In this post SEK examines the latest obnoxious Althouse effusion. In the comments over there the often-asked question about whether or not it's "worth it" to deal with goofballs like Althouse arises. Does not engaging a hack like her grant her undue legitimacy and so on.

I'm not entirely unsympathetic. But then, Althouse was just asked for her opinion by the New York Times about a nominee for the  United States Supreme Court.

So there you go.

One thing to consider about this "Obama ogled" story, and how it was always obvious bullshit, is how it seems to have blown back upon the young woman in question. Here is the New York Post, living down to its reputation:

The Secret Service might want to put a new threat on its watch list: the mad-as-hell mama of the 17-year-old Brazilian beauty ogled by President Obama and French leader Nicolas Sarkozy at the G8 summit last week.

"If I were there, I would have boxed their ears," said Lucia Rodrigues, 37. "They should be ashamed of themselves."

Patriarch Eduardo Tavares, after finally getting around to seeing the famous photo of his daughter from behind, quickly changed his tune from proud papa to furious father.

"My daughter is not a model and she is not a sex symbol," he told The Post. "That photograph has ruined my whole family."

At the Italy summit last week, daughter Mayara Rodrigues Tavares, her long locks flowing over her curvaceous frame, became the momentary focus of the leering leaders as she took her place for an official group photo.

Her father, a night watchman in their home city of Rio de Janeiro has been swamped with interview requests since the photo of his daughter in a little red dress was beamed around the world.

"She is dedicated to helping the poor, not to seducing world leaders," he ranted. "This is the wrong image of my daughter."

Her mom added, "She is really skinny and only ever wears pants. Mayara is timid and ashamed of her body. This was the first time in her life that she wore a dress, and it was borrowed from a friend in the shantytown because she doesn't own one."

The high school sophomore, who hails from one of Rio de Janeiro's slums known as favelas, had been picked by UNICEF to join the counterpart Junior 8 forum of teenagers because she stood out as a community volunteer. She shares a single room with her parents and two younger brothers and can't afford the bus fare to attend a good high school.

"Why are they looking at her like that? This is a girl who is articulate and intelligent and just wants to do the right thing," the father said. "Instead, they are forcing her into a negative light."

Her evangelical Christian parents said she was initially oblivious to the international uproar she inadvertently caused.

"She called us and she was very moved that she had met Obama and Lula [Brazil's president Luis Inacio Lula da Silva]. She didn't say anything about the looks she got," Mr. Tavares said.

And dad found some solace in the episode. "Thank God that [Italian playboy Prime Minister Silvio] Berlusconi was nowhere near her," he said.

The photo was a lie.

This is one of the most disgusting things, in its way, that I have ever seen online or off -- this kid, of all kids, and she's being given shit over something as asinine as this easily debunked garbage?

Hence and so forth.

This speaks for itself, and in just a couple of minutes crystallizes everything I've been saying about "civility" since, oh, 2003. Via.

Shorter Randy Barnett:

Of course, since the NY Times asked Ann Althouse to blather about the hearings this isn't the stupidest thing we'll hear about them today, but it is pretty stupid.

I am most heartily sick of anything to do with Sarah Palin, having read quite a bit of silliness about her in the past couple of weeks. But this... well, this speaks for itself:

This is the point at which we at Whiskey Fire turn to free animated gifs, because, well, what else is there to say in the face of such... stuff?

(PICTURED: Editorial meeting of The American Thinker, artist's rendition)

Flory brought up Althouse again, so it's her fault entirely that I saw this, which would be Miss Havisham Winebox's explanation for why David Brooks is a great big sillygoose for revealing that "I sat next to a Republican senator once at dinner and he had his hand on my inner thigh the whole time":

I'd make a joke, but, well, what can you say? How can you possibly improve, comedy-wise, or creepy-wise, upon the adverb "technically" in that particular sentence? Please, just marvel. This is not Art, precisely, but it is nevertheless fondling Art's balls under the tablecloth. The rest is good too:

Why wouldn't we believe this? Or are we supposed to believe that powerful men don't get away with public groping precisely because (1) they are powerful men, and (2) it's in public? Maybe if there were a still photograph of the thigh touching, we would be able to parse this all more precisely, but then again, Brooks probably had it coming, as I'm sure he was deliberately flaunting his tits.

