Saturday, May 2, 2009

(Belated) April traffic report

Seeing Troglopundit doing cartwheels over his recent traffic surge reminds me that I forgot to do my regular monthly traffic report.

April was our second-best month since the election, with 160,991 visits compared to 163,608 for March. The big day was April 9, when we got two Instalanches in one day (Smitty's ham-and-cheese sandwich and my "Blue State Republican" essay). That produced 20,480 visits, the best day in the history of the blog. Another 'Lanche ("I Question the Timing!") helped drive another 11,787 hits on April 17.

Proving the Rule 4 principle that linky-hate can be as good as linky-love, the "What next? Over-the-counter roofies?" post got me yet another "Malkin Award" nomination. Speaking of Malkin, I started getting picked up in the "Buzzworthy" feed at her blog, which has helped boost traffic in the past week. I've also started posting at The Green Room.

And all the FMJRA gang (you know who you are) have helped immeasurably. Networking and collaborating to build a shared pool of readers . . . well, I think Trog and others are starting to see how the rules work, if applied consistently.

VIDEO: HOT YOUNG SUSAN BOYLE!

Wow! The backup group is crappy, but she clearly had something back in 1984:

Hat-tip: Hot Air Headlines.

The woman who, in middle age, sprang to stardom on "Britain Got Talent," was a very polished performer at age 22 but, for whatever reason, never got a break. This kind of situation -- the undiscovered talent -- is really more common than might be imagined by people who aren't in the music business.

I used to know a bartender in Georgia who was a tremendous R&B singer. At one point, he had been under contract as singer for the group that eventually became famous as the Atlanta Rhythm Section. For whatever reason -- he told me the story, but I've forgotten now -- it just didn't work out, and he never really got another shot.

UPDATE: 'Lanches, light the corners of my mind . . .

UPDATE II: Some commenters are saying that Susan Boyle's thick eyebrows explain her lack of '80s stardom. Let me remind you of something:


That's Brooke Shields on the cover of German Vogue in 1984, when thick eyebrows on women were all the rage. Well, Susan Boyle's eyes weren't quite as startling and her mouth wasn't quite as pouty as Brooke's, and so everybody in the comments is saying that Susan didn't become a singing star 25 years ago because she needed a pair of tweezers. I think the explanation is otherwise, but I'm waiting for someone else to tell me what it is.

UPDATE III: OK, some of you guys in the comments (talking about the fact that there 5,000 musical geniuses waiting tables and driving forklifts in Nashville) are getting closer to the truth about the situation. Now check out my attempt to explain why Susan Boyle went undiscovered.

Pundette has the Official Anthem of National Offend a Feminist Week

Thank you, Pundette!

Bloggers: Join the Celebration!

The links are piling up!

'You report, we deny'

Sweet how the White House denies -- and everyone in the WH press corps except ABC's Jake Tapper ignores -- the accusation by an attorney that "Steve Rattner, the leader of the Obama administration’s Auto Industry Task Force, threatened . . . an investment bank, that if it continued to oppose the administration’s Chrysler bankruptcy plan, the White House would use the White House press corps to destroy its reputation."

Glenn Reynolds has a roundup, including a link to Nick Gillespie of Reason. Also, Jimmie Bise at Sundries Shack is on it, and there's lots more at Memeorandum.

Just imagine the outrage if the Bush administration had threatened to sic Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity on its political opponents. But the obedient steno clerks in the White House press corps just do as they're told nowadays. If Robert Gibbs needs a shoe shine, there are at least three network correspondents who'll be happy to do the job.

UPDATE: "First they came for the businessmen . . ."

UPDATE II: Newt Gingrich says "it's embarassing to watch" how the White House press corps has "taken a dive" for Obama. It's embarassing to me as a journalist, particularly remembering how Gingrich was demonized by the media in 1994-95.

That was clearly not a Change They Could Believe In.

UPDATE III: Welcome, Instapundit readers! Sorry it took me nearly an hour to realize I'd been 'Lanched, but I've been busy pondering the economy, and also trying to find new ways to offend feminists.

Also linked by Dad 29 and the Rhetorican. Thanks! If nothing else, the Obama administration seems to be working hard to fix my linky-love recession.

UPDATE IV: When it rains it pours: Linked at AnnCoulter.com! Also linked by Paco and at The Macho Response.

Dear Cassandra . . .

You were offended by my snarky comments about getting traffic from guys Googling for Carrie Prejean bikini pics.

While at your blog, however, I couldn't help noticing that the artwork at the top of your blog features a vintage pin-up of a sexy lady in a purple dress and black stockings, displaying her garters and a generous expanse of thigh.

NTTAWWT, but if you're going to exploit the cheesecake angle, don't complain about me exploiting the cheesecake angle. Because as Gloria Feldt says, "feminism is about justice and equality." Or, as the ancient Romans might say, "Tu quoque."

BTW, it's National Offend A Feminist Week. Feel free to join the celebration.

National Offend A Feminist Week

Hey, sweetheart, when I say "bring me a cup of coffee," I mean bring me fresh coffee, OK?

Bloggers: I hereby declare this National Offend A Feminist Week. Your expressions of reactionary, oppressive, patriarchal, misogynistic traditionalism are solicited. Search your mind, search the Internet, and come up with a post guaranteed to make Jessica Valenti and Amanda Marcotte even angrier than usual.

Please link here for inclusion in a special honor roll listing next weekend. Extra credit for women who find some way to enthusiastically embrace their traditional femininity. Now hurry up with that coffee, sweetheart. And make sure it's fresh this time . . .

UPDATE: You know what really offends a feminist? An old-fashioned classy dame. Because, according to feminist theory, classy dames from the Golden Age of Hollywood were exemplifying a patriarchal conception of femininity. Yeah, and they were hot, too.

UPDATE II: Speaking of patriarchal conceptions, Bar Rafaeli is being oppressed by her bikini. Shed your oppression!

UPDATE III: Because Amanda Marcotte may not understand, I'll explain: When Dan Collins calls you "sugar tits," he means that in an enlightened, egalitarian way, sweetheart.

UPDATE IV: Little Miss Attila says they like it like that. Especially the high heels, we presume.

UPDATE V: Paco recommends Dennis the Peasant's collection of feminist idiocies.

