"Over the next few months. I will be seeking a more suitable way of combining a meaningful public role, with hopefully, a more private life."

"I hope you can find it in your hearts to understand and give me the time and space that has been lacking in recent years."

Before Sarah Palin, there was Princess Diana. Tina Brown makes the comparison:

Like Princess Diana, who was both an addict of fame and its tormented victim, Palin is at constant war with the exposure she seems to live for. In Diana’s case, it was the raucous tabloids and their pitiless photographers who stalked her every waking hour alone or with her children. In Palin’s case, it’s that malign aristocratic phantom, the “media elite.”

It’s hard to feel as sorry for Palin as one did for Diana. The comely governor is so cocky in her ignorance, so relentless in pursuit of her own rise to fame, her arrogance makes it much harder to see her vulnerability. But that doesn’t mean it isn’t there....

Doesn't mean it is, either. And even if she is like Diana, Diana came back more powerful than ever.

(By the way, Tina Brown's book about Princess Diana, "The Diana Chronicles," is a terrific read, full of apt analysis of media and fame.)

Look how silly the Russians made Obama look...

... by giving him a really low chair:



And nice sock-pulling, Prez. Because it would only be worse if that forced hunkering exposed shin skin.

ADDED: Reminds me of this:

"The Democrats have total control."

Via Memeorandum, which links to a criticism by Greg Sargent of a minor aspect of this ad. The major thing I'm seeing here a very effective ad for the Republican Party. Of course, you can't beat something with nothing. The Republicans need more than the fact that the Democrats are scary. But the ad resonated with me. Now, Al Franken as the face of that scariness may be a bit silly. And, actually, I don't think you need to go all emotive to get the desired effect. I think I'd be more scared by a straightforward presentation of facts, recited by a sober voiceover, and no music at all.

Hey, kids!

I'm in the NYT...

And: more Sarah Palin, so get cracking. This is sure to be a 200+ comment thread.

"Has any single American of this century done more harm than Robert McNamara?"

"No one comes readily to mind. Yes, Lyndon Johnson bears greater responsibility for the damage done the nation by the Vietnam War. But McNamara is a Renaissance man. Before he helped ruin the American polity, he helped ruin the American economy, pioneering at Ford the bloodless, numbers-oriented management methods that helped bring so many corporations to their knees. After Vietnam, as head of the World Bank, he helped ruin the entire world's economy, shoveling out billions of dollars to fund failed 'development' projects. It's a tough record to match."

So wrote Mickey Kaus, in 1995.

Via Jac, who — like me in yesterday's McNamara obit-post — praises the Errol Morris documentary, "The Fog of War."

"It was an unbeLIEVable motorcade. I mean there were 3 Rolls Royces — FIVE Rolls Royces in it. 3 Escalades."

Yes. I'm watching the Michael Jackson Memorial. Isn't everybody?

12:15 CT: ABC takes us to the "service." Smokey Robinson is stumbling through reading condolences from Diana Ross, Nelson Mandela, etc. Now, nothing's happening, and the ABC newsfolk decide maybe that wasn't the service already beginning. So let's question Martin Bashir, the documentary filmmaker whose work led to Michael's arrest. Yeah, great to see you, Bashir. You're certainly welcome on this occasion. Bashir rambles, and Charlie Gibson interrupts with the assertion that Michael Jackson "probably had the singular greatest influence on the music business over the last 25 years as anyone." "Singular greatest influence"? Shouldn't that be "single greatest influence"? And if he was the single greatest influence, what do the words "as anyone" mean at the end of that sentence? Can't anybody talk anymore?

[I'll update this some more later, with a DVR assist. I can't sit in front of the TV all afternoon.]

UPDATE: It's 9 p.m. now, and I've fast-forwarded through the show, pausing occasionally. I listened to a bit of Brooke Shields talking about going out on dates with Michael when the 2 of them were teens. I listened to a bit of singing by Stevie Wonder and Jennifer Hudson and much of the "We Are the World" extravaganza. And I cried when the young daughter paid her tribute and broke down. Exploitative? I can't say it's not, but still....

"Personally, I'm not going to be seduced by some dinosaur wanna-be..."

"... that thinks a laid-back demeanor and a shit-eating grin is going to convince me to sully my honor."

In the Company of Thieves Café.

This really is a café called In the Company of Thieves, so I suppose I should have titled this post "In the Life Drawing Café" if I want to give my usual cue that you can talk about whatever you like. But you can.

"Palin Blasts Critics, Remains Mum on 2012 Bid."

