If you are in the path of Hurricane Gustav, get the heck outta Dodge:

[...]Gov. Bobby Jindal continued to urge coastal residents late Sunday to evacuate as soon as possible before tropical storm-force winds start buffeting the state early Monday.

“This is the first time we have successfully evacuated both southeast and southwest Louisiana (at the same time),” he said. “The vast majority of the people have evacuated.”

Jindal said that some parishes in the New Orleans area, such as Plaquemines and the West Bank of Jefferson Parish could see 12 feet or more of storm surge.

“Now is the time to get out of harm’s way,” Jindal said at a mid-day news conference. “There is still time for people to evacuate. Take this hurricane seriously. Evacuate. Take this storm seriously.

“I don’t want people in the coastal areas . . . riding out the storm,” Jindal said. “They must evacuate and . . . get them out of harm’s way. This storm could spend a lot of time in Louisiana” possibly dumping 10 inches on rain as it makes its way through the state and into Texas.

Better safe than sorry.  And let us know how you are when you can.

Oh and Michael Moore?  We don’t need your documentary “skills” to prove to us there is a God.  So keep your totally insensitive comments to yourself:

Louisiana Rep. Steve Scalise is calling on liberal filmmaker Michael Moore to apologize after he said Friday that the timing of Hurricane Gustav is “proof that there is a God in heaven,” since the storm approaching the Gulf Coast could disrupt next week’s Republican National Convention.

Moore made the remarks to MSNBC’s Keith Olbermann. Republicans have been monitoring the storm’s progress, considering whether to postpone their convention in St. Paul, Minn., if the storm wreaks havoc on the New Orleans area, just three years after Hurricane Katrina.

“I was just thinking, this Gustav is proof that there is a God in heaven,” Moore said. “To just have it planned at the same time, that it would actually be on its way to New Orleans for Day One of the Republican convention, up in the Twin Cities, at the top of the Mississippi River.”

Scalise released a statement Saturday blasting the documentary filmmaker for the remarks.

“I demand an immediate apology from Michael Moore to the people of south Louisiana for his offensive and inappropriate comments,” said Scalise, a Republican. “People in Louisiana, regardless of political affiliation, are making plans to leave to protect their families from this serious storm, and the God I know would not share Michael Moore’s glee for our plight.”

Residents of New Orleans and the surrounding area have to started to evacuate, while the storm strengthened to a Category 4 hurricane.

Moore seemed to back off his statement on air Friday, later saying, “I mean I certainly hope nobody gets hurt. I hope everybody’s taking cover.”

I guess Keith and Michael are only sensitive to the pain of others when it suits their agenda.  I mean, one could say that if the hurricane does turn ugly, we could just all hang onto Michael Moore, since there’s no way he will blow away in a storm, or use one of his shirts to take cover under.  But that would be mean and wrong.  So one will not say that.

The page on MSNBC has been removed.

Everybody stay safe.

Stations and websites in the Orlando area are now reporting what many of us have suspected for a while now:  There was a dead body in the trunk of Casey Anthony’s car, and that body allegedly was that of her daughter, Caylee:

For the first time on the record on Sunday, Orange County investigators acknowledged that recent FBI lab tests indicated that Caylee Anthony’s body was in her mother’s trunk and that the child is dead.

Evidence from a Central Florida body farm showed that an odor emitted from Casey Anthony’s car’s trunk was human decomposition.

A lead investigator in the case told WESH 2’s Bob Kealing that lab results indicated Caylee’s dead body was in the trunk of that car. Sources also confirmed that a stain in the trunk was not what clinched the decision that Caylee was in the trunk, but it was the strands of hair that investigators suspected all along were Caylee’s.

If you remember, back when Cindy Anthony called 911 on her daughter, she said that it smelled like there had been a dead body in the car.  She later recanted her story and said that the smell was a combination of rotting pizza and cleaning fluid.

For her part, Cindy is still upset that her daughter was taken back into custody on unrelated charges and the original bond rescinded, and she wants an apology from the sheriff:

“We need to start looking for a little girl that’s walking and living and breathing and someone actually has her,” Cindy Anthony said.

