Mitchell Guist, a star of the reality TV show “Swamp People,” died Monday in Louisiana.

He was aboard a boat near Belle River Landing in the southern part of the state when he appeared to have a seizure, said Assumption Parish Sheriff Mike Waguespack, citing an unidentified man who was with Guist.

The reality show star then fell on the boat.

The man who was with Guist towed both his boat and Guist’s boat back to the landing, called 911 and performed CPR, said Waguespack.

Guist was transferred to the Teche Regional Medical Center in Morgan City, where he was pronounced dead.

“We are extremely saddened to report that our friend and beloved member of the ‘Swamp People’ family, Mitchell Guist, has passed away earlier today. Mitchell passed on the swamp, doing what he loved. We appreciate your respect for the Guist family’s privacy and hope you join us in sending our thoughts and prayers to his brother, Glenn, and the rest of the Guist family,” the History Channel said in a statement.

So what is ‘Swamp People?’

Glenn Guist is also a cast member on the show.

“Swamp People” is the popular History Channel TV series that chronicles the lives of alligator hunters in Louisiana.

This article can be found at McClatchy.com This is no real surprise to me. Unions have long been corrupted and the leaders have been getting fat of the hard work of their rank and file members.

First-class travel. Six-figure salaries for half the 132 officers and staffers. Plenty of plum jobs for family members.

Life is good at the top of the International Brotherhood of Boilermakers, Iron Ship Builders, Blacksmiths, Forgers and Helpers.

The union, with its headquarters in Kansas City, Kan., represents about 59,000 workers in the U.S. and Canada who make and repair boilers, fit pipes and work on ships and power plants. The recession has hit their trade hard, reducing union membership.

At the same time, the president’s salary has surged 67 percent in the past six years, not counting a recent raise. Add in travel and some other expenses, and Newton B. Jones received more than $600,000 last year, putting him at the absolute top of the presidents of the dozen biggest unions in the country.

Many relatives of union officers also ride the payroll.

Totaling the pay to just the families of Jones and two other executives, the union and its affiliates gave them more than $2 million in annual salary, according to the most recent financial reports filed by the organizations.

“This is one of the more egregious examples of money flowing like crazy that I’ve ever seen,” said Nathan Mehrens, a former U.S. Labor Department lawyer and now general counsel for Americans for Limited Government, a conservative watchdog group.

In an interview, two union spokesmen defended the spending and hiring practices before requesting other questions in writing. Although they did not respond to every question, Michael Stapp, the union’s general counsel, provided a written response that included praise for the Boilermakers.

“The Boilermaker family of organizations, together valued at over $10 billion, has proudly represented the interests of hundreds of thousands of working men and women for over 130 years,” Stapp wrote.

“The history of the International Brotherhood of Boilermakers clearly demonstrates that they operate in strict accordance with all applicable laws and governing documents. They operate in much the same manner as most other labor organizations.”

Attempts to reach rank-and-file union members for comment were unsuccessful. But rumbles of discontent are sometimes felt.

In April, an anonymous letter, mailed purportedly by Boilermakers members and obtained by The Kansas City Star, sharply criticized union leaders.

“While members and their families struggle to make it through this recession, our IBB (International Brotherhood of Boilermakers) leaders have been living high off the hog at members’ expense,” the letter said.

“We regret that we have to be anonymous at this time because we fear retribution from a leadership that regrettably values its own personal and financial interests above the rank and file’s.”

In membership, the Boilermakers are a mere 5 percent the size of the Teamsters union. Yet which president received more in total disbursements from their unions last year — Teamsters President James P. Hoffa or the lesser-known Newton B. Jones?

Jones by more than $200,000.

Jones received $607,022 in total disbursements, compared with $372,489 for Hoffa.

Total disbursements include salary and business expenses, especially travel, which a union spokesman said made up most of Jones’ expenses.

Jones’ salary in the last fiscal year, which ended June 30, 2011, was $307,134 — also more than Hoffa. The figures come from annual reports the unions file with the Labor Department.

