FASHION
• Stella McCartney just had baby number three: Beckett Robert Lee Willis. [WWD]
• Mulberry’s new shoe line is set to debut on Valentine’s Day. [British Vogue]
• The Hills girls will no longer “work” at Teen Vogue. [WWD]
FINANCE
• Tony Blair, somewhat strapped for cash with a big mortgage on a house in Connaught Square, signed on as a part-time adviser to JPMorgan Chase. Thanks to the million-dollar salary for the occasional quick chat and speaking fees at $500,000 a pop, Blair should be able to avoid his own little mortgage meltdown. [FT]
• Is Ben Bernanke just too nice to lead the Federal Reserve? The new chief has tried to build consensus with his fellow economists, and several top bankers miss the days when Alan Greenspan led the Fed with an iron fist. [NYT]
• Steve Schwarzman has become a household name in China — and, now that China’s $3 billion stake in Blackstone has lost $1 billion in just six months, something of a household curse. [The Atlantic]
MEDIA
• Katie Couric may finally get the chance to moderate a debate: CBS News resolved its two-year contract dispute with 500 writers, unrelated to the main strike, which had led the Democrats to pull out of a previous debate. [NYT]
• Men’s Vogue has been making some big enemies in the mag’s brief run. Will Smith, Daniel Day-Lewis, Owen Wilson, and Wes Anderson have all been promised the cover, only to find that it runs months after their movies come out or that their pics — gasp! — shifted inside. [NYDN]
• Tom Brokaw on the networks’ bad predictions: “The pirouettes are amazing… . [Despite] the utter confidence with which everyone had been wrong twenty minutes earlier, they have the same utter confidence about what produced this surprise. It’s intellectually dishonest.” [WP]
LAW
• The long-awaited big-law bloodletting has begun: Cadwalader announced layoffs of 35 associates. Which firm will be next? [Above the Law]
• Associates are earning more than ever, so why all the bitching? Oh, now they’re getting fired. [NYO]
• Stephen Breyer almost set a record for most days as the junior justice, a title that required him to open the door when the justices were in closed session. But now that Alito’s taken over, Breyer’s finding it hard to drop the old servile habits: “When there is a knock at the door, I suddenly react and start to get up. I had been used to it like a Pavlovian dog.” [Legal Times]
