oh god

In case you missed it

I think that's one of the few times I've heard actual dead air during an interview.

Finally

Palin's avoidance of the press has become so abusrd, that Cambell Brown calls it out as being sexist. While I'm glad someone finally expressed some outrage about it, I'm not entirely convinced that this is sexism, so much as the fact that this she's simply an ill-prepared, unknowledaable-on-the-issues candiddate...neither of which has anything to do with whether she's a "she" or a "dude".

SNL opening skits - 2 for 2

Almost as funny (Text and story from politico.com):

Sen. John McCain’s top campaign aides convened a conference call today to complain of being called “liars.” They pressed the media to scrutinize specific elements of Sen. Barack Obama’s record.

But the call was so rife with simple, often inexplicable misstatements of fact that it may have had the opposite effect: to deepen the perception, dangerous to McCain, that he and his aides have little regard for factual accuracy.

The errors in McCain strategist Steve Schmidt’s charges against Obama and Sen. Joe Biden were particularly notable because they seemed unnecessary. Schmidt repeatedly gilded the lily: He exaggerated the Biden family's already problematic ties to the credit card industry; Obama’s embarrassing relationship with a 1960s radical; and an Obama supporter’s over-the-top attack on Sarah Palin when — in each case — the truth would have been damaging enough.

“Any time the Obama campaign is criticized at any level, the critics are immediately derided as liars,” Schmidt told reporters.

But as he went on to list a series of stories he thought reporters should be writing about Obama and Biden, in almost every instance he got the details wrong.

Schmidt criticized the press for the relatively sparse coverage of the fact that one of Biden’s sons, Hunter, is a registered federal lobbyist.

“His son is a lobbyist for the credit card and banking industry,” Schmidt said.

But Hunter Biden’s lobbying clients don’t include any banks or credit card companies. He did work, as a vice president and then as a consultant, for MBNA, a Delaware-based bank and credit card giant to which Biden had close ties. But he does not appear to have lobbied for the firm.

“Steve Schmidt lied — or just got it flat wrong," said Biden spokesman David Wade. "Hunter Biden has never — never — been a lobbyist for the credit card or banking industry."

Schmidt attacked Obama for his ties to William Ayers, who has spoken of his role in 1960s anti-war bombings committed by the Weather Underground.

"What we know for sure, and is beyond debate and argumentation is this: Senator Obama said that William Ayers is a guy that lives in his neighborhood. We know that that is a disingenuous and untruthful answer,” Schmidt said.

“Senator Obama began his political career in its early stages raising money at Ayers’ house,” he said.

Obama did hold a 1995 campaign event at Ayers’ house. It was not, however, a fundraiser, and Ayers did not contribute money to Obama’s first campaign, according to Illinois records.

Schmidt also complained of Obama backers’ attacks on McCain’s running mate, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin.

“As soon as Gov. Palin was nominated, one of … Obama’s chief campaign surrogates, [Florida Rep.] Robert Wexler, went out and accused her of being a Nazi sympathizer,” Schmidt said. “Where is the outrage to that aspersion on the part of some of the biggest newspapers in the country?”

But Wexler didn’t call Palin a Nazi sympathizer. He called former presidential candidate Pat Buchanan a Nazi sympathizer, and attacked Palin for allegedly having endorsed him.

“John McCain's decision to select a vice presidential running mate that endorsed Pat Buchanan for president in 2000 is a direct affront to all Jewish Americans. Pat Buchanan is a Nazi sympathizer with a uniquely atrocious record on Israel,” Wexler said.

(Wexler was apparently wrong: Though Buchanan claimed that Palin had supported him, she said she backed Steve Forbes in 1996 and 2000, and no evidence has emerged to the contrary.)

Asked about the series of errors, McCain aides could not provide evidence to back up Schmidt’s assertions.

One McCain aide, Michael Goldfarb, said Politico was “quibbling with ridiculously small details when the basic things are completely right.”

Another, Brian Rogers, responded more directly:

“You are in the tank,” he e-mailed.

vote or DIE

A very simple but (I thought) very good point was made to me last night, regarding polling data and Obama's numbers. Pollsters often get their data by calling landline phones at dinnertime, which inadvertently leaves out an important segment of the population: the cellphone-reliant youth vote. Several people in the 18-24 bracket (including yours truly) are sans landline phones. Therefore, a lot of national polling data doesn't include an important and very large segment of Obama supporters.