Jones’ total disbursements also are more than double those of Richard Trumka, head of the powerful AFL-CIO, a federation of national and international unions with 11.6 million members. Trumka received total disbursements of $293,750.

All together, the total disbursements last year to the top nine Boilermakers officers — $4.1 million — were $182,000 more than the total disbursements to the 29 executives at the national headquarters of the Teamsters union.

Although the Boilermakers’ general counsel did not compare total disbursements, he did say that Jones’ salary is not out of line with comparable union presidents.

Other unions came up last year at a Boilermakers convention in Las Vegas when delegates heard a proposal to raise Jones’ pay.

“Some delegates were against giving the (International president) a raise at a time when many Boilermakers are having trouble negotiating raises because of the recession,” said an article in The Boilermaker Reporter, an in-house publication. Others argued, however, that Jones not only deserved a raise but needed one to bring his salary more in line with salaries of other presidents of unions in the Building and Construction Trades Department of the AFL-CIO.

That wasn’t necessarily true. An examination of leaders’ salaries in the Building and Construction Trades Department — an alliance of 13 skilled-trade unions including the Boilermakers — shows Jones was smack in the middle last year. And when it comes to the total disbursements received from their unions, Jones is the highest.

The Boilermaker Reporter called the debate over Jones’ salary increase “spirited but cordial.”

Delegates agreed to give Jones a raise but to make it smaller.

Stapp said delegates overwhelmingly voted to adjust the salaries of Jones and other officers.

“President Jones was recently unanimously re-elected by approximately 600 delegates in an open democratic election process, clearly demonstrating membership support for him,” Stapp said.

Stapp added that union leadership has reduced annual expenses by more than $10 million over the past nine years, including the elimination of three officers. Shortly after the 2011 convention, Jones and other officers made an additional $3 million in cuts, with more being considered, he said.

The compensation and perks in the Boilermakers headquarters stunned Marcus Owens, a Washington, D.C., attorney who once headed the division of the IRS that oversees nonprofit organizations.

“Those kinds of benefits seem extraordinarily high,” Owens said. “That’s just over the top.”

Taxpayers have a stake in the Boilermakers’ spending, he said.

The union, like most, is structured as a nonprofit organization, which means it qualifies for exemption from federal income tax. But the law prohibits union officials or key employees from benefiting from the tax-free money they raise.

“They’re not paying income tax,” Owens said. “So in a sense, we’re all supporting them…I don’t mind tax-exempts that are doing what they’re supposed to do, but if they aren’t, I’d kind of like them to pull on the oars, too.”

While their union pay may seem comfortable, some officers get a second hefty paycheck, thanks to a bank the union controls.

The union is principal shareholder of Brotherhood Bank & Trust. Three of the bank’s 11 board members are union officers, and one is a retired union officer.

The bank’s chairman? Boilermakers President Newton Jones.

In calendar year 2010, Jones received $52,945 as chairman of the bank’s board of directors in addition to his union pay, according to the most recent report he filed with the Labor Department. The previous year, Jones earned $79,775 as bank chairman and $260,000 as the bank’s chief executive officer and interim president. In 2008, he received $230,000 from the bank.

“Those both sound like full-time jobs,” Owens said of Jones’ union and bank positions in 2008 and 2009. “It’s certainly full-time compensation.”

Stapp said that Jones played a key role at the bank.

“Chairman Jones’s leadership contribution to this institution is evident in the board’s continuing demonstration of confidence in him, his vision and his labor business outreach initiative,” Stapp wrote.

Other union executives on the bank board received compensation as well.

International Secretary-Treasurer William Creeden reported earning $258,650 from the bank in 2009, the last year he filed. He also received $252,098 in salary from the Boilermakers union in fiscal 2010.

And officers who retire from the Boilermakers union get more than a watch — each gets to keep his company car.

