We'll continue with the Year In Review in a bit, but first, the very latest on the suicide attack that killed Benazir Bhutto earlier today in Pakistan.

As I broke it to you this morning, the former Pakistani Prime Minister and opposition leader was shot twice in the neck and chest and undergone emergency surgery before she died at 6:16 p.m. local time (4:16 a.m. Alaska Time). Riots across Pakistan immediately broke out upon news of her death, and her body was flown to Sindh for burial on Friday.

Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf condemned the attacks; three days of mourning are in effect with schools, businesses, and banks closed. However, rival and fellow former PM Nawaz Sharif says his party is boycotting the upcoming elections on January 8 and is calling for Musharraf's resignation. Meanwhile, the worldwide reaction was quick, with President Bush offering his condolences to the whole country and United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon saying he was "shocked and outraged" by Bhutto's assassination. Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper called it "an abhorrent act of terror" while it was "an attack against democracy and against Pakistan" according to European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso.

What does it all mean now? As we head into 2008, the stakes in the war on terror will be increased several notches. And I am pretty much fearing for the worst when Pakistan goes to the polls in a few weeks.

And shifting gears now to a far less different story than Bhutto...Actress Mischa Barton was arrested for DUI and drugs also early Thursday morning in Los Angeles before being released a few hours later. There's no need for me to post the mug shot here, but talk about another messed-up crackhead!

Anyway, with those out of the way, on to a much more lighter change of pace...

It has always become a year-end tradition since 1991 and online since seven years later. I present to you:

20 (and in her NINTH STRAIGHT APPEARANCE!!!). Britney Spears (I don't know why I've included her year after year after year since '99. Maybe Chris Crocker must've been hot for her after his "LEAVE BRITNEY ALONE!!!!!!!" video)

19. Lindsay Lohan (her recent film packed in only 20 people at the theaters; but after her rehab stints she's turning over a new leaf)

18. "Are You Smarter Than a Fifth-Grader?" (ask Miss Teen South Carolina Lauren Caitlin Upton)

17. Kristen Bell joining the cast of "Heroes" (thank the gods at still fourth-place NBC for putting her in a bikini in one of the episodes)

16. Justin Timberlake (no comment)

15. The New England Patriots' undefeated winning streak (don't worry, the Seahawks may whup them in Super Bowl XLII)

14. Sanjaya Malakar (the awful voice, the different hair-dos, his boyish-looks...Justin Guarini, watch out!)

13. "The Simpsons Movie" (and who says the movie version is better than the TV series?)

12. Marie Osmond collapsing on "Dancing With The Stars" (as did all 300 other Osmonds)

11. "Hannah Montana" (we already had someone similar years ago: Hilary Duff!)

10. "High School Musical 2" (if Ashley Tisdale strips naked in "High School Musical 3" like Vanessa Hudgens did, I'm there!)

9. The iPhone (causing more traffic accidents than any cell phone/MP3 player hybrid)

8. TIE: "Knocked Up" (no, not the Katherine Heigl film, but Jamie Lynn Spears' pregnancy)/Paris Hilton in jail (wonder if her cellmates were "hot" for her)

7. "The Sopranos" finale (after that, men did a different kind of whacking, but to pics of Jamie-Lynn Sigler)

6. Carrie Underwood (forget "American Idol", she's a "Country Idol")

5. The Beckhams now in America (aka Britsh Invasion 21st Century style)

4. The Anna Nicole Smith baby daddy drama (it would've been better if Maury Povich handled it instead of that Judge Judy wannabe)

3. Idaho Senator Larry Craig (just imagine if the person in that restroom stall was Chris Hansen of "Dateline")

2. The writer's strike (which is leaving our late nighters dry of jokes and us racking our brains thinking of any jokes)

And the #1 thing that was abuzz in 2007 and will still be in 2008...

1. The presidential campaign underway one year early (and every candidate with their own master plan to forget what Bush did these last eight years!)

Tomorrow, the "Year In Review" continues with Fill In The Blank quiz. I may have to think of those questions right on the fly.

