LOS ANGELES, CA--Nicole Kidman has been named the highest paid actress by The Hollywood Reporter on Wednesday. The Oscar-winning actress is said to make up to $17 million per movie. Ms. Kidman celebrated the exciting news by trying to move her face.

To stay true to the spirit of the film, the Academy has agreed that if it wins Best Picture, it will win it as the first award of the evening, while winning an unimportant technical category to close the night.

The makers of Dove Soap have announced a contest in which users are asked to create and submit ads for the new Dove Cream Oil Body Wash due to hit stores next month.

Winners will have their commercials shown during the Academy Awards.  Winners will also be expected to do the taxes and pay for groceries for the company's marketing employees.

Unilever takes top position in soap market when they realize bigger people use more soap

PREP SCHOOL DEFENSEMEN FOR TRUTH CHALLENGE KERRY HOCKEY RECORD

BOSTON.  As he backpedals from comments suggesting that American soldiers in Iraq are there because they didn't study hard enough in school, Massachusetts Senator John Kerry faces charges that he embellished his hockey accomplishments as a prep school forward in the 1960's.

"I tipped it with my stick--I'm sure."

A new group, Prep School Defensemen for Truth, issued a statement today alleging that Kerry never achieved a "hat trick", the accolade earned by an individual player who scores three goals in a single game.  Kerry's campaign biography has listed this accomplishment since he first lobbied for membership in Yale's secretive Skull and Bones society.

Skull and Bones and Puck

Prep School Defensemen for Truth is composed of former Independent School League hockey players who competed against Kerry.  The Independent School League is made up of exclusive New England prep schools such as Groton School,  Middlesex School, and a passle of saints; St. George's, St. Mark's, St. Sebastian's and Kerry's alma mater, St. Paul's in Concord, New Hampshire.

"Who you callin' a middle-class mouth breather?"

Nils Beckwith, a spokesman for Prep School Defensemen for Truth who played for Governor Dummer Academy in Byfield, Mass., was blunt in his assessment of Kerry's hockey skills.  "He was on the third line, a real lightweight.  He never scored off of me."

Long the butt of jokes, now just "Governor Academy"

Kerry biographer Douglas Brinkley countered the group's charges, saying he had been given extensive access to Kerry's youth sports memorabilia, and that the hat trick claim was substantiated by a trophy that bore the inscription "Mini-Mites".

"Buzz off--I'm gonna be President someday."

USA Hockey  Recording Secretary Jim Lopresti could not confirm the significance of that award.  "Sounds more like a self-esteem kind of thing.  You know, everybody who shows up for the last game gets one.  For a hat trick it's different--you get a little patch.  Kids put them on their jackets."

Republican party officials seized on the controversy and vowed to examine Kerry's other hockey statistics such as his plus/minus rating, the measure of a team's overall effectiveness while a player is on the ice. 

"I don't have my goalie mitt!"

In a statement that he read from the steps of his Beacon Hill townhouse, Kerry denounced the charges as politically motivated.  "Who among us hasn't been thrilled by the sight of Bobby Esposito stopping a slap shot with his goalie mitt?  To turn hockey, a game of speed and beauty, into a partisan football is reprehensible."

"He was a puck hog."

One fact Kerry's supporters and detractors agree on: in four years of prep school hockey he never recorded an assist.   In response to a reporter's question, Edward "Bink" Hollings, St. Paul's hockey coach during the 60's, conceded that "if John ever passed the puck, I didn't see it."

Copyright 2006, Con Chapman

LONDON, England -- Fashion icon and award-winning singer and actress Cher is clearing her Malibu home of its Gothic contents and reshaping her life in a giant garage sale. Among the items emanating from Cher’s closet cleaning; nearly 800 costumes and pieces of gem encrusted jewelry, over 150 works of art, 30 plus pieces of furniture, an Oscar, a Grammy, an Emmy, 3 Golden Globes, Tom Cruise, Bert and Ernie, Mike Piazza, every “metro sexual” who has ever worn a “salmon” shirt, Peppermint Patty, the brakes for Sonny Bono’s skis, Snagglepuss, Jeff Gordon, and my internet history folder after writing this joke.

Academy Award winning actor Nicolas Cage says he is broke.

I guess this means he won’t be reimbursing me for the $12.50 I wasted on “Knowing.” 

We want to congratulate our Dear Leader for winning the Nobel Peace Prize. We hear he is also being considered for the American League MVP, the Heisman Trophy, and an Oscar. 

We wish Dear Leader the best of luck in all his great accomplishments.