In 2010 the union “gifted” a vehicle to retiring international vice president Sammy May. The vehicle originally cost $73,998 with a book value of $51,388 when the union gave it to him, the union’s annual report said.

According to its annual reports, the union has a long-standing policy of giving vehicles “as gifts to retiring officers.”

International vice president George Rogers retired in 2008, taking with him his company car that cost $53,380. That same year, the union gave a vehicle that cost $58,959 to the widow of an officer who had died.

Some retiring officers continue to receive union pay by working as a consultant. Rogers made $600,000 over two years, annual reports indicate.

Along with the $300,000 in consulting fees he received in fiscal year 2008, the year he retired, Rogers earned $400,871 in salary as a union vice president, Department of Labor documents show.

In fiscal year 2009, records show Rogers received another $300,000 in consulting fees.

Rogers said he couldn’t comment on pay.

“I’m not supposed to talk about anything,” Rogers said.

“Those seem extraordinary,” Owens said of the union’s consulting fees. “Frankly, I’ve never seen consulting compensation to a retired officer at that level.”

Being a boilermaker executive can be a family business.

Newton Jones, 58, took over the president’s office when his father, Charles W. Jones, retired in 2003 after 20 years.

Among Newton Jones’ family members:

His brother, Charles, is director of the Boilermakers’ History Preservation Department and assistant to Newton. His salary in 2011 was $150,091, with total disbursements of $187,641.
His sister, Donna, earns $98,802 as an executive secretary.
His relative, Michael Peterson, is an aide to Jones and until last year worked for the Boilermakers National Apprenticeship Program, earning $132,746 in 2010, according to the program’s most recent tax document, and $127,252 from the union, according to its annual report for fiscal 2011. He told The Star he is now an international representative for the union as well as an aide to Jones.
Jones’ son, Cullen, is a video communications technician who lives in North Carolina, earning $68,482 salary with total disbursements of $173,288 last year. He is 23, according to a court filing.
The union in 2009 paid $43,000 to send Cullen to the Vancouver Film School in British Columbia. The school describes itself as “Canada’s premier entertainment arts institution and one of the most distinguished worldwide.”
Several members of the Creeden family also make a good living working for the Boilermakers, totaling $624,000 in salary.

That is only a sampling of the family ties involving union officers.

In his written response, Stapp said it is policy not to comment on individual workers or consultants:

“All Boilermaker employees are hired based on their respective skills and experience as well as their desire to serve the best interests of the Boilermaker organization,” he said.

And employing family members is common in large corporations, Stapp said in an interview.

Watchdogs, however, pointed out that there’s a big difference between family-owned corporations and nonprofits such as the Boilermakers that don’t pay income tax.

They also called the Boilermaker jobs a classic case of nepotism.

“Especially for some of these young employees who are relatives of officers, it raises all kinds of alarm bells,” Mehrens said. “It begs the question, did that person get the job based upon skills or qualifications, or did they get it based on who their father was?”

When the union’s officers get away, they do it in style.

The union has an 18.75 percent ownership in a Piaggio airplane, which holds up to nine passengers. Today, a new one sells for about $6 million. The Boilermakers also have a 6.25 percent share in a second airplane, according to its Labor Department filing.

In 2011, the Boilermakers paid $521,160 to Avantair, its aviation service provider, for maintenance and other fees associated with the planes.

Union watchdog groups say few unions have ownership in planes. The Machinists union has a Learjet, but the Teamsters union — which used to own several private jets — sold them years ago because of criticism.

Union officers and their relatives also are allowed to fly first-class on commercial airlines, the union’s tax documents show.

Once they’re on the ground, officers make sure their stays are memorable.

About a year ago, members of the union’s International Executive Council treated themselves to at least one gathering at a renowned hunting lodge in Gettysburg, S.D. The council — the president and eight other officers — listed the trip as a council meeting.

The lodge, called Paul Nelson Farm, is a favorite hunting spot of former Vice President Dick Cheney and Hall of Fame quarterback John Elway.