(Is anyone genuinely startled that Brooks would have submitted to sexual abuse on the part of an abuser in a position of power...? I sure ain't. I'd have hit the guy, and if it had been her, my wife would have hit the guy, and neither of us would have done squat to protect a sexual predator: which is part of why, I suppose, we're just bloggers, not Elite Opinion Journalists. Dude, David, if you're telling the truth, you're protecting a monster -- speak up, asshole. Because sure as hell there is someone else who needs to be spoken for, and who has a hell of a lot more to lose than you do by going public. I mean, the more I think about this -- ha ha, a Senator gropes you in a public place, but no names, they're all like that -- I mean, Christ, this gets less funny and far more revolting.)

And with that I retire, because I have thought about this too long and I want to kill myself. And I thought being a Mets fan sucked.

No, I don't know what happened to all the missing comments either. Freakshow...

TypePad is shifting to a new version this weekend, that might be what's up. If you have been trying to comment and it is not working, leave a comment & let me know about it.

by flory

Did you know that putting one foot in front of the other in order to propel yourself forward isn't actually walking?

Didn't, did you?

Nope. According to no less an expert than Ann Althouse, what you're actually doing is not walking -- it's "crotch squeezing". And its a movement practiced by no less than the President of the United States.

The foot closest to the woman, like Sarkozy's, is planted and aimed forward, but the other steps off in the direction of the woman, bending the knee upward into a bit of a crotch-squeeze

She even has a picture demonstrating this activity.

{{And no -- I'm not even going to get into the ridiculous substance of the post. Annie the body-language expert is not an analysis I can contemplate without copious quantities of alcohol -- and it's only 2pm here in California}}

Update: Really -- her tag alone says a lot more about her than it does Obama: "Obama and manliness". Obsess much, Annie?

MORE (Thers): Via Media Matters, even the usually goofy Greta Van Susteren doesn't believe there was any ogling, based on the videotape. Check for yourself.

AND MORE. In typical Althousian style, she updates:

AND: Yes, I have seen the video, and I stand by my analysis of the still photograph.

And she's standing there with wine sloshed all over her boobs, no doubt. Anyhow, connoisseurs of Althouse dingbattery will here not merely recall breast-gate, but also her firm conviction that the letter "d" resembles a penis, her contention that onion rings look like a vagina, her assertion that the word "nigger" appeared on a child's pajamas, her declaration that terrorist messages can be transmitted by blinking in code, or... oh, heck, suffice it to say, we've seen this freakshow before, many times. And then there is her comments section, which, as we've said before, is always a cesspit (and remember, the young woman allegely being ogled is, what, 16?):

Sarkozy is thinking, ‘I go home to Carla and you go home to The Beast of ACORN!’ There’s our leader doing what he does best – community booty organizer. The only ghetto mannerism missing is his unconscious hand clutching his boy-brain (crotch) in MJ fashion!

I don't think Mrs. Althouse is short of guys who want to bone her. Besides, as noted, at least AA's face doesn't make one want to puke. The G8, Jr. girl needs a bag over her head - two bags.

The girl was a bit of a Butterface. (Nice ass, but her face?)

All this is based on the assumption that Obama is heterosexual, something for which I have yet to see any evidence.

I saw the girl's face, and those arc sines, arc cosines, and arc tangents aren't worth checking the other side. Check the unicef site fls provided, and if you're a man and her face makes you want to check her backside, then I don't understand you.

The posteriors of their respective first ladies should be taken into consideration when contemplating the thought processes of the two presidents when confronted with the shapely young backside. It isn't surprising that Sarkozy would be a bit bit more "Meh." about the whole thing.

BTW the girl isn't white. If you look at the frontal photo of her, she clearly has Africanish features. She's high yella.

I don't ordinarily nutpick, but in the case of someone notorious for tossing around charges of "sexism" by going into someone else's comments and making shit up, the rules are different.

by Ripley

Man, oh man, oh man... Did you get the news today?  What a week!  What a mighty good week! Wait, what now?  Anyhoo - a few notes...