UPDATE VI: Just wanted to commend Paul from Kingdom of Idiots for going into the comments field at a feminist blog to link me. That's the kind of genius evil we need, Paul.

UPDATE VII: Jimmie Bise at Sundries Shack offers some vintage redhead-spanking art. Oh, those naughty redheads . . .

UPDATE VIII: OK, somebody recommended me via StumbledUpon, and when I clicked over there, one of the other sites in the "feminist" category featured this photo:

Whiskey Tango Foxtrot? It was a feminist whining about the objectification of Olympic women's volleyball players. Talk about somebody needing to get a life . . .

Meanwhile, Stephen Gordon climbs aboard the Bandwagon O' Patriarchy, and the Daley Gator says, "IRON MY SHIRT."

UPDATE IX: Carol Tackett offends with facts:

The greatest mistake that feminists make is modeling themselves after men in the area of sexual promiscuity. Men are sluts because they can well afford to be. Women who believe that unfettered sexual activity gives them power are in denial of basic biological facts. The consequences of sexual activity falls squarely on women. Further, words like slut and skank are still part of vocabulary because that is how men view women who are "easy."
Now, I would quibble with the "men are sluts" part. Since it takes two to tango, men will be slutty only insofar as they can find opportunities. It's a supply-and-demand thing. But because feminists are liberals, they don't know anything about economics, either.

The other thing about "men are sluts": I am an ex-slut. Because my wife is sexy. But also because she's got a kitchen drawer full of knives, and I've got to sleep sometime. If more women were like my wife, there would be a lot less divorce. Maybe a few more widows . . .

UPDATE X: Mike at Cold Fury links, William Teach rolls out the offensive skin, and we now have our Official Anthem.

UPDATE XI: Fulminate of Andrew has some offensive thoughts. (Tip for Andrew: Install SiteMeter and Technorati on your blog.)

Full Metal Jacket Saturday

Every Saturday, in obedience to Rule 2 of "How to Get a Million Hits on Your Blog," we feature our reach-around round-up, linking everybody who has linked us in the past week. For the past several weeks, Smitty has done this with the help of high-tech clonebots.

However, Smitty is spending quality time with his in-laws this week, and therefore, he's left me in charge of the clonebots. Since I'm a low-tech kind of guy and therefore don't know WTF I'm doing, this is going to be kind of a mess. If your link got left out, e-mail Smitty, and he'll get you hooked up next week. And so, here we go . . .

(Actually, now that I'm looking at what the clonebots brought back from Technorati, it seems there was a photo-finish for third place -- lots of bloggers linked us twice this week -- but maybe you guys don't mind? If anyone objects: Kiss the pig!) URGENT: We interrupt this round-up to bring you this breaking news: "Top Gun" star Kelly McGillis has announced that she is a lesbian. Via Ace, who says, "I guess she's lost that lovin' feeling." I won't believe it until I see video proof. We now return you to your regularly scheduled reach-around . . .

Where do I get crazy ideas like this? Am I brilliant or just plain evil? Oh, well, on with the round-up:

BTW, just as an aside on blogospheric method, Rule 1 still works. After my pathetic whine about a lack of linky-love on my patented Carrie Prejean breast implant meme -- dude, I so owned that -- I actually got 'Lanched last night. It's like a double dose of Enzyte for the blog-fu. Now, on with the round-up . . .

Man, sorry this is taking so long, but ever since November, these freaking unionized clonebots act like they run the place. We continue:

More seminar training for newbie bloggers: Try a Rule 3. Go to Memeorandum. Find a story there you want to blog about. Link/quote the story, give your own commentary, and link/quote some of the other blogs that are commenting on that story, and be sure to hat-tip Memeorandum. (Right now Memeorandum has so much commentary on this Carrie Prejean thing.) If you'll do that regularly for a couple of weeks, eventually you should trigger their algorithm and pop up in the Memeorandum feed. We continue with the linky-love:

And, finally, these blogs linked us, but the stupid clonebots couldn't figure out which posts: Remember to celebrate Rule 5 Sunday -- and since it's National Offend A Feminist Week, this should be an extra-special version!

Friday, May 1, 2009

Video: Gay gynephobia

Look, I've made clear my disapproval of breast implants. So now, watch as Keith Olbermann and Michael Musto make clear their disapproval of . . . vagina:

Please remind me of this video, next time a feminist calls me a misogynist.

UPDATE: Welcome, Instapundit readers! Meanwhile, Allahpundit has this video of Laura Ingraham and the viciously intolerant Gloria Feldt:

Notice how Feldt says that Prejean "has a right to her opinion." Leftists don't actually mean this. The whole point of the gay-rights movement is to abolish your right to disagree with them.

Linked by Hedgehog Blog and Daley Gator.

UPDATE II: BTW, the Ingraham/Feldt interview is the kind of TV I hate. Feldt filibusters and interrupts; Ingraham becomes derisive. As a journalist, it has always been my thought that, when interviewing someone who is transparently wrong, the best policy is to give them enough rope to hang themselves. I wish Ingraham had let Feldt finish her prefab talking points and then hit her with a hard question.

As to Feldt's talking points: She began with the assertion that "feminism is about justice and equality," which ideology Prejean is accused of betraying and therefore (to complete the syllogism) Prejean is not a feminist.

Which is correct. I have argued explicitly (a) that feminism is wrong precisely because it is a radical egalitarian ideology and (b) that the same-sex marriage argument is based on the same fallacious doctrine. Please see my American Spectator column, "Marriage: A Hill to Die On," as well as "Whither Marriage?" and "Gay Rights, Gay Rage."

The argument against same-sex marriage can only prevail if we begin by rejecting the assertion that men and women are "equal" in the sense that feminists mean it -- identical and therefore interchangeable.

In fact, men and women are different, and it is their differences that create the necessary complementarity of marriage. Insofar as we accept the counterfactual feminist ideology of legally-mandated androgyny -- that men and women are the same, and thus fungible -- then it becomes impossible to argue coherently that it makes any difference whether you marry a man or a woman.

UPDATE: Dan Collins reminds Musto and Olby that "despite what your girlfriends may tell you, catty, stupid, vicious, jealous, ugly and self-righteous is no way to go through life, son." I've got some related stuff here.

Why does CNN anchor hate women?