That's the headline at Fox News, and there are many other stories about whatever Sarah happened to say today.

She's got our attention locked onto her now — plain evidence of the effectiveness of her running-for-President strategy.

What the Russians love about Michelle Obama.

"She can work with her hands."

No one much cared about the clothes she wore — which made things a bit hard for the WaPo fashion columnist Robin Givhan — they're interested in her vegetable garden where she (reputedly) gets her hands dirty.

"There is no passion in nature so demoniacally impatient, as that of him who, shuddering upon the edge of a precipice, thus meditates a plunge."

Acting on impulse... maybe you won't, but if you will, you will have first had the impulse.

"Sanford is in love. Palin is in pain. Sometimes what it seems to be is what it is."

Why not take people at their word... at least when their words are rambling, disjointed, and apparently against self-interest?

"Just because 'actual malice' is a tough standard to meet doesn’t mean you aren’t in big trouble if someone meets it."

When the threat of a defamation suit really should scare a blogger.

The ghost of Michael Jackson.

Here's the video everyone's talking about:



Elvis-y, no?

For added eeriness, there is a Michael Jackson song "Ghost." Video here.

ADDED: Presumably, Neverland will become a tourist attraction, and Michael Jackson's ghost will be part of the allure.

A "measured" response on Don't Ask Don't Tell.

It looks like Obama is being advised to keep DADT, but apply it in a more "humane" way.

I've had conservations with him about that,” [Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Mike] Mullen said on CNN's State of the Union. “What I've discussed in terms of the future is I think we need to move in a measured way.”...

“I haven't done any kind of extensive review. And what I feel most obligated about is to make sure I tell the president, you know, my – give the president my best advice, should this law change, on the impact on our people and their families at these very challenging times,” he said.

Last week, Defense Secretary Robert Gates said the Pentagon is looking into ways to apply the law in a “more humane way.” Gates appeared to suggest he disagreed with discharges in cases where service members were maliciously outed.

“If someone is outed by a third party … does that force us to take action?” he asked.

Is that enough hope and change for you — in these very challenging times?

Coffee time!

Don't forget!



More!



Okay!



That's more like it!

The 55 mice used in the University of South Florida study had been bred to develop symptoms of Alzheimer's disease....

When the mice were tested again after two months, those who were given the caffeine performed much better on tests measuring their memory and thinking skills and performed as well as mice of the same age without dementia.

Those drinking plain water continued to do poorly on the tests.

"She says, 'Yeah, you are free to take out the garbage and free to mow the lawn."

"I said 'wait a minute, you're talking to the former president.' And she said, 'Well, consider that your new domestic policy agenda.'"

Cornball foolery in the ex-President's new domain.

Too many religions!

Oh, to hell with them all!

"She's crushed. Her whole world is shattered."

When you learn, simultaneously, of your husband's affair... and murder.

Robert S. McNamara, dead at 93.

"The war became his personal nightmare. Nothing he did, none of the tools at his command — the power of American weapons, the forces of technology and logic or the strength of American soldiers — could stop the armies of North Vietnam. He concluded well before leaving the Pentagon that the war was futile, but he did not share that insight with the public until late in life."

Here's an excerpt from the great Errol S. Morris documentary "Fog of War":

It's me and Michelle Goldberg, blabbing about the governors Palin and Sanford.

On the new Bloggingheads.

Special Sex and Palin Edition

Is Sarah Palin insane?
Examining her motivations
Edwards’s sex tape vs. Sanford’s Appalachian hike
Mark Sanford’s an adulterous flake. But he’s so romantic!
Is Palin the next Obama?
Analyzing why Michelle HATES Palin

Rush Limbaugh on Sarah Palin.

He mainly says the "Beltway types" are just speculating, he doesn't know what it means, but clearly a lot of people are afraid of her:

"Trying to keep up w/getting truth to u, like proof there's no 'FBI scandal'..."

Aren't u following Sarah Palin on Twitter? I sure am!

Is it presidential to write "u" for "you"?

Don't you u look forward to the time when world leaders will just text each other? Frankly, I believe when that day comes, we will have world peace.

(Ultra-cute heart doodle from DeniseKerr.com.)

The 20 Most Terrifying Pictures...

... of Ronald McDonald.

(Via James Gunn.)

At the Green-and-Purple Café...

... you can make associations and take a point of view.

"It's growing in the street right up through the concrete/But soft and sweet and dreaming..."

So wrote Jerry Leiber and Phil Spector about the Rose in Spanish Harlem.

And then there's the Queen Anne's lace here in Madison...