BREAKING NEWS: Ex-Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto assassinated

Former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, who served from 1988-90 and again from 1993-96 and was educated at Oxford and Harvard universities, was assassinated today in a suicide attack in Rawalpindi, Pakistan as well as 20 others during a campaign rally.

According to her security adviser Rehman Malik, Bhutto was shot twice in the neck and chest by the attacker, who later blew himself up. She was immediately rushed into the hospital where she would be pronounced dead at 6:16 p.m. local time.

News of the assassination immediately sent shockwaves around the world. The U.S. State Department as well as British, Russian, and French governments all condemned the attack while President Bush in his Crawford, Texas ranch was informed about it and will address the situation later this morning.

Once again, former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto assassinated today in a suicide attack nearly eight miles south of Islamabad. More developments later to come.

From very brief jailtimes for Lindsay Lohan and Nicole Richie, to the misadventures of Paris and Britney, to the end of a hit show leaving us in blackout, to the "High School Musical"/"Hannah Montana" craze (the former nearly tarnished by scandal), to "Spider-Man 3" and "The Simpsons Movie" raking in the "d'oh", and to the latest writers' strike that had us cracking our own jokes on the news during late night; 2007 in the world of entertainment made us want to go to rehab following all these but we said "no, no, no!"

After six straight losses, the 79th Annual Academy Awards was culminated with Martin Scorsese finally bagging the Best Director prize for "The Departed"; the film picked up three more awards including Best Picture of 2006 while lead and supporting acting honors went to Forrest Whitaker/Helen Mirren and Alan Arkin/Jennifer Hudson.

The much-anticipated series finale of "The Sopranos" may have left us in the dark, but its light was shone when it took Best Drama at the 59th Primetime Emmy Awards; Tina Fey's "30 Rock" was honored with Best Comedy while "The Daily Show" and "The Amazing Race" both extended their streak to 5-0. But it was the Fox censors blacking out Katherine Heigl and Sally Field that had all of us heading to YouTube to see and hear what they really mouthed off.

"Heroes" may have left the Emmys empty-handed, but its second season with the addition of Kristen Bell ("Veronica Mars" herself) attracted millions of us to the show...for at least eleven episodes during its second season; it would end prematurely due to the writers' strike, which I'll get to later. Now the show's tagline may be "Save the Cheerleader, Save the World"; but in the case of star Hayden Panettiere, she tried to replace "Cheerleader" with "Dolphins" by attempting to stop the annual dolphin hunt in Japan with a group of surfers. It failed, and the sight of Hayden back on the shore bawling would be seen around the world.

But "American Idol" remained the top remote-stopper, with Sanjaya Malakar's reign of terror and a "What if?" duet between Celine Dion and Elvis Presley as the top highlights and Jordin Sparks out-singing them all in the end; Fox also had another runaway hit with "Are You Smarter Than a Fifth-Grader?". ABC's "Dancing With The Stars" had its own share of drama, brought to us by Marie Osmond with her collapse and the death of her father. And still number-one CBS had another controversial reality hit on their hands with "Kid Nation", while the still unwatchable My Network TV relied on cheaply produced shows to save themselves from extinction.

The biggest TV stories of the year belonged to the Disney Channel, as "High School Musical 2" was the all-time cable ratings grabber with 17.2 million viewers...until it was recently eclipsed by the 17.5 million that tuned in for the New England Patriots-Baltimore Ravens on ESPN's "Monday Night Football" (go figure; they're both owned by the same company). But the franchise was briefly marred by scandal as nude photos of star Vanessa Hudgens taken a few years ago were the hit of the Internet, and Hudgens would take the brunt of scrutiny as she had to regret all that.

"Hannah Montana" was also another hit for Disney, with Miley Cyrus picking up where her once-famous dad Billy Ray left off. And when news of her first tour broke, fans' parents were doing anything they can -- and I mean anything -- to get ahold of any good tickets left. Maybe it's because it the reunion tours of The Police and the Spice Girls were sold out within minutes. And speaking of the Spice Girls, it was Victoria Beckham who got all the attention with a reality TV special and a steamy photo shoot with David in "W" magazine.

And oh yeah...Bob Barker called it a career after 50 years; 35 of them were spent on "The Price Is Right." The extensive search for his successor ended when Drew Carey signed on the dotted line. And being a longtime viewer for years and years and years, I think he literally feels right at home there.

