And lots of it.

• First and foremost, is the strike almost over?
• Adding “For Kids” to the end of something doesn’t necessarily make it right.  Case in point: American Gladiators For Kids.
• Survivor will be around for at least another two seasons.
• Snoop from The Wire is a witness in a murder trial.
• One of the actors from Mad Men was killed in an avalanche.
• Michael Showalter talks about The State’s DVDs.
• Televisionary talks to Ben from Lost.
• Aasif Mandvi explains how the “writing” process works on the strike-era Daily Show.
• E-Kristin has a spoiler chat with Lost and Heroes.

They say politics is show business for ugly people. I live in D.C. — it’s kind of true.

So, when you cross show business with politics, what do you get? Not The West Wing (we should be so lucky). We get reality TV contestants running for Congress. Although, generally, they’re hotter than your average Mark Souder (it’s okay to make fun of him — he’s awful).

The latest person to throw their hat in the ring is Survivor winner Yul Kwon, who may run for a Congressional seat in California. Yul, who won the Race War season of Survivor, is also known as one of the smartest, nicest and most likable people to ever win the show. That’s saying a lot, given that it’s so easy to have your character flaws exploited on that show. But he’s not only smart, but decent — a real rarity. He’s also hot, but that’s neither here nor there.

This seems like a good opportunity to do a brief survey of reality TV stars who have launched bids for political office. Here goes:

Kevin from The Real World: New York

Kevin, originator of the “angry black man” reality show archetype, was a cast member on the very first season of The Real World. He’s actually made a respectable name for himself as a writer — notably for Vibe magazine. He ran, and withdrew himself, in 2006 for a Congressional seat in Brooklyn. Now he’s entered the race again. I can’t say whether I think he’ll win or not, but let me put it this way — the link to his site is broken.

Jim Morrison from The Mole

First of all, yes — it’s his real name. Second of all, you may remember Jim as the skinny, aviator shade-wearing gay dude from the very first season of The Mole. Morrison ran for the New Jersey State Senate a few years back and, dramatically, was asked to quit the race by his own party based on the fact that he had nude pictures circulating from when he was entered in a contest at an NYC gay bar. You can look at his campaign Web site here, which is (weirdly) being hosted by some t-shirt company. The real one is defunct.

Raj from The Apprentice

Raj is known to viewers of The Apprentice as the gross, bow tie-wearing, wannabe Anna Kournikova-dating guy. Voters in Pennsylvania know him as the psycho who accused his opponent of performing abortions on women without their permission. He ended up getting trounced, receiving less than a third of the votes in the election in 2006.

Sean from The Real World: Boston

Sean was one of the easiest-to-forget cast members on the Boston season of The Real World. The best he got was a brief screaming match with Southern blonde lesbian Genesis — I think over cleaning. Other than that, his only claims to fame were participating in those lumberjack games and pronouncing the word mouth “mowth.” He entertained, but ultimately dropped, the idea of a Congressional bid. He is currently the district attorney for Ashland County, Wisconsin. Fun fact: he’s married to Rachel from the San Francisco season of The Real World. They met on one of the battle of the seasons when it was more about extreme sports and less about body shots. Oooh, oooh, and Rachel was once considered for the “conservative psychopath” slot on The View that is now occupied by Elizabeth Hasselbeck.

So, I’ve kind of been watching American Gladiators. A little bit. For what it’s worth, I’m only 20% paying attention — I’m usually distracting myself on the computer or eating something or doing a scrimshaw.

There’s not a whole lot to it. If you remember watching American Gladiators in your feet jammies, the show is pretty much the same. Only this time around, you’re the one who’s changed. You’re more aware of what’s going on and it’s obvious that the contestants have been coached to act super-psycho and delusionally over-confident. And they say silly catchphrases and the crowd cheers unnaturally hard, with their veins bulging. You can practically see the production assistant doing the upward arm motions to make them cheer louder.

I don’t really have enough to say about American Gladiators to constitute an entire post, so how about a little game? Below, there’s a list of words. You’ve got to figure out whether the word is the name of an American Gladiator or a refreshing soda/energy drink.

1. Vault
2. Blast
3. Surge
4. Crush
5. Toa
6. Josta
7. Jolt
8. Venom
9. Hammer
10. Freek

Get the answers after the jump…

They were playing Laura Veirs in Starbucks!

• A 30 second ad on American Idol costs more than your life.
• American Gladiators has already been renewed.
• E-Kristin has a spoiler chat featuring Lost.
• Seems like the whole gang is around for High School Musical 3.
• Terminator appears to be a hit.
• Barack Obama loves The Wire.  Or at least that’s what his campaign advisors told him to say to get him in with the hip, artsy demographic.
• Chile is getting its own version of The Office.
• ABC producers are getting the ax thanks to the writers strike.

I can’t believe how warm it is. Time to put on my mesh tank top.

• USA Today reviews last night’s Daily Show.
• After Ellen talks to the lovely lesbians from The L Word.
• Remember Daybreak? You know, Taye Diggs + dead girlfriend X Groundhog Day = flop show. It’s coming to DVD.
• Looks like The Golden Globes are going to just be a press conference this year.
• Jerry Seinfeld’s getting sued for defaming a cookbook on Letterman.
• Sophia Hill talks about One Tree Hill.  I don’t know why I’m posting this.
• The Playmate from Celebrity: Apprentice opens up. So to speak.
• Jesus… they’re bringing back The Mole!
• American Gladiators and Carson Kressley’s new shows are hits.
• One of the gals from Shear Genius is getting her own Bravo show.
• E-Kristin has a spoiler chat with stuff on Lost and Dexter.
• Project Runway’s Daniel V. doesn’t think this season is that interesting.
• Marc Cherry is struggling with the strike.
• The guy from The Wire doesn’t care about Emmys.

