To print this page, select "Print" from the File menu of your browser salon.com > People Dec. 18, 1999 URL: http://www.salon.com/people/col/reit/1999/12/18/npw1218 I'm dreaming of the white room President Oprah? Godfather Trump? Noah Wyle will see you now? Starstock.com survey sez ... fans are nuts; after 33 years of throwing punches, William F. Buckley Jr. hangs it up. Plus: Jann Wenner jams, Yoko Ono swings ... it must be office-party season. - - - - - - - - - - - - By Amy Reiter It was an abbreviated week for Nothing Personal: Tuesday, Thursday and Friday. It began with news of a survey that indicates our country is apparently crying out desperately for relationship counseling – I mean desperate enough to turn to Howard Stern. And ended with a report on Jann Wenner rocking out before his troops at the office party, where, gripped by the spirit of the season, he sang that old holiday favorite, "White Room." "White Room"? - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Tuesday: "Starstock raving mad" How would you like to get back from vacation only to be met with the news that recently separated Howard Stern has been chosen as the celebrity from whom Americans would most like to get their relationship advice -- with the maritally challenged Kathie Lee Gifford trailing close behind? Would it make you proud to be an American? Then so might this. According to a year-end survey conducted by StarStock.com, people would pick Donald Trump above all other celebrities to be their child's godparent, would trust Dr. Carter of "ER" to be their operating-room physician and would put their faith in Oprah Winfrey as president. They'd also rather have Jerry Springer than Dr. Ruth give their kids the first-time sex talk. Suggested birds-and-bees approach for the former mayor of Cincinnati: "Well, Billy, sex is something a man and a woman who love each other very much do together ... but if you're an elected official, it's best not to pay by check." Read the entire Nothing Personal column for Tuesday, Dec. 14. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Thursday: "Retiring line" I'd been warned, but not long after I arrived at HBO studios for the taping of the final "Firing Line" (it ran from April 1966 to December 1999), I grew weak. As I clustered in the studio's green room with my fellow latecomers, I was treated to a montage of William F. Buckley Jr. -- young, old, young again (but always with that strange delivery: immobile neck, reptilian tongue flicker, eye flash, Cheshire Cat grin) -- mixing it up with a stream of the "prominent liberals" who appeared on his show during its 33 years on the air. ("Firing Line" was the longest-running talk show in TV history.) The clips showed the best of Buckley through the decades: looking supremely bored by Jesse Jackson, insulting the late civil-rights attorney William Kunstler, alarming Germaine Greer ("Oh, come, come," she clucked, hand to throat, in response to some right-wing diatribe) and even -- in 1968 -- rendering Muhammad Ali speechless. Read the entire Nothing Personal column for Thursday, Dec. 16. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Friday: "Rack of hams" It sounds like an office holiday-party nightmare: The boss gets onstage with his pals and cranks out classic-rock hits. But if Wenner Media magnate Jann Wenner deserved the hook as he crooned and strummed "Rainy Day Women #12 & 35," "White Room," "Misunderstood" and "Love Me Tender" at the Roxy in New York on Tuesday night, his employees aren't saying. "It was fun," one party attendee told me. "The best part was watching the people in the audience. On one side of the stage you had Yoko Ono swing dancing and on the other side you had guys from the mailroom getting down. [MTV's] Kurt Loder and G.E. Smith [of 'Saturday Night Live'] were at the sides, really getting into it." Read the entire Nothing Personal column for Friday, Dec. 17. salon.com | Dec. 18, 1999