You know what's great about alleged political short lists and the unnamed political insiders who allegedly know who's on them? If they're wrong, and someone like Anna Wintour isn't actually on one of them — just like she likely wasn't two weeks ago, or in June, or in 2009 — no one will ever know just how wrong they were. The Ambassador Anna rumor has heated up again, this time by way of an "exclusive" this morning from The Hollywood Reporter's Tina Daunt. "Political insiders, however, suggest reports that Vogue editor Anna Wintour might be open to becoming ambassador to France are accurate," Daunt writes in her rundown of Obama's Hollywood donors who might — maybe, possibly — now get positions as diplomatic appointments. (Jeffrey Katzenberg has "too many obligations to consider a few years in Paris or the Bahamas," in case you were wondering.) "Political insiders," of course, is the kind of blurry indicator that can apply to anyone from the vice president to Obama advisors, but it can also apply to the "two people" from whom Bloomberg heard the Wintour rumor a couple weeks back.

Anyway, the Vogue editor's name is the crown jewel on a THR list of donors that also includes a Hollywood philanthropist, a White House decorator, the chief of the Tennis Channel, and an "industry money manager." So, yeah, Wintour makes for a sexy competitor. But we'll believe an Anna ambassadorship when we see one, not just when "political insiders" tell us to.

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Alexander Abad-Santos