Dennis Miller Takes Down Nancy Pelosi

"When there's money involved she's up and down like a seal at Seaworld."

(Via Instapundit)

Kenneth The Page Responds

I don't know who this internet chatter character is, this Kenneth the Page, as I don't watch television, but from this clip I can see what they are trying to suggest.



Ann Althouse suggested there was an undercurrent of racism about the personal attacks on Governor Bobby Jindal's speech. After all, it was just a speech, and some people bomb in them. He did last night, stylistically, but given the instantaneous diarrhoea of posts his performance got (possibly as much as the actual and much more important State of the Union), you'd think he had slain three kittens on national TV.

Althouse asked.

"Why the urge to paint him as a white white man? Where did that come from?"

Probably the critics will mention that his regionalism and conservative religion made the connexion evident, but she is going for something deeper here.

There is a programme on IFC called "The Whitest Kids You Know".

A blogger described such kids as:

"The whitest kids I know all sort of look like Ashton Kutcher, listen to Jack Johnson, think Dane Cook is funny, and dig Adam Sandler movies."

I think what many people don't like about Jindal is that he doesn't talk like Apu, doesn't look like he could break into a Bollywood dance routine, and therefore isn't the "other" that is cool because of cultural expectations. Take it into another level, and they are also inferring that he is a race traitor by being a poseur, this Republican Southerner Indian fella.

What I BELIEVE Althouse is saying is that he fails to live up to some kind of stereotype they refuse to acknowledge they have deep inside themselves.

He acts like just another vanilla geeky white guy, like Kenneth the Page. More Millionaire, than Slumdog, if you will.

And that makes him the fairest of game.

Sure, he did himself no favours with that speech.

But if Obama had stunk up the joint, and others had criticised him so savagely, don't you think that his supporters wouldn't have claimed racism as a possible reason for the derision?

You bet they would have.

ADDED: Some journalists are not even hiding their references about Jindal and his Indianness.

“Bobby Jindal was ‘pitiful,’ Helen Thomas tells film crew, right before making a ‘Slumdog Millionaire’ crack.”

That is Helen Thomas, the doyenne of the press corps who practised unbiased reporting all those years, you know.

IN THE COMMENTS: I mean, after Chris Matthews admitted he uttered that infamous "Oh God", and stating that the GOP CPAC conference this week will resemble a Star Trek convention (you know, more uncool geeky white guys), what do we expect anymore.

But JSU reminds us of his latest Jindal crack.

There was definitely something rotten in Matthews' "outsourcing" remark.

Laura Norder

You may be wondering who this lovely lady might be, this Laura Norder. It's not a woman at all, but refers to the way many Brits pronounce "Law & Order".

(Think of it like JFK's Cuber, and yes, sometimes I too add the superfluous -er to words ending in a vowel sound. One which makes me wince when I hear myself saying it, is insomnier)

I only say this because it would seem ITV will be joining forces with the famed American franchise television series and will finally come out with the British version, set to premiere next Sunday, 23 February.

It'll be called, rather unimaginatively, Law and Order: UK.

The famous intro has been jiggered juuuust a wee bit to fit a different set of realities.

"In the criminal justice system, the people are represented by two separate yet equally important groups. The police who investigate crime, and the Crown Prosecution Service who prosecute the offenders."

Oh dear, the Crown Prosecution Service. Hee. Hee.



This clip above is interesting for it reveals to me that something I always thought was true about the Law & Order series, might yet prove to be a fallacy.

I always thought that L&O was a "plug and play" series, which worked regardless of the actor or character.

It was like the Denver Broncos of television shows.

No matter which running back you put out there, he was sure to run for 200 yards, and score 2 TDs every game. It wasn't the player which made it work, you see -- it was the system.

But the teaser reveals a charmless cast of actors, all politically correct, flatfooted and scrubbed up, quite different from the streetwise partnership of the late lamented Jerry Orbach and Chris Noth (my favourite cop duo in the series), snarky Sam Waterston or that amazon, Jill Hennessy.

Eh, who knows. I'll give it a chance and watch it online. And so can you, if you find away to change your IP by proxy...

P.S.: Ooh! You know what the clip didn't play? The addictive Laura Norder doink-doink.