Remember when my reaction to over-the-counter sales of Plan B to 17-year-olds was denounced by lefties as ignorant, hateful, misogynistic and anti-sex? OK, so now there is a column by CNN anchor Mike Galanos criticizing the decision.

Sully? Pandagon? Mahablog?

Oh, and while you're at it, be sure to denounce Monique Stuart as a self-hating puritanical anti-sex bigot. But maybe I should warn you about her 6-foot-tall penis. NTTAWWT.

Is bigger always better?

Velociman loves him some humungous boobies, and doesn't care whether they're silicone-enhanced or not. He derogates my oft-declared preference for naturals.

Now, I know what I prefer, and I know why I prefer it. But what do you prefer and why? Opinions and comments are solicited from readers, and if any of my fellow bloggers want to explore this theme in their own Rule 2/Rule 5 posts . . . well, I won't stop you.

Racist Byron York?

"I suppose if you haven't been called a racist by the usual suspects on the left, you haven't been writing for very long."

This explains everything

How NOT to avoid swine flu:

UPDATE: No fair trying to monopolize the "swine flew" Google traffic, Trog. Now that I'm on the subject, Trog: Did you ever date a mule? NTTAWWT.

And, BTW, Carol at No Sheeples Here had got The Best Blog Headline Ever. Except she didn't say nothin' at all about Mama. Or prison. Or trains. . . .

Of Hope and Hubris

Less than six months after the 2008 election, and just past the 100-day mark of Barack Obama's presidency, liberals have begun congratulating themselves on the triumph of their ideas. Paul Krugman on global warming:
The 2008 election ended the reign of junk science in our nation's capital, and the chances of meaningful action on climate change, probably through a cap-and-trade system on emissions, have risen sharply.
But the opponents of action claim that limiting emissions would have devastating effects on the U.S. economy. So it's important to understand that just as denials that climate change is happening are junk science, predictions of economic disaster if we try to do anything about climate change are junk economics. . .
And here's Josh Marshall on same-sex marriage:
I think most of us can see that despite some painful setbacks, and likely more to come, time is definitely on the side of marriage equality in the United States. But are we hitting some sort of tipping point under a new administration and with a rush of recent successes in several states around the country?
Think back to the 2008 campaign and ask yourself: Did Obama and the Democrats win because of gay marriage and global warming? Obviously not. It was the economy, stupid. And yet in the wake of that election, liberals now believe they have a mandate to enact their entire agenda.

Ah, but what about the economy? Megan McArdle has a 1,070-word article at the Atlantic Monthly examining the basic math of Obamanomics. It's so good, it feels unfair to attempt to characterize it by excerpts, but here is the key part:

It's probably no exaggeration to say that Obama's presidency will ultimately stand or fall on its handling of the financial crisis. And at this point, with respect to all the frantic activity, the polls seem to be saying, so far, so good. . . .
Of course, Jimmy Carter's early approval ratings hit 70% before beginning their long downward slide. And Bush's ranged as high as 95% after 9/11. As the Wall Street prospectuses all say, past performance is no guarantee of future results.
Still, Obama's performance thus far ought to offer some clue: has he set the stage for economic victory, or defeat? In some sense, for all its exertions, the Obama administration hasn't actually done all that much.

Megan then proceeds to dismantle the fiscal assumptions of Hope, and you should read the whole thing. It is not unfair to summarize her analysis in three words: It Won't Work. The stimulus-and-bailout policies have not addressed the fundamental problems of the economy -- namely, an excess of debt and a shortage of capital to spur job creation -- while the entitlement trainwreck of Social Security and Medicare loom immediately ahead. By piling on new trillion-dollar deficits, at a time when the recession will result in significant tax revenue shortfalls, the Democrats are steering the economy into a stagflation trap.

If the economic situation actually worsens between now and fall 2010 -- and there are many reasons to believe it will -- the public-opinion polls of April 2009 will have proven a false omen, which served only to swell the pride that went before the fall.

UPDATE: Welcome Red State readers and other disciples of blog-fu sensei Moe Lane, who says:

Not to be a broken record about this, but I didn’t need Megan to tell me that we enjoy, ah, suboptimal economic oversight. . . . Or that the current administration seems to default to style over substance.
So how come we can see this and yet (if polls are to be believed) Obama's approval rating is at something like 110 percent? Might I suggest that we are paying the price of an educational system that renders a majority of Americans ignorant of, or misinformed about, basic economics?




UPDATE II: At The American Spectator, commenter "Indiana Alex" summarizes a fundamental problem with Obamanomics:
The shortage of capital is going to be even more severe given the extent of government borrowing.
This is why stagflation is the inescapable result of the current policy. Begin with the fact that the collapse of the "housing bubble" has left millions of Americans saddled with a huge debt load for illiquid assets (i.e., their homes) that cannot be sold for a profit or leveraged to acquire additional liquidity. Now, consider that the stock-market collapse (i.e., from a 14,000 Dow to an 8,000 DOW in less than three years) has severely depleted the 401Ks and IRAs of tens of millions more Americans.

Between the declining market value of their homes and the declining market value of their retirement accounts, these individual Americans who had positive net worths in 2005 are now in no position to make new investments that would create jobs. The total supply of American capital has thus been diminished by a sum of however many trillions.

The Obamanomics answer to this is for the government to borrow many trillions more, in order to fund an expansion of public-sector programs. And government must borrow this money from the same global credit pool already depleted by the loss of capital caused by the collapse of the bubble.

Guess what? Foreign investors balked at the last offering of Treasury notes. As a result, the Federal Reserve bought the unsold balance of this new debt, which means . . .?

Very good, class! The Fed will just turn on the printing presses to produce "new" money to account for the additional federal debt. This is inflation, which further erodes whatever asset value individuals had after the collapse and therefore leaves them less able to make new job-creating investments than they were before the enactment of these stimulus-bailout policies.

The erosion of currency value makes U.S. debt even less attractive, since inflation will cheat investors out of what interest would be paid on new bond issues. Thus, Geithnerism/Obamanomics results in a federal fiscal/economic policy that is chasing its own tail, a descending spiral of recession and inflation.

This is not merely The Road to Serfdom, but the road to Weimar America. Even if Obama, Geithner, Pelosi and Reid wised up tomorrow and suddenly reversed course by enacting sound policy, it might take 18 to 36 months of serious economic pain before we'd see anything like a real recovery. And since there isn't the slightest hope that they'll do the right thing, this crisis is going to get much worse over the next several years.

