Tom Cruise and his Scientology buddies must be upset this morning. They’ve lost their political supporter in New York City.

Disgraced state senator Hiram Monserrate lost a special election yesterday to Queens Assemblyman Jose Peralta.

Monserrate was kicked out of the State Senate after being convicted on misdemeanor charges for slashing his girlfriend’s face with a glass.

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Jennifer Aniston and Gerard Butler are not a romantic couple in real life.

They play one in “The Bounty Hunter.” And the tabloids are dizzy over the idea that they might be in real life. But they’re not. It’s an act, designed to puff up audiences for “The Bounty Hunter” ahead of its opening Friday.

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I was so sorry to see that the great Ron Lundy has passed away. The legendary WABC DJ died from a heart attack on Monday at age 75.

David Hinckley has a nice piece on him today in the New York Daily News.

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Kirstie Alley got some stuff wrong this morning when spoke to Meredith Vieira on NBC’s beloved “Today Show” in response to our report on her Organic Liaison diet company.

Again: Facts are facts, Kirstie. Two of your board members are Scientologists. One of them runs a Scientology-centric company. The address of your company in Clearwater, Fla., is the same as the the World Institute of Scientology, not your accountant.

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“Twilight” star Kristen Stewart–so good as Joan Jett in “The Runaways” and in “Welcome to the Rileys”– has her next project lined up.

Stewart will co-star with Julianne Moore in “Backwoods.” Sources say the film, directed by Moore’s husband, Bart Freundlich, concerns the end of the world.

“Backwoods,” still to be fully cast, should start sometime this summer. By then, Stewart will be starring in “Twilight:Eclipse.”

Freundlich has three features under his belt including a gem called “The Myth of Fingerprints.” He also recently directed four episodes of “Californication” for Showtime.

Moore, who was denied an Oscar nomination for her wonderful work in “A Single Man,” opens shortly in Atom Egoyan’s “Chloe,” with Liam Neeson and Amanda Seyfried.

The menschy Moore also pays a rare visit to her alma mater, the CBS soap “As the World Turns,” on April 5th, to help celebrate her fictional parents’ (Don Hastings, Kathryn Hays) anniversary and give a nod to the 54 year old soap’s scheduled end this fall.

Moore won a Daytime Emmy playing lookalike cousins on the show. She will only play one for the return. What happened to the other one? “I’m not in touch with her,” the four time Oscar nominee quipped at the “Chloe” premiere last night in New York.

She says she loved being reunited with her soap family, including 92 year old show matriarch Helen Wagner, who plays her grandmother. “She’s still giving us acting tips,” Moore recalls.

The new Sony deal for Michael Jackson’s new records is actually worth $225 million according to my sources.

That means that Jackson attorneys John Branca (a co-executor) and Joel Katz, with the help of co-executor John McClain, have cut for Michael Jackson’s estate the richest deal ever in recording business history. It far exceeds the deal Sony made with Bruce Springsteen a couple of years ago for $100 million.

The deal is only for records for the next seven years. It already includes the soundtrack to “This Is It.” Come November, the first scheduled release will be a collection of unreleased tracks perhaps including a duet with Paul Anka and one or two songs left off of “Thriller.”

Two more releases will be anniversary editions of “Bad” and “Off the Wall” which will include extra and remixed tracks a la the 25th anniversary edition of “Thriller.” McClain and hopefully Jackson’s longtime manager Frank DiLeo will be involved with those.

There are also enough tracks for at least one or two live albums from various Jackson tours.

The Sony deal does not include anything to do with Michael’s publishing, live shows still to be arranged, or merchandise. A show with Cirque du Soleil, as I’ve written before, will be announced shortly for Las Vegas.

But all of that is separate. What happened: Since his death Jackson has sold 31 million albums worldwide. Sony, which had parted company with Jackson before his death, wants to remain in the Jackson business. With this contract, they will be in business with his estate for at least seven more years.

Insiders say that Jackson’s estate will retain the rights to all the master recordings, too. This is highly unusual. Also: Branca, Katz and McClain also, apparently, renegotiated Jackson’s royalty rate with Sony for this deal. “It’s the highest rate anyone’s ever had,” says a source.

At this rate, the prediction is that Jackson’s huge debt leveraged against his own MiJac Music Publishing will be paid off in a short time. His even bigger debt, secured against his one half interest in the Sony/ATV Music Publishing company–also known as the Beatles catalog–will be refinanced and reduced. When Jackson died, sources point out, he was $500 million in debt.His estate is now solvent, and his children are well taken care for their lives.

It is the sad irony of the Michael Jackson story that for years he suffered financially, and drifted in his career. Since his death. his career and finances have flourished.

Kate Winslet and Sam Mendes each have Academy Awards, but it wasn’t enough to keep their marriage intact.

They’re ending their marriage, according to their representatives.

I am told, believe it or not, that the split actually came last summer. “Kate was bored with Sam,” says a source who knows the inside scoop. “They drifted apart.”

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Rielle Hunter fesses up to a lot in her new GQ interview. If Elizabeth Edwards doesn’t die from the cancer, this should kill her.

But there’s a lot Hunter doesn’t tell my old pal Lisa DePaolo, about her life in Hollywood just prior to meeting John Edwards in 2006.

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The blogs are alive with speculation that Kirstie Alley’s new diet scheme, called Organic Liaison, is a front for Scientology.

It sure seems that way.

Let’s not forget that Alley is a devoted member of the sect. She fronted a PR pamphlet for them in 2007 called “Keep Scientology Working.”

Organic Liaison’s advisory board includes a prominent Scientologist named Michelle Seward. Seward is also the CEO of Protege Financial, a Scientology-based company. The two other execs at Protege — Mark Francovich and Scott Foulk – are longtime, high-ranking, practicing Scientologists. Not only that: The corporate office for Organic Liaison is in Clearwater, Fla. — headquarters, not coincidentally, of Scientology. Organic Liaison is in the same building in Clearwater as the World Institute of Scientology.

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Peter Graves died Sunday at age 83. He was the gray-haired, suave, deep-voiced star of the “Mission: Impossible” TV series on CBS from 1967 to 1973. Graves was also the younger brother of James Arness, who was Marshall Dillon “Gunsmoke” on CBS from 1955 to 1975. They were probably the only siblings ever to star in simultaneous long-running hits on any network. Arness, 87, is still alive.

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