They better.

Truther Douchebaggery Entering Our Homes Soon

I rarely watch any television that is not PBS, cable news, Sundance, foreign channels, or the triumverate of Discovery-History Channel-Travel Channel, and perhaps I see why now.

Despite hearing that America is going through a second "Golden Age of Television" exactly 50 years after its first, if segments like this on FX's "Rescue Me" are anything to go by, I am not missing a thing.

A coming episode of the acclaimed FX drama “Rescue Me” will tackle what may sound like a far-fetched plot line: that the attacks of Sept. 11 were an “inside job.” The actor who espouses the theories on camera, it turns out, also subscribes to them in real life.

Claims that Al Qaeda terrorists were not solely responsible for the attacks have a lively following on the Internet, including on YouTube, but the second episode of “Rescue Me’s” fifth season, starting in April, may represent the first fictional presentation of 9/11 conspiracy theories by a mainstream media company (FX is operated by the News Corporation).

“They’re not discussed a lot in the press,” Daniel Sunjata, the actor who plays Franco Rivera on “Rescue Me,” told reporters at a television press tour last month. He predicted that the episode would be “socio-politically provocative.”

Ugh. I wonder if "Rescue Me" would ever tackle the Holocaust suggesting it never happened. Of course not (thank God). And why? Because there are some conspiracy theories more acceptable than others.

As for the topic, let me reiterate that there is nothing, and I do mean nothing, that makes my hair stand on end more than people who believe in conspiracy theories. It alters my entire view of a person's intelligence. This actually affected my enjoyment of Marion Cotillard's wonderful performance as Edith Piaf, in last year's "La Vie En Rose".

Yep, she's a Truther, too.

Cotillard: I have a tendency to often share the point of view of the conspiracy theory. [...]

Coluche, 9/11, all that. We can watch on the Internet all the films that, well…about 9/11, about — about the conspiracy theory. It's fascinating. It's even addictive after a while.

Paris Première: Let's take 9/11, for example. What did disturb [sic] you more concretely?

Cotillard: You are shown that other towers of the same kind that were hit by planes, that burnt — there is a tower, I think that it's in Spain, that burnt for twenty-four hours.

Paris Première: Before collapsing…?

Cotillard: It never collapsed! None of these towers collapsed. And, over there, in a few minutes, the thing collapses. And, then, after that, we'll talk lengthily about it because there was — because the thing was filled with gold, the towers from 9/11. And then it was a money-sucker because they were finished, it seems to me, in '73, and to update all that, to modernize all the technology and everything, it was much more expensive to have work done, etc., than destroying them. Did man walk on the moon? I've seen quite a lot of documentaries about it, and I ask myself. But, in any case, I don’t believe everything that I'm told, that's for sure.

I've already spoken at length about conspiracy theories. Though upon reading this excerpt by Cotillard (who later apologised for her remarks, saying they were taken out of context), I am again jolted back into the theory I have about why certain people believe in them.

It's not a logic thing. It's also not that there has never been a single conspiratorial act in the history of mankind, and therefore, they're all bunk.

It's that conspiracy theories are twisted creatures of the human ego.

Listen to what conspiracists always, always say when justifying their beliefs.

But, in any case, I don’t believe everything that I'm told, that's for sure.

Commit that sentence to memory. It is used by every person who has ever wanted to explain how the world works according to their world view.

What they are really saying is this:

The whole world might be made of gullible morons who believe in everything they are told, BUT! I! AM! SMARTER! THAN! THEY! ARE!

"They" - another they - cannot pull the wool over MY eyes!

... whomever "they" think it is, though I suspect the they is more The System than an actual cadre of people.

Having said that, I think it goes again to my theory of the ego being stimulated by such thoughts. It is very easy for people to imagine that there is a puppetmaster inside a smoke-filled room pulling the strings of our world, sending his minions to do his evil bidding.

Never mind that the total sum of our world's actions cannot be conceived by any single human being, let alone one person or select group being able to control such an organic growth as an open society. In their hearts, they are comforted by their view of how the world works, at the same time continuing to be appalled by misanthropic visions, which is the root of their attitude.

They do not trust their fellow human beings, especially those who they disagree with politically.

