You should probably read the incredible summaries posted by those who witnessed this bizarre celebration of one man's incredibly dysfunctional self-regard. The basic story: Glenn Beck is "Eddie," and he is poor, and his mom makes him a sweater, and then he kills his mom with ingratitude, and then he cries on the floor while a black woman sings at him, and then he runs through a cornfield during a storm, and his mom comes back to life. And then Glenn Beck, who is no longer Eddie, explains that the capitalists at Simon and Schuster forced him to write that terrible dream ending, and in reality, he did kill his real-life mom with ingratitude.

So. Uh. Yes. It is the confession of a damaged depressive masquerading as a heart-warming hacky Xmas tale that has no moral besides "be nice to mom or she will die but she won't really die but yes she will." Merry Christmas, everyone!

The Palin-Beck drama began when the former governor of Alaska told Newsmax she considers Beck "a hoot" and would be open to running with him. She repeated the coy "we'll see..." wink-nudge invite on Fox and Friends, prompting the king of televised weeping to dismiss Palin as frivolous, strident, and exceedingly female. First he asks her to stop using the word "hoot":

BECK: I don't think things are hoots. I don't. I don't think it's a hoot. I would never use the word hoot, and I respectfully ask that every time my name is brought up she would stop using the word "hoot."

And then he puts her in her place, the kitchen. He adds a note of self-irony about "evil conservative stereotypes," but does that actually redeem it?

BECK: I'm just saying, Beck-Palin, I'll consider. But Palin-Beck—can you imagine, can you imagine what an administration with the two of us would be like? What? Come on! She'd be yapping or something, and I'd say, "I'm sorry, why am I hearing your voice? I'm not in the kitchen." I mean, you'd have to live up to the evil conservative stereotypes, you'd have no choice, you'd have to. Look, I talked to the woman about it, I don't even know what she was saying.

Listen here:

Palin has a hair-trigger reaction to sexist slights—see Newsweek Cover Melodrama, The—so I would predict a wingnut feud, but in this case, Lady Alaska's martyr complex is going to conflict with her effusive love of right-wing media. Also, Beck's producers will likely pressure him to make nice. She's way too valuable to them.

Then again, if this most schadenfreude-rich year has taught us anything, it's that the only predictable thing about the Thrilla from Wasilla is her ability to hold grudges, so I'm going to call a 50-50 split on whether she flies into attack mode or sits back, arches an eyebrow, and quietly snubs him, instead. Hooray, now we have something to look forward to for after the holiday!

Beck's Sexist Reason For Ruling Out Palin-Beck Ticket: She'd Always Be ‘Yapping' Like We're ‘In The Kitchen' [Think Progress]

Correction: An early version of this post said Beck's Palin-slamming broadcast occurred today, but in fact it was yesterday.

The AP now report that Bill Sparkman, who was found in September bound and gagged with duct tape in Daniel Boone National Forest, staged the scene to look like a homicide.

Expect to see extensive discussion of this on Fox News, perhaps quoting in a fair and balanced way from articles like this. Which are correct despite today's news.

Fred Thompson had Dobbs on his radio show today, and asked him if he'd given thought to a presidential run. Dobbs said "yes," adding that he's engaging the services of all sorts of experts to give him the best advice.

Which means that the 2012 primaries—even if Dobbs runs as an independent, his campaign will be perceived as an adjunct of the festival of white rage that will determine the GOP's standard-bearer—will, god willing, be nothing short of a phantasmagorical Hunter Thompson-esque fever-dream populated by snake-handlers, idiots, Mormons, and fat, chain-smoking television hacks. Between Dobbs, Sarah Palin, and whatever Glenn Beck's 100-year-war "plan" has in store for us, the wingnut beat will be a life-changing event for those reporters lucky enough to chronicle it in 2012. The New York Times' David Kirkpatrick famously pioneered the paper's "conservative beat" in 2004, but it was largely a survey of the intellectual undercurrents of neoconservatism and seems to have been abandoned. Whoever picks up the mantle from him in two years will be richly rewarded. It's never too early to start strategizing.