Since I didn't cover this in the news section, Al Gore had a pretty good year himself with his "An Inconvenient Truth" claiming the Documentary Feature and Best Song Oscars, his series of Live Earth concerts around the world, and to cap it all off...the Nobel Peace Prize.

In movies, "Spider-Man 3" was the new opening weekend record holder, while "The Simpsons Movie" proved that fans still love the franchise after 20 years. "The Bourne Ultimatum", "Transformers", "Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End", "Hairspray", "300", "Wild Hogs", "Shrek the Third", "Ratatouille", and "American Gangster" were all supergood, while "I Know Who Killed Me", "Good Luck Chuck", and "Norbit" were, well...superbad!

Music wise, Sparks winning "Idol" didn't translate to success as her debut album tanked; we were better off watching Carrie Underwood continue to fill up her mantle with award (Best New Artist plus two more at the Grammys) after award (three Academy of Country Music awards) after award (two CMA awards) after award (three American Music Awards)! Justin Timberlake, Beyonce, and Rihanna continued to scorch up the charts; Amy Winehouse did an anthem about rehab; and it was Kanye West vs. 50 Cent round two, in which Kanye won.

Scandals, nuptials, and splits were of course the talk of 2007. Rosie O'Donnell and Elisabeth Hasselbeck really heated up "The View" when the two exchanged verbal blows about the war in Iraq; immediately thereafter, Rosie quit and Whoopi Goldberg took her spot. Videos of a drunken, shirtless David Hasselhoff struggling to eat a cheeseburger and Miss Teen South Carolina Lauren Caitlin Upton's bone-headed answer about why a fifth of us can't find the U.S. on a world map literally burned up YouTube. Though not also covered in the news part, there was Idaho Senator Larry Craig's adventures at a Minneapolis airport restroom with another man. And just recently, "Boy Meets World" hottie Danielle Fishel was arrested for DUI. Imagine what her mugshot is going to be!

In couples, the year's "I Do's" included Eva Longoria and Tony Parker, Rebecca Romijn and Jerry O'Connell, Katherine Heigl and Josh Kelley (who'll be married by the time this blog gets published), Elizabeth Hurley and Arun Nayar, Usher and Tameka Foster, Pamela Anderson and Rick Salomon (the two would be divorced sixty-odd days later, but they had second thoughts), and Kate Walsh and Alex Young. As for hook-ups, Reese Witherspoon and Jake Gyllenhaal were the hottest couple; the Oscar winner and the "Brokeback Mountain" hunk found love while filming "Rendition." The film may have flopped, but there were lots of sparks flying between the two after the director said "That's a wrap!"

Meanwhile, it was over for Cameron Diaz and Justin Timberlake, Kate Hudson and Owen Wilson, Ryan Gosling and Rachel McAdams, Heath Ledger and Michelle Williams, and Drew Barrymore and Fabrizio Moretti.

And then, there are Lindsay Lohan, Paris Hilton, and Nicole Richie. We start with Hilton, as the image of her in tears after being hauled to a police car bound for jail would be front page news for the papers...and a gold mine for the late night jokesters. Her ordeal ended after only a few weeks. Lohan's 2007 started with a visit to rehab in January, then two DUI arrests later in the year with two more stints in rehab. In mid-November, she did go to jail...but for only over an hour. And Richie too spent time in jail, but only for 82 minutes in July for her 2006 DUI arrest. At the same time, she announced she's expecting a little bundle of joy with boyfriend Joel Madden.

Richie's not alone; others who have buns in the oven include Halle Berry, Christina Aguilera, and Jessica Alba.

Of course, the year's drama queen was still Britney Spears. From shaving her head bald after a day-long stay in rehab (followed by going gung ho on the paparazzi with an umbrella as a weapon), to a nasty custody battle, all the way down to flaunting her portly figure during her disastrous performance at the MTV Video Music Awards (though her album "Blackout" did get favorable reviews and sales), we tried so hard not to follow her move every step of the way. And to rub salt in the would even further...little sister Jamie Lynn is now pregnant!!!