The other way would actually entail putting away their half-gassed fabrications; to approach the world as a mature, mentally healthy adult -- and some people die of old age believing in Machiavellian blueprints.

Look, conspiracy theories exist only because we have doubts. The doubts are legitimate, but the conclusions are a panacea for ignorance.

RELATED LINK: Pithy and always intellectually stimulating Blake of The Bit Maelstom coincidentally touches on the very topic of conspiracy theories, of which he was working on posting for a while.

He writes about the current and past crops of conspiracies, from the moon landing (debunked by Adam and Jamie, thanks be to God -- I'm only being half-facetious when saying that) to the JFK assassination to Obama's "mysterious" birthplace.

Blake's gambit is to try to shame the conspiracists for the inane quality of recent theories.

The 9/11 Truthers have instead constructed an elaborate explanation for the towers' collapse which insults everyone who saw the planes hit.

Worse, they do so in the face of an actual conspiracy: Of anti-American hard-line Muslim terrorists who left massive paper trails, who had ties all over the world, who had many co-conspirators, and who had a boss willing to take credit for it.

On a lighter note, another dumb conspiracy making the rounds is the "Obama wasn't born in America" theory. This requires us to believe that the State of Hawaii is hiding something (apparently in a many-decade anticipation of Obama's eventual Presidential bid) and that there's not a single Republican or Hillary supporter able to sneak that evidence out.

Really, it's just not up to snuff.

I hope to see better in the future from everyone.

Heh.

I only wish I could be this light-hearted about the topic, tweaking their noses like Blake does.

Unfortunately, it really cheeses my left non-existent nut to have to speak about such things. I think it is the educator and the Historian in me, which balks at the grains of truth being used to insinuate concrete fact.

We have the French Revolution to blame for every cockamamie conspiracy that has been flung out since the world exploded into modernity in the late 1700s. People who didn't know how to explain how the world suddenly looked back at them, needed to find reasons in the form of groups (the Jews, the Jacobins, the Jesuits, the Masons) to make sense of a topsy-turvy era.

The world has never really recovered since.

SUGGESTED VIEWING: If you haven't already done so, check out Fritz Lang's silent film, "Spies" (Spione).

It's a treasure trove of insinuations about how the world works, down to the creepy banker (so obviously intended to suggest "a grasping, devious Jew" with his neurotic Lenin goatee and Dr. Evil sidekick cat) who masterminds a spy ring.



I always wondered about this film, which despite the love of intrigue and sense of helplessness Lang loved to show in his films, was uncharacteristically lazy intellectually.

Then I remembered that Thea von Harbou, Lang's then wife, was later one of the top artist prizes secured by a grateful Hitler to show the world that, hey, intellectuals were amenable to National Socialism.

To quote the outraged Headmistress in another Weimar classic, "Mädchen in Uniform", ein Skandal.

The New Gilligan

In what is being called a "bit of inspired casting" peach-faced Canadian actor, Michael Cera, is apparently slated to play the new Gilligan in a movie about those ill-fated castaways.

It's one of those *slap - wow - that's awesome* kinds of moments when you first hear something, because you can totally see the gangly, diffident, and yet utterly lovable Cera in Bob Denver's role -- no problem.



Now, I know what your next question is, especially if you're given to quiz your male friends:

Ginger or Mary Ann?

Seems that Beyoncé is being approached to play the glamourous movie star, which a million Baby Boomers lusted over back in the day.

Given that the most obvious casting choice sadly died recently (you all know I mean Anna Nicole Smith), and that inevitably, a modern-day version had to be more racially diverse, it seems also an inspired choice.

Who would you cast for each role, if the choice were yours?

Let's see.

- Brian Dennehy as the Captain (except he's not jolly enough -- I fear John Goodman will be given the role).

- The Professor would have to be a computer geek type these days, to reprogramme all those GPSes, and what-not, so let's go with Michael Trucco, of Battlestar Galactica (that's for my boyfriend, who is constantly nagging me to start watching the series).

- Parker Posey as Lovey. Come on, you know it.

- Julian Fellowes, one of the few proper toffs who are jobbing actors, could play Thurston Howell III with his eyes closed.