Things are about to get very, very bleak, and I've heard some informed investors talk about the Dow not reaching a bottom above 4,000.

UPDATE III: Professor Thomas Woods:
In a nutshell, the point is that when the government's central bank intervenes in the economy to push interest rates lower than the free market would have set them, the result of its tampering is a massive cluster of errors . . . on the part of investors and consumers alike.
Of course, the professor's new bestseller, MELTDOWN, has been a must-read recommendation here for weeks. He makes clear that it is a fundamental error to describe the Bush administration's fiscal/monetary policies as "conservative."

Thursday, April 30, 2009

Extremist discredits movement

No, this is not about Pam Geller vs. Charles Johnson. Rather, it's about a guy in Georgia who's pro-secession and who admits to having once had sex with a mule.

Speaking of brain bleach . . .

OK, palate cleanser: Pontiac GTO.

UPDATE: I just got an e-mail from a reader correcting a typo I had on this post. When Chris Muir is proofreading my blog, I feel a little better about my recent linky-love deficit.

A little better, I said. I'm still on the verge of suicidal depression over not getting the 'Lanche on the Carrie Prejean fakies angle. But I'm still not depressed enough to have sex with a mule.

What's up with TCOT?

I've been putting TCOT (Top Conservatives On Twitter) hash-tags on my Tweets routinely since I began Twittering, only to learn today that co-founder Rob Neppell (a/k/a N.Z. Bear) had a falling out with his TCOT partner Michael Patrick Leahy.

Exactly WTF this is all about, I don't know. Matt Lewis says, "even our hashtags can't get along." It seems to me, just reading between the lines, that Leahy's PJTV gig might have annoyed Neppell.

But nobody ever tells me anything, so if you know what's going on, please tell me.

ADL denounces Geert Wilders?

This is freaking crazy:
The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) strongly condemns remarks made over the last few days at various appearances throughout South Florida by Dutch Parliamentarian Geert Wilders. In his speeches, he claimed that "Islam is not a religion" and "the right to religious freedom should not apply to this totalitarian ideology called Islam." Mr. Wilders also stated that the Koran is a book of hatred, and that Mohammed was both "a pedophile and a warlord."
Evidently, ADL is trying to horn in on CAIR's action. Pam Geller has much more, including a photo of Wilders speaking in a synagogue.

UPDATE: Saudi girl divorced at age 8. Guess the ADL was too busy denouncing Geert Wilders to worry about that.

A linky-love recession?

How hard did I work to own the Carrie Prejean breast implant meme? Like a mofo.

So I'm checking SiteMeter and notice traffic off an Ace of Spades thread, check it out and it's Ace blogging about Carrie's fake tits. But it's not Ace that's linking me, it's a commenter.

Instead, Ace links Jammie Wearing Fool, whom I beat to this meme by at least a week. And then I go to Jammie's place and see that he got a freaking Instalanche.

So then, I notice I'm getting traffic from a Hot Air thread, but when I go there, it's not Allah linking me, it's also a commenter. Allah won't link me even though I was blogging about this at the Green Room this morning!

WTF? Is my blog-fu fading? Is it my breath? If I wanted to be treated like crap, I would have stayed in the newspaper business.

UPDATE: Welcome to the Linky-Love Deficit Syndrome Encounter Group, where we sit around and talk about our feelings about our anemic traffic. And hug and cry a lot.

UPDATE II: When it rains, it pours, and your protege gets linked by The New York Daily News. It makes a guy feel . . . inadequate.

UPDATE III: Brother Jimmie offers comforting words. We covet the linkage.

UPDATE IV: Carol at No Sheeples Here gives me a hug. And you know something? I think maybe Allahpundit is jealous because my wife of 20 years is still so freaking hot. And I'm going to rub his face in it by posting another hot photo of her from back in the day:

Yeah. They're real. And they're spectacular.

'SWINE FLU: PANDEMIC IMMINENT?'

The title of this post was the chyron on my TV screen a little while ago as MSNBC interviewed Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano about the Media Panic Of The Week. Meanwhile, Joe Biden is warning citizens to avoid subways and planes. (What about AmTrak, Joe?) And in watching last night's White House press conference, I was struck by the number of questions Obama got about swine flu.

WTF? Not since the Great Alar Apple Scare of 1989 have so many media alarmists spread so much panic to so many about so little. Jim Harper of Cato has noted the absurdity of treating a (largely potential) flu pandemic as a "national security" issue. What's going on here? Two things, basically:
  • Women and old folks -- Health news is consumed mainly by women and the elderly. Healthy men in the prime of life tend to consider themselves invulnerable to disease. Every real guy learns at an early age that only wussie-boys fret over germs. Real guys instinctively loathe the neurasthenic wimp who explains his latest case of the sniffles by whining, "It's my allergies." Women, however, seem to have an inherent predisposition toward hypochondria. For example, women are the prime market for hand sanitizer; it's like they have a self-esteem issue about their immune systems. And old folks, of course, spend 80% of their waking hours worrying about their health, carefully monitoring themselves for "regularity" and visiting the doctor weekly to demand diagnoses and treatment for their various aches and pains. This is why Medicare is threatening to bankrupt America: Going to the doctor is actually a hobby for the elderly. Old folks love to collect things, and now they're collecting prescriptions at taxpayer expense. (Honestly: Go look at your Grandma's medicine cabinet.)
  • The illusion of executive competence -- One thing certain about swine flu: The panic will eventually end. A week or two from now, the outbreak will have run its course and people will stop worrying about it. But the ubiquitous image of Barack Obama on TV, speaking calmly in his resonant baritone about government measures to combat The Dreaded Swine Flu Menace, will have had their intended effect of conveying the idea that he is The Man In Charge, the calm at the eye of the storm, the antithesis of how George W. Bush was perceived during Hurricane Katrina.
Not coincidentally, if you scratch the surface of those polls showing how popular Obama is, you'll see that women, old folks and neurasthenic wussie-boys are his strongest constituencies. Ask Grandma -- if you can catch her between her taxpayer-funded visits to the doctor -- what she thinks of how Obama has handled The Dreaded Swine Flu Menace.

Obama's lackeys in the media know exactly what they're doing. Turning an ordinary virus into a Code Orange national-security threat is political gold for Obama.

