Okay this election has totally “jumped the shark”
DailyKos has a summary of the best conspiracy theory I’ve ever heard: That Vice-Presidential nominee Sarah Palin’s 5th baby isn’t really her baby at all — it’s her daughter’s, and Palin faked the pregnancy to protect daughter Bristol from the stigma of being a pregnant teen.
The summary is very convincing: Palin never really showed; she announced her pregnancy at 7 months, gave a speech after her amniotic fluid broke, had the baby in a remote Alaskan medical center even though it was premature, and … Bristol had been pulled out of school for three months for mono. Read it and tell me what you think: is she the mother?
The video below is NOT Bristol Palin, but whatever it kind of could be.
Larry Craig Memorial Bathroom
I went there. It was everything I hoped it would be, and more. Below are two photos. The first is outside the bathroom where Idaho Senator Larry Craig had teh gay sex. The awesome thing is that the Republican National Convention has set up a welcome station RIGHT OUTSIDE THE BATHROOM where you can ask questions like “where is the convention?” “how do i get downtown” and “can I have oral sex with a Senator in here?” The setup actually makes it harder to take photos, which I think was the point. The balloons are a nice touch; the Jesse Helms Memorial Wheelchair is a nice touch as well; I hear Lindsay Graham bumped into it on his way out of the stall last week.
The second photo is of my feet inside the bathroom. I don’t know if it’s the same stall and I have learned Larry’s lesson: my feet are in a narrow stance. In other news, I need a new pair of Campers those shoes are done for! Enjoy:
ISO St. Paul closets; some reflections on Denver.
I’ll be in Minneapolis for the next week, watching the Republicans feign concern over Hurricane Gustav and working vigorously to out closeted, self-hating lithe and fit gay Republicans. I can promise more frequent blogging than from Denver as well as some more adventurous reporting. My goal in Minneapolis is to find as many strange and extreme Republican gatherings as I can, and then tell you about them. Creationist caucus anyone?
Yes we can.
I will also bring you the best Craigslist ads available featuring repressed Republicans who — away from their wives — are interested in gay sex, fisting, slutty schoolgirls, tapas showing party unity.
Has anyone been to Minneapolis? If my plan is to (a) have my gay former Republican friend Karl point out gay Republicans, (b) follow them into a bathroom, (c) have my colleague burst in before I have to touch anything, then (d) upload photos immediately to that CNN citizen journalism site, where should I go? Has anyone spent time in Minneapolis? Besides the airport (which is no longer in “service,” natch) if we want to nab some nasty conservatives in the act where should we go? They don’t have to be doing gay sex to someone. We’re open to family values Republicans at a strip club, churchgoers at an art exhibit they don’t know is naughty, etc. If it comes to it I’ll just expose some fiscal conservatives on a spending spree at the Mall of America, but that’s a little meta. Any ideas?
Also a couple of quick thoughts from Denver, before I let the moment pass:
When I walked into Invesco Field I was behind three women from Georgia, all in their 60’s, singing Amazing Grace. It seemed almost too much of a stereotype to actually be happening, but soon two delegates from Detroit and a family from Denver joined them. They were singing, and crying, and it was only 3:00 — 5 hours before any speech of consequence. They were just so proud and happy to be there.
The media hyped stories all week about “party unity” and angry Hillary supporters, but what I saw block after block after block in Denver was an unprecedented outpouring of joy and pride. The most poignant moments, clearly, were older black delegates in the audience crying at the site of a black Presidential nominee, but I met college students from Montana and volunteers from Boulder and establishment, longtime Democrats all of whom were just overwhelmed by the moment. It was a privilege to be there.
Watching the speech was terrifying in a way: high-flying rhetoric is really a tight-rope act, where a speech is so good that one fumbled word feels like a near-fall from the wire. When Obama stumbled over the word “inextricable,” we joked that maybe he had a piece of arugula stuck in his teeth and should have chosen a simpler word; but it was tense in the same way watching … Olympic figure skating is tense, in those moments where they go up in the air for a jump. It was pretty cool.
Anyway it was stellar; here is a good recap of all the speeches with video if you missed it. Here is a good preview of the RNC … or rather the media stories that should take hold.
Also some idle gossip and observations: John Corzine bought an entire Johnny Rocket’s full of convention-goers cheeseburgers on Wednesday night. It was weird. Russell Simmons was walking through Invesco with an unidentified and very attractive woman. He was wearing a good hat. I gained 17 pounds eating roasted red pepper hummus, which is apparently the appetizer de rigeur at lefty events this year. It wasn’t even Sabra! boo. That’s all I got — see you in St. Paul!