- Mary Ann is tricky. Wholesome doesn't fly as much anymore, though I suppose it's an universal male archetype of womanhood. I say, choose a complete unknown for this role. Please not Katherine Heigl.

With Cera as Gilligan, and Beyoncé as Ginger, I think we got ourselves a terrific hommage movie.

Don't You Know There's No Such Thing As Werewooooolves

I remembered a skit from a "Best of Carol Burnett" show -- Tim Conway's own inimitable take on the Paul Henreid cigarette gesture I mentioned in a post below.

Minute 5:00 to 5:15.



I had to watch about four of these eight minute clips to find it, and in doing so, I remembered just how much Carol and her Friends were outstandingly funny. The comic timing, Tim cutting up Harvey Korman, Lyle Waggoner the toy boy, Vicki Lawrence's younger sis routines (I imagine commenter Ruth Anne Adams in that role to Peggy's Carol), as well as those priceless, and I do mean priceless, take-offs on Norma Desmond.

God, what happened to television like this?

It's not just that Rosie O'Donnell's weird Christmas skit show didn't take off, it's that comic ensemble performances are not even attempted anymore, anywhere on US television. In Living Colour (two snaps up) was the last one that I recall, though that was more Saturday Night Live, than Sid Caesar.

Is it because the talent is all gone?

Kermit Khristmas

The Muppets were an integral part of my childhood. This episode, "Letters To Santa" will make you smile. Sorry international viewers -- the magnificent resource that is Hulu is not available to you, alas.

The Pointy And Rather Fabulous Eyebrows Of Andy Levy

Everyone remembers the dismal Fox News comedy show, The 1/2 Hour News Hour, probably because it stank worse than Pepe Le Pew's romantic overtures to Penelope Pussycat.

Let that be a lesson to you, kids. You can't out-Jon Stewart Jon Stewart. Only Stephen Colbert can do that.

So it was with trepidation that I began watching Red Eye some months ago.

This best kept secret on late night combines the libertarian morality play that is Trey Stone's and Matt Parker's South Park, with Paul Lynde's circle-gets-the-square zingers. It's proof positive that conservatives not only have a sense of humour, but that they can say irreverent things liberals can't say anymore because they're stupid literalists.

The show is anything but formulaic, unless inside jokes qualify.

Greg Gutfeld, the host, is a good Catholic boy from California, who is at pains to point out he's not Jewish, all the while making with the homosocial yucks to lovable, and yet rather pathetic sidekick, Bill Schultz. I'm not exactly sure what function Schultz fulfills on the show, but he does it really well. Perhaps he's best described as Major Healy to Gutfeld's Major Nelson, and with that, I'm pooped out of 1960s pop culture references.

Red Eye usually has on hand three or four guests, including generally one via satellite, notably, ex-Drudge pal and total hottie, Andrew Breitbart.

Most of the time Greg throws out outrageous claims about Schultz and his guests like, "Bill, you were in Sing-Sing in the 30s for murdering your mother-in-law, how does Obama's prison reform strike you?".

(I just totally made that up. I'm sure Greg would approve though)

Gutfeld gets to opine in his daily Gregalogues, which can be best described as a cross between Jerry Springer's Final Thought and that part in the Wizard of Oz where Dorothy gets attacked by a gang of flying monkeys. It's really good.

In fact, the whole show is a middle finger to Brits like my male cousins who say Americans don't do "silly" well. Hah!

But for comedy to work, there has to be tension present somewhere, usually in the form of an authoritarian figure hovering around, ready to quell the madcappiness.

(This is why "Grace and Favour", the "Are You Being Served?" sequel, didn't work, in case you were wondering all these years)

Enter Andy Levy.

He of the pointy eyebrows, blond Sir Wisp-A-Lot hair, and air of exasperated proof-reader dismissiveness. Andy is, I'm not embarrassed to claim, a national treasure.

Only Fox News could hold such a golden nugget, and relegate him to the graveyard shift correcting a bunch of misfit retards. I use the word "retards" with affection, you understand.

Levy first came into prominence in Hollywood, where he was the publicist for the 69th Academy Awards. (Yeah, I didn't think there was money in that either).