So: we got teased yesterday and this morning with two great pieces on Glenn Beck talking in his strange, voodoo-esque language on whatever way he plans to molest and exploit the minds of whoever will lend him an open ear to aim his ideological piss into. The first was the aforementioned Politico note, which quoted Beck teasing his big ideas on his show. But this was fun! Remember that scary 9/12 Project that was presumed to have gone away because only crazy people listened to crazy people and hey, there can't be that many crazy people who are that organized. We call those cults, and there are lots of them, sure. But they don't represent any kind of frightening majority. Because crazy people need crazy leaders with power and a platform and there aren't really any of those out there as completely insane as the 9/12ers are, right?

Christine Drawdy, a Florida event promoter involved in the tea party and 9/12 movements who is listed as the travel coordinator for the 2010 march, said the permit for the march is in the name of The 9.12 Project's administrator, Yvonne Donnelly. Though Drawdy stressed that Beck "is not the leader of" the 912 movement, she added "all he has to do is say something, and they'll jump."

And by 'jump,' she means, kill people.

Brian Stetler at the New York Times also talked to Beck before today. Stetler's a sizable dude, not someone I imagine can be easily intimidated, nice as he is. Really, he could probably bounce a guy Glenn Beck's size easily.

That said, I imagine he'll be sleeping in the fetal position tonight:

"We'll be looking for ways to get people involved in politics," [Beck] said. "I hear people saying, ‘O.K., now what?' They're calling their representative, but it's time to get more proactive."

Right. So. What was Beck's big plan? He unveiled it today, starting with his website, which is the image you see at the top of this post. One more thing before we get there, though. This video, taken at a Borders yesterday, of Beck teasing out The Plan.

"We're gonna be asking of you some big things." Funny, I've been told the same thing by my bosses, but the first thought that went through my head never involved any kind of civil war and/or revolution.

But hey, Beck: he's just passionate! No way could this entire rollout involve the guy cashing in.

No way could all of this buzz, this entire thing, all of this talk about "community organizing"—taking The Dirty Word of President Barack Obama's past and platform, and putting it to their own new, awesome, terrible uses—no way could Beck be leading his flock into spending some cash.

Funny, then, that they found out that The Plan was for them to spend more money on Glenn Beck, The Brand. Observe his two key points from the manifesto written on his website:

- I have begun meeting with some of the best minds in the country that believe in limited government, maximum freedom and the values of our Founders. I am developing a 100 year plan. I know that the bipartisan corruption in Washington that has brought us to this brink and it will not be defeated easily. It will require unconventional thinking and a radical plan to restore our nation to the maximum freedoms we were supposed to have been protecting, using only the battlefield of ideas.

- All of the above will culminate in The Plan, a book that will provide specific policies, principles and, most importantly, action steps that each of us can take to play a role in this Refounding.

Kinda sounds like a cross between Avon and the Left Behind series, right? Except with scarier salespeople who have drier hands.

Yeah, Glenn Beck's got a plan: for the next 100 years, he's gonna keep writing books and making TV shows, and his fans are going to keep buying into both of them. It's kind of genius. His entire multimedia empire is predicated on one, long, 100-year plot arc: that the main character will make viewers'/listeners'/readers' lives better so long as they're with him every step of the way. The man will make references to revolution, to change, to bringing everything back to a fundamental state. The beautiful irony he has to see and embrace—in order for this to have worked as long as it has—is that the only real movement he'll be making is into better cars and larger houses. The kinds that are far away from the rabid zombies who salivate at every vague allusion to blood and violence Mama Bird spits out like discarded pieces of chewing gum for them to suck every last grain of sweet flavor out of. The kind, if provoked, and unleashed, are as much as a threat to anybody as they are to him. A "random act of violence" is never really that random, is it? Especially when the word "radical" gets thrown around over, and over, and over.