In the end, the year's biggest entertainment story that'll continue through 2008 is the ongoing writer's strike, as compensation over new media as well as an increase in residuals from DVD sales are the main focus. So far, two series of talks fell through and many of our favorite shows have shut down production. Even the late night shows felt the pinch, and we had to crack our own jokes on current event without their help. But recently, Jay Leno and Conan O'Brien said they will be back on in January minus the writers, while David Letterman's show will return to full strength (i.e., with his writers) also in the new year. As for the major awards shows like the Golden Globes and Academy Awards: Jon Stewart may have been tapped to host the latter, but the stars may or may not walk the red carpet at both; the Grammys appear to be strike-free as it is a music awards show.

When we head to 2008, will we see an end to the strike; dunno if it'll last longer than the 1988 one? Will Jamie Lynn Spears not follow in her big sister's footsteps when it comes to caring for her new baby? And will Oprah Winfrey on Barack Obama's side pay off during the presidential campaign. We'll have the answers to those questions and others more then.

The "Year in Review" continues tomorrow with the Top 20 Things That Were Abuzz in 2007!

The AllenBlog's
It was the year when the death of a blonde bombshell would lead to a paternity battle too hot for Maury Povich.

The year when a 400-plus page report would blow the lid off the great American pastime as to who got juiced.

The year when the "What happens in Vegas..." term didn't apply to O.J. Simpson this time around.

The year when over 30 people were gunned down to death in the bloodiest school massacre since Columbine.

The year when the sequels to "Spider-Man", "Shrek the Third", and "Pirates of the Caribbean" hit pay dirt, while "Norbit" and two Lindsay Lohan films (and her in general) hit rock bottom.

The year when a beauty queen gave "dumb blonde" a whole new meaning.

The year when America got knocked up...or in that case, the sister of a one-time teen pop queen. And speaking of which, the year when her reputation would be put on the line with a new album.

The year when the Presidential campaign would prematurely get into overdrive, with a former President on one candidate's side and a talk show icon on the other.

And it was the year when there were two different blackouts: The "Sopranos" ending and the writer's strike.

That year was 2007.
Join the AllenBlog as we take a look back at yet another tide-turning year.

The 2008 election underway...deadly mass shootings in Virginia and Nebraska...attempts to pull our troops out of Iraq as more of them die...a scathing name-dropping report that lists which baseball stars were juiced...and a mortgage crisis sending the stock market into a free-fall...you can't script all these in 2007; they were happening right before our eyes.

We began with a fond farewell to the last major person to die in 2006, as former President Gerald Ford was laid to rest in his home state of Michigan. Days after Nancy Pelosi took over the gavel as the Speaker of the House, a series of devastating storms including Hurricane Kyrill takes many lives in Europe. Microsoft's Windows Vista is unleashed to the public, while a winter tornado kills 20 in Florida.

In college football, it was the Florida Gators over Ohio State in the national championship game, while on the pro side at Super Bowl XLI, the Indianapolis Colts shuffled over the Chicago Bears. Kevin Harvick may have taken the checkered flag at the Daytona 500, but perhaps the biggest winter sports story of the year belonged to David Beckham; he announced he was taking his act to this side of the pond with the L.A. Galaxy. We'll get to wife Victoria in the Year in Entertainment.

The Chinese Correction in February caused stock markets worldwide to plummet, while a suicide attack at a military air base where Vice President Dick Cheney visited killed 23. And Illinois Sen. Barack Obama announced he's in as far as the 2008 election is concerned, but I'll have more on that later.

Lance Mackey overcame cancer and became the first dog musher to clinch both the Yukon Quest and Iditarod races in the same year; Florida remained the men's NCAA basketball champions while Tennessee claimed the women's crown; at the Masters, Zack Johnson out-putted all others to wear his first green jacket; and at a rain-shortened Indianapolis 500, Dario Franchitti got his first swig at the congratulatory bottle of milk. Too bad he didn't share it with Ashley Judd; if she chugged it down the photos would be all over the papers and Internet.

Mass murders once again were in the headlines, from five people killed at a Utah mall in January to recently in Nebraska at eight slain followed by the gunman. But the Virginia Tech massacre in April was the worst of them all, with Seung-Hi Cho pulling the trigger on 32 people and later himself, making it the deadliest school shooting in U.S. history since Columbine in 1999.