It's growing right up through the concrete, and, even here, Anne/Ann is feeling soft and sweet and dreaming....

An essay on dignity.

That WaPo apology got me thinking about this: From "Welcome to the Dollhouse," a movie I highly recommend.

Katharine Weymouth apologizes for whatever somehow happened at the Washington Post.

The Publisher and CEO of The Washington Post addresses us dear readers:

I want to apologize for a planned new venture that went off track and for any cause we may have given you to doubt our independence and integrity. A flier distributed last week suggested that we were selling access to power brokers in Washington through dinners that were to take place at my home. The flier was not approved by me or newsroom editors, and it did not accurately reflect what we had in mind. But let me be clear: The flier was not the only problem. Our mistake was to suggest that we would hold and participate in an off-the-record dinner with journalists and power brokers paid for by a sponsor. We will not organize such events.

My lawyer's eye fixates on one word — in that last sentence: will.

You start out with your terrible, suggestive flier. And just when my mind is screaming quit putting all the blame on the damned flier, you're all let me be clear: The flier was not the only problem.

Okay, so you will confess that you did plan to sell access to power brokers in Washington through dinners that were to take place at your home?

Then on to the crisp declarative We will not organize such events. You skipped a step!

I know you won't organize "such events" now — now that you've been publicly humiliated. You're glossing over the key thing you ought to apologize for: that you did organize a series of dinners at your home to make money giving access to Washington power brokers.

Like other media companies, The Post hosts conferences and live events that bring together journalists, government officials and other leaders for discussions of important topics. These events make news and inform their audiences. We had planned to extend this business to include smaller gatherings, a practice that has become common at other media companies.

From the outset, we laid down firm parameters to ensure that these events would be consistent with The Post's values. If the events were to be sponsored by other companies, everything would be at arm's length -- sponsors would have no control over the content of the discussions, and no special access to our journalists.

If our reporters were to participate, there would be no limits on what they could ask. They would have full access to participants and be able to use any information or ideas to further their knowledge and understanding of any issues under discussion. They would not be asked to invite other participants and would serve only as moderators.

When the flier promoting our first planned event to potential sponsors was released, it overstepped all these lines. Neither I nor anyone in our news department would have approved any event such as the flier described.

Gah! Must I sort through that? Will anyone sort through that? What are "firm parameters"? And how firm can they be if they don't work? And what are "The Post's values" — other than what The Post actually does? And how does the flier come into existence when nobody could possibly have caused it to exist? There's some abstruse theology here, and it's annoying me.

We have canceled the planned dinner. While I do believe there is a legitimate way to hold such events...

We all make mistakes and hope to be forgiven for them. I apologize to our readers for the mistakes I made in this case.

Which mistakes did you, specifically, make? I can't figure it out from this letter.

We remain committed to you, our readers.

Well, of course. There isn't even any influence to sell if you don't have readers. There's no dilemma here at all for you.

We remain committed to the highest standards of integrity. And while we will continue to pursue new lines of business, we will never allow those new avenues to compromise our integrity.

So you're still doing something — ambling down "new avenues" — but you will will will will will will will do it with integrity this time. And if you get caught again, if somebody somehow — not you — stumbles over the firm parameters on the new avenues, then we dear readers will surely hear that you will get it right in the future.

"Caribou Barbie is one nutty puppy," says Maureen Dowd, who wants to be sure you know that Sarah Palin is crazy.

Yes, yes, Palin is crazy. I'm hearing it and hearing it, and naturally, my working theory is that Palin's opponents are taking advantage of the opportunity to paint a vivid picture in the public mind. Crazy, crazy, cah-ray-zeeeee.

Dowd does the diagnosis, plucking a term out of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders or rather plucking a term out of Todd Purdum's Vanity Fair hit-piece:

And so it was, Todd Purdum learned, as he traveled Alaska reporting on Palin for Vanity Fair, that the governor’s erratic and egoistic behavior has been a source of concern for people there.

“Several told me, independently of one another,” Purdum writes, “that they had consulted the definition of ‘narcissistic personality disorder’ in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders — ‘a pervasive pattern of grandiosity (in fantasy or behavior), need for admiration, and lack of empathy’ — and thought it fit her perfectly.”

Oh! Lord help us! There were people there! There were several. Oh, my lord. Several! Several told Purdum that they were the sort of jackasses that go flipping through the DSM to leverage their displeasure with a powerful person in their vicinity.

Memo to Purdum, Dowd, and the several people there in Alaska: Everybody who runs for high office will have a lot of check marks on the DSM list of symptoms of "narcissistic personality disorder."

