To print this page, select "Print" from the File menu of your browser salon.com > People Sept. 29, 1999 URL: http://www.salon.com/people/col/reit/1999/09/29/np929 What a waste it is to lose one's laughingstock Danny drops out; Shaq backs Gore; Bauer doth protest too much. Plus! More on Diana Ross' breastly behavior! - - - - - - - - - - - - By Amy Reiter It was a sad, sad day for the late-night TV set, but they made the most of it. After Dan Quayle announced his withdrawal from the presidential race on Monday, Jay Leno called it "probably the worst day of my life," and suggested that he and his fellow comedians take up a collection to keep him in the race. David Letterman said he felt sorry for Quayle, noting, "It's a sad situation when you've got Donald Trump running for president, you've got Warren Beatty running for president and Dan Quayle is still considered the dumb one." But Craig Kilborn offered this encouraging news: "Quayle has agreed, however, to remain in the public spotlight for an additional three months, until another national laughingstock can be appointed." Phew! - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Premature denial? That blind item in New York Daily News' "Daily Dish" column about a presidential candidate who is "praying that a former secretary doesn't go public with her claim that he's been having an affair with a twentysomething woman"? Like a lot of other people, GOP presidential hopeful Gary Bauer thinks the gossip columnists mean him and that the item was planted by one of his political rivals, and he's not very happy about it. "It's disgusting. It makes me physically sick," he told the San Francisco Chronicle. "My wife and I have been married for 27 years. We have three children. I have been loyal to her, and she's been loyal to me all those years. And it is depressing that in American politics, this sort of thing can be elevated to even that rung." What's more, he said, "You'd have to be a complete idiot to do something like this in the glare of a presidential campaign." - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - White House Pet? (And I don't mean Buddy.) "There was some joking there would be first lady of the month." -- Donald Trump's swingin' advisor Roger Stone on his client's active love life, on CNBC's "Rivera Live" Monday. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Sowing the seeds of success I don't know about "Walkin' on the Sun," but certain members of the alterna-rock band Smash Mouth are coming clean about dancin' on the wrong side of the law. In an upcoming High Times magazine interview, vocalist Steve Harwell and drummer Kevin Coleman admit to supporting the band during its lean early years by trolling through pot gardens in the Bay Area, merrily plucking the feisty foliage, and then drying and selling the seeds for a tidy profit. But hey, Harwell and Coleman weren't in it just for themselves. Oh, no. Chalk it up to drug-addled delusions of grandeur if you will, but the duo saw themselves as regular Robin Hoods of the wacky weed, providing the product at a deep discount from what the growers would have charged. "I was probably stealing the guys' mortgages or something, but I was young and dumb," an older, wiser Harwell now muses in the pot-lovers' bible. And while Harwell says toking up now "just makes me paranoid," Coleman is still living the high life. "I'm on the 11-step program: weed and coffee," he says, "and once in a while some Tylenol PMs." Probably swiped from his local Rite Aid. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - But will it play in Pashtoonistan? "With 'Bowfinger' my aim was not to write a sophisticated comedy. I wanted to write something that would play in Afghanistan." -- Steve Martin on his lofty comedic goals, in the London Telegraph. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Milking the attention for all it's worth Sheesh. Heaven help a gal if she fails to note an on-air furtive breast feel around here. In response to my coverage of Diana Ross' recent alleged breast brush in London's Heathrow Airport, I received a flurry of e-mail from readers who were truly, deeply upset that no mention was made of the Supreme diva groping the gazonga of hip-hop vocalist Lil' Kim at the MTV Music Video Awards earlier this month. Consider mention now made. Ross copped to the cupping on Larry King last week, maintaining she was merely acting "like a mother" at the time. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Juicy bits What would you pay for Ty Cobb's false teeth? Karen Shemonsky of Clarks Summit, Pa., forked over $7,475 to snap up Cobb's dentures at a Sotheby's baseball memorabilia auction Monday -- something her friends are giving her a lot of plaque, er ... flack, about. "They keep calling me, saying, 'Why would you want that?'" Shemonsky told reporters after her toothy haul. "My sister goes on cruises. I'd rather have this in my hand." In other words, "Bite me." Moynihan, shmoynihan ... It's time for a political Shaq attack. Los Angeles Lakers center and consummate product endorser Shaquille O'Neal is standing tall for Al Gore, not -- as B-ball fans might expect -- former New York Knicks All-Star Bill Bradley. And Bill Cosby has announced he's getting on Gore's ark, too. "It's huge," Gore spokesman Chris Lehane crowed to the Associated Press. "These two are very prominent Americans who have both transcended their professions." Wonder what the opinionated retiring senator from New York makes of the Lakers' chances this year ... salon.com | Sept. 29, 1999