Oprah Winfrey

I read with interest Maralyn Lois Polak's Oct. 12 Inquirer Magazine interview with Oprah Winfrey. Ms. Polak seemed to be upset that Ms. Winfrey has told us so much about her life. I say, good for you, Oprah, because if the media had told it first, they would have made it 10 times worse. I must take issue with Ms. Polak on two things. What right does she have to call someone a "natural disaster"? And if Ms. Winfrey's show is the lowest of the low, what does that say for The Phil Donahue Show and People Are Talking, which are in the same vein?

The deconstruction of Lance Armstrong's legend, which the disgraced cyclist built with the aid of performance-enhancing drugs and savagely defended whenever his dark secret was challenged, continued Tuesday, two days before the world at last gets to hear his confession. According to reports confirmed by Oprah Winfrey, Armstrong admitted to cheating during a 21/2-hour interview with the celebrity host that will be televised over two nights, beginning Thursday. While it would be Armstrong's first public acknowledgment that the suspicions that long shadowed his unprecedented success were true, Winfrey said he "did not come clean in the manner that I expected.

Cyclist Lance Armstrong , stripped of his seven Tour de France titles and given a lifetime ban, will make a limited confession to doping in an interview with Oprah Winfrey , according to a person with knowledge who spoke to the Associated Press. The 41-year-old Armstrong, who has long denied doping, will also reportedly offer an apology during the interview, scheduled to be taped Monday at his home in Austin, Texas, and televised Thursday. While not directly saying he would confess or apologize, Armstrong texted the AP on Saturday, saying: "I told [Winfrey]

Lance Armstrong ended a decade of denial by confessing to Oprah Winfrey that he used performance-enhancing drugs to win the Tour de France, a person familiar with the situation told the Associated Press. The admission Monday came hours after an emotional apology by Armstrong to the Livestrong charity that he founded and turned into a global institution on the strength of his celebrity as a cancer survivor. The person spoke on condition of anonymity because the interview is to be broadcast Thursday on Winfrey's network.

IT SEEMS LIKE Forbes publishes one of its highest-paid-celebrity lists every few weeks, but maybe that's just because Oprah Winfrey is always on top. So what if OWN is searching for viewers the way presidential candidates are searching for undecided voters, Oprah still topped this year's Forbes celebrity-earners list, netting $165 million in the fiscal year ending in May. Yes, it's $125 million down from the year before, but here at Tattle,...

CHICAGO - Lance Armstrong finally cracked. Not while expressing deep remorse or regrets, though there was plenty of that in Friday night's second part of Armstrong's interview with Oprah Winfrey. It wasn't over the $75 million in lost sponsorship deals, nor when Armstrong was forced to walk away from the Livestrong cancer charity he founded and called his "sixth child. " It wasn't even about his lifetime ban from competition. It was another bit of collateral damage that Armstrong said he wasn't prepared to deal with.

TWO WEEKS AGO, Oprah Winfrey went to Instagram and Twitter - @oprah, natch - to post praises of one of her favorite things. The O electronically professed her endless love of a $249 countertop kitchen appliance, a fryer that transforms baking taters into french fries using a scant amount of oil. "This machine . . . T-Fal actifry has changed my life," wrote Winfrey. "And they're not paying me to say it. " (One would hope not, since America's pre-eminent media mogul seems to do quite well for herself with the jobs she's already got.)

GO AHEAD, Lance Armstrong, run to Oprah. Better yet, ride your bike. A real man would have held a news conference and submitted himself to reporters' questions instead of hiding behind Oprah Winfrey's forgiving skirttails. If Lance Armstrong were truly genuine, he'd stand in front of a sea of cameras and admit: "I cheated for years. I lied about it over and over. And I'm sorry. " Straight-up, no chaser. That's how a public figure of Armstrong's stature should admit guilt and apologize for what he's done.

OPRAH Winfrey, when asked why she was starting a school in South Africa and not in the U.S., said: "I became so frustrated with visiting inner-city schools that I just stopped going. The sense that you need to learn just isn't there. If you ask the kids what they want or need, they will say an iPod or some sneakers. In South Africa, they don't ask for money or toys. They ask for uniforms so they can go to school. " Is Oprah right on, or off-base? Please keep your replies to 100 words or less, and send them to "Burning Question" at one of the addresses listed below.

OPRAH Winfrey, who recently got the city's Marian Anderson Award for her humanitarian efforts, demonstrated once again why she is so deserving of it. Ms. Winfrey televised her trip to South Africa, where she concentrated on bringing joy into the lives of hundreds, perhaps thousands, of children orphaned by the scourge of AIDS. Many of the children themselves had the disease. Because I also recently traveled to South Africa, I saw that some small steps toward preventing the spread of HIV have been taken at last.