I mean, maybe Fred Thompson didn't, but you see, it's a problem if you don't have these things. Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, Joe Biden, etc. etc. — who among them lacks a pervasive pattern of grandiosity, need for admiration, blah blah blah? Oh, but they have empathy, you burble. Bullshit! Watch all the Democrats try to claim the empathy loophole to the narcissistic personality disorder diagnosis. Ha! Bullshit! They all have it. And don't throw your money at a prospective candidate who doesn't. He'll poop out, like Fred.

Memo to the good folks who construct the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual: Consider constructing an official disorder definition that will perfectly fit the kind of people who try to understand human individuals in their vicinity by consulting DSM checklists.

***

The link goes, of course, to the NYT, so there's no link to the Vanity Fair article upon which Dowd relies so heavily. Link withholding — a symptom on what DSM disorder checklist?

Scenes from a double murder.

Picture this:

On Saturday, Wayne Neeley, a friend of [former NFL quaterback Steve] McNair’s who co-rented the condominium with him, entered it just before 1 p.m. He found McNair on a sofa and [his 20-year-old female friend Sahel] Kazemi on the floor in the living room, the police said. At first, Neeley did not notice they were dead, but then he found blood near the bodies. He called Robert Gaddy, another friend of McNair’s, and Gaddy called the police.

Double murder, but is one of the murders self-murder?

Both bodies were found in the living room of the condominium, [a police spokesman] said, with McNair on a sofa and Kazemi on the floor close to him. A pistol was found near Kazemi at the scene....

Late night animation of a photo from earlier in the day.

Photo by me. Animated by Chip Ahoy.

"I study Ed in his former girlfriend’s father’s shirt and an old hat he found on the roadside..."

"... From one angle he looks to me like a Sicilian padrone – a good soul, kind to animals and dragonflies..."

At the link, a pic of Ed with dragonflies and scavenged hat and much more, kayaking on the Wisconsin River.

"Warhol said art should be meaningful in the most shallow way."

"He was able to make commercial art that was taken seriously as fine art... that's what I'm doing too... I make soulless electronic pop... Everybody wants me to show my vagina to the world. And the truth is, I don't have to."

Says Lady Gaga.

Where are you... when you should be in Madison?

We're whiling away the hours by the lake... on the lake...



... drifting off....

"Chubby celebrities are stoking the obesity crisis by proving it is possible to be fat and famous..."

Emergency. Crush them into oblivion!

Robot hummingbirds to terrorize our enemies.

A real Pentagon project. Video of the actual robot at the link. I'm picturing something more like this:

"Sarah Palin is not stupid."

Skeptoid vs. ad hominem attacks.

Uncle Jay sings the news of the first half of 2009.

The truth about "bee balls."

It's not the heat. It's the suffocation.



Don't worry, the scotch-taped giant hornet was anesthetized before he was introduced to the bees.

"Repeating positive self-statements may benefit certain people, such as individuals with high self-esteem, but backfire..."

"... for the very people who need them the most."

Are you surprised, losers? (Sorry, I was trying to help.)

"Manba involves devotees wearing dark tans, white make-up around their eyes and hair that is often a combination of neon colours."

A Japanese fad moves to Britain.

It has been around for nearly a decade and is an eye-catching statement against conformity....

Do not attempt this look in the United States.

They start their routine by applying self tan to their bodies.

Eilish rubs the self tan on her neck but her face is darkened much more heavily.

She smears the coffee-bean powder on her pale skin and tries to rub it in so that it does not look "patchy".

Declan explains that he buys his foundation from Afro-Caribbean shops as normal shops do not sell powders that are dark enough....

They then use... white marker pens to create big eyes... and white lipstick.

Uh, Declan... Eilish... you're wearing blackface!

Declan and Eilish say they have been accused of racism for darkening their skin in this way, but they say this could not be further from the truth.

Eilish insists that she is "not mocking anybody" and Declan asks, "what black person looks like this?"...

The British followers of this Japanese subculture are also into the music, which is called Eurobeat, and practise dance moves called Para-Para.

If you're wondering what kind of music and dancing is favored by people this... dumb, there's video at the link.

"Palin is running for president, get used to it."

Lots of posts over at The Corner about what Sarah Palin is really up to, but I'm with Mark R. Levin, quoted in the title to this post.

"We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world..."

"... for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these united Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States, that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown.... And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor."

The NYT aims its "36 hours in" analysis at Madison, Wisconsin.

I've been here for 25 years, but I'm interested to see what's picked out for the 2 day visitor. And also what's left out.