Cindy’s behavior (including threatening media, not that they don’t sometimes deserve it, constantly berating the police and how they are handling the situation, and furiously rowing down that river of denial) is being blamed for an exceptionally low turnout at searches organized this weekend by Equusearch:

“We usually have 1,000 to 2,000 a day (for a search),” Texas Equusearch official Mandy Albritton said. “Unfortunately, Saturday we only had 200.”

Even fewer volunteers showed up for a Sunday search.

Some blamed the low turnout — which was described as dismal — on Caylee’s mother, Casey Anthony.

“Regardless of what your opinion is about the family, the focus is on this little girl who needs to be found,” volunteer Magie Woodward said.

“I’d like to see a better turnout,” volunteer Lee Mann said. “There is so many people around here. Anybody could help.”

“We need them to realize this search is not about the family,” Albritton said. “This search is about brining this baby home. Whether to live out the rest of her life or rest — it’s a rescue mission.”

The Orange County Sheriff’s Office directed the teams to areas that needed to be searched Sunday.

“It’s important that we find Caylee whether she is dead or alive,” Orange County Sheriff’s Sgt. John Allen said.

And I have to agree.  Since it is all but certain that little Caylee is (allegedly) gone now, it’s important that her body is found so that she can have a proper burial and that part of the mystery can have some closure.

I’ve been taken to task by some commenters who think I need to be more objective in my reporting of this case.  All in all, I think I’m one of the more objective celeb bloggers out there.  I try very hard to look at all sides of a story before presenting my opinion.  I tried to do that in the beginning, in this case, before I started writing about it.  But a combination of new evidence, the Padilla fiasco, and Dawn (who has done a fabulous job covering the intricacies of this case) being temporarily gone from the site, all came together at once in time for me to start writing about it.  I’m sorry, but this blog is our opinions on current events, so I’ll leave the objectivity in this case to the mainstream media.

Personally, I believe Casey killed her daughter or was directly responsible for her death, whether accidental or on purpose, and she’s spent the past two months covering up with lie after lie after lie, all told with a straight face and a chilling demeanor.  She went out and partied while her dead toddler daughter lay rotting in an unknown grave.  I believe her family knows more than they are letting on, and the guilt is coming out in some of the continued hostility towards the media (of course, the media does push too far and that also accounts for some of the hostility…my opinion only).  I might have felt a bit of sympathy for her had Caylee died accidentally and she came forward with that information, even belatedly, and said that she just freaked out…but she hasn’t done that.  She’s continued on day after day and week after week telling lie after lie, knowing good and well that her lies continue to hurt her family:

On the worst of worst days, remember the words spoken
Trust no one, only yourself.
With great power, comes great consequence.
What is given can be taken away.
Everyone Lies.
Everyone Dies.

And not only has she lied continuously, but she went out and partied and got a tattoo while her daughter was “missing”, saying she was conducting her own “investigation”.  No…all she has done is lie and lie and lie, and I think she believes her own lies at this point, because to lie at this stage of the game takes a person who really believes what they are saying no matter how outlandish it is.  I personally don’t wish bodily harm to Casey, I pray for everyone involved, but neither Dawn nor I can be objective about this.  It’s too late for that.

You can follow GlossLip’s coverage of this case here.

UPDATE:  There are protesters at the Anthony house who are making things rough for the family:

But protesters and supporters refused to give up on the prospect that the missing girl was still alive, as they descended on Caylee Anthony’s home Monday, some saying they wanted to help the Anthony family find the missing toddler.

Protester Erika Courtney claimed the Anthonys were covering up for 22-year-old Casey Anthony, Caylee’s mother, who is in jail on charges of child neglect and lying to authorities. Courtney banged on the Anthonys door and demanded the family tell the truth.

“I am here to speak for little Caylee,” Courtney told MyFOXOrlando.com. “They know the truth.”

Courtney said she plans on continuing her protest despite a trespassing warning issued by Orange County deputies.

I’m sorry but that is completely ridiculous.  What do people think they are going to accomplish…that Casey or Cindy or George is going to come out and confess all, and now the protester is a hero?  Delusions of grandeur much?  All they are doing is breaking the law and being a nuisance.  Just because you believe somebody broke the law doesn’t give you the right to then break the law in return.  No matter one’s personal feelings about the Anthony family (and I do believe they know more than they are letting on, I really don’t think they are that deluded by their daughter), harassing them in their own home is not the answer.  These people are doing nothing but taking the law into their own hands and possibly hindering an investigation.

