Gossip

Yeah, but what's up with the nose

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In case you've forgotten that more than one aspect of Michael Jackson's life is under public scrutiny, a medical doctor now says that the King of Glop can be believed when he says his skin is involuntarily turning white.

Len Horovitz, a New York doctor who has many celebrity patients, tells FoxNews.com that he treated Jackson a few times in the 1990s and that the singer really does have vitiligo, a skin disorder that causes smooth white spots to appear on the body.

"He has not had chemical peels or used any drugs to do it. ... The vitiligo is real," Horovitz said.

Reader alert: Possibly too much information ahead:

In giving a few details, Horovitz said that Jackson is "blotchy in places that you can't see, and he does wear makeup in public."

Totally pointless moment of the week: People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals has decided to become boring. The group known for dramatic, over-the-top displays to bring attention to its mission agreed this year to abandon its catwalk-crashing at New York Fashion Week and operate under conventional means. So Monday it held a traditional press conference to traditionally introduce its new media campaign starring the long-past-his-freshness-expiration-date Dennis Rodman. The focal point is a poster with the tattoo-covered Rodman naked and a slogan sure to send fur and leather sales to record levels: "Think Ink, Not Mink."

Come back, William Hung: Simon Cowell predicts that someone like Ruben Studdard or Fantasia Barrino will win this edition of American Idol. And he thinks that would be a disaster. Because neither of them deserved to win to begin with.

The no-holds-barred Idol judge was heard saying these things in what the New York Post described as a heated phone conversation with one of the show's producers in a Los Angeles hotel. He said there was almost no talent among the hopefuls who made it to the Hollywood round and that apart from a country singer from Missouri, the group was a bunch of "untalented Usher wannabes."

He then made his Ruben-Fantasia prediction and said Kelly Clarkson is the only winner among the show's three that has talent.

Super Bowl fashion update: Alicia Keys' very sharp fedora is from milliner Eric Javits, the New York Post says. He has a similar style for purchase on his Web site, www.ericjavits.com Just ignore the name he gave it: Britney.