributed to the success that conservatives have had in their efforts to perpetuate the myth of a "liberal media bias," and the media's fear that full coverage of the story would prompt more right-wing attacks?

If the big-name newspapers had played up the drug angle it's reasonable to assume that Republicans and conservatives on talk radio would renew such accusations. They might say liberal editors were dredging up an old story from a disloyal friend to thwart the agenda of a popular conservative president. Foreign editors (and local TV) have no such worries. They have a simpler view: George Bush using illegal drugs is worth a headline.

by TChris

Talon "News," the right-wing media outlet that employed James Guckert, a/k/a "Jeff Gannon," pulled the plug on its website in the wake of Gannongate.

The Web site, closely linked to Texas Republican activist Bobby Eberle and his GOPUSA.com, posted a message on its home page today announcing that Talon was going offline for, as it said, a "top-to-bottom" review.

Readers interested in the Talon perspective will have to content themselves with White House press releases.

Raw Story reports that Senator Dick Durbin (D-IL) is asking other senators to join him in calling for an investigation into fake news reporter Jeff Gannon.

The letter, issued from Minority Whip Richard Durbin (D-IL), calls on President Bush to “order a full inquiry” into how a “fake” journalist working for a “sham” news organization got access to the president,

America Blog has more details and an Action Alert so you tell your Senators to sign onto Durbin's letter.

Update: House Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) is joining in Sen. Durbin's request. Raw Story has the details.

Why are all criminal defense lawyers depicted on Law & Order shows as being "ethically challenged?" The creators of the new Law & Order spin-off, the one that begins with the late (and great) Jerry Orbach, have announced that this depiction not only will continue, it will be a plot point specifically written into the formula for the show.

But for all that is new - including early guest appearances by Annabella Sciorra, Lorraine Bracco and Peter Coyote, each playing ethically challenged defense lawyers - there will be much that viewers will recognize after Briscoe has passed.

The reason, I suspect, is because that is how the series creator, Dick Wolf, thinks of us. Comments like this tell the story:

Mr. Wolf, speaking by phone last week from California, said that "one of the things both Walon and I hope to accomplish with this is to demolish the shibboleths that have grown up around criminal law, namely that a defense attorney will never ask their client if they did the crime."

"All defense attorneys, if you give them three drinks and a good steak, will say that of course they've had clients who confessed to them and who they know to be guilty."

Can someone explain why this ad is so offensive it would be pulled in Milan?

'A tribute to women' ... The Last Supper advertisement for Marithé and François Girbaud

The Guardian reports:

The poster, by French fashion house Marithé and François Gribaud, is a version of Leonardo da Vinci's work with an almost all-female cast. Angelic-looking women clad in the company's "casual chic" pose around a long table as Christ and his apostles. One man, John the Apostle, sits on a woman's lap, his torso bare and jeans riding low.

The poster has been plastered on walls, billboards and magazines in New York and Paris for weeks. In Milan, where Leonardo's fresco is preserved and the influence of the Vatican is never far away, city authorities have banned it.

It's a play off the best-selling book, the DaVinci Code, "which suggests that the figure of John in Da Vinci's masterpiece is actually Mary Magdalen in disguise."

Crooks and Liars has the video.

Raw Story reports it may have found the link between Gannon and the White House, and it may be GOPUSA and Talon News founder Bruce Eberle.

Update: Clarence Page of the Chicago Tribune, in a blogger-friendly article, tells Bush to check his media lapdogs.

Talon News reporter Jeff Gannon goes public again, saying he made mistakes but he is still entitled to be a journalist. He denies improper White House access, having a permanent White House pass and ever seeing Valerie Plame documents. John Aravosis of AmerciaBlog is named throughout the WaPo piece and Gannon is forced to respond to his allegations.

Gannon's story of why he used a pseudonym doesn't quite ring true. He says it's because his name is hard to pronounce. James Guckert. So why not be James Gannon instead of Jeff Gannon then?

Crooks and Liars has the video of Gannon's appearance Friday on Anderson Cooper's 360.

Editor and Publisher spoke to Ari Fleisher about Jeff Gannon. Snippets:

Former White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer was so concerned about Talon News reporter James Guckert's potential ties to the Republican Party that he stopped calling on him at press briefings for about a week in 2003, Fleischer told E&P today.

"I found out that he worked for a GOP site, and I didn't think it was my place to call on him because he worked for something that was related to the party," Fleischer said in a phone interview. "He had the editor call me and made the case that they were not related to the Republican Party. He said they used the GOP name for marketing purposes only."