It seems that the Padillas, the fame hunters bounty hunters from California who so amazingly believed Casey Anthony’s incredible stories about the disappearance of her daughter Caylee, have flip-flopped yet again and rescinded the original bond, leaving Casey Anthony in jail:

The $500,000 bond posted a week ago for the mother of a missing Florida girl was rescinded after she was taken back to jail on check fraud and theft charges, a bondsman said Saturday.

Orange County Sheriff’s Office investigators took Casey Anthony into custody at her home Friday night, just a week after she was released on bond for charges related to 3-year-old Caylee’s disappearance.

Anthony was being held on $3,000 bond on the new charges of uttering a forged instrument, fraudulent use of personal information and petty theft, Capt. Angelo Nieves said.

According to sheriff’s office reports, Anthony used a friend’s checkbook to buy items at Target and Winn-Dixie, and to write a check for cash in July.

The 22-year-old has already been charged with child neglect, making false statements and obstructing the investigation into her daughter’s disappearance.

“The allegations surfaced during the investigation but we had to do our due diligence,” Nieves said of the new charges.

On Saturday, a bondsman said the $500,000 bond posted for the charges related to Caylee’s disappearance was rescinded in the middle of the night, making it unlikely she will be released again.

California bail bondsman Tony Padilla said the bond was surrendered based on the latest charges, new evidence and “heightened security concerns” that he declined to describe.

And perhaps by the fact that he realized that the Two Stooges had been a complete tool in the hands of a mentally ill manipulator, who batted her eyes and cried a few crocodile tears and played on their sympathies.  Your fifteen minutes are up, go back to the magical land of make-believe, otherwise known as California (no offense to Californians).

Casey’s lawyer is, predictably, not thrilled with the latest turn of events:

At a press conference outside the Anthony family home, Casey Anthony’s attorney called her latest arrest “grandstanding” on the part of law enforcement.

“They are not searching for anyone,” attorney Jose Baez said. “They are disingenuous.”

No, the police took back control of a situation which had gotten completely out of hand.  These so-called world famous bounty hunters blew into town and tried to take control of a situation which they had no business whatsoever being involved in, and the Florida police rightfully took it back.  Besides, they don’t have to search for anyone…they’ve already found their murderer.  Alleged, of course:

Several people from a California bail bonds company helped Anthony post bond, saying she might be more likely to talk about her daughter’s disappearance if she were released from jail. But Padilla said Friday he no longer believes the girl is alive.

“Absolutely not,” he said.

Anthony family spokesman Larry Garrison called the arrest a “three-ring circus.”

That’s putting it mildly.

At least she is back in jail where she belongs.  She’s had her little moment in the spotlight, pampered and coddled by her amazingly in denial family, with her hot showers and her nice bed and her pizza and her six-hour lawyer meetings (what goes on in those meetings, anyway?  How long does it take to say, “Here is where Caylee is, here are the people who have her,” since that’s the angle she still chooses to work?  Or does she just sit around doing nothing?), she’s gotten more attention from more men (her lawyer, the bounty hunters) and now she needs to face the music.

Here’s the deal…there are too many unexplained things around this case.  The flurry of cell phone calls to Casey’s mother and father…the unexplained cell phone pings in a wooded area around the airport…the babysitter who does not exist, at least not as her babysitter…the three 911 calls made by Cindy Anthony, implicating her daughter, then her sudden about-face and professed belief in her daughter’s innocence…the warning by Casey’s father (a former detective) to a police officer that Casey isn’t telling all she knows…the “investigation” by Casey that took her to nightclubs and parties.  Too many loose ends that don’t tie to anything.  And the thing is, if you tell a lie long enough, and with enough conviction within yourself, you can make yourself believe your own lie.  Your lie then becomes your truth, at least in your little world.  And I believe this is what Casey Anthony has done…she’s lied so much that she believes her own lies.

The limited immunity deal expires at 9 AM Tuesday.  At least Casey won’t be enjoying a Labor Day cookout while her daughter’s body continues to decompose somewhere in a lonely grave, unlike her month of partying shortly after her daughter was “kidnapped”.  Don’t forget, this is the worried mama out looking for her baby, before she was forced to say Caylee was missing.  I don’t think your daughter is hidden in that guy’s crotch.

