Spear Image: Is Britney Miraculously Salvaging Hers?

We thought we had lost her, one bad second-husband and two insta-kids ago. We watched as pop music's unchallenged queen seemingly lost sight of herself, or her goals, and regressed into a disastrously clad, gum-snapping, rap-star wannabe husband-pimping shell of her once-famous, Madonna-frenching self.
But now, and all in the course of but a week, Britney Spears appears to have brought the sexy back. (Apologies to her old flame for the reference.)
A surprise visit to Letterman? She's still flirty, and adorably unpredictable!
Filing for divorce from that poster child for so many wrong things? She's come to her senses... detoxified!
Spied by the New York City dailies out on the town, slimmed down and dressed to kill, then taking a playful spin around 30 Rock's skating rink? She's got her zest for life back, and most importantly, she remembers exactly what sells.
The pop tart's reimagining... makeover... return to old form.... Whatever one wants to call it, it has been so Swiss watch-precise, it must be at somebody's deft hand. But whose? Spears recently broke off with her longtime publicist, the papers say, presumably after - or, one could reckon, right before - her painful-to-watch meltdown on Dateline NBC. (Some damage-control maneuver that turned out to be.) So who is pulling the strings? Or is Britney herself at the helm, having had some epiphany that the best way to reclaim her glam glory is to simply be the girl, not yet a woman she once was?
It was so easy to kick Brit when she was down, during UPN's Chaotic, CarSeatGate, and what not. But it's even easier, and more enjoyable, to now welcome her back to where she belongs, as the gal making headlines for the right reasons, and in a career-invigorating way. Is Britney the best singer, amongst a field of Christinas and Kellys? Oh, hardly. But few put more into a video or a concert than she. So let's look forward to no more (or at least fewer tabloid-feeding) "Oops," and instead anticipate her doing thing, baby, one more time.