Go patriarchy, go!

Darlene Click's beautiful daughter just got married! But don't worry, lovelorn right-wing bachelors of the blogosphere, Darlene's got at least two more beautiful daughters.

Take that, Amanda Marcotte!

Wednesday, April 29, 2009

SHANNA MOAKLER: NAKED LIAR?

Earlier today, I reported Shanna Moakler's denial of Perez Hilton's report that she had told Access Hollywood that pageant officials paid for Carrie Prejean's implants. Now Access Hollywood reports:
Shanna Moakler, Co-Executive Director of the Miss California Organization, has confirmed the group behind the pageant paid for Miss California Carrie Prejean’s breast implants, weeks before she competed in Miss USA.
In a new interview with Access Hollywood’s Billy Bush, Shanna confirmed the news.
"Did you guys pay for it?: Billy asked Shanna directly.
"Yes," Shanna said. "We did."
The organization paid for Carrie’s breast enhancement prior to her competing in the Miss USA pageant, which was held in Las Vegas, almost two weeks ago.
"It was something that we all spoke about together," Shanna said referring to herself, Carrie and Keith Lewis, Shanna's co-executive director. "It was an option and she wanted it. And we supported that decision."
Shanna, a former Miss USA herself, defended the Miss California Organization's decision to pay for the elective surgery.
"Breast implants in pageants is not a rarity. It's definitely not taboo. It's very common. Breast implants today among young women today is very common. I don't personally have them, but you know — they are," she added.
You lying bitch! You deleted your earlier Tweet, in which you denied the Perez Hilton story, then turned around and Twittered:
Just did Access Hollywood, feel very good about it and hope I cleared up things! Billy Bush was a great!
Public Relations 101: NEVER LIE TO A REPORTER. We are not stupid. You are not required to respond to any press inquiry. You can refuse to comment, "neither confirm nor deny," etc. But never lie, because once you're caught lying, your credibility is shot.

Obviously, however, you're telling the truth about not having implants. I did my research, lady. They're real enough, all right. But they're definitely not spectacular (or safe for work). No wonder Travis dumped you. Maybe he'll take the kids, too.

UPDATE: Via Dan Collins, prepare for the weirdness of Perez Hilton in drag as . . . Bettie Page. Go ahead and laugh while you can. If Obama gets his way, it will be a hate crime to laugh. It's already illegal discrimination to fire a transsexual.

UPDATE II: Frank J asks: "Why are people always trying to tear down our heroes?" Feet of clay, boobs of silicone?

Also, not to fuel anyone's paranoia, but I'm getting anonymous tips that Carrie Prejean might actually be a Trojan Horse for the gay-rights movement. Prejean is friends with pageant director Keith Lewis, who was executive producer for a pro-gay documentary, "For The Bible Tells Me So."

According to my tipster's theory -- and this is just speculation -- the whole Perez Hilton question for Prejean was a setup, a stunt conceived to catapult Prejean to celebrity as a national spokewoman against same-sex marriage. Then, a few months later, she'll have a "Road To Damascus" conversion, claiming to have "seen the light" about how hateful those conservative homophobes are, and why same-sex marriage should be the law of the land.

Also, my tipster speculates, various people (including Shanna Moakler) are using the Prejean controversy as publicity to help them negotiate new reality-TV gigs. (Apparently, landing a reality-show contract has in recent years become the obsession of every washed-up starlet and D-lister in Hollywood.)

This is all just speculation from anonymous tipsters, and is close enough to being outright conspiracy theory that I take it with numerous grains of salt. However, it's worth keeping in mind as we watch the continuing saga of Carrie Prejean.

UPDATE III: I've also explained the tin-foil hat/silicone boobs theory at the Green Room. Meanwhile, Brian Simpson disputes my assessment of Moakler's (non-)spectacularity. I'm sorry, Brian: I've got very high standards in this regard, after being married 20 years to such a hottie.

UPDATE IV: Naturally, Pandagon's Pam Spaulding is outraged that anyone could (even pretend to) be against same-sex marriage.

UPDATE V: Ace says Prejean is getting the "Joe The Plumber treatment" from the press corps, and sees a double standard at work. Please note that, although I'm a thoroughgoing right-winger, I don't feel like it's my job to ignore Carrie's fakies.

News is news, facts are facts, and -- most importantly -- traffic is traffic. I'm a capitalist blogger, and I don't see any reason to let Gawker and Perez Hilton monopolize the "Carrie Prejean fake boob" traffic.

The 100 Days PrimeTime LoveFest

The slobbering apologists of the White House press corps will pitch underhanded softballs at Obama's Teleprompter tonight.

I don't know that I can bear to watch, but fortunately, Steve Green of VodkaPundit is already three martinis into his drunkblogging. (Don't try this at home, kids: This man is a professional alcoholic.)

UPDATE: On Twitter, Mike Laroche says he'd rather watch Michael Moore eat bacon off Janeane Garofalo's breasts.
I just switched on the TV and am amazed by the Mexican swine flu obsession of the Washington press corps. As I explained to David Brooks yesterday, it's very easy to avoid Mexican swine flu:
1. Avoid swine.
2. Avoid Mexicans.
Of course, for the DC press corps, being around a lot of swine is an occupational reality.

Congratulations, William Jacobson!

To be called a "blowhard" by Alan Colmes is a high honor indeed!

Thomas J. Marier is badly confused and writing for David Frum, but I repeat myself

He's also a friend of mine, which is why he asked me to denounce his latest article at The New Majority. I'd be happy to demolish his argument, except that it's such incoherent jibberish that it's impossible to understand exactly what he's trying to say. Perhaps readers will click over there and leave rude comments for Marier, just so he's grateful for the Rule 4 punk-smacking he so richly deserves.

$500,000 transsexual bailout

"Discrimination":
A federal judge has awarded a former Army Special Forces commander nearly $500,000 because she was rejected from a job at the Library of Congress while transitioning from a man to a woman.
Diane Schroer of Alexandria, Va., applied for the terrorism analyst job while she was still a man named David Schroer. He was offered the job, but the offer was pulled after he told a library official that he was having surgery to change his gender.
U.S. District Judge James Robinson ruled Tuesday that Schroer was entitled to $491,190 in back pay and damages because of sex discrimination.
You could also view this as a violation of the Americans With Disabilities Act, since Shroer is an amputee.