You can follow GlossLip’s continuing coverage of the story here.

UPDATE:  Casey Anthony has been arrested and taken to jail again, this time on charges unrelated to Caylee:

Protesters were at the house when deputies arrived to arrested the mother of 3-year-old Caylee Anthony, who remains missing since July 15. She didn’t show much emotion as she was taken away. [...]

She is accused of stealing more than $600 from a friend. About 11:30 p.m., she was being taken from the Sheriff’s Office to Orange County Jail. [...]

The Sheriff’s Office said the charges are uttering a false instrument, fraudulent use of personal information, and petit theft. A judge signed an arrest warrent Friday evening and set a bond of $3,000.

It’s worth noting that only 10% of the bond needs to be paid before Casey can be free again, which is $300.  Hey, Padillas, if you have ANY cojones left whatsoever, now is the PERFECT time to revoke the first bond.  She’s already in jail!  Do the right thing!

I remember reading about the bad check thing a while back, but at the time authorities were unsure what they were going to do with the information or if the people involved wanted to press charges.  Part of me wonders if they resent the Padillas coming in and screwing things up, and wanted to show everyone who is really in charge here.

Also, it seems that Casey has been writing a girl, who was so stressed out when she learned about the test results on Casey’s car that she had to be hospitalized:

Casey Anthony wrote e-mails and at least one letter to a girl who helped organize a vigil for Caylee Anthony. But the grandmother of the girl, named Dakota, said this afternoon that recent news that evidence of a decomposing body was found in Casey’s trunk was too much for the girl, who has been hospitalized with stress-related trauma. She is reported to be doing okay but is still in the hospital.

When the truth finally comes out I hope she is punished for what she did to this poor girl as well as to her daughter.  Allegedly.

This is getting ridiculous.  In yet another twist in the sad story of little Caylee Anthony, it seems that Leonard Padilla, the so-called “world famous bounty hunter” who was instrumental in bonding Casey Anthony out of jail, has now flipped his previous stance (which he flipped from his previous previous stance) and said that he won’t be revoking her bond after all:

Padilla met with Casey’s attorney, Jose Baez Friday morning. After the meeting Padilla he announced he would no longer consider revoking her bond.

On Thursday, Padilla said he planned to have Casey Anthony brought back to jail on Saturday. 

He even confirmed his plan to have Casey’s $500,000 bond revoked. He says the mother of missing 3-year-old Caylee Anthony hasn’t spoken one word to him except for “thank you” when he and his team bonded her out of the Orange County Jail last Thursday.

The California bondsman now says Casey was one of the best liars he’s ever met and he now believes Caylee is dead. He admitted he regretted posting her bond. It is not clear why he changed his mind Friday morning.

He originally said that one of the reasons why he was going to revoke her bond was because Casey lied to authorities so many times, as revealed in the 400+ pages of documents released earlier in the week.  However, he then said he was revoking her bond because he was concerned about her safety:

Padilla says he’s concerned about the safety of Casey as well as her family and the media.  “Yesterday, I saw Cindy talking to reporters with a hammer in her hand. That’s not good,” Padilla said.

And he’s since decided that he’s so concerned about her safety and so convinced that she’s a liar, he’s going to let her stay out of jail, even though he regrets bailing her out to start with.  Because that’s what people do with the number one suspect in the murder of a toddler…let them out of jail.  Hey, makes sense to me, I don’t know about you.

(btw, if you’re making threatening calls or emails to them, stop it.  Not cool.  Not to mention illegal and if you’re caught, you’re in big trouble.)

He also says that he won’t revoke the bond if certain conditions are met:

But at noon Friday, Padilla told the Sentinel he spoke with Anthony’s defense attorney, Jose Baez, about the security concerns.

Padilla said he told Baez, “I want these changed because I don’t feel comfortable.”

“If he takes care of those by this afternoon or by tomorrow we won’t revoke [the bond],” Padilla said.

Padilla said people have called and e-mailed threatening to kill Anthony. He would not say what the safety concerns are and referred those questions to Baez. A telephone message and e-mail sent to Baez have not been returned.