Love, love, love...

It's all about love.

Mickey Kaus counts 10 theories about Sarah Palin.

I thought it was obvious that there was only one, but Mickey has all these:

1) She's running for president; 2) She's undergoing fame withdrawal and plans to get more attention in the lower 48; 3) She wants to cash in ($); 4) There's another shoe about to drop; 5) She'll now run against Murkowski for Senate. 6) She needs to tend to her family. 7) She's bonkers. 8) She's preggers. 9) She wants to "effect positive change outside government at this point in time on another scale and actually make a difference for our priorities." 10) Actually being a governor in a recession is no fun.

Well, the obvious and only theory to me was #1. Mickey's #2 and #3 merge with my view of #1. Eh, so do they all really.

Sarah Palin resigns as Governor of Alaska!

Well, that can only mean one thing, right?

Crack Emcee has a few more things he'd like to tell you about France...

... and New Age and Oprah and "is it any surprise that France — this country with no black politicians but a backwards language — believes a kinda black, kinda American with no real qualifications... will, somehow, be capable of 'healing' the worlds problems by doing nothing - or the wrong thing - if we would only 'hope' and 'believe' enough? It's all part of a whole, people."

It's all part of a whole, people.

"The salient thing about Franken isn’t that he used to be a satirist."

"It's that he used to be a satirist who was so interested in politics that he transitioned to becoming a political satirist and then a candidate for office. All because he was really interested in the issues and wanted to make a difference. Most comedians probably aren’t very well-informed about policy issues, but comedians do have both the time and the means to inform themselves if they’re so inclined, and Franken very much was and is so inclined."

Matt Yglesias assures us that we don't just have a clown in the Senate.

(Now, why do I feel that I can predict the first comment?)

Is bicycling bad for your bones?

"Some of the racers, young men in their 20s, had osteopenia in their spines, a medical condition only one step below full-blown osteoporosis... [M]ost recreational cyclists probably don’t need to worry too much about their bones.... [Elite racers] train for hours at a very high intensity. They sweat a lot. They never go for runs. They don’t usually do much weight-lifting... They’re strange."

Bikers, do some bone-stressing things before your bones decide they aren't needed!

Café Café.

The way things look from Madison, Wisconsin...

At the Green Pond Café...

Be cool. Reflect.

"The real story has as much to do with journalistic irrelevance as journalistic integrity."

Roger Kimball on WaPo's Pimpsalongate.

I made up "Pimpsalongate." It's just a placeholder coinage. Help me out here!

IN THE COMMENTS: Curtiss has "All the President's Pimps."

Krauthammer on Ricci v. DeStefano.

"Ricci raised the bar considerably on overt discrimination against one racial group simply to undo the unintentionally racially skewed results of otherwise fair and objective employment procedures (in this case, examinations). It's not enough for a city to say, as did New Haven, that it was afraid of being sued by black firefighters."

Yes, but that sounds like a pretty low bar to clear in the next case. It may be an increment of raising the bar, but everything depends on the next case. And since it was a statutory interpretation case that declined to address the constitutional level, Congress could amend the statute and neutralize it altogether. Krauthammer is writing in an aspirational mode... and defining "considerably" downward.

"For Once, Cynthia McKinney's Problems Really Are Caused by the J-E-W-S."

A headline.

Cabaret Recessionista.

A just-noted style.

"What exactly is wrong with making a movie accurate?"

"And since when does an authentic film translate as an 'art' film?"

What really happened to Soderbergh's "Moneyball"?

ADDED: "We've noticed that studios like it when true stories are told through blatant fabrication!"

The 23-year-old wife of the actor Gary Coleman was arrested for domestic violence, criminal mischief and disorderly conduct.

Coleman is 41.

I'll do the math for you: (41 ÷ 2) + 7 = 27.5.

Nevertheless, crimes are crimes, and we are all responsible for our own behavior.

"J.D. Salinger invented blogs, according to a federal judge..."

"... who granted a temporary injunction yesterday against John David California's planned 'parody' of Catcher in the Rye."

That's Gawker's take on the judicial opinion that said:

Both narratives are told from the first-person point of view of a sarcastic, often uncouth protagonist who relies heavily on slang, euphemisms and colloquialisms, makes constant digression and asides, refers to readers in the second person, constantly assures the reader that he is being honest and that he is giving them the truth.

[Insert you own slangy, sarcastic, digressive aside against the judge... who is probably a phony.]

I don't know what you watch on TV...

... but I watched "I Was Bitten."