He also had a blog for a brief moment in time called "The Cranky Insomniac", which oddly is his job description on the show. I'm of the opinion that you can tell a lot about a person by the blogroll they keep, and his includes Cathy Seipp, Gateway Pundit, Patterico's Pontifications (I sure hope he got his domain back, poor chap).

Now that's a stand-up guy.

(We will ignore that he also blogrolls Andrew Sullivan, Atlas Shrugs, and Wonkette, for the mere fact that he had the prescient taste to also blogroll Christopher Althouse. Wait, the Christopher Althouse? I can haz lulz?)

Anyway, Andy's schtick is to bookend Red Eye with a faux-Faux News alert at the start of the show, then a full five minute segment called "The Half-Time Report", finally finishing up with some Kleenex and Vaseline with the "Post Game Wrap-Up".

It's hard to describe his pièce de resistance, The Half-Time Report. If you held a gun to my head, I would say it's like going to your principal's office, as you squirmed during a long recitation of your mistakes in that morning's Trig class.

For five minutes he dryly corrects any hyperbole flung out by Gutfeld and Guests, and my word but he is sharp. He has the incisive logic of a lawyer, who if he were passing an Aussie sheep farm, you know, like you do, were asked if a sheep on the road was shaved, he'd say, "well, at least on one side he is".

You can't take anything you say for granted around Mr. Levy!

In fact, I wondered if he had been a lawyer at some point, because not only is he Jewish, and smart, but he's also always right. If that doesn't describe every Jew I know, I don't know what does.

To my amazement, I read on his Wiki page that he had been a 31K Signaller in the US Army (!). He just went up 1000 degrees in my Male-o-Metre of Perfection right there.

You know what makes for the best comedy? Being quick on the uptake.

It's hard, because you have to think on your feet, like when someone makes a gaffe and says, "This movie takes place in a menstrual hospital", and you immediately reply, "Oh, it's a period piece."

Comedy should not just be about banana peel flops, and Runyonesque one-liners, but the real good stuff is when you can get your listeners' brain wheels whirring away. The quicker you get a Groucho Marxist sly reference, the more you feel rewarded by the mental calisthenics.

It was this talent that Andy had, that actually brought him to the attention of Gutfeld over at HuffPo, in the first place. He actually parlayed his devilish comments on Gutfeld's deadpan blogposts into a gig on Red Eye.

He thus fulfilled the not-so-secret wish of anyone who has ever taken the time to comment on a notable blog, of being so good in one's replies, that you were elevated into superstardom by dint of one magically turned phrase, or fifty.

But enough of our time over at Althouse.

Andy Levy is that rarest of guys -- one who was discovered not sitting on a stool at Schraft's wearing a tight angora sweater, but probably in sweats and a t-shirt, a ballcap with the words "NASCAR FAN" on them, typing furious retorts for the delectation of an observing few.

I should be so lucky.

Okay, so if you've never watched Andy Levy, Red Eye, or even liked the pungent gayness of unicorns, you'll have no idea what I'm talking about, but I promise you, staying up to 3-4 AM EST is worth it if you have nothing better to do. This includes the Best Of reruns every weekend at midnight.

And yes, I am using the same whimsical hyperbole in this entire blogpost, which would probably earn me the pointy eyebrowed condescension of my hero -- but I don't care. Andy Levy is a Greek God with ripe buttocks!

Here he is, in one of my favourite episodes, from October 23.

Notice the self-satisfied smirk when professional comedian, Jeffrey Ross, marvels "this guy is very funny".



Oh, and on November 1st (the last episode they broadcast before the Presidential Elections), he predicted:

"It will be Obama 364, McCain 174. It's a bloodbath."

I listened to that in horror that day. But, wouldn't you know it, final tally: Obama 365, McCain 172.

Christ on cream cheese, this guy IS good.

EXTRA: From Andy's blog, The Cranky Insomniac, is this incredibly topical opinion on Joe "The Prophet" Biden, our next Vice-President, written in 2006.

