Oprah doesn’t like sharing her magazine cover.  It’s not one of her favorite things.  She’s only ever shared with Michelle Obama before this December’s issue.  After Ellen Degeneres’ aggressive campaigning, she appears with Big O on not one, but two covers.

I love Ellen, even if I don’t understand her love of all things O.  You know what else I don’t love?  Oprah’s constant yammering about living her authentic self.  Just how many whacks of Photoshop’s warp brush tool do you think O’s saddlebags were treated to?  Even in discussing the shoot, Oprah said “When Ellen arrived at the photo shoot for our cover, I didn’t have to ask her how she was doing: it showed on her face.  She radiated the kind of peace and satisfaction that comes only when you’re living at your highest potential.”  I wish I could get five minutes with Oprah to ask if she’s living at her highest potential or is she just edited to appear that way.

Taylor Swift got pranked at Ellen the other day and apparently she had the pants scared off her so badly that she wound up on the bathroom floor of her dressing room. Taylor was a really good sport about the prank and laughed until she and Ellen embraced, but her reaction definitely implied that she was freakin’ out there for a moment.

American Idol is very, very careful to get record-label approval for every song they use, and they’re going to have to start explaining that shit to Ellen in the near future. Her talk show’s producers are being sued for the use of music during the TOTALLY AWESOME “dance over” segment, where Ellen dances through the audience to some super-fun tune and it’s hilarious and even I laugh. But apparently it’s not funny to the record labels, who weren’t paid for license fees.

According to the suit filed Wednesday in U.S. District Court in Nashville, when representatives of the recording companies asked defendants why they hadn’t obtained licenses to use the songs, defendants said they didn’t “roll that way.”

“As sophisticated consumers of music, Defendants knew full well that, regardless of the way they rolled, under the Copyright Act, and under state law for the pre-1972 recordings, they needed a license to use the sound recordings lawfully,” the suit states. …

The suit claims the daytime talk show has used copyrighted music without permission since its inception, including “recordings by virtually every major current artist of popular music.” It claims the show routinely used some of the most popular songs of the day, which the record labels don’t license for daytime television at any price.

Plaintiffs include Arista Music, Atlantic Recording Corp., Capitol Records, Motown Record Company, Sony Music Entertainment, Virgin Records America and Warner Bros. Records.

The suit does not specify the dollar amount it seeks in damages.

My Lord, whomever told these record companies that licensing wasn’t the way they rolled ought to be fired, and quick. Why on earth would they think they didn’t have to obtain licensing? Who do they think they are — bloggers?

I’ll tell you what’s funny, though — no one would have reported on this story if Ellen hadn’t been named the fourth Idol judge this week. Success is a bitch.

This comes so far out of left field, it’s guaranteed to be a home run. As we were all sitting around, shaking our heads and wondering how on earth American Idol could continue to be interesting during its post-Paulum depression, the FOX executives were doing something absolutely genius: They were hiring Ellen Degeneres.

Ellen will take the fourth judge’s seat after its preliminary auditions phase (so basically she gets to miss out on the worst part.) “I’ve watched since the beginning and I’ve always been a huge fan, so getting this job is a dream come true,” said Ellen.

It’s funny this should happen today. I’ve been absent from around here for awhile — I was at a cabin in the middle of Idaho, for anyone who’s interested — and this morning I found myself sitting in front of the TV as it happened to be tuned to Ellen. It’s been years since I’ve watched her show, and I was just struck with how creative and entertaining and all-around brilliant her show is. I was like “I wish I had the opportunity to see more of her.” AND NOW I WILL!

Ya know, I really thought Paula was irreplaceable on that show. I bet she thought that, too. But they didn’t try to find another Paula — they found her polar opposite. I think Ellen will continue Paula’s tradition of treating the contestants with kindness, but she’ll be perceptive and (intentionally) funny and sober in the process, and I think it’ll be fantastic for the show. Ellen seems to have lately really embraced her inner butch lesbian — and I’m loving the look on her — and I think it’ll be fantastic to have an openly gay presence on the show. I’m certain it’ll prevent Ryan and Simon from hinting at one another’s homosexuality as an insult, which was getting really really old.

Well-played, my friends at FOX.

Well this is interesting. An informal poll conducted by ParentDish.com asked over 10,000 mothers which celebrity couple they’d be most comfortable leaving their kids with. The winner? Ellen Degeneres and Portia de Rossi.

The TV chat show host and her wife took 31% of votes with Jennifer Aniston coming in second at 22%. Brad and Angie got 18% of votes, while Oprah Winfrey got just 9%.

Now, granted, this isn’t exactly Pew research, but 10,000 moms is a pretty large sample size. And they feel safer having their kids with non-mom Jen than with parents-of-six Brangelina! AND they trust their kids around HOMOSEXUALS! Shocking!!! Isn’t it a part of the gay agenda to allow people to have sex with children as well as household pets? I guess I got my facts wrong, because American women feel their children are perfectly safe with a gay couple.

As Wendie mentioned this morning, the rotting, hungover corpse of Lindsay Lohan appeared on Ellen Degeneres’ show today to talk about Samantha and the “rumors” about her life. Now we have the clips. Enjoy.

Guys, I’m really sorry about this Linds news every single day.  You know how I feel about her, but these stories just keep popping up and I’m afraid that if I don’t report them, Beet will punish me by making me watch a twenty-four hour-long compilation DVD of the works of Julia Roberts, or something as equally horrific.

Anyway, Ellen DeGeneres and wife Portia de Rossi, or Double De as they are affectionately called by me, attended the 20th Annual GLAAD Media Awards in which Ellen won Outstanding Talk Show Episode for the episode of Ellen that featured Ellen and Portia’s wedding.  Ellen told Access Hollywood, “We didn’t register, so this is nice. We get an award!”

She also let it be known that Lindsay Lohan is set to appear on Ellen.  “I’m excited. I want to hear what Lindsay has to say and [I] hope she gets back to her career.  She seems to be reaching out to people lately… I hope she’s OK… she’s so talented.  I’m going to ask her what’s going on and let her have a platform to speak.”

Can someone, anyone, please explain to me just how talented Lindsay Lohan is?  I’m not kidding right now, I’m open to learning.  What production, done within the last five years (because we cannot allow Linds to still be riding on the hair extensions coattails of Parent Trap), has Lindsay appeared in and been “so talented,”?  I respect Ellen a lot both as a human and as a comedienne so I’m sure she’s right and I’m just overlooking some body of work.  And if Lindsay was good in something, I really need to watch whatever it was so I can be more educated on this loved and hated girl.  Call it research for the job.

I’ve got two open slots on my Netflix queue right now.  Tell me what Lohan masterpiece I need to order up.  Go.