"Widespread violence broke out... after somebody threw a dead pig..."

... in Mysore Thursday.

"I was still attached to a whole row of seats. It was rotating much like the helicopter and that might have slowed the fall."

"... I landed [on] very thick foliage and that might have lessened the impact.... I didn't wake up until nine o'clock the next morning. I know this because my watch was still working. So I must have been unconscious the whole afternoon and the night. When I came to I was alone, just me ... and my row of seats."

Is this honeymoon wearing you out?

At this point, it hurts and there's a worrisome burning sensation.

Remember...

... Grunge?

I started a meme...

... which started the whole world pinking.

***

I wish I could get my tag "pink" not to always want to auto-complete into "Code Pink," like an unwanted and lamely inarticulate protest.

Kozinski...

... admonished.

"It basically leaves it up to a website owner to determine what is a crime," said Judge Wu, overturning the guilty verdicts against Lori Drew.

In the case that grew out of the suicide of Megan Meier, who was tricked on MySpace into believing that a nonexistent boy loved her and left her.

The Washington Post loses its mind.

"Underwriting Opportunity: An evening with the right people can alter the debate. Underwrite and participate in this intimate and exclusive Washington Post Salon, an off-the-record dinner and discussion at the home of CEO and Publisher Katharine Weymouth. ... Bring your organization’s CEO or executive director literally to the table. Interact with key Obama administration and congressional leaders."

Price: $250,000. With "parameters" said to ensure that that the newspaper "did not in any way compromise our integrity" (such as it was).

"Nelson ambles on stage and embraces his audience’s love with open arms and a mile-wide wide grin."

"Dylan sneaks in and stares into the masses like it’s a plain white wall. Nelson plays virtually the same songs every night. Dylan changes his playlist every night, and never plays the songs the same way. Nelson radiates warmth and ease, Dylan chilliness and vague discomfort."

Bob Dylan and Willie Nelson together in concert, in Milwaukee.

Less pink.

Dark pink.

Water lily... in pink.

More pink...

... more pink!

Peak pink experience...

... ant level.

At the Golden Reflection Café...

... your thoughts are mere fluff sitting lightly on water.

Burned by Burning Man.

Re-burned by the court.

The Instapundit on Twitter is not Instapundit.

Instapundit asks the faux-Instapundit to contact him.

Non-parody impersonation is a violation of Twitter's terms of service. Let Twitter squelch that account for you.

ADDED: Glenn says:

JUST TO BE CLEAR, I don’t think the Instapundit feed on Twitter is any sort of a scam. I think it was just set up by someone trying to help. I just want to upgrade it and need the keys. I figured it would be easier to ask the person who set it up for me first, rather than going through Twitter.

I can see why he'd want to take over the existing feed rather than eliminate it and start over, and while the person who started it may have meant well, I do think Glenn needs to control his brand. I assumed this Twitter feed was his and formed the opinion that it was awfully unimaginative. And as Jason (the commenter) notes, the fake Instapundit was following various Twitterers: "It's like Mr. Reynolds is endorsing them and I wonder if payments are being made for the follows." Well, that would be a scam.

"Nixon didn’t try to do that. They couldn’t control [the media]. They didn’t try."

"What the hell do they think we are, puppets? They’re supposed to stay out of our business. They are our public servants. We pay them.... When you call the reporter the night before you know damn well what they are going to ask to control you. I’m not saying there has never been managed news before, but this is carried to fare-thee-well — for the town halls, for the press conferences. It’s blatant. They don’t give a damn if you know it or not. They ought to be hanging their heads in shame."

Said Helen Thomas. She's 89. And she's angry. Good!

Hot video (with Thomas butting in at 2:46):



Gibbs: "We've had this discussion ad nauseum." Thomas: "Of course you would, because you don't have any answers."

Wow, Gibbs's affability gets really annoying!

"Almost 4,000 United States Marines, backed by helicopter gunships..."

"... pushed into the volatile Helmand River valley in southwestern Afghanistan on Thursday morning, reporting little resistance from Taliban fighters, whose control of poppy harvests and opium smuggling in the area provides major financing for the Afghan insurgency."

"If there's no God other than Him, then why is He jealous?"

Male Student starts the dialogue with the Jesus Peddler. 

Afterwards:

...I went up to Jesus Guy when I had to leave (which was before he left) and told him that I admired his courage for standing up in front of everyone all by himself and telling us what he believed. He thanked me and said: I don't think I'll forget you.

I didn't know how to take that, so I said: Rock on. (Poignant, right?)

