I begin today more distressed than ever about the situation in today’s “fourth estate,” as there are a welter of “bombshell” stories the conservative media and blogosphere are freaking out over while the Axis media are ignoring them entirely…and vice-versa. I have no way to figure out “what’s happening.”

If you can, please: speak up.

I should mention that the clip above from “Poltergeist,” one of the most frequently used in the Ethics Alarms Hollywood Clip Archive, is a small measure of immortality that I can confer to the memory of Dominique Dunne, the actress who played “Dana.” She was murdered by her boyfriend in 1982, the same year the movie was released. Dominique Dunne was 22.

There should be a lot to write about today that I have missed so far.

Meanwhile, the Hackman demise mystery is more confused now than when I posted on it yesterday. The theories are getting really wild now: last night I heard an “expert” speculate that Hackman and his wife had simultaneous heart attacks.

I think we can officially conclude that the Hackmans did not kill their dog as part of a grand, planned exit, because two of the couple’s dogs are alive and well. Well, good. The post was primarily about the unethical practice of euthanizing healthy dogs “out of love.” (No one has yet suggested that the dogs conspired to rub out their masters, but the way the speculation is going, that theory may surface yet.

I always feel terrible when any well-loved and respected public figure has a final act that is embarrassing, lurid, pathetic or ugly. Often this means that the mess is remembered for than what went before, which was what mattered.

Do write something memorable for me today.

Well, today has started like so many other mornings lately: by me being kicked out of bed by my dog. (We’re going to have to talk about this.) Then, like so many Fridays, I find myself thinking about how the entire weekend is going to be devoted to work and depressing chores, causing me to feel like I owe myself a tiny break today, but I won’t really take one, just slack off enough to make me feel lazy and irresponsible.

Then I visited my email, and told a website optimizer who claimed EA had “no web presence at all” to bite me. I wish it had more “presence” just as I wish I could figure out a way to make some money for the work I do here about four hours a day without minimizing readership, but I can’t, and that’s that. I didn’t start Ethics Alarms for profit, and I won’t run it that way.

Finally, as I stare at another blank “Add New Post” page, I find myself getting all warm, fuzzy, teary and grateful over the outpouring of appreciation and kindness I have received over the past horrible year from so many of you out there. I wish I were organized enough to write individual notes, but I’m not…that kind of thing was among Grace’s jobs, because I’m too scattered and easily distracted to do it competently.

This was especially true during the holidays. I got cards with messages that made me cry, gift cards, and checks: one of you even stopped by the house to deliver a gift (and give me some much needed human company and live face-to-face conversation.) I received almost as many seasonal greeting from the readers here as I did from people around the country I have actually met—hmmmmm, maybe that should tell me something.

It all meant a great deal to me, and does, and will. Thank you for reading, thank you for caring, and thank you for giving me something to look forward to during each and every day, especially during a year during which most days began with me hoping that everything was just a bad dream, and that I would find Grace in the shower, like Bobby Ewing at the end of that infamous fake season on “Dallas.”

Well enough mushy stuff: get to work. You have some brilliant comments to write, and I have to go argue with a pit bull….