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Madonna’s high-profile charity in Malawi has collapsed, amid allegations of lavish spending on cars, salaries and a golf course membership, and $3.8 million spent on a girls’ school that won’t be built, The New York Times reported.

Madonna with adopted Malawian son David Banda in April 19, 2007 (photo by Getty)

Signs of upheaval had marred the charity, Raising Malawi, for months. The newspaper reported that the foundation’s board was ousted last year and its executive director left in the wake of cost overruns. The NYT quoted Trevor Neilson, once a Seattle director at the Gates Foundation, and now a philanthropic adviser to the stars:

“Despite $3.8 million having been spent by the previous management team, the project has not broken ground, there was no title to the land and there was, over all, a startling lack of accountability on the part of the management team in Malawi and the management team in the United States,” he said. “We have yet to determine exactly what happened to all of that $3.8 million. We have not accounted for all the funds that were used.”

Madonna told the newspaper that she still intends to use the charity – which she founded with fellow Kabbalah devotees – to help the impoverished country.

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Is Serena Williams’ new commercial for the video game Top Spin 4 too hot for t.v.?

The folks at the game’s maker, 2k Sports, apparently think so and the ad won’t air anywhere but YouTube — even then only because it was leaked (allegedly).

Joystiq.com: “The ad was originally posted on YouTube by the actress featured in the commercial — apparently she wasn’t satisfied with 2K Sports’ decision to cancel the public release.”

But the tennis star herself chimed in on Twitter, alerting fans to the imminent official debut of the ad, which never happened.

NY Daily News: “On Monday, Williams herself told her fans to “Stay tuned for a awesomely sexy video I am tweeting later,” but, interestingly enough, she hasn’t mentioned it since then.”

“As part of the process for creating marketing campaigns to support our titles, we pursue a variety of creative avenues,” 2K Sports said in a statement. “This video is not part of the title’s final marketing campaign and its distribution was unauthorized.” (read more)

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A full head of hair or a healthy sex life? You might have to choose.

A medication for male pattern baldness may cause sexual dysfunction in men, even long after they stop taking the drug, according to this Time report on a new study. The hair-loss drug finasteride, marketed as Propecia and Proscar by Merck, may cause low libido and impotency.

Here’s more from the story:

Participants had taken finasteride for 28 months on average, and reported sexual problems for an average 40 months, but the study author said that 10% of the surveyed men had used the drug for less than a month.

The medication carries a warning about persistent sexual dysfunction, along with potential psychological problems, in the U.K. and Sweden. But U.S. labeling doesn’t contain such warnings.

MSNBC explains a little bit more of the dilemma here:

Doctors have long known that finasteride can cause impotence and related sexual problems. Finasteride decreases the conversion of testosterone to the more potent dihydrotestosterone, the latter of which is related to hair loss. Yet any medication that interferes with testosterone runs the risk of also affecting sexual performance.

In fact, GlaxoSmithKline and Merck, who both sell finasteride for several medical conditions, have reported that up to 8 percent of users have adverse sexual events. A review study published in 2008 in the Journal of Sexual Medicine extends that range to 38 percent, depending on dose and duration.

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Dove World Outreach Center 'executes' the Quran.

Terry Jones, the Florida evangelical pastor who threatened to hold a Quran burning last Sept. 11 only to back down in the face of international outrage, finally went ahead and burned one.

And now there’s a 2.2-million-dollar price on his head.

Jones appointed himself “judge” and presided over a trial hearing evidence and testimony against Islam’s holy book. A “jury” found the book guilty of crimes against humanity; promoting terrorist acts; raping, torturing and killing people “whose only crime was not being of the Islamic faith.” Also, its treatment of women was found lacking.

Interestingly, lethal injection and electrocution, the two forms of capital punishment in Florida, were not offered to the convicted holy book. Instead, an online Facebook poll picked the sentence from these choices – burning, shredding, drowning or firing squad. Burning won.

Sentence was carried out by soaking the convicted in kerosene, placing it a metal tray and igniting it with a barbecue lighter. Thirty people witnessed the execution.

Jones’ kangaroo court stunt was obviously aimed at provoking a response, but the Council on American-Islamic Relations didn’t take the bait.

“Terry Jones had his 15 minutes of fame and we’re not going to help him get another few minutes,” said Spokesman Ibrahim Hooper.

Unfortunately, Pakistan did.

Pakistani Islamists respond to the Florida Quran burning with their own U.S. flag and pastor effigy barbecue.

President Asif Ali Zardari condemned the desecration of the Quran during his address to a joint sitting of parliament. The country’s Foreign Office in Islamabad called it a “despicable act.”

Pakistanis are already angry at the United States over the release last week of an American CIA employee who was arrested after he shot and killed two men who he says were trying to rob him.

Pakistan’s Jamaat-ud-Dawah, a banned Islamic organization and suspected terrorist group, announced a reward of 10 crore rupees (about $2.2 million) for anyone who kills the preacher.

Jones is probably pleased that at least the terrorists are taking him seriously.

US pastor supervises Quran burning, sparks outrage in Pak (Times of India)

Koran burned after Fla. church ‘trial’ (CBS News)

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Is lower Fairfield County one of the “drunkest” metropolitan areas in America?

The website Mainstreet.com has ranked U.S. cities according to their admitted rates of binge drinking in a 2009 Centers for Disease Control survey and the Stamford-Bridgeport metro area comes in at number 7 — just under Milwaukee, the beer capital of America.

Places like Fargo, N.D. and Bozeman, Mont. dominate the top of the list, which makes a little more sense than Connecticut, where our entertainment options are slightly more diverse.

Given our puritan roots and a legislature that can’t manage to ease the state’s blue laws limiting alcohol sales on Sundays, do we deserve this dubious distinction?

MainStreet.com:

As one of the wealthiest states in the country, people in Connecticut may be able to afford a few extra drinks now and then, but that doesn’t mean they should. The residents of Stamford had a wake-up call earlier this year when it was discovered that a group of high school freshmen were found to be binge drinking, leading to at least once case of alcohol poisoning.

Heavy Drinkers: 7.2% of the population

Binge Drinkers: 21.5% of the population

(read more)

MainStreet’s full list:

1. Hilo, Hawaii

2. Kapaa, Hawaii

3. Fargo, N.D.

4. Butte-Silver Bow, Mont.

5. Bozeman, Mont.

6. Milwaukee, Wisc.

7. Bridgeport-Stamford, Conn.

8. Hilton Head Island, S.C.

9. San Francisco, Calif.

10. Wilmington, N.C.

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If you were ever curious about Mike Tyson’s opinion on the hit iPad app, Angry Birds, this is the video you’ve been waiting for.

The former boxer and bird lover expresses his displeasure for the game in a video promoting his cable television show about pigeon racing on Animal Planet (wait, what?) apparently he doesn’t like it.