GOP to Rock You Like a Hurricane!
John McCain is likely to shake things up this week and deliver his acceptance speech from the rubble of the World Trade Center the ‘devastation zone’ that we used to call the gulf coast.
From Politico:
McCain was scheduled to deliver his acceptance speech Thursday but now may do so from the devastation zone if the storm hits the U.S. coast with the ferocity feared by forecasters.
This may sound like a tacky move to some, but the Republicans are the kings of scoring political points off of disasters of their own making.
It is still unclear if President Bush and John McCain will bake Hurricane Gustav a cake, as is their tradition.
Who the hell is Sarah Palin?
It’s official. John McCain has picked Sarah Palin to be his Dick Cheney. So now the main question is: Who the hell is Sarah Palin???
Well, Sarah Palin is the 44 year old second year Governor of Alaska. Prior to becoming Governor she was on the city council and later the Mayor of Wasilla, Alaska (pop. 8,471).
On the national stage, Palin is best known for her position on… well, nothing really. Ontheissues.org has many of her positions listed as “no issue stance yet recorded”.
It’s hard to understand McCain’s thinking here. McCain’s camp has been running with a non-stop message of readiness and experience. Now they are pitting Palin against Joe Freakin’ Biden, a man who was first elected to Senate when she was only 8.
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Ben’s Thursday Night
Ok, so we’ve been a little slack this last week. We have been neck deep in hope and are just now starting to dig ouselves out. Thee is just so much to talk about! What are the bathrooms like at a 80,000 person political rally? Would you recognize Madeline Albright if she didn’t have a brooch on? And Hillary! AND BILL!
Luckily we have so much stuff to report on that we’ll more than make up for it next week. So until our Editor in Chief sleeps of his hangover in the bathroom stall of a gay bar in Denver gets back, we’ll leave you with this:
As (not) Seen on TV: Brian Schweitzer
If you missed it, Brian Schweitzer, the current governor of Montana, gave one hell of a speech last night at the Democratic National Convention. Judging by the fact that it was only broadcast on C-SPAN, you probably did miss it. Luckily we have the video. Thank god for the inter-tubes! (via TNR)
Update: The big networks aren’t carrying John Kerry’s speech either!
Sorry Keith.
I could watch Rachael Maddow make an ass out of Pat Buchanan all day long. Still, if you are getting sick of hearing Chris Mathews lecture Keith Olbermann on how much Barack Obama has in common with Bill Cosby, you may want to change it on over to C-SPAN.
C-SPAN is commercial free, and best of all commentator free, so you can actually watch the speeches. So check your local listings. And don’t worry. You can always get your fix of ill-informed, poorly researched rambling from us bloggers.
Exclusive Pinko Pics: Michelle Obama!
Pre-order this book!
This year is the 75th Anniversary of the Works Progress Administration, which means it’s also the 75th Anniversary of the design and printing of some completely awesome posters. From 1935 to 1943, the WPA Poster Division designed, printed, and distributed millions of posters to raise awareness about public issues and civic life. Many of these posters, however, were never saved or categorized; some have been lost forever and the bulk of the posters have never been celebrated publicly.
Thankfully, our good friend Ennis Carter is obsessed with them! Ennis (with an assist from Pinko beer critic Alex Peltz) has a book coming out this Fall called Posters for the People: Art of the WPA. It includes images from more than 500 posters; Ennis also tells some amazing stories about the artists, the values behind the project and the politics of the new deal.
So, clearly you need to buy someone a gift sometime soon. Or you need a coffee table book for your new apartment. What are you going to buy, Anne Geddes? Come on.
From the Posters for the People website:
The lavishly illustrated book Posters for the People: Art of the WPA amasses nearly 500 of the best and most striking posters designed by artists working in the 1930s and early 1940s for the government-sponsored Works Progress Administration, or WPA. Posters for the People presents these works for what they truly are: highly accomplished and powerful examples of American art. All are iconic and eye-catching, some are humorous and educational, and many combine modern art trends with the techniques of advertising and commercial designs.Roughly 125 posters in this collection were never cataloged by the federal government and represent exciting new additions to the WPA Living Archive, the most comprehensive online database of WPA posters known to exist. This ever-growing virtual archive will be launched in September 2008 and will bring to light countless posters that haven’t been seen by the public in more than 70 years.
Convinced!? Awesome. Click here to pre-order the book. There are some special offers on the site too.
Not convinced? Boo. Look at that great cover! Okay fine: here is a great interview with Ennis about social arts and political propaganda and after the jump, a couple of our favorite posters from the book.
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