Catching Up

Mid-morning update: This is the second "Ben & Jen are getting a divorce" cover. When I wrote this morning's post I had forgotten that they were also the main cover story on the issue dated July 20. The other celebrity break-up at that time was Kourtney K and Scott.

Original Post:
Issue dated August 17, 2015


Two weeks ago I said that People loves a Celebrity Divorce and it's still true. This week is actually a "twofer" with the Jen & Ben cover I've been expecting ever since their separation was announced as the main story, and a sidebar about Gwen Stefani and Gavin Rossdale. Bobbi Kristina Brown's sad story is also featured in a sidebar for the second week in a row, along with leonine Dead Celebrity Cecil the lion.

In political news, Fox has announced which 10 candidates are invited to participate in the main debate tomorrow night. The Washington Post has updated their chart:



Biggest talking point? Kasich is in, Perry, Santorum and Jindal are out, along with Fiorina, Pataki, Graham and Gilmore (who is not shown.) I also think it's interesting that Chris Christie has fallen to 9th place, just above John Kasich. Is he beginning to regret saying no back in 2012? Almost certainly.

In other political score-keeping, former Maryland governor Bob Erhlich has announced that he is not, after all, running for president. In the interest of accuracy, I've updated my running list. Is it getting to be time to start our "Faced Reality and Dropped Out" list? Possibly. Some pundits are saying that exclusion from the first big debate is close to a fatal blow for Perry, Santorum, Jindal and the rest of the excluded ones. Will any of them officially drop out? Stay tuned. Here's how my list looks now, and this should be the final version, until candidates do indeed start dropping out.

Declared GOP Candidates, in order of their official announcement:

1. Ted Cruz (March 23) 
2. Rand Paul (April 7)
3. Marco Rubio (April 14)
4. Dr. Ben Carson (May 3) 
5. Carly Fiorina (May 4) 
6. Mike Huckabee (May 5) 
7. Rick Santorum (May 27)
8. George Pataki (May 28)
9. Lindsey Graham (June 1) 
10. Rick Perry (June 4) 
11. Jeb Bush (June 15)
12. Donald Trump (June 16) 
13. Bobby Jindal (June 24) 
14. Chris Christie (June 30)
15. Scott Walker (July 13) 
16. John Kasich (July 21) 
17. Jim Gilmore (July 30) 

Officially Not Running
Rob Portman (Dec 2)
Paul Ryan (Jan 12)
Mitt Romney (Jan 30)
Rick Snyder (May 7)
John Bolton (May 14) 

Mike Pence (May 20) 

Bob Ehrlich (August 4)

Days until Election Day: 460

Days until the first debate: It's tomorrow! Start popping the popcorn, this is going to be very entertaining!