Just on the off chance that some of you might have missed it, newly crowned national treasure Sally Bercow made her much-anticipated debut as a columnist for the Daily Star Sunday yesterday.

A website which stocked a range of children's shirts emblazoned with a controversial quote from Kate Moss has been censured by the Advertising Standards Authority.

One post-Murdochalyptic beneficiary will be the comely Conservative MP Nicola Blackwood, whose accomplished performance on the Home Affairs Select Committee yesterday had many an irregular BBC Parliament viewer hurrying to Google her name. Obligingly, Ms Blackwood's personal website yields an array of images – and she is indeed a photogenic gal, as you can see. Unfortunately, her political passions remain something of a mystery. "Nicola is currently updating the information on the local and national issues which matter most to her constituency," is the solitary message on the 'Issues' page of her site. "Watch this space." Nicola, I surely will.

Alleged hip-hop fan and Downing Street spin chief Craig Oliver doubtless enjoyed a few fist bumps with colleagues yesterday, following the televisual feast that was the No 10 barbecue. Oliver – a former BBC employee – is renowned primarily as a "pictures man", and a shirt-sleeved Dave and Barry serving burgers to servicemen was perhaps the most striking image he has generated since joining the PM's staff (or at least since his first day, when he graced the press corps with this classic, right). Yet the course of media handling never did run smooth and Oliver made at least one influential hack unhappy yesterday. Sky News political correspondent Glen Oglaza was giddy with excitement after being assigned the opening question of the post-BBQ press conference, only to have it snatched from him cruelly at the last moment by Oliver's shiny-domed BBC chum Nick Robinson.

Last week, this column was illustrated exclusively by middle-aged men, so I'm jolly grateful to Zach Galifianakis, star of The Hangover and its forthcoming sequel, for saying something mildly interesting about an attractive young lady. January Jones, best known as Mad Men's Betty Draper, recently claimed that Galifianakis (whose name I remain unable to spell without cutting and pasting it from the internet) was the most naturally funny man she'd ever met.

With Newt Gingrich now officially in the race for the Republican presidential nomination, the eccentrically-coiffed front-runner of sorts, Donald Trump, is surely smart to be scotching unfavourable rumours about his own candidacy. Accused by critics of "race-baiting" over his pursuit of President Barack Obama's birth certificate, Mr Trump assured Fox News yesterday that some of his best apprentices were black. "When it comes to racism and racists," the famously wealthy businessman revealed, "I am the least racist person there is. And I think most people that know me would tell you that ... In fact, [black person] Randal Pinkett won on The Apprentice a little while ago... and Randal has been outstanding in every way." Satisfied, haters?

As my lecherous uncle once drunkenly slurred: "That Carol Vorderman's a very clever woman" – so I'm concerned to see the old girl is still getting herself all hot and bothered about that irksome peacock Piers Morgan. Middle England's favourite number cruncher was yesterday busy spreading the word across Twitter that the ratings for Morgan's CNN show are rubbish. The bad blood goes back several years – the former Daily Mirror editor once charmingly suggested that Carol "lost her Countdown gig to a foxy maths genius Essex girl half her age and twice as good-looking". Carol, if only for me and my increasingly confused alcoholic of an uncle – let it go!

MPs' claims for second home expenses slumped by more than a third in the wake of the scandal that engulfed Westminster, it was disclosed today.

Anyone previously unbriefed as to whether Craig Oliver was a blue-sky-thinking Steve Hilton-alike or an Andy Coulson-esque attack dog has their answer courtesy of this compelling photograph of Oliver arriving for his first day at work. Number 10's new communications chief, or so his accessories would attest, is a fellow who gives good flow-chart. Let's start with the "Beats by [Dr] Dre" designer headphones, denoting a middle-aged man keen to convince passers-by that he was once deeply into hip-hop, and thus requires "cans" with superior bass quality in order to enjoy his old Public Enemy albums on the move.