More than anything, this guy is a threat to the proliferation of rational thought. Beck knows that there're people in the world who listen to this kind of nonsense without processing it any way but through their emotions, because they're tired, hungry, scared, or angry, and maybe, sometimes, rightfully so. Then again, so are most of us! But when you have an asshole like Beck running the con, one thing leads to another, and shit like this happens. Believe me, nothing would bring me more joy than to watch Glenn Beck get the Downfall-meme treatment after his empire of exploitative bullshit comes crumbling down under the weight of the inevitable rise of the truth: that this man is a crook, a fraud, a shyster, and a very skilled, sophisticated con artist. But who wants it to get that far?

Glenn Beck does have one up on Hitler in terms of likability: a decent Kermit impersonation. I'm pretty sure nobody with such an affection for Muppets can possibly be capable of anything too terrible.

Then again, evil, as we're all aware, is a scary, subversive force, and comes in all forms, at all times, with little to no discretion. Beware.

[Top image via Glenn Beck's website. Bottom image via Bert Is Evil.]

Hoffman's loss to Democrat Bill Owens, was embarrassing for all concerned: he was the first poster boy for the Teabaggers and 9/12 nuts, and only ran because said nuts felt that the Republican, a moderate called Dede Scozzafava, was too nice and normal.

Politico report that:

Even as he faces near-impossible odds of pulling ahead in the count, Doug Hoffman announced Wednesday night that he is officially revoking his concession from Election Night, and is accusing labor unions and ACORN of stealing the election for Rep. Bill Owens (D-N.Y.).

Hoffman posted a message on his campaign site Wednesday alleging dirty tricks by Democrats, and is asking for additional campaign contributions to fund a legal challenge to the election results.

Maybe he's doing it to save Glenn Beck's health - as soon as Hoffman lost Beck's appendix exploded with rage. Or maybe it's a clever political tactic that we're all underestimating. On Hardball last night, when asked about Sarah Palin's potential strengths as a presidential candidate, 538.com's Nate Silver genuinely cited her perpetual victim status and frequent faux-outrage as a factor that makes her difficult to run against.

First up, the mighty Glenn Beck offers a new way to look at Obama's health care proposal:

"We're the young girl saying, 'No no! Help me!' and the government is Roman Polanski. In the end I think we're all going to be cowering in France."

The Obama administration is a child rapist. He just might be on to something. Next up, Washington Times editor emeritus Wesley Pruden gets truly provocative about Obama bowing down to foreign leaders:

But Mr. Obama, unlike his predecessors, likely knows no better, and many of those around him, true children of the grungy '60s, are contemptuous of custom. Cutting America down to size is what attracts them to "hope" for "change." It's no fault of the president that he has no natural instinct or blood impulse for what the America of "the 57 states" is about. He was sired by a Kenyan father, born to a mother attracted to men of the Third World and reared by grandparents in Hawaii, a paradise far from the American mainstream.

How much more pride would our nation have today if only Obama's mother had been attracted not to the lowly dirt-people of the third world, but rather to fine American men, like, say, Wesley Pruden, pictured? Vote for the most outrageous American hero, below!

Democrat Bill Owens originally had a 5,000 vote lead over Hoffman. That vote shrank to 3,000. There are 5,800 of absentee votes left to count! And though Hoffman would need to win 75% of those votes, and though presumably many of those votes were cast before Republican Dede Scozzafava withdrew from the race (and endorsed Owens), Hoffman has decided that his concession was premature. Well, Glenn Beck decided that Hoffman's concession was premature. And Hoffman just does whatever Glenn Beck says. Because he is a true conservative.

Because he is an idiot, Glenn Beck tried in September to shut down glennbeckrapedandmurderedayounggirlin1990.com, a satirical site that used Beck's insidious "I'm just asking the question" pose to advance the Fark-inspired meme that Beck may have raped and murdered a young girl in 1990, because, well—have you ever heard him deny it?

The proprietor was anonymous at the time, but he's come out of the closet as Isaac Eiland-Hall, a Florida computer programmer who was sick of Beck's posturing and enjoyed funny things on the internet. Beck complained to a WIPO arbitration panel that the site was defamatory and infringed on the trademark he holds over his own name. Late last month, his complaint was denied.