And Cindy Anthony continues dancing on her showboat down the river of denial, saying that it is possible somebody put a dead body in the trunk of Casey’s car to implicate her, since hair and air quality samples tested earlier came back this week showing that there was a decomposing body in the trunk:

Cindy said Casey is not going back to jail, and she doesn’t believe the air sample results of Casey’s car, even though she, herself, initially said the car smelled like a dead body.

“I got the car on the fifteenth of July,” Cindy Anthony said. “When they picked up from Amscot on the thirtieth of June there was no odor. (But what about the odor you said you smelled to the 911 operator?) That was 15 days later. I found rotten – whatever it was — something decomposing in there. Maybe someone put a body in the car after it went to the tow yard. Why don’t you call them about their security?”

Like I’ve said before, unless Casey was moonlighting as a hearse driver and using her car to transport the bodies, I’m pretty sure that means that little Caylee was dumped in the trunk on her mom’s way to dump the body somewhere.  Joe Schmoe The Ragpicker up the road figured out weeks ago that Casey was a liar, mentally disturbed, and was covering up the death of little Caylee, so I don’t know why these bounty hunters and her parents are acting all surprised and weirded out by all this.

The Texas group EquuSearch is now helping search for Caylee, using horses, divers, dogs, choppers, and remote-controlled planes that take photographs from the air.  They are hoping to find something, anything, that leads to little Caylee.  And the prosecutors have extended an offer of limited immunity to Casey, which expires at nine in the morning on Tuesday.

So basically we have this…the attention junkies fame-seeking morons bounty hunters, also known as the Keystone Kops or the Two Stooges, bailed out Casey even though her behavior was suspect at best, downright criminal and psychopathic at worst.  They read the documents and decided to revoke the bond because they realized what tools they had been, then said it was because they wanted Casey to be safe.  Now they’re not going to revoke the bond at all and let Casey stay out free, even though they now believe Casey killed her daughter, possibly accidentally.  Cindy Anthony believes somebody put a body in the trunk of Casey’s car to frame her even though she told the 911 operator that the car smelled like there had been a dead body in there and implying that her daughter had something to do with it.  And there is an offer of limited immunity on the table but they’re going to give Casey over the Labor Day weekend to mull it over, presumably so both she and they can attend their respective cookouts.

I was going to say that this case couldn’t possibly get any worse, but I’m not going to say that, because I have a feeling it will.

You can follow GlossLip’s continuing coverage here.

What a shame.  Anyway…call the manicurist, because somebody done ticked off Little Miss Thang Axl Rose, and you don’t mess with Axl, because he will cut you.  I mean it.  He will break off one of those braids and totally mess you up.

Seriously…the FBI had to come in and do Axl’s dirty work for him, arresting a blogger who streamed some of the songs off the long-awaited Chinese Democracy album:

FBI agents arrested 27-year-old Kevin Cogill on Wednesday morning on suspicion of violating federal copyright laws. Cogill appeared in court in the afternoon wearing a T-shirt; his girlfriend sat court and afterward said, “Rally the troops,” but declined further comment.

Federal authorities say Cogill posted nine unreleased Guns N’ Roses songs on his Web site in June. The songs were later removed.

In later posts, Cogill wrote that the FBI had questioned him and asked his readers if any of them knew a good attorney. He was represented Wednesday by a federal public defender.

According to an arrest affidavit, Cogill admitted to agents that he posted the songs on his Web site. Prosecutors said Wednesday the leak could result in a “significant” financial loss for the band.

And the album sitting in some studio not being released for ten years isn’t costing the band anything, I’m sure.  There’s a smart move…let’s make an album, but let’s not release it!  That should really get the dough rolling in!

In case you’re wondering just why the album hasn’t hit the stores yet, it’s because Axl and his former bandmates are at odds and he’s pretty much burned his bridges with them.  It’s reported that the album has cost $13 million to make…and it still sits on a shelf somewhere, gathering dust.  There is one song that you will reportedly be able to hear legally, though…Shackler’s Revenge, supposedly to be released in the video game Rock Band 2.  I’ll head to my nearest Wal-Mart and listen for some teenage kid to screw up the demo.