I love Joe Biden. I love how Joe Biden loves him some Joe Biden. All politicians love themselves, but Joe Biden takes self-love to a level that would make Narcissus shake his head and say, “Dude,” before slowly backing out of the room. The only thing Joe Biden needs to do to make me love him more is start referring to himself in the third person. Also, Joe Biden should always be called by his full name. It’s just one of those names, like Genghis Khan or Chi Chi LaRue. Have you noticed that Joe Biden suffers from inappropriate smile syndrome? Watch Joe Biden when the Senate Judiciary Committee is holding a hearing and it’s his turn to pretend to ask questions. He may be reading from his notes (wearing those ab fab half-glasses!) or just droning on about the pet hamster he had as a kid that taught him some valuable lesson, but literally every 5 or 10 seconds he’ll look up at the poor sap who’s supposed to be answering questions and give him a big smile. I think this is supposed to convey sincere reassurance but it’s so obviously phony and bizarre that it gives him more of an “I could very easily cut you into McNugget-sized pieces with a chainsaw and store your body parts in my Sub-Zero” vibe. We could do with more of this in our leaders. That’s why I also love John Bolton – he’s exactly what we need in an ambassador to an organization composed of thieving bureaucrats and murdering tyrants. You just know Johnny wouldn’t hesitate to stick a serrated blade in someone’s gut and twist it until a good portion of the intestine was hanging out, which he would then slurp down as if it were Mom’s linguini after football practice.

Mmm. I love linguini. Wait, isn't that "linguine"? Hah!

Joy Behar Is A Carbuncle Inside The Devil's Armpit

One day she went from a mildly annoying, no talent comedienne who moonlighted in Woody Allen murder mysteries, to this vastly annoying liberal dumptruck on morning TV.

Incidentally, I don't like Fred Armisen's characterisation of her on SNL. But then, his Barack Obama is equally weak.

Aww, Geez Do I Really Have To

Yes, all right. Your inevitable "Senator McCain's first post-election interview with Jay Leno" post.

The military who were part of the audience gave him the best welcome I've seen since I saw McCain at the Univ of Miami. I want to be gracious, and I genuinely am thankful for his service, his valour and overall career, but right now, my emotions are still raw.



(HuffPo had two 2 minute excerpts on their site, but so far, I haven't found the full segment on Hulu)

Did you watch McCain on Leno? What impression did he give you about the whole Palin situation?

John McCain On QVC

The SNL skit featured Tina Fey as Sarah Palin and John McCain as, well, John McCain. It was a bargain-basement telecast since he is "a Republican without money".

It was a decent skit, which featured Cindy McCain showing off the McCain "Fine Gold" jewelry for sale (get it?).

Consider this a place-holder for the video of the opener, and the anticipated Weekend Update video!

GOT IT.



WEEKEND UPDATE SKIT



UPDATE: Yeesh. Ben Affleck is bombing badly, and laughing at his own outrageous over-acting. So far he's mimicked Alec Baldwin and as anticipated, Keith Olbermann. Awful.

MORE: Affleck closed the Olbermann skit very well, so I have to amend my "awful" opinion. The next skit featured him chatting up a crazy Target cashier lady as an UPS courier playa, for some reason doing a black accent. You fillin me?

John McCain did indeed appear on the Weekend Update segment, but like the Palin appearance, one skit was stronger than the other. The opener was far better. I did like the "Sad Grandpa" idea though. You'll see.



ADDED: I installed SiteMetre a few days after my original hit counter, but this post was visited by Sundries' 300,000th visitor -- from an Egyptian searching on Google UK. Somewhat fitting, I'd say.

Mac On SNL

Senator John McCain scored the biggest SNL spot just prior to the election, two weeks after his running mate drew a record amount of eyeballs to the NBC skit show. Everyone thought Senator Obama might make it this last weekend, but perhaps even he thought that would be overkill.

Given the unusually gracious, even kindly words about Palin by Alec Baldwin, and Tina Fey seen below on Conan, I am hoping against hope they don't sabotage his appearance this Saturday.



(Via Zachary Paul Sire)

The View Brings The Halloween Crazy

What...what is this?

Apparently, it's the harpies ladies of The View in their Halloween costumes for today's show. I know the photo is small, but perhaps you can make out who each lady is going as.

But just in case, I think I can make them out for you.

- That's either Whoopi Goldberg as FDR, or Red Foxx, I'm not sure which.

- Joy Behar looking eerily like "Rough Rider" Teddy Roosevelt, indeed, better than Robin Williams' version.

