Arianna asks, Who IS this guy?

One of the biggest questions inside Hollywood is why Arianna Huffington would seek permission to post George Clooney's blog item from Lisa Taback — an independent publicist working on the "Good Night, and Good Luck" Oscar campaign — and not from Clooney's personal publicist, Stan Rosenfield.

Rosenfield, infamous for deftly handling stars who don't need publicity — also known as 'The Keeper of the Clooney" — is, and rightfully so, fiercely protective of his superstar charge. Is it really possible that Arianna didn't know that Stan is the go-to guy for all things George?

"I had never spoken to Stan before Monday when he called," says Huffington, speaking from the Caribbean for a piece on the blog brouhaha that will run Thursday, March 16, in the Los Angeles Times Calendar section.

"Hollywood is not my beat so I had never heard of him before," she explained. "But I had met Lisa Taback at every "Good Luck" event and she was always with George. She told me to just send her the compiled quotes for the blog and that she would run it by George. The fact that it was for a blog was very unambiguous. Naturally, I didn't think twice about it."

Huffington sent Taback, not Rosenfield, the blog item, exactly as it would eventually appear on her site. Three days later, Taback responded with "Of course this is fine, Arianna." Huffington even emailed the email correspondences to this writer as proof.

"Once I got the approval from Lisa, I went ahead and ran it: George Clooney's words put into blog form," says Huffington.

Bet she won't do that again.