• Thers has a shiny, new laptop!  Huzzah!  But, unlike Thers' and Mary's 117 children, laptops aren't God's special free gift to us all.  Look to your left, hit the Tip Jar and keep the DFH Commune at Liberal Mountain running.  You can direct your contribution to the Thers Laptop fund or the Christ's Sake, I'll Sell You All For a Bottle Of Bushmill's, You Little Bastards! fund.  The internets are cool, that way.  We're not here to judge you.
• My girlfriend's back and I'm gonna be sorry!  Hey la, hey... Yes, she's back in the USA and we're feeling each other out as we... hey! stop giggling! you know what I meant!  So, we're reconnecting and what have you - closet space, drawers, my pillow!, you're a slob! I love you anyway nom nom nom! and all that rot.  (Who's a happy boy?  Ripley!)
• Jonah Goldberg is still an idiot.  I don't think I have to offer any... yeah, you know what I mean.
• Sarah Palin. (Laugh at will)  Sarah Palin did... something!  
• Barack Obama.  Man, I thought you were cool, but now you're all...
• Watch out for the bold caps, cuz here they come.... AL FUCKING FRANKEN!!!, motherfuckers!  I can't even begin to imagine what Bill O'Reilly's underwear tab must be right now. "Rosario!  I've crapped myself again!"

On a serious note, T's mother has been in the hospital for two months with some horrific GI problems.  Are you listening, Rahm-bama?  We need - no, we NEED!! and deserve - some kind of Univeral Health Care coverage.  My Dad was lucky that he had union-provided Retiree coverage or he would have died within months after the diagnosis. (Mulitple myeloma, centered in his spinal column).  We walk away from our parents, drink beer and raise Hell, and... We watch our parents die and wish we could do something.  We should be able to do something... right?

Shifting gears...  Look around you.  Do it, right now.  There's a person who needs something, right next to you.  Love, medical attention, help with a utility bill, help with groceries, someone to drive them to a job interview or a doctor's appointment...

They say "Liberal" is a bad word.  They say a lot of shit, don't they?  I'm one of the principals in the KINship Project and I can tell you, without hesitation, that there's a metric ass-ton of good people out there.  Really good people.  And they call themselves "liberal." 

So, take a moment and share your wealth and love with somebody.  Get all up in a brother's face and make his day.  Make someone understand that we are here to help. 

And never, NEVER, stop laughing at Sarah Palin.

>

Rip -

There's nothing more confusing than wingnut attempts at satire.

Here for instance is an emanation that recently made itself detectable over at NRO, where the zingers include advice, intended, if you please, as satirical, that the GOP might at some point begin filing "frivolous ethics complaints against all [Democratic] elected officials" (keep in mind that that this is supposed to be in the tradition of Swift (Ernie Swift, a guy I was in junior high school with, who liked to snort his own boogers for yuks)) -- something we're supposed devoutly to wish has never ever occurred to Republicans ever in the past (see also the 1990s, et passim) (and yes, this sentence is grammatical, motherfucker: the convoluted (but correct) structure mirrors the convolution of the logic being discussed, and so this sentence, in fine, exhibits a pleasing symmetry of content and form). We also learn that the election of Barack Obama, as well as the elaborate conspiracy to pull the wool over the eyes of the nation so that Sarah Palin always looks like an idiot whenever she talks, even though she's IN TRUTH Jesus, Buddha, Milton Friedman, and the Fucking Wizard of Oz wrapped into one magical moose-murdering package, is really all to do with a Sinister Hidden Agenda:

Shazam!

"A Modest Proposal" relies upon the generally accepted opinion that it is wrong to eat babies. That is, if you will, the common ground upon which the satire rests. This NRO thing is not satire. The common ground upon which it rests is nonexistent. It is all, it emerges, my bum, and thoroughly unintelligible to the uninitiated, which is to say, to the sane. (The implicit, though still stirring motto here is "Give Me Liberty, Or Give me Death, But I Won't Say 'America Stinks.'" Wolverines!)

But this is not to say that there is no good wingnut satire in regards to the Sarah Palin psychadelia. Indeed there is, and it's some pretty high-grade shit, too. The unintentional satire is to be savored. To wit:

That last sentence is magnificent, and to be cherished. It is a golden gift and a jewel for the ages and I do not mind saying so in the least or the slightest. It is, in its way... Art, and evidence of quite extremely competent masterwork of the sort the US of A still leads the world in producing. God Bless America. Gorgeous. Just marvelous.

Via Steve M., Brent Bozell gets all outraged at the MSM covering the Michael Jackson death saga and not combat deaths in Afghanistan:

Steve is right about the hypocrisy here, in that it used to be quite fashionable in wingnut circles to call the MSM traitors for reporting about US combat deaths. Another point though is that Bozell's point is ludicrous on its face: the Jackson stuff is enormously popular and TV news audiences are increasing. I haven't watched any of the coverage myself, and yeah, Afghanistan is more important, and the service members killed were very likely worthier souls than Jackson, but it is what it is. People want to see the Jackson stuff and so the media's filling the demand.