In May, a deadly tornado wipes out nearly the entire town of Greensburg, Kansas, while four people were charged in a terrorist attempt to blow up JFK Airport in New York. On the sports side, the Anaheim Ducks cop the Stanley Cup; San Antonio claims another NBA championship; and one of the tragic stories of the year took a gruesome twist as WWE wrestler Chris Benoit and family were found dead by murder-suicide. Also, Tony Blair passes the torch after ten years as British Prime Minister to Gordon Brown while a massive heatwave crippling Greece and claiming 11 lives leads to a series of wildfires ablaze around the country.

Several floods break out through Great Britain in July, while in Phoenix, two TV news choppers collided in mid-air killing both crews. 13 people were killed after the Interstate 35W Mississippi River Bridge in Minneapolis collapses; another collapse happened at the Crandall Canyon Mine in Utah, trapping six miners. That would be followed by yet another bridge collapse, this time in China with 22 lives lost and almost 40 missing.

The Dow Jones market had quite a wild 2007, starting with their first close above 13,000, followed by hitting the 14,000 mark. But it would all come to ahead later in the year, as the mortgage crisis would send the numbers tumbling up and down in the weeks to come. Guess my hard drive wasn't the only thing that crashed!

Over 500 were perished as a result of an 8.0 earthquake in Peru, while Hurricanes Dean and Felix take over Mexico and Central America respectively. In October, former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto returns to her native homeland, only to be met by a suicide bombing killing 136; thankfully, Bhutto was unharmed. And back in the States, wildfires all over Southern California destroyed over 1,600 homes and evacuated over a million people.

Two minor sports scandals made headlines in the fall. Marion Jones had to relinquish all five of her Olympic medals she won in 2000 after admitting she took steroids. And Floyd Landis was stripped of his 2006 Tour de France title after tests revealed he was doping; Spain's Oscar Pereiro was the official champion (This year's was Alberto Contador, also from Spain).

But the biggest ones belonged to Michael Vick and O.J. Simpson. First, Vick: The Atlanta Falcons quarterback was indicted for running a dog fighting ring in Virginia and would be sentenced to almost two years in prison. And in September, Simpson would be charged in a robbery attempt in Las Vegas and will be facing trial yet again next spring.

And there was baseball in 2007, from Barry Bonds breaking Hank Aaron's home-run record to the Boston Red Sox sweeping yet another World Series over the Colorado Rockies. However, the sport's biggest story was in the off-season, as former U.S. Senator George Mitchell released a 409-page report that blew the whistle on former and current Major League Baseball players who allegedly used steroids in their careers. Among the famous names listed: Roger Clemens, Andy Pettite, Eric Gagne, and the biggest surprise of all...Barry Bonds.

So, what was 2007's biggest story that will continue to roll over to 2008? The premature kickoff to the presidential campaign, with showdowns between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama on the Democratic side and Rudy Giuliani and Mitt Romney on the Republicans. And this time around, there's backup, with former President Bill Clinton stumping for his wife and talk show icon Oprah Winfrey on the Obama bandwagon.

Some of the faces we've said goodbye to in 2007 included: Art Buchwald, Norman Mailer, Merv Griffin, Richard Jeni, Tom Poston, Wally Schirra, Charles Nelson Reilly, Jerry Falwell, former women's professional wrestlers Sherri Martel and Lillian "The Fabulous Moolah" Ellison, Joel Siegel, Tammy Faye Messner, newscaster Hal Fishman, television pioneers Augie Hiebert and Roger King, Leona Helmsley, Jane Wyman, Luciano Pavarotti, Joey Bishop, Evel Knievel, Benny Parsons, professional wrestlers Bam Bam Bigelow, Brian Adams, and Arnold Skaaland (Chris Benoit was already covered); Calvert DeForest (Larry "Bud" Melman), Kurt Vonnegut, Don Ho, former Russian president Boris Yeltsin, Kurt Waldheim, Liz Claiborne, former First Lady Lady Bird Johnson, Beverly Sills, Phil Rizzuto, Sidney Sheldon, Yvonne De Carlo, jazz musician Oscar Peterson, and the one death which continued to make news just weeks after and making us all sick...Anna Nicole Smith.

