Lucy Mangan on the people in the media spotlight in the past seven days
Silence please
Iman Al-Obeidi
In a world full of them, Al-Obeidi's tale stands as a strong contender for least uplifting story of the year. This Libyan woman burst into the journalist-stuffed Rixos al-Nasr hotel in Tripoli saying that she had been gang-raped, beaten, defecated and urinated on by Gaddafi's militiamen at a checkpoint. She was then set upon in the hotel by waitresses, security staff and government minders, and dragged away into a car. The alleged rapists have launched a criminal case against her for blackening their names.
As outrage about her treatment has grown, her family claim they have been offered bribes by Gaddafi's people to get her to retract her story and have her released. It is unclear where Al-Obeidi is being held. It is very clear that her alleged attackers are not being held at all. And so this rotten, stinking world turns.
Best man down
Ed Miliband
Busy week for Miliband minor. Rallying speeches to anti-cuts protesters, then to AV gonks, and finally the news that he and his partner are to be married in May. But – duh-duh-duuuh! – there is no best man.
Note to EM: when the main public perceptions of you are a) that you're only getting married to appease the cretinous portion of the electorate who care and b) that you and big bro are on no-speaks because of the whole leadership thing, you need to go all out to prove otherwise. A stag night to end all stag nights ("We stayed up reading Kolakowski's Main Currents of Marxism til half two! Ended up with me being tied to a think tank and pelted with position papers!"), and David front and centre wearing the wackiest black tie he owns to signal all is well. OK? On you go.
Can I get a celebrity witness?
George Clooney
"I am the most accused man in history and the universe," cried Italian premier Silvio Berlusconi this week. Of course, many might muse that there might be a reason for that. But Silvio is not among them. His task is to rebut and refute the various allegations of corruption and underage sex piled up against him, and to this end his lawyers have compiled a list of 78 potential witnesses to be called to the "bunga bunga" trial. It includes Clooney and his girlfriend, whom "Ruby" (the underage fulcrum on which the sex plank of the allegations is balanced) says attended a party – a claim the couple themselves deny – and the footballer Cristiano Ronaldo.
The prosecutors' list, meanwhile, has but a nugatory celebrity quotient, concentrating instead on the women who supposedly worked as prostitutes at the gatherings. Bo-o-ring! Honestly, it's like they have no idea how this thing's supposed to work at all.
What we've learned
66% of homes have DIY jobs unfinished
Childcare by grandparents is worth £33bn a year
There are fewer than 1,000 adders left in the UK
Walnuts are the healthiest of all nuts
Vanilla Ice is making his panto debut at Chatham theatre, Kent this December
… and what we haven't
Just how the dancing was split between Natalie Portman and her body double in Black Swan. The world needs to know.
What they said
"I'm gonna let him plead, pay a small fine and he's gotta sing Blue Eyes Crying In The Rain with his guitar in the courtroom." Hudspeth County Attorney and Willy Nelson fan Kit Bramblett concludes how best to deal with the singer's latest charge of pot possession.
"Bacon is the most perfect invention ever. It's like smoking and taking a shit at the same time." Comic Greg Proops speaks from the heavily furred heart.
"I am a ladies man who can never make love." Andrew Lloyd Webber gives us too much information about his post-prostate-cancer state.