He mentioned his wife, so I was glad to know he wasn't a lonely person. Being a born-again fundamentalist can't be easy if you're alone. Plus, I felt bad about the people who were reacting so angrily toward him and ridiculing him. Sure, I find his beliefs nonsensical, and I didn't appreciate that he was telling me I was "wrong" in an area as abstract as spirituality, but he did something good for us students on campus....

"Eating in France..."

"... dying inside."

"It's dark in here... I've never seen you in the light. That's a fact... I've never had a real good look at you, Blanche...."

9:30: "Marry me, Mitch!"

Karl Malden, who won an Oscar playing Mitch in "A Streetcar Named Desire," lived to be 97. RIP.

Now, here is a bold and original movie poster!

Via Awards Daily.

There's also this poster for the movie. Good, but very much trying to be Saul Bass. Maybe the one I like so much is also in the style of someone else, and I just don't know it. And if you're going to try to be somebody, and you're a poster designer, be Saul Bass. He's so iconic, it's not a ripoff but an homage. And it's so refreshing to see movie posters that aren't actors' faces.

Magazine cover.

Sir Archy, that the Ghost of a Gentleman, dead these 260 Years and more, makes a new appearance....

... here.

"Kickass new animal I just learned existed #1: The Sea Pig."

Says James Gunn, via Rainn Wilson (who recently exclaimed "I am so gay for my wife!").

ADDED: After 5 tries, I give up trying to embed the pic. And I officially hate Twitpic.

"Pop," the Swedish 2-year-old whose sex its parents keep a secret.

"The child — called Pop in Swedish papers to protect his or her identity — is now two-and-a-half-years-old, and only a handful of close relatives (those who have changed the child’s diaper) know the sex. Pop’s parents, who are both 24, say they made this decision in the hope of freeing their child from the artificial construct of gender. 'We want Pop to grow up more freely and avoid being forced into a specific gender mould from the outset,' Pop’s mother told the Swedish newspaper Svenska Dagbladet last spring. 'It’s cruel to bring a child into the world with a blue or pink stamp on their forehead.'"

Oh, but is it cruel to act out your ideological opinions on the tender life of a child?

Let's play some music:

"I sit in my room at home and sometimes cry. It's so hard to make friends."

"Sometimes I walk around the neighborhood at night, just hoping to find someone to talk to. But I just end up coming home."

The controversial and very expensive Jaked J01 swimsuit splits open at the rear.

And poor Flavia Zoccari is disqualified and embarrassed. Still, it's okay to look at the picture if you want.

"It’s a very realistic looking portrait. There are some interesting features that I think people will find unique."

Well, now, I really am curious about this portrait of Mitt Romney. Realistic... and yet interesting, unique features on this man who is often said to be made of plastic.

100 best blogs for journalism students.

We're all journalism students, aren't we? We should be, to be competent in this crazy world. That being the case, here's your link fest.

"It's comforting that liberals now understand that there are worse things than having a divided Supreme Court disagree with your position."

"I understand that supporters of Judge Sotomayor are claiming that she has been 'vindicated' by the fact that four dissenting judges in Ricci adopted something resembling the position she took when the case was before her. It's comforting that liberals now understand that there are worse things than having a divided Supreme Court disagree with your position. During the Bush years, when a divided Supreme Court would strike down this or that Bush anti-terrorism measure, some liberals were quick to declare the president 'lawless.' They did so despite the fact that there was little precedent on the subject, and such precedent as there was often supported the Bush administration's position. Fortunately, liberal commentators seems to be 'growing in office.'"

Quality snark from Power Line, which links to this Stuart Taylor piece explaining why, in fact, the 4 dissenting Justices were not on the same page as Sotomayor:

[E]ven Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg's 39-page dissent for the four more liberal justices quietly but unmistakably rejected the Sotomayor-endorsed position that disparate racial results alone justified New Haven's decision to dump the promotional exam without even inquiring into whether it was fair and job-related.

Justice Ginsburg also suggested clearly -- as did the Obama Justice Department, in a friend-of-the-court brief -- that the Sotomayor panel erred in upholding summary judgment for the city. Ginsburg said that the lower courts should have ordered a jury trial to weigh the evidence that the city's claimed motive -- fear of losing a disparate impact suit by low-scoring black firefighters if it proceeded with the promotions -- was a pretext. The jury's job would have been to consider evidence that the city's main motive had been to placate black political leaders who were part of Mayor John DeStefano's political base....

[W]hile Ginsburg at least required the city to produce some evidence that the test was invalid, the Sotomayor panel required no such evidence at all. Its logic would thus provide irresistible incentives for employers to abandon any and all tests on which disproportionate numbers of protected minorities have low scores.