It’s a luxurious resort that “attracts 700 hunters a year who are prepared to pay for the very best,” according to a 2009 review in the magazine Business Jet Traveler.

The Paul Nelson Farm website offers a package that includes three days of hunting with guides and dogs, pheasant cleaning, and meals and beverages. For a group of six or more, a three-day package runs $4,595 per person.

The Boilermakers paid a total of $163,000, according to Labor Department reports they filed.

The union also paid $12,854 in 2010 to Alaska Fly Fishing Adventures in Sterling, Alaska, but it is unclear who enjoyed the service, described as an “outfitter and tour guide.”

That year, the union held an Alaska conference at which union officials met with contractors and owners.

In France, where officers went in fiscal 2009 to negotiate contracts, the union paid $5,232 to Yachts de Paris, a “dinner cruise service provider.”

Stapp defended spending for recreational events.

“As most successful organizations recognize, sporting and entertainment activities and venues are important tools for relationship building with business partners and fellow organizations and are used in this organization’s efforts to insure and expand the work opportunities of its members,” he wrote.

But watchdog groups find the perks and benefits enjoyed by union officials to be unusual and profligate.

“This is a pork fest,” said Ken Boehm, chairman of the National Legal and Policy Center in Falls Church, Va., a conservative union watchdog group.

“These things sound way out of line. They’re not even in the same ZIP code as the line.”

A woman in a wedding dress was found apparently stabbed to death in a bathtub in a southwest suburban Burbank apartment, just days after her wedding, officials said.

Estrella I. Carrera, 26, was found around 3:30 p.m. Sunday in the 7800 block of South Rutherford Avenue, according to police.

An autopsy conducted today determined that she died of multiple stab wounds and her death has been classified as a homicide, Burbank police said in a statement.

Police believe she was killed as a result of a domestic-related incident.

Carrera’s body was discovered after her sister became alarmed when she could not contact Carrera after she had failed to pick up her two children who were in the care of relatives. Carrera’s sister called police to conduct a well-being check at the home, officials said.

Carrera was last seen at about 2 a.m. Saturday, hours after her wedding the evening before, according to a source. The woman was scheduled to pick up her children, one 8 years old and the other 2 years old, from family on Saturday afternoon.

Carrera apparently suffered several stab wounds and was found in a dry tub, the source said. An autopsy is scheduled for today.

Burbank police were releasing few details but said the death was being investigated by the South Suburban Major Crimes Task Force.

A spokeswoman for the Cook County Clerk’s office said Carrera did not yet have a marriage certificate on file. The marriage is officially recorded after the officiant at the wedding signs the couple’s marriage license and submits it to the clerk’s office.

Jason Tokarczyk, 24, a neighbor, said the woman lived in the apartment for three or four months and he would see her with a young son. He said the woman was very quiet and kept to herself except for the occasional goodbye or hello.

He said he had never seen her in the company of a man and was surprised to hear that she had been recently married.

“I’ve never seen her with a dude…I figured she was a single mom,” said Tokarczyk. “She was quiet as a mouse.”

About a month ago she used his phone to call a locksmith after she was locked out of her home. He last saw her Thursday or Friday and did not see her in a wedding dress.

“You’d think you’d see a big thing if you had had a wedding,” said the neighbor.

He said said he was surprised when he heard about how the woman was found.

“I was shocked out of my mind to hear something had happened to her,” said Tokarczyk.

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Its seems rather odd to me that people are making such a fuss over Mit Romney being a bully to a person that may or may not have been gay, when in 1965 African Americans were still being lynched in the south.

It was in 1963 that DEMOCRAT Governor George Wallace had his now infamous “Stand in the Schoolhouse Door” at the University of Alabama to keep black students from attending the school.

Yet here we are almost fifty years later in a floundering economy with little relief or even so much as a game plan from President Obama for our future, and we are worried about a presidential candidate that may have been a bully in an era where our society was still largely segregated.