In years past, this hasn't been been hugely important because the youth vote has a pitiful turnout rate on election day. But this year, that could change.

Point being: never mind the women's vote or the blue collar vote as the game changer in the election. I think if the youth vote turns out in record numbers (or if they don't) it will make a world of difference about how close this election will be.

Tina Fey's best SNL skit

And a little sobriety from Frank Rich, blatantly liberal leaning to be sure, but who sure knows how to make a point:

"But race is just one manifestation of the emotion that defined the Palin rollout. That dominant emotion is fear — an abject fear of change. Fear of a demographical revolution that will put whites in the American minority by 2042. Fear of the technological revolution and globalization that have gutted those small towns and factories Palin apotheosized...

...Since St. Paul, Democrats have been feasting on the hypocrisy of the Palin partisans, understandably enough. The same Republicans who attack Democrats for being too P.C. about race now howl about sexism with such abandon you half-expect Phyllis Schlafly and Carly Fiorina to stage a bra-burning. The same gang that once fueled Internet rumors and media feeding frenzies over the Clintons’ private lives now express pious outrage when the same fate befalls the Palins...

...But the ultimate hypocrisy is that these woebegone, frightened opponents of change, sworn enemies of race-based college-admission initiatives, are now demanding their own affirmative action program for white folks applying to the electoral college. They want the bar for admission to the White House to be placed so low that legitimate scrutiny and criticism of Palin’s qualifications, record and family values can all be placed off limits. Byron York of National Review, a rare conservative who acknowledges the double standard, captured it best: “If the Obamas had a 17-year-old daughter who was unmarried and pregnant by a tough-talking black kid, my guess is if they all appeared onstage at a Democratic convention and the delegates were cheering wildly, a number of conservatives might be discussing the issue of dysfunctional black families.”

Not Jen Lindley

I've been quite a big Michelle Williams fan ever since Brokeback Mountain. (Dawson's Creek didn't quite do it for me, especially when she so randomly died at the end. Really, WB? Did you really think that show needed to be more morose and weepy than it already was?) So I was happy to see an extremely intersting interview (her first in eight months) in the Times. Some highlights: (Full interview here)

- "Looking ahead to her year off she said that she wanted to pick up a skill, some kind of handicraft. “I want to humble myself in front of a task like embroidery,” she said. “I like how physical work can really free your mind.” At a low point last year she signed up for night classes in bookbinding and calligraphy. “I was prouder of my little foldout book than of some movies that I’ve made,” she said.

- On what she reads during filming: "She...favors poetry over novels while filming so she’s not distracted by competing narratives."

- On her difficult past year: “I think I stopped feeling creative a while ago, and I’m just realizing it now... I used to have all the time in the world to daydream and even just to dream and let your unconscious do some of the work for you,” she said. “Now I’m up at 5 in the morning, and I don’t remember what I dreamed about.”

In any case, between her new Scorcese, Wim Wenders and Kaufman films, she certainly seems to be doing more interesting work than Katie, James or Joshua.

in other news

Doing my best to avoid the news for the next few days, because if I see one more picture of a certain creationist-loving, book-bannin', earmarks-using, bridge-to-nowhere-(until people noticed)-advocating 'Alaska-is-near-Russia-on-a-map-so-I-clearly-know-how-to-deal-with-North Korea' governor, I JUST might have to kill the next pitbull I see.

But enough of that. Happier thoughts and times prevail because:

Fashion Week Commences!








a) Designers at work: Thakoon (via NYTimes)

b) Lucky's good blog on the favorite items they're seeing

c) and the mother of all fashion week blogs, Cathryn Horn

(images: luckymag.com, nytimes.com)

A reminder why I need to start watching The Daily Show again.

Amazing:





Karl Lagerfield teddy bears, valued at $1,500 each, of course.

Diddy blog = more entertaining than mine

Oh, Sarah Palin. So much to say, so much to question, so little time. Where to start with thee?

How about by watching Diddy of Puff Daddy/P. Diddy fame spin around in a circle while he vents eloquently about the potential VP:



Some highlights:

"Alaska?? Alaska. Alaska! Alaska. Come on man. I don't even know if there are black people in Alaska...If you really think we're going to let you, like, win this election with these crazy decisions you're making, you're buggin'."


And his Extremely Sage Advice:
"You should have gotten Michelle Obama to be your running mate. That would have been fly."