UPDATE: In an unrelated but equally weird development, People magazine has named Timothy Geithner and Rahm Emanuel to its "100 Most Beautiful People" list. Helen Thomas has demanded a recount.

You are not surprised . . .

. . . to learn that Hillary Clinton rented out her e-mail list of supporters for $4.5 million?

I signed up for her e-mails, in order to keep track of her campaign last year. Perhaps that explains all the spam scam soliciations filling up my inbox.

For the record, spammers: I am not interested in meeting "HOT RUSSIAN BEAUTIES."

Nor do I believe that you are actually a representative of the former oil minister of Nigeria.

And I don't need "Special Herbal Supplements" to give me "Extra Staying Power," no matter what my wife may have told you.

Confirmed: They're fakies

UPDATED 9 p.m.: SHANNA MOAKLER IS A LIAR!

PREVIOUSLY: Perez Hilton: "In a very catty move. . . [Miss California USA pageant directors Keith] Lewis and [Shanna] Moakler confirmed to Access Hollywood that the Miss California pageant paid for Carrie Prejean to get breast implants six weeks before the Miss USA competition."

UPDATE 2 PM: Keith Lewis is DENYING that either he or Moakler told Access Hollywood any such thing. However, Lewis did not deny that Carrie's got fake boobs. Don't worry: We are fearlessly committed to exposing the truth here.

You heard it here first, folks!

And we're now the the No. 1 Google for "carrie+prejean+implants"!

UPDATE 2:30 p.m.: Via Twitter, ShannaMoakler also denies the Perez Hilton item. Folks, I'm trying hard to get to the truth. As I just said in an e-mail to Bob Barr, it's not the crime, it's the cover-up. What did Shanna Moakler know, and when did she know it?

UPDATE 5:40 p.m.: Ouch:

Did she buy them at Walmart? . . . Not a good look when you are competing in a national beauty pageant, but a great look for amateur night at your local strip club. Supposedly, the state committee for Miss California - USA bought them for her; my question is, Did they use a coupon?

UPDATE 6 p.m.: From the official bio:

[Prejean] an advocate for encouraging healthy lifestyles for young women. Carrie wants people to remember her as being compassionate and real.

Jezebel comments:

If it turns out that Miss California organizers bought her new breasts, they should be called on the carpet; and Prejean may need to rethink that last statement.

Stay tuned for further BreastGate updates as the investigation continues . . .

UPDATE: An anonymous commenter (whom for some reason I suspect to be either Troglopundit or Professor Donald Douglas) provides this link to a photo of pre-fakie Carrie.

In a related development, why is Perez Hilton involved in an organization that discriminates against transsexuals?

BTW, if Miss Prejean wishes to deny that she's got implants, she should e-mail Smitty, who has been appointed chairman of the Fake Boob Investigative Commission.

UPDATE II: Alert the media!

FOR IMMEDIATE RELASE
BREAST IMPLANT PANDEMIC MUST BE EXPOSED
Internet Investigation Launched in Wake of Pageant Scandal
WASHINGTON, D.C. April 29 -- Revelations that Miss California USA pageant sponsors paid for Carrie Prejean's breast augmentation procedure have prompted a group of Internet activists to organize an investigation of the prevalence of silicone implants in the pageant industry.
"This is an aesthetic disgrace and an unpatriotic insult to the fine tradition of American breasts," said blogger Robert Stacy McCain, a leading online advocate of traditional values who helped launch the Fake Boob Investigative Commission. "These pageant officials are displaying a widespread and harmful prejudice against small breasts that damages the self-esteem of millions of women in this country. Their claim to value 'diversity' is clearly false, so long as they effectively banish healthy American A-cups from their competitions."
Vowing to combat the misleading use of "fakies" in the pageant industry, the Internet activists announced a slogan for their campaign: "REAL PRIDE: EXPOSE THE FAKES!" The activists urge that pageant contestants with natural breasts publicly declare their unenhanced status, and "name names" of contestants whom they know to have had deceptive implant surgery.
"This isn't just about small-breasted women," McCain said. "Naturally large-breasted women are also being cheated by being forced into competition with these artificially enhanced frauds. It's the equivalent of illegal steroid use in sports."
McCain said that at least one former member of Congress has expressed interest in the issue, and that the Fake Boob Commission is seeking legal advice on whether the use of breast implants in pageants violates state or federal laws, including civil rights statutes.
Legal advisers say a class-action lawsuit is possible, if we could find enough beauty pageant contestants with real breasts who feel they have been victimized by discrimination.

UPDATE III: We have a theme song, "Miss California," by Jack's Mannequin:

UPDATE IV: Another shocking revelation: WATER IS WET!

Conservative possibility?

"There have always been many men . . . who sit around Washington observing and commenting on trends, and then there have been those rare men who make trends happen. . . . Whether or not a conservative resurgence is likely, it can only be accomplished by those who begin with the assumption that it is possible, and then work tirelessly to turn possibility into reality."

Caption Contest

Via Politico, where Michael Calderone has the background on this photo of New York Times columnist David Brooks and Obama political strategist David Axelrod:

Note to contestants: Entries suggesting extreme acts of violence or unnatural uses for Brooks' "Columnist of the Year Award" will be disqualified. I can think up enough of those without your help.

Tuesday, April 28, 2009

All great rock music was recorded by the time John Bonham died

That is all the "rock music criticism" anyone under 40 needs to know. Anything recorded after Sept. 25, 1980, is therefore not great rock music.

As to this silly dispute over '80s "hair bands" vs. '90s "grunge," it's like debating which was the better painter, de Kooning or Pollock. Neither one had any talent, so who cares?

UPDATE: James Joyner weighs in, prompting his commenter Bernard Finel to say of my argument: "I think this is probably the single dumbest thing ever posted anywhere in the history of the internet."

Don't be too sure of that, Bernie. I've written more 3,900 posts here. Surely you could find something dumber. If not, there's always tomorrow . . .

OMG, Douthat, too?

If David Brooks is Pinky, Ross Douthat is the Brain, but as to his New York Times debut, Matthew Saroff of TPM sums it up in a blog post title: "Ross Douthat Is a F***ing Moron."