Its amazing to me that we as a society can ignore affairs, drug use, statement that border on treason, but we are worried about a guy that put his dog on the roof of his car and was a bully in school.

I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but there have always been bullies and there always will be bullies.

No matter how hard the women of America try to make men more like women, boys will always grow into men. God made us this way.

I once watched a documentary on PBS about bullies and why they are the way they are. They showed a playground with a bunch of preschool aged boys playing on the swings and monkey bars. These boys could not have been more than three or four years old.

Yet even at that early age there was an obvious pecking order. The bigger boys were bossing around the smaller boys and pushing them around.

That’s because its the nature of things. We have all seen documentaries on animals where there are two or three newborn animals, and without fail the bigger of any given species kills off the smaller, weaker newborns.

This is where the phrase “Only the strong survive” comes from. In almost every other species on earth, there is an alpha male that mates with all the females to ensure the survival of the species.

We humans are the only species that try to change this by calling the strong bullies and making boys behave like little pansies.

I have written of this before. I believe then that I called it “The pussification of the American male.”

The mom’s of America have been busy trying to turn their boys into their idea of the perfect male. Sensitive to the needs of a woman, polite and honest. Basically what we used to call a sissymarys.

Now these same moms are scratching their collective asses with broken bottles wondering why their little Bobby grew up and became homosexual.

Don’t get me wrong here. I am not condoning bullying. I am saying that it has to be understood by all of us that its simply the nature of things.

All of this thinking is brought on my the media, who as far as I am concerned are second only to lawyers on the list of scumbags.

Americans have become a collection of saps that believe virtually anything they see on the news.

No one ever questions what they see and hear, they simply walk about like parrots propagating the nonsense put out by the socialist media.

We will forget about the fact that John F. Kennedy was a philanderer son of a bootlegger, but Mit Romney was a bully.

We will think of Senator Robert Bird as a national icon of the left even though he was in the Ku Klux Klan, but Mit Romney was a bully.

Will will pretend that Bill Clinton banging a woman in the oval office is a good thing and even consider him a hero for doing it, but Mit Romney was a bully.

What I am getting here is there is not one politician on the left or right that does not or has not done something in the past that would be embarrassing to them today. Its the nature of things. JD

Hairstylist Vidal Sassoon, who undid the beehive with his wash-and-wear cuts and went on to become an international name in hair care, died Wednesday. He was 84.

Mr. Sassoon died at his home on Mulholland Drive in Los Angeles, police spokesman Kevin Maiberger said. Officers were summoned to the home at about 10:30 a.m., where they found Mr. Sassoon dead with his family. They determined that he died of natural causes, and there will be no further police investigation, Maiberger said.

When Mr. Sassoon picked up his shears in the 1950s, styled hair was typically curled, teased, piled high and shellacked into place. Then came the 1960s, and Mr. Sassoon’s creative cuts, which required little styling and fell into place perfectly every time, fit right in with the fledgling women’s liberation movement.

“My idea was to cut shape into the hair, to use it like fabric and take away everything that was superfluous,” Mr. Sassoon said in 1993 in the Los Angeles Times, which first reported his death Wednesday. “Women were going back to work, they were assuming their own power. They didn’t have time to sit under the dryer anymore.”

His wash-and-wear styles included the bob, the Five-Point cut and the “Greek Goddess,” a short, tousled perm – inspired by the “Afro-marvelous-looking women” he said he saw in New York’s Harlem.

Mr. Sassoon opened his first salon in his native London in 1954 but said he didn’t perfect his cut-is-everything approach until the mid-’60s. Once the wash-and-wear concept hit, though, it hit big and many women retired their curlers for good.

Mr. Sassoon got more headlines when he was flown to Hollywood from London, at a reputed cost of $5,000, to create Mia Farrow’s pixie cut for the 1968 film “Rosemary’s Baby.”

Mr. Sassoon opened more salons in England and expanded to the United States before also developing a line of shampoos and styling products bearing his name. His advertising slogan was “If you don’t look good, we don’t look good.”