The arbitration panel's decision renders in hypnotically robotic, lawyerly prose a precise distillation of what is wrong with Glenn Beck, and it's worth quoting at length. Here's what Beck's lawyers said about the trademark:

Complainant contends that the disputed domain name is confusingly similar to the GLENN BECK mark.

And here's what Eiland-Hall responded:

Respondent alleges that only a "moron in a hurry" could be confused by the disputed domain name.

And here is the panel's magnificent summary of Beck's rhetorical style and why his site constituted a satire of that style:

Respondent argues that the disputed domain name is a meme that is based on the technique deriving from a comedy sketch performed by Gilbert Gottfried on a Comedy Central Roast of Bob Saget during which Mr. Gottfried made continuing references to an unflattering rumor concerning Mr. Saget (similar to the one embodied in the disputed domain name), while requesting that those repeating the rumor cease to do so. According to Respondent, Glenn Beck has used a similar technique while interviewing at least one individual on his news broadcast by making an unsupported assertion about his activities, and placing a burden on the interviewee to deny the unsupported assertion. According to Respondent, this technique places the interviewee in a compromised position regardless of underlying facts.

The best part of the whole affair is that, after Eiland-Hall won at arbitration, he sent a letter to Beck with the site's admin username and password and said, essentially, "Here you go you big crybaby. You can have your precious web site. I don't want it any more."

It bears observing that by bringing the WIPO complaint, you took what was merely one small critique meme, in a sea of internet memes, and turned it into a super-meme.

[snip]

It also bears noting, in this matter and for the future, that you are entirely in control of whether or not you are the subject of this particular kind of criticism. I chose to criticize you using the well-tested method of satire because of its effectiveness. But, humor aside, your rhetorical style is no laughing matter. In this context of this WIPO case, you denigrated the letter of First Amendment law. In the context of your television show and your notoriety, you routinely and shamelessly denigrate the spirit of the First Amendment. The purpose of the expressive freedoms embodied in the First Amendment is not to simply permis the greatest possible scope of expression, but also, in doing so, to also [sic] strive for excellence in the conveyance of ideas. Rather than choosing to strive for excellence and civic contribution, you simply pander to the fears and insecurities of you audience. And in the process, you do then, and us all, a great deal of harm.

[snip]

Now that it is safe, at least from you (for the time being), I have no more use for the actual scrap of digital real estate you sough. I will transfer the domain to you now.

So glennbeckrapedandmurderedayounggirlin1990.com is no more. But a mirror still lives here, so Glenn Beck still loses anyway, as is his wont.

First off, let's talk rules. From a commenter, on our last SNL Digest:

Standardized Responses for SNL Threads.
1. SNL is still on?
2. I might have to watch this SNL sometime.
3. SNL hasn't been funny since _____ (insert name) was president.
4. The Tina Fey era was the (Choose one:) Best/ Worst.
5. (Canadians/Brits/Aussies:) You Americans can't say Fuck on the telly?
6. (Me, other Oldes:) Jane Curtin/ Dan Aykroyd - now there was a Weekend Update.
7. And I remember when Charles Rocket said Fuck. I got on my Commodore computer and typed a letter about it.

Don't be that guy. Onward:

Taylor Swift's opening monologue: self-depreciating about writing superficial songs ("songs about douchebags who cheat on me, LA LA LA LA LA"), talking shit on Joe Jonas, Kanye West, and more or less totally came out publicly about dating Twilight star Taylor Lautner, and inspiring an audience singalong. She was crazy-charismatic and pulled it off with a fair amount of flair. This was, for what it's worth, how every one of them should be done.

