Who is Johnny Lopez? He’s a writer-producer at TMZ who has been on board with Harvey Levin since the website’s earliest days.

He’s also basically the only guy, besides Harvey, who gets to byline items at TMZ.com rather than be herded under the generic moniker of “TMZ staff.” This morning, his latest blurb is about how last night’s American Idol telecast dealt with Lady Gaga‘s clear-plastic penis heels:

When Gaga appeared on the show, producers smacked an Idol logo over her sexually explicit stilettos because they each had a Lucite penis for a heel. The porno pumps by London fashion brand Void of Course may be racy but they ain’t cheap… They retail for over $4500.

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For the May issue of Harper’s Bazaar, contributor Derek Blasberg recently sat down with Lady Gaga at a small New York City recording studio.

First order of business is what she was wearing (as always, impressively thrown together). Third order of business involves her newly accented horn-like bone protrusions (we all have them, she insisted). And the penultimate order of business turns out to be one of the most hilarious descriptions of LA we’ve ever heard from a self-professed east coaster:

Gaga says that once she had become a household name, she felt pressured to move to the pop-culture mecca that is Los Angeles… Suffice to say, it didn’t work out.

“I put my toe in that water, and it was a Kegel-exercise vaginal reaction where I clenched and had to retract immediately,” she says in a very vivid metaphor. “I ran furiously back to New York, to my old apartment, and I hung out with my friends, and I went to the same bars.”

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It started today with an article in London’s The Daily Mail. Under the blaring headline “Cowell Signs YouTube Girl, 10” came the news of how a Toronto youngster, Heather Russell, has been signed to a recording contract by The X Factor impresario after he watched her YouTube video.

Another long syndicated story about the Simon Cowell deal has quickly hit Canadian newspapers, indicating that Russell will soon be moving to LA to pursue her golden opportunity. Take a listen; this girl’s talents – which have previously been noted by the likes of Ashton Kutcher – are pretty astounding, especially when you consider she also wrote the song:

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The Buffalo Beast has published its annual Matt Taibbi-inspired (he founded the paper) list of the “50 Most Loathsome Americans.” Not surprisingly, a few Angelenos made the cut.

Media creatures Perez Hilton and Andrew Breitbart were on there–along with Breibart’s truth-challenged protege James O’Keefe. Celeb-wise, Kim Kardashian, Charlie Sheen and Lady Gaga were also on there. Yawn. Far more interesting is the Beast‘s writeup of “Lost” writer and co-creator Damon Lindelof.

As co-creator of “Lost” and co-writer of the monumentally terrible final episode, Lindelof first conjured a confusing yet entertaining sci-fi epic but then, despite its mechanical sound, the “Smoke Monster” turns out to be the ghost of the father of liberal philosophy, side plots about mental illness and alternate universes go nowhere, paper-thin characters inexplicably commune with the dead, and finally, in a clichéd, Old Testament-inspired supernatural battle, evil is defeated when a big rock dildo is crammed into a shiny hole by a handsome, emotionless doctor. And the whole damn thing—concocted entirely on the fly, with no eye toward resolution—from the plane crash to the time travel was actually just some brightly-lit, stained glass, feel-good, new-age, ecumenical afterlife delirium. Right. Fuck you, Damon Lindelof. Fuck you, for stealing 127 hours of our lives, giving us hope that television needn’t be utterly awful, and then shitting out the most hackneyed, series-diminishing, spiritually pandering, lowest common denominator deus ex machina to ever air on TV. Fuck you. Fuck you with a fake beard.

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Score one for the bad girls. Women’s Wear Daily notes that the outrageous and overtly sexual Lady Gaga as cover girl made for great magazine sales in 2010, while decidedly vanilla country-pop starlet Taylor Swift stayed on the shelves. Numbers culled by the Audit Bureau of Circulations reveal that covers featuring the innovative pop icon were 2010 bestsellers for Rolling Stone and Cosmopolitan. Gaga’s Vanity Fair issue was the second highest selling of the year, beat out only by superstar Angelina Jolie.

In contrast, Taylor Swift was no friend to print. Reports WWD:

Her April Elle cover was its worst seller of the year through October, with sales running 60,000 less than the average on the newsstand; her November cover for Glamour was the second-worst-selling for the monthly, and her July Marie Claire cover was the third-worst-selling issue for that monthly through October.

To be fair, not all the sales numbers for 2010 are in. Swift graced the December covers of Allure and Entertainment Weekly, and we’ve yet to hear how well those issues sold.

Hat tip Romenesko.

Madame Tussaud’s Hollywood is the kind of attraction few LA locals would ever think of visiting, other than when the in-laws or other relatives are in town. But having stopped by over the weekend, FishbowlLA has some important holiday season news: if you’re struggling to come up with a kitschy photo for your 2010 Christmas card, this place is a goldmine!

When William Shatner was inducted into Tussaud’s, he reportedly exclaimed of his drip-doppelganger, “There’s wax in his ears!” Per the image below, that’s your trusty FBLA correspondent, wishing you a very Vulcan Xmas from the bridge of Starship Tussaud’s. (For good measure, it also says “Merry Xmas!!!” on my forehead.)

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One is a 17-year-old high school student in Duisberg; the other, a 23-year-old unemployed male in Wesel. Both still live with their German parents. Nevertheless, this unlikely pair was able to victimize from afar Lady Gaga, Justin Timberlake and other pop superstars over a one-year period.

According to a report in the newspaper Bild, Deniz A. (a.k.a. DJ Stolen) and Christian M. simply emailed an MP3 file with an attached Trojan virus to reps for Gaga, Timberlake and other entertainers. Faster than you can say “Hasselhoff”, they were in possession of unreleased new tracks and, in one unidentified case, a compromising picture of a pop star.

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New York Times fashion writer Cathy Horyn shares a fascinating look at 43-year-old Chinese fashion designer Guo Pei, whose meteoric rise over the past decade and a half has paralleled her native country’s consumerist revolution.

While most fashionistas (and butchers) would die at the thought of Lady Gaga wearing one of their creations, Pei apparently could have cared less. In the middle of Horyn’s article is this titillating LA tidbit:

Not long after a November China show, Nicola Formichetti, an editor who helps style Lady Gaga, contacted Pei to borrow some clothes… There is nothing dainty about a 40-pound crystal beaded dress, as Lady Gaga discovered when four or five dresses (and the platform shoes) arrived in Los Angeles, ‘‘all beautifully packaged in silver boxes,’’ Formichetti recalled. She tried them on, he said, ‘‘but basically couldn’t move in them, so they couldn’t work onstage.’’

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Sesame Street resident Cookie Monster is so eager to host “Saturday Night Live” that he’s created an audition video to show his chops. From an opening monologue to parodies of MacGruber and Lady Gaga, the Monster makes his case. Plus, muppets are so under-represented on late night television! Help Cookie Monster pull a Betty White and join the Facebook campaign.

“I’m here to be a voice my generation. Not the generation of the senators who are voting but for the youth of this county,” says Lady Gaga. She also calls John McCain out by name.

About time these celebrities do something useful.