Lookin’ at you, Vance and Liz.

• Conan and David bearded it up last night when their shows returned.
• Omarosa talks about her return to the Celebrity Apprentice.
• Fox is shuffling its mid-season schedule again.
• Tila Tequila. Again.
• The main guy behind Brothers and Sisters has been “ousted.” His words not mine.
• They’re casting for a Gossip Girl reality show.
• Jeez… they canceled the Serbian Big Brother after three evicted contestants got killed.
• Cher and her daughter Chastity will be working on a reality show.
• Gloria Reuben is back on ER.
• Are TV theme songs dead?
• Some dude says Work Out was his idea.
• The Baltimore Sun ain’t happy with its portrayal on The Wire.

Bravo released a flurry of bedazzled news yesterday as it announced the renewals of Top Design and Shear Genius.

As I previously reflected, Top Design is entirely watchable, yet entirely inferior to Project Runway and even Top Chef. And it’s really hard to put my finger on why.  Arguably, it does everything right. That is, it does pretty much everything those other shows did, but for some reason the different parts didn’t synergize into must-watch television. Could it be that the network just saturated itself with flamboyant competitive reality shows and this was the straw that broke the gay camel’s back? After all, I really didn’t even watch Shear Genius.  Like at all.

In any case, it’s going to be back and I’ve got some tips for the show on how to proceed.

• Get a new host. As much as it pains me to say it, Todd Oldham was just not cutting it (he’s not mentioned in the press release, so it looks like that could definitely happen). He had the expertise of Tim Gunn, but the camera presence of Katie Lee Joel (remember when she hosted Top Chef?… me neither). When he announced challenges, it was with calculated inflection — like an unfortunate chemistry teacher trying to make oxidation numbers “come alive” for his students.
• New judges, but keep Kelly Wearstler. One of the few memorable things about Top Design was judge Kelly Wearstler’s crazy-ass get-ups and hairdos. She’d switch from vamp to poodle in the blink of an eye.  She had a good eye for design, so you knew she was just messing with our heads with these outrageous get-ups. Her antics aren’t enough to make the show work, but it helps.  Jonathan Adler, on the other hand, even though he’s famous as hell, would probably make a better catty side judge than main judge.
• New catchphrases. No one thinks “see you later, decorator” was a good idea. No one.
• New location. Somewhere exotic. Top Chef’s Miami edition gave it a distinct flavor (get it? flavor… ergh…) and the Chicago one will probably be unique too.  I think a New York sensibility would be interesting to see.

It’s a start, right?  The success of the series will depend, as it always does, on casting.  We’ll see if they can make it happen.

So, we’ve been through this before. They announced a cast list for the celebrity edition of The Apprentice and we got to play the guess-the-real-contestant game. Unfortunately, it was a bunk list.

However, now the cast has been listed by reputable sources. Shall we play again?

Remember, one of the following groupings is the real contestant on The Celebrity Apprentice.

The gymnast: Nadia Comaneci, Mary Lou Retton, Carly Patterson.

The playmate (I don’t expect anyone to know this person, so, to make it easier, the two decoys don’t actually exist): Laura McDonald, Stacey Ammon, Tiffany Fallon.

The talent show judge: Randy Jackson, Piers Morgan, Dave Navarro.

The rocker: Gene Simmons, Alice Cooper, Ted Nugent.

The chatty lady: Marilu Henner, Leeza Gibbons, Ricki Lake.

The fighter (pick two): Sugar Ray Leonard, Lennox Lewis, Tito Ortiz, Oscar De La Hoya, Tommy Speer.

The country musician: Garth Brooks, Trace Adkins, Reba McIntire.

The pretty lady: Bo Derrick, Cindy Crawford, Carol Alt.

The Soprano: Jamie Lynn Sigler, Vincent Pastore, Robert Iler.

The softball star (again, two of these names are just made up): Olivia David, Jennie Finch, Mandy Hammond.
The Spanish talk show host: Lili Estefan, Nancy Alvarez, Nely Galan.

The crazy born-again: Kirk Cameron, Candice Cameron, Stephen Baldwin.
Omarosa: No guesses here. Omarosa’s going to be on it.

Follow the jump for the answers…

Quoth Janice Dickinson — this is what she said on the UK’s edition of I’m a Celebrity — Get Me Out of Here of fellow contestant Lynne Franks’ boobs:

“I’m going to stab her in the middle of the night and take hers. You think I’m kidding? I’ll eat her tits. I’ll fry up those big old boobs.”

My God, that lady’s awesome.

It’s that time again.

The good folks at MTV and our publicist pal Jorge are helping us sponsor another giveaway — this time seasons one and two of Run’s House.

For those of you who don’t know it, Run’s House is basically The Osbournes with Rev. Run from Run DMC. The big difference here appears to be that Run’s family doesn’t appear to be on the verge of imploding. It’s quite refreshing, actually, here’s a really cheesy trailer. I won’t embed the other clip they had of Kid Rock talking to the son while wearing a shirt that says “I (heart) black people.”

To enter, just e-mail tifaux (at) gmail (dot) com with the subject line “I’ve got the runs.” Then Maggie will activate her sophisticated randomized selection algorithm to pick the winner. The contest ends Nov. 15.