- That lady Sherri something or other (sorry, I haven't watched The View in years) as a two-dimensional Abe Lincoln penny. Another site's commenter said "Great, now she has a penny for her one thought". Heh.

- I do believe that is the lone Republican on the show, Elisabeth Hasselbeck dressed either as Ronald Reagan, Ralph Reed or Clay Aiken.

- And oh my left nut, is that Barbara Walters as a catatonic George Washington? Hideous, Babs, hideous.

Yeah. Think I'll pass.

I Would

Question for those in the Battlegrounds: Which ads are you getting in your States?

This is the one plastered everywhere in South Florida. From the Republican Jewish Coalition PAC. I think it's effective.



Effective for the same reason this is effective, and possibly it was inspired by the same sentiment -- Obama is much too different even from other Democrats.



ADDED: More stream-of-consciousness about this. Remember Josh Howard's reprehensible remarks about not honouring the National Anthem due in part, to Barack Obama's attitude?

"The Star-Spangled Banner is going on. I don’t even celebrate that sh*t. I’m black."

(NSFW)

Sundries Will Live-Blog Barack Obama's Infomercial

Due to popular demand in the previous thread, Sundries will have an open comments section during the "Baracommercial" (h/t Laurie).

It's intended to be a conservative-friendly area, so please use other resources for diverging viewpoints. I'll launch a thread at 7:30 PM EST.

As a preview, here's Michael Ramirez' IBD cartoon today. Truth or consequences?

Hey Girl, Can I Hitchu Back?

I officially have a new favourite television ad.

I still love Vince from Shamwow ("'cause we can't do this all day"), but this is priceless, don't you think?

Sarah On Letterman?

EDIT: JSU related about the SNL deal, "it's on", and it's being reported that a deal has been struck between Palin and SNL. But don't salivate just yet. She will be in Philadelphia, Saturday, dropping the puck at the Flyers home opener. That's at 7:30 PM. She has to stay at least a little while, to prevent others from saying it was just a campaign stop. So let's say she stays until 8:30, she can board a plane at 9:30, arrive in New York at 10:00, at the studios at 10:30, get into makeup, read the script, and have a rehearsal at 11:00. I don't think so. It'll more likely be next Saturday. She won't bail on the Flyers.

UPDATE: There you go. It's on for the 25th October, according to Cindy Adams.

SOCCER moms and Joe Sixpacks, listen up. Get your beer, mooseburgers and caribou dips ready. Sarah Palin is doing “Saturday Night Live.” Not Tina Feywants to do it. doing Sarah Palin doing “Saturday Night Live.” But the Sarah Herself. She has already OK’d it. She’s booked. It’s confirmed. Done deal. Sketches are being sketched as we speak. She - eyeglasses, haircomb, designer jacket and trunkful of gosh-darns, golly-gees and gol-dangs - will be on “SNL” Saturday night, Oct. 25. Sarah’s rehearsal time has already been penciled in for Friday the 24th. And it’s because she wants to do it.

Fresh off the presses, Sarah Palin might tag along with Senator McCain for a "kiss-'n'-make-up" appearance on The Letterman Show.

Please.

After he went on a hissy fit for two weeks straight when McCain suspended his campaign, and ditched his show? I wouldn't give him ratings' juiciest plum on the airwaves -- Palin's late-night debut.

(She's rumoured again to be appearing on Saturday Night Live. Her schtick will apparently be playing Tina Fey in a parody of Fey's AmEx commercial. Heh)

And it's not like he's taking the suggestion graciously, either. David Letterman went after both candidates tonight. His rant in unadulterated form.