The money sentence in Douthat's silly mess:
In the wake of two straight drubbings at the polls, much of the American right has comforted itself with the idea that conservatives lost the country primarily because the Bush-era Republican Party spent too much money on social programs. And John McCain’s defeat has been taken as the vindication of this premise.
First: Conservatives are not interested in "comfort." Second, the simple lesson of the past two cycles is something that anyone who has been paying attention since Ross was in middle school would tell you: Lie down with Bushes, wake up with Democrats.

Douthat has never been a reporter. His life has been confined to academia and think-tank punditry in elite precincts: New Haven, Cambridge and Washington. He does not have any scope of experience to write about anything except the opinions of the elite, which are already easily available to anyone with access to NPR. Ergo, Douthat is redundant at best, and allowing him to write this kind of Big Picture analysis is to subject the reader to an arrogant, puerile know-it-all-ism.

Marc Ambinder (an actual reporter) shrugs his shoulders in resignation. Obviously, the thinking at 620 Eighth Avenue is: "If we've got to hire a 'conservative' columnist, make sure we hire one who'll reaffirm our readers' belief that conservatives are clueless idiots."

Kathy Shaidle e-mailed me this column with a two-word subject line, "Lent's over." Thank God for small blessings.

It's David Brooks Fisking Day!

"Educated elites have taken over much of the power that used to accrue to sedate old WASPs with dominating chins. . . . The educated elites have even taken over professions that used to be working class. The days of the hard-drinking, blue-collar journalist, for example, are gone forever. Now if you cast your eye down a row at a Washington press conference, it's: Yale, Yale, Stanford, Emory, Yale, and Harvard."
-- David Brooks, Bobos in Paradise (2000)
On behalf of my fellow alumni of Jacksonville (Ala.) State University: Fuck you, David Brooks.

Things have been so busy lately -- Jessica Valenti, Amanda Marcotte, Arlen Specter -- that I've scarcely had time even to celebrate my 20th wedding anniversary. And so you probably hoped I'd forget our regular rendevous, didn't you?

No such luck, you arrogant son of a bitch. People pay good money to watch me smack you around every Tuesday, providing a fee-for-service incentive that delightfully enhances my enjoyment. There's no escaping this weekly engagement, so long as the New York Times can afford to continue paying you $300,000 a year to write your columns -- and who knows how much longer that will be?

Shall I flay your latest column about Mexican swine flu? It hardly deserves the effort -- a Seinfeldian column "about nothing." Health officials battling the pandemic aren't reading the op-ed pages of the Times in search of advice, and what manner of advice would they get from you, anyway? Name-checking a Princeton professor and referencing the World Health Organization (predictably brown-nosing the elite) en route to a buzzword-clogged whiffle-ball conclusion:

The correct response to these dynamic, decentralized, emergent problems is to create dynamic, decentralized, emergent authorities: chains of local officials, state agencies, national governments and international bodies that are as flexible as the problem itself.
Swine flu isn’t only a health emergency. It’s a test for how we’re going to organize the 21st century. Subsidiarity works best.

If David Brooks is paid $300K/yr. for 2 columns/wk. (104 columns/yr.), simple math tells us that each column earns him $2,884.62. Since this latest outing is 799 words, this means Brooks earned $3.61 each for his first use of "dynamic" (ka-ching!), "decentralized" (ka-ching!), "emergent" (ka-ching!), then cleverly doubled his $10.83 to $21.66 by immediately repeating the same three buzzwords -- ka-ching! ka-ching! ka-ching!

My, how the money rolls in. And as to what Their Mister Brooks has added to the reader's understanding of the Mexican swine flu threat -- hey, next time, David, why don't you rack up a few bucks by quoting some Dire Straits lyrics about "money for nothing"?

It's the lack of value, you see, that makes you so useless. Suppose, purely as a hypothetical exercise, that I could be persuaded to accept the Walter Duranty-tainted Sulzberger cash and consent to have my byline appear in the credibility-impaired New York Times. Suppose, further, that I accepted this unfathomable $3.61-per-word rate for mere op-ed opining, but under the special condition that I write no more words than the topic deserved. What might that column look like?

How to Avoid Mexican Swine Flu
By Robert Stacy McCain

1. Avoid swine.
2. Avoid Mexicans.
3. Otherwise, take two aspirin and call me in the morning.

My count: 14 words, not including the title, byline or numerals. So that's a $50.54 paycheck for a "top Hayekian public intellectual." You see, perhaps, why Old Media dinosaurs like yourself are an endangered species, David.

However, exposing the overblown emptiness of your latest column is such a simple task as to be unworthy of my attention on this, the 20th anniversary of my wedding. No, by God, when Jax State sends forth a man into this world, he is expected to acquit himself manfully. Therefore, I'll direct my readers to the work of a real journalist, Howard Kurtz:

Last Tuesday evening, Rahm Emanuel quietly slipped into an eighth-floor office at the Watergate.
As white-jacketed waiters poured red and white wine and served a three-course salmon and risotto dinner, the White House chief of staff spent two hours chatting with some of Washington's top journalists -- excusing himself to take a call from President Obama and another from Hillary Clinton. . . .
For more than a year, David Bradley, the Atlantic's soft-spoken owner, has hosted these off-the-record dinners at a specially built table in his glass-enclosed office overlooking the Potomac. . . .
Among those in regular attendance are David Brooks and Maureen Dowd of the New York Times, Gene Robinson and Ruth Marcus of The Washington Post, NBC's David Gregory, ABC's George Stephanopoulos, PBS's Gwen Ifill, the New Yorker's Jane Mayer, Vanity Fair's Todd Purdum, former Time managing editor Walter Isaacson and staffers from Bradley's Atlantic and National Journal, including Ron Brownstein, Andrew Sullivan and Jonathan Rauch.

Well, well, well! We see now why dear Dave has such upscale notions about what's to be seen when you "cast your eye down a row at a Washington press conference." Dare say you're nearly the low man on the totem pole at those clubby little elite get-togethers at the Watergate, eh? David Gregory and George Stephanopoulos are both multimillionaires, just for starters.

When a fellow starts hanging around with all those bigwigs, chowing down on salmon and risotto, it's easy to see how he could imagine himself a Platonic archon, solving the world's problems one $3.61 word at a time.

Oh, don't think I begrudge you the risotto, Dave -- as a strictly neutral, objective journalist, I'm mighty fond of a free meal myself. The second-rarest sentence in the English language is, "Gee, Stacy, thanks for picking up the tab." (The rarest sentence is, "Gee, Stacy, why don't you tell us what you really think?")