No, the guy shouldn’t have streamed what wasn’t legally his (no word on how he got the music to start with).  But come on.  Shouldn’t the FBI be doing something like searching for the complete strangers who have little Caylee Anthony, like the family asked?  (btw, that’s sarcasm)

But hey…does this mean that we all get a free can of Dr Pepper now?  I mean, some of the album has been released, does that count?

(I know, I know…but so many memories of my misspent youth!  Happy Friday!)

Actor David Duchovny, of X Files fame, has reportedly entered a treatment center to receive help for his sex addiction:

“I have voluntarily entered a facility for the treatment of sex addiction,” the actor says in an exclusive statement. “I ask for respect and privacy for my wife and children as we deal with this situation as a family.”

And I say good for him, for recognizing that he has a problem and for taking steps to deal with it.  What he needs is privacy and our prayers, not stupid jokes that just spread misunderstandings about what he is dealing with.  Some of the articles and comments I’ve seen on other sites really make me sick.  Would people be making jokes if it came out that he was struggling with alcohol addiction, or drug addiction?  It is imperative that anyone dealing with any sort of addiction, no matter what it is, recognize the warning signs and be willing to seek help.

Our thoughts and prayers are with David and his family.

File this under “Ten Things I Could Have Gone To My Grave And Never Learned About Matthew McConaughey’s Mother’s Sex Life And Been Totally Fine With That” – Celebslam

Do NOT mess with James Woods, because he will not rest until he has hunted you down – Janet Charlton’s Hollywood

Hilary Duff’s dad is in jail and it has something to do with her birthday party.  I know, I’m confused too - Bitten & Bound

Sarah Larson allegedly cheated on George Clooney, which means…I don’t know, but it was pretty stupid nonetheless - pop on the pop

Michael Phelps can score even by accident - PopCrunch

Believe me, I take no joy in typing that title.

Bounty hunter Leonard Padilla, whom I took to the woodshed in my previous post for being a total tool in the hands of Casey Anthony, is finally showing some stones.  Casey Anthony made a fool of the wrong person, because now Padilla is trying to revoke the bond that is keeping Casey out of jail:

Eyewitness News was informed Thursday morning by bounty hunter Leonard Padilla that he’s beginning the process of having Casey Anthony’s $500,000 bond revoked after details emerged that suggest missing 3-year-old Caylee Anthony is dead. Padilla said he’s working to determine the process and hopes to begin it Thursday afternoon or Friday.

Orange County detectives were expected to meet with the State Attorney’s Office to discuss new evidence in the Caylee Anthony case. A source close to the investigation confirmed for Eyewitness News, that FBI test results show hair and a stain in the trunk of Casey Anthony’s car belong to her daughter, 3-year-old Caylee Anthony. Eyewitness News was also told the evidence found proves that she is dead.

Casey has been offered limited immunity if she helps in the investigation; however, that offer has a time limit and the clock is ticking away.

(GlossLip has previously reported on the continuing investigation, and Dawn has done a wonderful job keeping us all up to date on the latest events in this horrid case.  I am merely attempting to keep everyone posted while she is out today; I’m sure she will have her own insights on the case later.)

It seems that there is definitive proof that the trunk of Casey’s car was used to transport a dead body:

Eyewitness News spoke to a forensic expert to find out how investigators are able to use DNA to determine that a dead body was in Casey’s trunk.

“Just putting the hair under the microscope one can tell the difference between a normal hair root and one that’s been infected with bacteria after death,” stated forensic expert Michael Baden.

Baden is a forensic pathologist who worked extensively on the OJ Simpson case. He also said the inside linings of the mouth and nose release fluid when they begin to decompose and that fluid can also be identified by DNA.

As much as I have totally railed against Padilla, he has sucked it up and admitted he was wrong:

“I was wrong,” said Padilla. “The people were right that said I should have left her in there.”

When asked where he thought Caylee was now, Padilla answered, “You know, the car was parked next to a dumpster. I would hate to think the worst. God, it’s terrible to think she’d be at the local garbage dump. It’s terrible to think that.”

In an interview Tuesday night on CNN’s Nancy Grace, Padilla said he doesn’t think he would have bonded Casey Anthony out of jail if he had read the information contained in 400 pages of documents released related to the case.