This gets to why the conservative "media bias" stuff is so asinine; the actual bias is towards eyeballs, profit, and getting ahead according to the strange rules of elite insider journalism.

Scott may feel compelled to defend Jeter, but that doesn't mean the Yankee-hating universe doesn't have anything to cheer over:

Talk about lawsuits you deserve to lose. It should have been a lot more. Patriotism: in the name of Liberty, we forbid you to pee! Truly this is what the Revolution was fought over, the self-evident right of the wealthy owners of sports teams to use state law enforcement to ban unpatriotic piss-taking.

The good news is that now this guy won his ten grand, he just might be able to afford a ticket to Yankee Stadium to actually exercise these hard-won pee privileges, with possibly even just enough left over to pay for a beer to help him fill up first.

Via wt.

In celebration here's GBV covering a classic Strokes tune.

So here's what happened.

Yesterday morning I had my laptop with me in the bedroom, with it on the end table. A small child climbs up behind me, as small children do, and since I'm a bit grouchy, I say "stop that," as I often do. This doesn't work, it never does, and the child giggles and leaps onto my head. I attempt to gently deposit the child on the floor with the intention of leading the child downstairs to watch SpongeBob or some shit like that so I can get some work done.

Three things happen: the child writhes, falls, cries; I try to stabilize the laptop, fail; I kick over the wastepaper basket, inadvertently; and... the laptop hits the carpet at precisely the same moment as the contents of the wastepaper basket.

Which would not be a problem, were it not for the fact that the wastepaper basket had, quite surprisingly, been filled halfway up with soda.

Gah, gah, gah, this is by my count the third computer my children have clobbered.

I've already gotten a new machine -- though I had to dip deep into the Vacation Fund (a week in the Adirondacks) to do it. And this time I bought the way expensive no-fault warranty.

Anyway, if you'd like to contribute to defraying the cost, I'd appreciate it. If you don't, that's cool too. But there are costs to doing this blog thing, like, a computer is kind of an essential tool in this regard, and this is only the second time I've ever asked for anything. Hell, I don't even run ads. if you like how this is the most fuck-saying political blog evar, well, a nickel or two would be OK.

So if you can contribute, hit the tip bar in the left sidebar. If you can't, well, thanks for reading, sincerely. I didn't get into this for money; I blog out of spite, as I've said before, many times, many ways. Anyhow thanks.

Thers

MORE. Wow! Thanks you guys. I'm pretty humbled by your generosity and humor. 

More bad word saying coming soon.

I'd forgotten that Jonah Goldberg has a blog specifically devoted to "Liberal Fascism," which he uses to deposit random items that he runs across and that he imagines proves his thesis, much in the same way that he would stick his gum under his desk "for later." Anyway I imagine that everyone else also forgot he had this little hidey-hole, or this well-chewed gooey wad of stupid might have gotten more noticed at the time it was hocked up.

Lebensunwertes Leben   

From the LA Times:

Reporting from Washington — President Obama suggested at a town hall event Wednesday night that one way to shave medical costs is to stop expensive and ultimately futile procedures performed on people who are about to die and don't stand to gain from the extra care.

In a nationally televised event at the White House, Obama said families need better information so they don't unthinkingly approve "additional tests or additional drugs that the evidence shows is not necessarily going to improve care."

He added: "Maybe you're better off not having the surgery, but taking the painkiller."

There's an interesting contradiction here. According to the pro-choice perspective, it's outrageous for the state to interfere in a woman's decision to terminate a pregnancy. But it's pragmatic and reasonable for the state to consider terminating a person, if some money can be saved.

This logic is nothing new.

The link of course goes to a Wikipedia entry about Nazis and mass killings.

Anyway, there's no "contradiction" here, since he's talking about families making better informed decisions, not "the state" forbidding old people from having surgery to save money. So the principle is the same, that health decisions should be left to the person or people most directly involved.

More to the point, the dilemma Obama is talking about is one that families of people with terminal diseases have to face all the time. And, yes, obviously there are lots of cases where people have had risky, grueling, expensive surgeries, when they really would have been better off taking the painkiller. And that can be a damn hard thing to watch.

But I don't suppose the sort of people who went nuts over Terri Schiavo, or the people who would look at Obama's statement and think Buchenwald, actually give a rat's ass about the realities facing families in such situations, either because they're actual sociopaths or just pretending to be for fun & profit.