Now here’s this thing with John McCain…you know a couple of weeks ago, John McCain was supposed to be on the show. And at the last minute he calls me up –- and I’ve got a lot of respect…you get a call from a senator –- you get a call from a guy who is a bona fide war hero –- all of a sudden, you know, your lips start to vibrate. So I said “Sure, whatever you want.” And he says, “Look, Dave, the economy is about to crater.” It’s about to “crater,” his word. “And I have to rush back to Washington to save the economy.” And so it made me feel puny. So I said, “OK, Senator, do what you have to do. Rush right back to Washington.” And then I hung up and I felt like a patriot. I felt like I had done my part. And he was supposed to be on the show like an hour later. So now, we’re in a hole but everybody has to pull together in economic hardship times. So we all pull together and we get that guy with the big head from MSNBC. What’s his name? Keith Olbermann, yeah. Giant head. So he comes over. He’s good. He’s very good. So now it turns out, not only did he not rush back to Washington, he spent the night here in New York City. He went on Katie Couric…he was on Conan…he was on Regis…he was everywhere. So now, in an attempt to save his campaign, they’re talking about coming back. You see what I’m saying? So we said, “Sure, we would love you to come back.” And even on the phone, he said, “I’ll bring….Sarah.” But they’re being squirrely. Politicians can be squirrely. Because we have a date picked. We do this show every afternoon at 5:30. He wants to do the show at 5. So one –- we have no guarantee he’s going to show up, period. And we’ve kind of already rearranged our schedule on his behalf to save the economy, right? By getting that big-headed kid in here to talk about the politics. You know what I’m driving at? I just don’t know if we can trust him. And by the way, I don’t need to remind you that the road to the White House runs right through here."

Letterman = Kingmaker? There is just enough unctuous narcissicism present in a monologue one isn't supposed to take seriously, for me to think he was being serious.

Get over yourself, Dave.

You were funny maybe 10 years ago, and even then only because of your Yves Montand wardrobe.

All right, McCain. Take Sarah for your playdate in the sandbox with Dave. But if you take her to The View, or allow her within a nautical mile of those harpies, you'll be hearing from my solicitors.

Sarah Palin's Poised Hannity Interview, Part 2

This was even better than Part 1, as she showed that she didn't take any of the smears personally, and showed her practical side that political conservatism will draw fire to any politician. She is willing to pay that price.

Note that she mentioned the three politicians who mean so much to me personally, as influences on her:

Ronald Reagan. Lady Margaret Thatcher. And Abraham Lincoln.

She even referenced Doris Kearns Goodwin's "Team of Rivals" biography about Lincoln, and it'll be interesting to see that LBJ crony respond to this startling admission (startling only in that people have dismissed her intelligence, when she actually is a voracious newspaper and non-fiction book reader).

When Hannity was asked by Newt Gingrich to describe Palin, he said she was "authentic". That's so true, it hurts.

Party Schools

And University of Miami didn't make it.

BOGUS!

• 1. University of Florida, Gainesville, Fla.
• 2. University of Mississippi, University, Miss.
• 3. Penn State University, University Park, Pa.
• 4. West Virginia University, Morgantown, W.Va.
• 5. Ohio University, Athens, Ohio.
• 6. Randolph-Macon College, Ashland, Va.
• 7. University of Georgia, Athens, Ga.
• 8. University of Texas, Austin, Texas.
• 9. University of California-Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, Calif.
• 10. Florida State University, Tallahassee, Fla.
• 11. University of New Hampshire, Durham, N.H.
• 12. University of Iowa, Iowa City, Iowa.
• 13. University of Colorado, Boulder, Co.
• 14. Indiana University, Bloomington, Ind.
• 15. Tulane University, New Orleans, La.
• 16. University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, Ill.
• 17. Arizona State University, Tempe, Ariz.
• 18. University of Tennessee, Knoxville, Tenn.
• 19. University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, Ala.
• 20. Loyola University-New Orleans, New Orleans, La.

I'm completely in agreement about the Gators being a party school, perhaps even THE party school -- though FSU, I thought, always beat them (the 'Noles have FAMU to help out, though).

However, I congratulate alum and Sundries reader, José Aguirre, on the finish!

I simply do not understand the University of Miami not making the top 20, though. That's like listing the 20 coolest people on late night television, and failing to cite Red Eye's, Andy Levy, and his surgically-altered, cynically-raised eyebrow.

No Risk No Fun

Germany's "TV Total" show has weekly compilations of funny outtakes. The segment is called "Nippel", but don't worry, unless you speak German this is totally work-place friendly.

Call it a change of pace from the recent, unceasing spate of Reverend Wright spewings, both his and mine.

Let's have a real laugh today, or as close to it as Germans can get.



P-O-RRRRRRR-N-O!

Oh, and "Schwul" means gay. Enjoy!