"The arrival of a neophyte justice coupled with Chief Justice Roberts’s increasing mastery of the judicial machinery..."

"... foreshadow a widening gap between the Democratic-led political branches and the Supreme Court. Indeed, the court appears poised to move to the right in the Obama era."

Liptak tacks left. Or, uh, the Court tacks right. John Roberts is a big right winger. Just look — look! — at all that incremental minimalism he's insidiously inflicting on us with the assistance of the mushily malleable Anthony Kennedy, that infuriatingly enigmatic Justice whom the smiling villain Roberts controls in ways that neophyte Sonia Sotomayor will never understand.

Bakari Bahia, a 14-year-old girl, survived 12 hours in the Indian Ocean after a plane crash that killed 152 others.

She tells of being "ejected" from the Yemenia Airways Airbus as it broke up:

"She felt nothing, and was found in the water. She heard people talking around her but saw nobody during the night. She was ejected. She was found beside the plane. I never thought she would get out like that. It’s the Good Lord who wanted it."...

She had climbed on to a portion of wreckage – believed to be part of the plane’s cabin – but kept slipping back into the sea while clinging on to part of it with her hands.

By the time a boat’s torch picked her out in the depths, she could hardly move.

"We tried to throw her a life buoy to hang on to, but she wouldn’t take the buoy," said one of the rescuers.

I had to jump in to rescue her. She was trembling, trembling. We put four sheets around her, and gave her hot water and sugar.

She'd broken her collar bone, but she is doing well, the doctors say.

Michael Jackson's body — transported in a white carriage led by two horses and on show in a glass coffin.

Off to Never-going-to-be-alive-again-land Ranch.

Exactly how cute are you allowed to be after the age of 40?

Is this going too far?



Oh, go ahead and trash her, but I love Helena Bonham Carter! She's beautiful and adorable. I loved her in "Room With a View" and "Howard's End." She was perfect for that sort of thing, and also perfect in the completely different sort of thing, the fabulous "Fight Club." And — look! — she's the Red Queen!

That was no coup, that was constitutional law.

"The military didn't oust President Manuel Zelaya on its own but instead followed an order of the Supreme Court. It also quickly turned power over to the president of the Honduran Congress, a man from the same party as Mr. Zelaya. The legislature and legal authorities all remain intact."

But then why is Barack Obama — our constitutional law professor President — taking the other side — aligned, alarmingly, with Hugo Chavez?

Hunter was hired to make videos of Edwards, "but this one is said to have shown him taking positions that weren’t on his official platform."

The Daily News gossip column quipped about the report that there's a John Edwards/Rielle Hunter sex tape.

This sets Popehat off, riffing wildly on sexual wordplay, for example, here:

This brings us, of course, to pirates. How did it come to pass that “to take one’s foot” became an idiom for orgasm? Prior to the Revolution, and therefore prior to the metric system, the French used measurements akin to the imperial system. When corsairs went to divide their spoils after a stint of rapine, each would naturally demand his portion of the whole. The allotted part, by convention, was a foot-high mound of booty. No, really.

Taking his foot of gold was the pirate’s pleasure. Since not everything that happens in Tortuga stays in Tortuga, taking the foot gradually became anyone’s pleasure in anything... And just as a noble, sexy, piraty bit of bawd has by now been stripped bare by its broad overuse in French, so too has the vitality of allusiveness in English suffered under the weight of too popular a press. We’ve seen enough; it’s time to close your eyes and think of English.

Maybe you'd better go over there and see how this all fits together.

"Life After People: How Fast Will Our Cities Crumble?"

A History Channel documentary, rerun last night, depicted something that I've thought about since I was a child. I arrived at this topic when, as a child in the 1960s, I often heard fretting and agonizing about how the entire world was being paved over.

Here's Joni Mitchell channeling the angst of that period:



I thought human beings were stomping out nature and was relieved when I realized that if people stopped tending to their concrete creations, nature would fight back and win. Maybe this song prompted me to think about Nature's inevitable ultimate victory:



Got that? Love will never die. Even after people? Well, there is no History Channel documentary about what happens to love after all of humanity is gone, but how cool to show us what happens to the buildings, bridges, art and monuments....



... and puppies!

"At dawn my lover comes to me/And tells me of her dreams..."

"With no attempts to shovel the glimpse/Into the ditch of what each one means..."

Almost no one bothers to interpret dreams anymore. Bob Dylan's sneering seems archaic now.