People and Events

Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev was voted top male newsmaker in the 1989 UPI American Editors Poll while two notables tied for top female attention-getter--First Lady Barbara Bush and Cop-Slapper Zsa Zsa Gabor.

The latter verdict was a bit of a surprise. One Florida editor even admitted that some of the controversial newsmakers he had chosen “may not be remembered in the history books as major players in world events.”

Doesn’t this guy read his own newspaper? There’s no need to apologize for voting for Gorbachev and Bush.

While the L.A. Convention and Visitors Bureau has taken one momentous step--changing its name to the L.A. Visitors and Convention Bureau--it still hasn’t picked a new president, the last one having been fired several weeks ago.

But, reports the L.A. Downtown News, “the bruised and benumbed LAVCB is now in negotiations with George Kirkland of the Miami Convention Bureau (for that post). . . . Kirkland is credited with turning around the image of Miami, which once had even a worse national rep than L.A. . . .”

Miami’s rep was that bad?

Speaking of L.A.’s image, that was a nice cable TV segment the other day on our Skid Row, complete with a visit inside an all-transvestite bar.

Charging that a new DMV policy could result in even less food on the table for starving comedians, the operators of a comedy traffic school have taken the state agency to court.

The $5-million lawsuit, filed here by Comedians Plus--Learn With Us Inc., is the punch line to a DMV decision to cease providing the public with the names of the more than 400 licensed traffic violators’ schools across California. Instead, DMV brochures will list only the serial numbers and telephone numbers of schools.

The court action charges that the DMV is dropping the names because of lobbying efforts by more traditional traffic schools that have been losing business.

Sort of confirms an old show biz maxim: There’s no one more bitter than an out-of-work traffic school comic.

Weekend shoppers at the Glendale Galleria this holiday season can park their chariots at the L.A. Zoo and take a tram to the mall and back. In other words, they can go from one zoo to another.

“Bartenders Stir Up Competition in Absolut Vodka Ski Classic,” said the headline in a recent issue of Beverly Hills Today newspaper.

Then, on the next page, another story was headlined: “Skiing, Alcohol Described as a Dangerous Mixture.”

Always wise to get a second opinion.