Oscar Handicapping

According to Variety Leslee Dart was fired from her job as president of one of the most prestigious public relations firms in Hollywood. While I would normally not bother to spend much time thinking about something this inside baseball, the fact that this is Oscar campaign season and this woman has been responsible for orchestrating successful Oscar campaigns for Ron Howard, Anthony Minghella, Tom Hanks and Jonathan Demme - and she was orchestrating the campaign for Scorsese's The Aviator, Mike Nichols' Closer, and Wes Anderson's new film. If you are handicapping the awards season, all three of these films (3 that however great they may or may not be are difficult enough to need help in this department) just saw their odds become less favorable.