Other than the election, what else will 2008 bring in store for us? Pope Benedict XVI's first U.S. trip is one of them, plus we've got the Summer Olympics in Beijing. And it will be an end of both eras for the New York Mets and Yankees, as their last games will be played at Shea Stadium and Yankee Stadium respectively...unless one of both teams make the playoffs and/or the World Series. But like I said in the first paragraph, there'll be no scripting in what will transpire in the new year; all we have to do is see for ourselves.

Tomorrow as the Year in Review continues, a look back at the biggest entertainment and celebrity stories of 2007.

Hello, everybody. We're into the holidays and there's lots of ground to cover as always, so on to it.

First up...the latest on the writers' strike, and it appears it ain't going to be a very Merry Christmas after all as the latest talks which resumed after Thanksgiving fell through again. But on the upside of things, Jay Leno has been plundering through his "Tonight Show" vaults and airing assorted old episodes from the days when Edd Hall was the announcer, Branford Marsalis was bandleader, and Kevin Eubanks had something on his head: HAIR! Oh, those were the days.

Conan O'Brien meanwhile is also enjoying plenty of free time during the strike; he even sported what he calls a "strike beard". And I don't know how the other late night hosts have been holding up; but I'm sure they've been out and about in the stores and malls on their holiday shopping with the money they've made.

But because of the strike, we've been deprived of jokes about what's in the news as of late, including the CIA admitting in 2005 they destroyed videotapes of interrogations made in 2002 of two al-Qadea suspects. 2005? I'm thinking they've taped over those interrogations with episodes of "Desperate Housewives."

Here at home, a series of wolf attacks outside Fairbanks have been making news. I tell you, those are the kind of predators we'd rather keep an eye out for instead for the ones we usually see on "Dateline."

Now you know of the transatlantic TV show "How Clean Is Your House?", in which two English grannies scour through the nastiest, filthiest homes known to mankind and afterwards, briefs the residents on what they saw (and smelled) and orders them to clean house? Well, for one complex of buildings in Fairbanks, a good name for it should be "How Clean (and Old) Is Your Apartment?", and here's why:

For weeks, there has been talk about whether or not the Fairview Manor apartments on Airport Way -- which have been around since the '50s -- should be demolished to make way for a more modern apartment building in its place. On November 7, the Daily News-Miner ran an editorial saying they should...and days later, I wrote a "Letter to the Editor" in agreeance:

To the editor:

In response to your Nov. 7 editorial about Fairview Manor, I agree that it should be demolished, imploded, whatever to keep Fairbanks fresh.

Here's why: Sure, they've been around since the 1950s but as Fairbanks would grow and prosper in the decades since, the buildings would become a total eyesore both inside and out. From the torn carpets to little or no air conditioning/heat in some apartments to even the 1997 fire, I have no idea why they've managed to last so long in the face of modern and more energy-efficient apartment buildings springing up all over town.

I hope the Fairbanks City Council does the right thing and sees that that decrepit complex known as Fairview Manor should be done away with forever. And if they finally start the demolition, it would get more news here than that ongoing writers' strike in Hollywood.

Fairview Manor has remained the same for over 50 years, going back to when they were Army housing on the old Weeks Field. But now, the time should come to be given its last rites, because when I first lived in Fairbanks for a time in 1983, again from 1985-89, and since moving back for good in 1992, they've always stood there! Now that Fairbanks has a new city mayor (Terry Strle), it's time for them to step up their game face and do something about those old buildings...before the "How Clean Is Your House?" grannies make the long trip to England and shows the City Council what "spring cleaning" is really all about!

And before I go...a sign that we're nearing the end of 2007 is that soon, I'll be working on my special series of blogs recapping the year, from the top news, sports, entertainment, and celebrity stories to my Top 20 list on the things that were abuzz to new this year...the "Fill In The Blank" quiz. Yes, it's the AllenBlog's 2007 Year In Review, and you'll be seeing that here after Christmas. With that said, so long and stay strong!