“After reading it, I don’t believe I would have talked my nephew Tony Padilla into posting the bond. And I don’t think I would have come to Orlando after reading that. I mean, I’m still hoping that little girl’s alive, but there’s a lot of information in those 400 pages that would lead those people to believe something different,” bounty hunter Leonard Padilla said during an interview with CNN’s Nancy Grace.

So Casey Anthony is enjoying her freedom, albeit for a possibly dwindling time, while her daughter is undoubtedly dead, probably killed by her mother’s hand.  While Casey was out partying the night away her little toddler daughter’s body was alone somewhere…a trash dump, a swamp, a grave dug in the dead of night.  Casey’s family continues to stand behind her even while all evidence points to her guilt.

I’ve said it before…in today’s modern digital age, where literally the whole world is linked via the internets and digital signals, it’s harder and harder to get away with something as heinous as this.  You can fool some of the people some of the time, and you can fool some of the people all of the time, but in this day and age you’ll never fool all of the world all of the time, and that’s exactly what Casey Anthony tried to do.

Welcome to Fail: Epic Division.

I’ve certainly done my share of Michael Jackson-bashing posts, all of which I still stand behind.  But on the eve of his 50th birthday (yes, 50 years old…gah, when did this happen?), I can’t help but look at the above photo and feel a twinge of pity for the man.

After all, perhaps Michael would have led a life of relative obscurity had his father not pushed he and his brothers into the spotlight at such early and tender ages.  Who knows how much of MJ’s personality is a result of nature versus nurture; how much would have come out had he not turned into one of the biggest superstars of the modern era.  Would he still have struggled with the inner demons that have plagued him for so long?  Or were the demons planted there when he took his first spinning dance steps on a stage?

Of course, I also remember that a lot of his current problems have been of his own doing, because had he not been behaving inappropriately with young boys much of this would not have happened and he would have still been regarded as a great yet eccentric genius, probably still making new music and putting on concerts.  After all, for all I’ve railed on Madonna (and rightfully so), she is also 50, and is energetically embarking on a new tour to promote a new album of fresh music.  MJ has simply been re-releasing new versions of old stuff, such as his remake of his classic album Thriller, and by all accounts isn’t even interested in doing concerts any longer…not that he could, with his current problems with his back and ankles, the legacy of all those acrobatic dance moves.  Was his behavior because of his fame, or in spite of it?

It’s said that his most recent trial is what has finally broken his spirit:

Those who knew Jackson before the 2005 child-molestation trial – in which he was acquitted – place the blame firmly at its door.

Emotionally devastated, he has been unable to bounce back, suffering almost as much as if the verdict had been a guilty one.

I remember the day of his acquittal. I sat behind Michael in the Santa Monica courtroom – as I had every day for months – and listened as each charge was dismissed.

When he stood up to leave, he didn’t seem to know what was going on or even that he had been found not guilty.

He was a shell of the person I had known over the years. He was disoriented – his eyes vacant, his face expressionless – the result of obvious drug abuse.

I knew then that he would never be the same. The testimony had been so damning, I was certain that a man as private as Jackson would never recover.

Unfortunately, Michael has been allowed over the years to do as he pleases, without having to be held accountable to anyone, and this is one of the things which has caused his downfall…his inability to deal with anything resembling the real world and all the obligations that entails:

Looking back, Neverland – which he bought in 1988 – was the worst thing ever to happen to Michael Jackson.

It allowed him too much solitude and gave him the chance to isolate himself from his friends and family, and from common sense.

He surrounded himself with children, animals and a false reality – so much so that he never learned how to cope in the real world. He never wanted to grow up, and his managers encouraged these eccentricities when they should have encouraged therapy.

They allowed him to live an excessive life and spend money like there was no tomorrow.

Alone in his madness, he became gradually weirder, and no one seemed to care.

During the Eighties, when he started to experiment with plastic surgery – an obvious cry for help – there was nobody to slow him down and not even his family seemed to help him.

But by then, it was almost impossible to get through to Michael in his increasingly isolated state.

And now, he has selfishly added three children to this mixed-up existence he calls a life…children who are never, ever going to have anything that resembles a normal life, much like their father:

A middle-aged man wearing pyjamas is being pushed in a wheelchair down a sidewalk by an assistant. He is gaunt and frail-looking. His skin seems to be peeling. His fingernails are a sickening shade of yellow-brown.