The hairdresser also established Vidal Sassoon Academies to teach aspiring stylists how to envision haircuts based on a client’s bone structure. In 2006, there were academies in England, the United States and Canada, with additional locations planned in Germany and China.

He sold his business interests in the early 1980s to devote himself to philanthropy. The Boys Clubs of America and the Performing Arts Council of the Music Center of Los Angeles were among the causes he supported through his Vidal Sassoon Foundation. He later became active in post-Hurricane Katrina charities in New Orleans.

He had moved to Los Angeles in the early 1970s in search of a chemist to formulate his hair-care products and had decided to make the city his home.

A veteran of Israel’s 1948 War of Independence, Mr. Sassoon also had a lifelong commitment to eradicating anti-Semitism. In 1982, he established the Vidal Sassoon International Center for the Study of Antisemitism at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

Growing up very poor in London, Mr. Sassoon said that when he was 14, his mother declared he was to become a hairdresser. After traveling to Palestine and serving in the Israeli war, he returned home to fulfill her dream.

“I thought I’d be a soccer player, but my mother said I should be a hairdresser, and, as often happens, the mother got her way,” he told the AP in 2007.

Married four times, Mr. Sassoon had four children with his second wife, Beverly, a sometime film and television actress, usually billed as Beverly Adams.

CHARLESTON, W.Va. — Just how unpopular is President Barack Obama in some parts of the country? Enough that a man in prison in Texas is getting 4 out of 10 votes in West Virginia’s Democratic presidential primary.

The inmate, Keith Judd, is serving time at the Beaumont Federal Correctional Institution in Texas for making threats at the University of New Mexico in 1999. With 83 percent of precincts reporting, Obama was receiving 60 percent of the vote to Judd’s 40 percent.

For some West Virginia Democrats, simply running against Obama is enough to get Judd votes.

“I voted against Obama,” said Ronnie Brown, a 43-year-old electrician from Cross Lanes who called himself a conservative Democrat. “I don’t like him. He didn’t carry the state before and I’m not going to let him carry it again.”

When asked which presidential candidate he voted for, Brown said, “That guy out of Texas.”

Judd was able to get on the state ballot by paying a $2,500 fee and filing a form known as a notarized certification of announcement, said Jake Glance, a spokesman for the Secretary of State’s office.

Attracting at least 15 percent of the vote would normally qualify a candidate for a delegate to the Democratic National Convention. But state Democratic Party Executive Director Derek Scarbro said no one has filed to be a delegate for Judd. The state party also believes that Judd has failed to file paperwork required of presidential candidates, but officials continue to research the matter, Scarbro said.

Voters in other conservative states showed their displeasure with Obama in Democratic primaries last March.

In Oklahoma, anti-abortion protestor Randall Terry got 18 percent of the primary vote. A lawyer from Tennessee, John Wolfe, pulled nearly 18,000 votes in the Louisiana primary. In Alabama, 18 percent of Democratic voters chose “uncommitted” in the primary rather than vote for Obama.

Obama’s energy policies and the Environmental Protection Agency’s handling of mining-related permits have incurred the wrath of West Virginia’s coal industry. With the state the nation’s second-biggest producer of this fossil fuel, Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin and Sen. Joe Manchin _both Democrats have championed the industry – have declined to say whether they will support Obama in November.

Hillary Rodham Clinton beat Obama handily in the state’s 2008 primary, and he lost the state to Republican John McCain in the general election. Polls show some of his worst approval ratings in West Virginia.

Brown, the Cross Lanes electrician, went to the polls Tuesday with his 22-year-old daughter, Emily. She planned to vote for Judd too until she found out where Judd has been living.

“I’m not voting for somebody who’s in prison,” she said.

She was certain about one thing: “I just want to vote against Barack Obama.”