TWO WEEKS AGO, Oprah Winfrey went to Instagram and Twitter - @oprah, natch - to post praises of one of her favorite things. The O electronically professed her endless love of a $249 countertop kitchen appliance, a fryer that transforms baking taters into french fries using a scant amount of oil. "This machine . . . T-Fal actifry has changed my life," wrote Winfrey. "And they're not paying me to say it. " (One would hope not, since America's pre-eminent media mogul seems to do quite well for herself with the jobs she's already got.)

Oprah Winfrey , 59, and history's youngest best-actress Oscar nominee, Quvenzhane Wallis , who is half a century her junior, were two of the honorees at Essence magazine's sixth annual Black Women in Hollywood awards Thursday at the Beverly Hills Hotel. Wallis, 9, needed a step to reach the microphone for her acceptance speech after winning the Breakthrough Performance award for Beasts of the Southern Wild . She thanked God, director Benh Zeitlin , and "my babysitter that was on set. " Oprah was introduced by the graduating class of her Leadership Academy for Girls in South Africa.

CHICAGO - Lance Armstrong did it. He finally admitted it. He doped. He was light on the details and didn't name names. He mused that he might not have been caught if not for his comeback in 2009. And he was certain his "fate was sealed" when longtime friend, training partner, and trusted lieutenant George Hincapie, who was along for the ride on all seven of Armstrong's Tour de France wins in 1999 through 2005, gave him up to antidoping authorities. But right from the start and more than two dozen times during the first of a two-part interview Thursday night with Oprah Winfrey, the former champion acknowledged that he had lied repeatedly for years, and that he was the ringleader of an elaborate doping scheme on a U.S. Postal Service team that swept him to the top. "I went and looked up the definition of cheat," he said at one point.

CHICAGO - Lance Armstrong finally cracked. Not while expressing deep remorse or regrets, though there was plenty of that in Friday night's second part of Armstrong's interview with Oprah Winfrey. It wasn't over the $75 million in lost sponsorship deals, nor when Armstrong was forced to walk away from the Livestrong cancer charity he founded and called his "sixth child. " It wasn't even about his lifetime ban from competition. It was another bit of collateral damage that Armstrong said he wasn't prepared to deal with.

LANCE ARMSTRONG was light on the details and didn't name names, but he confessed to using performance-enhancing drugs to win the Tour de France during an interview with Oprah Winfrey , reversing more than a decade of denial. He mused that he might not have been caught if not for his comeback in 2009. And he was certain his "fate was sealed" when longtime friend, training partner and trusted lieutenant George Hincapie , who was along for the ride on all seven of Armstrong's Tour de France wins from 1999-2005, was forced to give him up to anti-doping authorities.

Well, one thing is for sure: Lance Armstrong won't be voted into the Baseball Hall of Fame - at least not on the first ballot. Most of those not currently in a coma couldn't have found the cyclist's confession to Oprah Winfrey any more shocking that Jodie Foster's acknowledgment at the Golden Globes that she is . . . "single. " The question is what Armstrong does now. Can he rise from the ashes of his Nike sponsorship? For some people, "breaking good" is motivated by a desire for inner peace.

Just to be clear, no one summons the warm, mothering arms of Oprah Winfrey in order to confess. They do it to be forgiven. That is what Lance Armstrong hopes he will receive from his admissions to be televised later this week on the Oprah Comfy Couch Network. He wants to be forgiven. He wants to be forgiven by Oprah. He wants to be forgiven by you. He wants to be forgiven by Nike and Oakley and Michelob Ultra. And he really, really wants to be forgiven by the World Anti-Doping Agency.

The deconstruction of Lance Armstrong's legend, which the disgraced cyclist built with the aid of performance-enhancing drugs and savagely defended whenever his dark secret was challenged, continued Tuesday, two days before the world at last gets to hear his confession. According to reports confirmed by Oprah Winfrey, Armstrong admitted to cheating during a 21/2-hour interview with the celebrity host that will be televised over two nights, beginning Thursday. While it would be Armstrong's first public acknowledgment that the suspicions that long shadowed his unprecedented success were true, Winfrey said he "did not come clean in the manner that I expected.

GO AHEAD, Lance Armstrong, run to Oprah. Better yet, ride your bike. A real man would have held a news conference and submitted himself to reporters' questions instead of hiding behind Oprah Winfrey's forgiving skirttails. If Lance Armstrong were truly genuine, he'd stand in front of a sea of cameras and admit: "I cheated for years. I lied about it over and over. And I'm sorry. " Straight-up, no chaser. That's how a public figure of Armstrong's stature should admit guilt and apologize for what he's done.