When I went down to Alabama for Tax Day Tea Party a couple weeks ago, I had a free dinner at the Five Points Grill, ate free barbecue the next day at Jim 'n Nick's, and then a free dinner with Tito Perdue and his wife at Dusty's Diner. Then I swung on over to Georgia and stopped by the Village Church in Hapeville for more barbecue before heading to the state Libertarian Party convention, but what happens in Norcross stays in Norcross, as they say. One thing I can guarantee you: I didn't pay a dime.

Now, if we count the fine breakfast Stephen Gordon's mother fixed me whilst I was in Hartselle, that's at least six free meals in four days. So I've got you beat all to hell in that department, Mr. Brooks -- even if I had to drive 1,700 miles and sleep in my car to earn it.

I didn't notice any white-jacketed waiters offering to pour wine for me, but then again I don't reckon The Atlantic Monthly gives a damn about folks in Alabama and Georgia. So you just report whatever Rahm Emanuel tells you to report, David Brooks, since that's all anybody who really matters cares to read about.

Just one question, Mr. Brooks: When you were chowing down with Rahm at the Watergate, did you happen to notice if any of those white-jacketed waiters were Mexican?

Take two aspirin and call me in the morning, Dave.

And the rest of you: Hit the freaking tip jar! This lunatic gibberish may not be worth $3.61 a word, but man cannot live by free food alone.

Specter: RINO no more

Good-bye and good riddance:
Pennsylvania Sen. Arlen Specter will switch his party affiliation from Republican to Democrat and announced today that he will run in 2010 as a Democrat, according to a statement he released this morning. . . .
"I have decided to run for re-election in 2010 in the Democratic primary," said Specter in a statement. "I am ready, willing and anxious to take on all comers and have my candidacy for re-election determined in a general election."
He added: "Since my election in 1980, as part of the Reagan Big Tent, the Republican Party has moved far to the right. Last year, more than 200,000 Republicans in Pennsylvania changed their registration to become Democrats. I now find my political philosophy more in line with Democrats than Republicans."
Exit lying. One less member of the Senate Republican "Jellyfish Caucus." Specter reminds me of the high-school slut trying to sleep her way to popularity -- a weak reed, blown by the shifting winds. The fact that the national GOP apparatus lined up behind this venomous crapweasel in 2004 is all you need to know about what a worthless waste of time the national GOP apparatus was during the Bush/Mehlman era.

Even if Specter wins the Democratic primary (which is certainly not a given) and wins the general election (also not a given), no one will ever respect him because he is dishonorable and untrustworthy. A pox upon him and his ilk. (Via Memeorandum.)

UPDATE: Via Jules Crittenden and Gateway Pundit, a statement from RNC Chairman Michael Steele:
Republicans look forward to beating Sen. Specter in 2010, assuming the Democrats don’t do it first.
At least Steele won't have to spend more time pandering to the politically irrelevant "Specter wing" of the GOP.

UPDATE II: Philip Klein of The American Spectator:
If Specter had made this party switch right after his vote in favor of the stimulus package, and before he decided to oppose card check, he would have been in a far better position to claim the Democratic nomination.
Klein links Markos at Daily Kos:
Interestingly, he remains a foe of EFCA, which means that labor is free to fund and help a real Democrat in the Democratic primary. Bizarre choice. Had he decided to back EFCA, as he has always done so in the past, he'd have labor's full support. Now, he gives the opposition an opening to take him out in the Democratic primary.
When you see Kos using the phrase "real Democrat," it means that the Nutroots will back a Ned Lamont-style challenge to Specter in the Democratic primary, a challenge that every conservative should encourage. The more bitter the Democratic primary, the more obscure and extreme Specter's primary opposition, the better for conservatives.

BTW, I disagree with Klein when he says this:
This is a huge blow for Republicans hoping to stop Obama's agenda in the Senate.
Specter is a "huge blow," in one sense of that term, but he was never a reliable vote for anything. He is one of those vain, unprincipled creatures -- like Robert Byrd or John McCain -- who revel in their self-created image of being a "public servant," an image that is merely an excuse for selfishness and dishonesty.

UPDATE III: Notice how the treacherous crapweasel, after describing himself proudly as a member of the "Reagan Big Tent," then pisses all over the Reagan legacy:
When I supported the stimulus package, I knew that it would not be popular with the Republican Party. But, I saw the stimulus as necessary to lessen the risk of a far more serious recession than we are now experiencing.
If there is one thing that Reagan firmly stood for as firmly than his hatred of Communist tyrrany, it was his opposition to the Keynesian economic hokum that led to Carter-era "stagflation." If you don't understand why the bailout-and-stimulus idiocy of Obamanomics is bad policy -- It Won't Work -- you need to be reading Hayek and Mises.

UPDATE IV: Matt Welch of Reason:
By choosing to die on the hill of the stimulus package of all things, Specter reinforces whatever notion there is that stimuli and bailouts are Democratic, not Republican, pet toys. Since professional Republicans are currently scattered in the wind, trying desperately to latch onto the anti-stimulus/bailout Tea Party movement, cementing that divide may come back to haunt Democrats when those policies (inevitably, I think) become so derided that even Barack Obama's impressive popularity can't rescue them.
Hear! Hear! And the heroic Club For Growth:
Senator Specter has confirmed what we already knew – he's a liberal devoted to more spending, more bailouts, and less economic freedom.
The Club For Growth is "heroic," I say, because their support for Republican conservative Pat Toomey was what finally forced Specter to admit that he is a Democrat. As I said at The American Spectator:
Specter will be less useful to the Democrats now than he ever was when he had an "R" beside his name.
He was certainly never useful to Republicans. All things considered, swine flu has never been a greater threat to America than RINO fever.

UPDATE V: Michelle Malkin reminds us of Specter's habitual dishonesty, when he vowed just six weeks ago that he would not switch parties.

UPDATE VI: Some commenter just suggested that, in celebrating the RINO's departure, conservatives like myself were "purging" Sphincter. Nonsense. He purged himself. After years of zealously advancing the Democratic agenda with an "R" beside his name, he's now joined Jumpin' Jim Jeffords and Lincoln Chafee in the Formerly Useful Idiot Coalition.