Queen Latifah a lesbian? No !!! Your kidding me right? As if no one knew she was gay. She is rarely seen out with men, she acts like a transvestite and dresses like a dude more then she dresses as a woman. Good God the things that we call news has sunk to new lows. JD

Rumors about the veteran star’s sexual preference have been circulating for years, but now it appears she’s chosen to end the speculation… by headlining this year’s Long Beach Lesbian & Gay Pride Festival.

It takes place on May 19/20.

Said Pat Crosby, co-president of the event:

“From hip to R&B, pop to standards, Queen Latifah is the voice of our generation, and her concert here will be phenomenal. For her to make her worldwide Pride debut here in Long Beach is a tremendous testament to the popularity of our celebration and to the strength of our community.”

What else would anyone expect? ABC was happy to unload Oprah, who was getting less than a one share in the ratings on a major broadcast network. People have grown weary of her vapid self indulgence and watching Oprah being duped by authors that are less than honest about their backgrounds.

Then when you factor in the fact that in 2008 she turned her back on the woman candidate for president of the United States in favor of the half black man, she showed that she was more of a black activist then a woman’s rights advocate. JD

Oprah’s OWN loses a staggering $330m as industry insiders predict it will be axed within a year

The losses at Oprah Winfrey’s troubled cable channel are approaching a staggering $330 million, according to a report over the weekend.

Industry insiders believe the channel – the Oprah Winfrey network (OWN) – will not last another year unless they come up with a hit show and make a dramatic turnaround.

Though ratings have seen a slight insurgence thanks to interview program Oprah’s Next Chapter, it has stumbled since the get go with ratings of just 308,000 daily.

It is believed shows which do not feature the chat show queen herself are not popular with viewers.

Discovery, which partnered with Winfrey to launch the network and has been underwriting its costs, has invested nearly $600 million in it since 2008, according to an extensive report in Businessweek magazine.

Since it started on the air in January 2011, it may have lost as much as $330million, according to the magazine.

David Zaslav, the chief executive officer of Discovery Communications who talked Oprah into the idea of OWN, is famously impatient with money-losing operations within his company and insiders say he will not put up with the aiing network’s losses for much longer.

Winfrey appeared before advertisers two weeks ago to ask for more time, telling them: ‘I am in the climb of my life. I am climbing Kilimanjaro.’
Although she doesn’t risk losing a lot of money from the channel’s failings, Oprah’s reputation is at stake.

Over her 39-year career, The Oprah Winfrey Show had as many as 12.5 million viewers. O, The Oprah Magazine had more than two million subscribers. And her Internet site, Oprah.com, draws more than three million unique visitors a month.

Her image as the most successful TV star of her generation is on the line.

E-mails to OWN and Oprah’s production company, Harpo, were not returned yesterday.

In March i was announced that Rosie O’ Donnell’s talk show The Rosie Show had been axed by the network after only six months.

It debuted with 500,000 viewers but within days fell to half of that.

The TV stars both released statements, with Rosie saying she ‘wished the show was able to attract more viewers.’

She added in a statement: ‘I loved working with Oprah in the amazing city of Chicago. I was welcomed with open arms and will never forget the kindness of all I encountered.’

In a statement, Oprah Winfrey said: ‘I thank Rosie from the bottom of my heart for joining me on this journey. She has been an incredible partner, working to deliver the best possible show every single day.

‘As I have learned in the last 15 months, a new network launch is always a challenge and ratings grow over time as you continue to gather an audience.’

However, just a week after they released these statements, it was reported the pair were not even on speaking terms because Rosie was

unhappy with the way the press release was worded announcing her show was being unceremoniously dumped.

In February, the media mogul came under fire after she made a controversial bid to resuscitate ratings on Twitter.

Competing for viewers on the same night as this year’s Grammy Awards, she took to the micro-blogging site to ask her 9.2million followers: ‘Every 1 who can please turn to OWN especially if u have a Nielsen box.’

The tweet was deleted, Ms Winfrey said, ‘at the request of Nielsen’, which prohibits clients from attempting to influence ratings.

A backlash of comments followed, with several Twitter users accusing the mogul of ‘being desperate’.