Beneath a red Marines baseball cap a surgical mask is visible, covering the bottom half of his face. A pair of large sunglasses shield the top.

Three children walk ahead – two boys and a girl. All seem happy and look adorable in colourful clothing. Their baseball caps do not seem a deliberate attempt to shield their faces.

‘Slow down,’ the man commands in a hoarse whisper, but the children ignore him and quickly cross the street to stand in front of a bookshop.

When the man in the wheelchair finally catches up, one of the children dutifully holds the door open as he is wheeled inside.

‘Thank you,’ he mutters weakly. All seems calm, but then – just as the children are about to follow the man into the shop – a stranger approaches the smallest of them.

‘Was that…?’ she begins to ask. The boy is about to answer, when a large man steps between them.

‘No. That was not,’ he says, taking the boy by the hand and rushing him inside. But, just before the door swings closed, the young boy turns to his inquisitor, smiles broadly and mouths just two words: Michael Jackson.

Yes, his father was horrible to him, and I’m sure that has a lot to do with the man Michael became…however, we are all responsible for our own actions, regardless of upbringing.  That is something Michael just cannot accept.  He’s spent his whole life blaming everyone else and trying to escape, instead of stepping up and taking responsibility for himself.  At some point there was a place where two roads diverged, and Michael chose the wrong one to follow.

So while I realize that Michael Jackson has to pay for the decisions he has made in his life, I can’t help but wonder just how much of this is the result of being pushed too far, too young.  And here is the result.

Michael Jackson, Dina Lohan, Denise Richards, Kardassian family, anyone out there with children who are in the public eye…are you paying attention?  When you whore out your children to the john of fame and fortune, this is often the cost you barter…because in this business, it isn’t the johns who hand over money to screw you out of your childhood.  It’s the children who end up paying the price.

As Glosslip reported a while back, NYT bestselling author Ian Halperin has a new book coming out in November on Britney Spears, Stalking Britney Spears: Britney Under Siege.

While doing work for his book, Hollywood Undercover (check here for Glosslip’s coverage on Halperin), Ian made a side-project of posing as a member of the paparazzi and followed the moves of the fallen pop-wreck Britney Spears. Ian, whose expertise is going undercover to expose the seedier elements of the entertainment industry, saw the media-swarm surrounding Britney during her legendary fall from grace and wisely took an opportunity to give the consumptive masses an inside look into one of the most sought-after and stalked celebrities.

He’s told Glosslip, rather than the book preying on the failures and missteps of the blonde bombshell (including 3 rehab stints, loss of custody of her two young children, a messy divorce, mental breakdown, and disastrous attempts at a comeback) his portrayal of Spears is sympathetic, as he saw her in her most vulnerable moments. The book is sure to be chockful of revealing details about the users in Britney’s life (ahem…Sam Lufti) and what role they had in her downward spiral into mental illness.

Here are some excerpts from In Touch’s latest piece hitting newsstands today:

On Britney’s death wish:

Britney’s representative denies she ever tried to take her own life and dismisses Halperin’s claims. After months of binge drinking and drug abuse, Halperin reports in his book that the despondent star ” took a large quantity of champagne and pills” at LA’s Penisula Hotel in January of 2007. “It was rumored Britney left a note. But a friend rushed the singer to the hospital in time and she later tore up her own note.”

On Britney’s troubled childhood:

He (Halperin) learned of much about the singer’s difficult childhood – and her tragic history of unchecked psychological issues. “She was suspected of being bipolar at 9, but her parents turned a blind eye to it and let it ride. They though they’d just encourage her artistic endeavors as a way to make her a normal child.

On her road to recovery:

Today, Britney is on medication, but Halperin believes she’s far from recovered. “There’s no doubt based on the last two years that she is a highly unstable person. She’s on a temporary high right now, but she’s never really dealt with all the problems she had. I don’t think it’s possible to turn over a new leaf just like that.”

Outlook on Britney:

As far a Halperin is concerned, Britney deserves to get better – and a lead a happy life. She’s a “good mother and a good person. In fact, she’s nicer than most of the stars I’ve met.”

The article is very comprehensive and give us a lot more than what we’ve heard in the way of mere rumors and conjecture. Glosslip tried to reach Halperin for a comment on this story, but the author has not gotten back to us.