Anyhow it's good to remember now and again that while Jonah Goldberg sometimes comes across as a hilarious doofus, he really is at bottom a horrible little shit.

Shorter Robert J. Samuelson:

There is nothing so complex that a WaPo columnist cannot fail to explain it with reference to a sonorous oversimplification. Also, Niall Ferguson is a prat.

I ordinarily have no time for Bill O'Reilly, but this... this is special.

Maybe Franklin just didn't know that sheep "bray." I didn't. I thought that was donkeys, and that sheep were the woolly gentlemen concerned primarily and in the initial res ipsa with "bleating." But then again, I am almost positive I am not the only person relieved, and surprised, that Bill O'Reilly is not intimately discerning in regards to barnyard noises. For myself it is by far the nicest thing I could ever imagine saying about the fellow.

Bill O'Reilly will no doubt be thrilled to learn that at least one American is free of all weenie linguistic biases and is patriotically proud to call him an asshole.

Fuck you and stop bothering me.

I think you're good.

He'd shout out, "damn, you're even a worse asshole than Aaron Burr."

What? How the hell did we get from Alexander Hamilton to hip-hop and then to Paris Hilton? Are we high?

And while there may be things about Paris Hilton of which I fail to approve, what especial evil did she ever do to proper English usage? This is mysterious: how is Paris Hilton an insult incarnate to the language of Milton and Shakespear and the Bible? Just because your tits are out there on the Internet does not make you a bedraggled guttersnipe. Hence Bill O'Reilly ought to cease this detestable boo-hooing.

Hooray rappers!

Allahu Akbar!

If Dick Cheney wants to shoot Donald Rumsfeld in the face, I'd have no problem with that.

You know what would actually be scary? Rappers saying "groovy." To be fair, I sincerely wish they would not do that, if they were planning to. MC No-No! Also, this is a very advanced algebra:

Perhaps this is even correct, if we are willing to argue over what the definition of "two" is. Also, last I heard, "they be chillin,'" in hip 1985 white people slang, translated to "those fellows are having a refreshing beverage." What a wacky demotic! Is "homeboy" a no longer an equivalent term in 1980s-white-guy talk for "can I rape your sister?" (Flipping frantically through current-edition phrasebook.) Bill should "help a brother out" and ask about this the next time he visits a Harlem restaurant. 

WHAT EVILS BESET LARRY KING!

I hate that. "It is what it is." What does that mean? Should we go around saying stuff like "hey, look at that alligator over there -- it is what it is." I know that. I know what I'm seeing and hearing. I don't need someone to tell me "that refrigerator is what it is." That is sooooo not cool.

Sooooo. Pleeeease. Stooooop.

Getttttt. Helppppp. Fasttttttt.

Boo! An alligator! Gah! In the refrigerator! Squawk!

And cool. When Brando said it in the 1950s, it sounded good. When Edd "Kookie" Byrnes said it on "77 Sunset Strip," it was in context. When President Obama says it, I want to turn in my passport. Grown ups should not be saying "cool" unless they are willing, like Brando, to ride big motorcycles very fast. Then it's OK. You go, girl!"

Snark fails. He really said that.

As far away from you as they can get with or without a passport. In the room the ladies come and go, talking of how the court said keep a half mile away from me, creep. I must go and make my visit; Snoop Dogg mumbles "yah fo shiznit"; Bill O'Reilly, he's illit'rate.

The Son of Erick on Sarah Palin resigning:

The Son of Erick on local GOP party elections in Arizona counties:

Discuss: was the remainder of his intellectual development more profoundly informed by the Highlander movie, or the series? I say the series. The film seems beyond him, philosophically.

And of course, ahem, Wolverines.

NOTE. There were Highlander sequels? Gracious.

MORE. Equally gooberish commentary:

The explanation suggested by this latest Martin story seems pretty persuasive to me: get out of Alaska as a bigger stage beckons, earn lots of money to support your family, and keep your options open in national politics. If the world wants you to be a celebrity, why bother with the grinding details and all the frustrations of being governor of Alaska? Be a celebrity.

Is a decision to walk away from the people who voted for you because you want to be a celebrity a good way of "keeping options open in politics"? I myself find this a not entirely "persuasive" line of thought, but then I am not Rich Lowry.

These idiots confuse their perception that "Palin annoys liberals" with the notion that "Palin is therefore great." The reason they do this is that they are idiots.