When actress Ellen Barkin Tweeted her anger about the NYPD's apparent "random arrests" of innocent people in the wee hours of New Year's, she set off a firestorm of criticism from other Twitterers when she criticized the NYPD ("People being thrown in police vans, arrested for 'jaywalking'What happened to the NYPD of my youth?Who are u all?Shame shame on u all") and Mayor Bloomberg ("Fuck all of u,Bloomberg & every1 goose-stepping behind u.I cannot believe what I am seeing.U protect nothing.U ARE the violence in my city") and complained about a cop shoving her. But what do the cop-types on NYPD Rant think? more ›

W Magazine has a feature on the famous spawn of celebrity, currently rocking out in the dim spotlights of downtown clubs. Amongst them are CBS CEO Les Moonves's son (Chief), Susan Sarandon and Tim Robbin's son (The Tangents), Michael Keaton's son (The Hatch), Jann Wenner's son (The Ellis Unit), Ellen Barkin and Gabriel Byrne's son (also in the Ellis Unit), and...you get the picture. more ›

• Today on the Gothamist Newsmap: an unusual rescue on 68th St. and Central Park West in Manhattan, a confined space rescue at Lorimer and Meserole Sts. in Brooklyn, and a shooting on Carpenter Ave. and 221st St. in the Bronx.
• Columbia University is a-brimming with protests, against things like torture and apathy.
• A young man and his family are recovering from a freak accident involving a fallen tree branch in Riverside Park that put him in a coma.
• Billionaire Ron Perelman is suing his ex-wife Ellen Barkin and her brother for draining a company they founded together of a few hundred thousand dollars.
• The Long Island man with the "GETOSAMA" license plates filed a federal suit against the DMV to have them returned.
• Regulatory and zoning issues continue to hold up the construction of a Brooklyn Whole Foods grocery store, despite a groundbreaking that occurred a year ago.
• A 37-year veteran with the DOT was arrested after being accused of accepting bribes in relation to bridge construction.
• The application for a zoning change to the St. Saviour's property in Queens has apparently been withdrawn.

This is sure: Jennifer Connelly is breathtakingly beautiful and her husband, Paul Bettany, is no slouch himself. And from all gossip, they seem very cute when they are living their lives in Brooklyn with their kids. That said, we were amused to read in the Post that Bettany freaked out at the Waverly Inn when another patron made some comments about Connelly. Various witnesses tell the Post that some dude as making "lewd comments" or comments that weren't insulting but more "objectifying."

Bettany - who was about 10 feet from Connelly, his Academy Award-winning co-star in "A Beautiful Mind" - heard what was going on and "completely lost his temper" with the man who approached her, the witnesses said. more ›

If you got a copy of today's NY Times, there's no way you could have resisted reading the Styles section story about Ellen Barkin. Not only was there a big headline ("Ellen Unloads") and big photograph of her, there were photos of jewelry accumulated during her marriage to Ron Perelman - jewelry that will be auctioned at Christie's New York on October 10. And it's some decadent stuff. We looked up the auction on the Christie's website, where we learned that sometimes necklaces are called sautoirs and that Ron Perelman must be many a jeweler's friend (apparently Ron loved to buy diamonds rings). The "Magnificent Jewels from the Collection of Ellen Barkin" is expected to bring in $10-15 million, and Barkin tells the Times she's using proceeds to fund her own film production company. Now we understand the discrepancy in her post-divorce settlement numbers. more ›

- One reason not to be a panda? Photographs of your deflowering (like that of four-year-old panda Lin Hui, right) may appear on a Reuters feed. They are cute though. more ›

Todd Solondz, Filmmaker more ›