The cold open was a take on Fox News, with Greta Van Susteren, Shep Smith—played by Bill Hader, somewhat homoerotically—Karl Rove, Joe Trippi, etc, but it was mostly a play on the personalities that weren't anything special (besides Hader's Shep Smith). Jason Sudekis tried to do Glenn Beck, but to properly make fun of Glenn Beck via Sketch Comedy, you're going to have to get racier than this:

Weaksauce. But back to Taylor:

She also did plenty of riffs on how young she is, including this perfectly timed short commercial with her wearing headgear braces, which is the kind of visual indignation most SNL potential diva guest hosts won't run with:

One of her three big celebrity impersonations, Kate Gosselin was a little stilted, even with the "Kate Gosselin, emphatically talking" running joke, but was, for the most part, funny. As is watching Keenan Thompson dressed up as Whoopi Goldberg, which is absurd visual humor, and yeah, an easy sight gag, but one with a decent payoff. Any sketch that involves a panel of people often runs too long, though, and this one was no exception. The last minute drags on a little.

There was a bizarre, boring sketch involving BBQ and Swine Flu jokes that's not really worth watching. The night's big viral moment's going to go to the Digital Short, which is a play on Twilight, with Frankensteins. Especially priceless was the dead-eyed look Bill Hader plays the Robert Pattenson-character (Frankenstein) with, and the flaky melodrama of Kristen Stewart that Taylor Swift kinda nailed.

As she did with her Shakira impersonation, which isn't on Hulu. Fast-forward to 1:25, you'll get the gist. It was an otherwise patently dumb sketch about a movie involving bunnies, with a soundtrack.

Except this skit, which involved lots of screaming, about two officers teaching juvie inmates lessons via dated pop culture references. Six minutes, for this? Someone in the writers' room is letting their assistant do more than carry the coffee. Come on:

Less screaming! Kenan, the crazy-eyes are funny, but every time SNL puts on a screechy sketch, most people walk away. You don't need to violate our hearing capabilities to do big humor. What happened to shock value? The key to this episode was playing The Taylor Swift Angle at every possible moment-who she is, what she is, why she's different-which is why it was kinda surprising to see Kanye West not cameo on a skit with her. Then again, they nailed it with this, which is how some hyperactive post-college roommates kind of actually talk. I know these girls, you know?

Terrifying, funny, nuanced. Weekend Update was fairly boring other than a drop-in from Amy Poehler on Goldman Sachs getting Swine Flu vaccines from the CDC. Two minutes and sixteen seconds of complete Goldman Sachs raging. Just long enough, just enough indignation, and completely to the point:

The only other skit worth mentioning was the Entertainment Tonight spoof. Celebrity news broadcast journalists really are this insane.

Big complaint: Andy Samberg was incredibly underused this week—why?—but other than that, not bad at all! If the show used all their guest hosts like this, if they were all as good, we'd watch more. The writing still desperately needs work, and Saturday Night Life needs to forget being more family friendly. So far, Jenny Slate saying "fuck" is still as edgy as this season's been, and this is a show with a legacy most of us would rather not see be any more sullied.

Either way, suck it, Joe Jonas. Taylor Swift did a better job than anyone in recent memory, and definitely, this season; SNL, learn quickly, your performer-host double-threats like Swift (and Justin Timberlake) seem to be natural fits lately. And they have catchy songs, too! Take it out, Taylor Swift.

What'd we think?

• Nouriel Roubini likes to rock the party.
• JFK blown away, what else did Mad Men have to say about how crazy it was that things were different in the early '60s?
• We endorsed not voting for Mike Bloomberg and, to be fair, a majority of New Yorkers took our advice, one way or another.
• Jay Leno maybe wants to go back to late night. No one knew that Tucker Max had a movie out, besides Hamilton.
• Old people at a newspaper were punching each other. It was kinda awesome. Then someone from Yelp tried to punch someone else from Yelp, and it was not as awesome.
• Sarah Palin really wanted to give a terrible speech full of "gonnas" and stuff, on election day, last year.
• Google stole maps! And they know everything about you!
• Gossip Girl and The City are shows about girls who gossip and live in the city.
• Oh no, some newspaper reporters missed out on the heartwarming story of a baseball team buying themselves a special prize.
• Dead clubs: still dead.
• Hey, an attempt to put the civil rights of a minority group to a popular vote failed, this week. Crazy.
• Whoops, we forgot to ask permission before reprinting emails between journalists and Eliot Spitzer's press office.
• Tom Cruise can control things with his mind. His mind and his arms and hands and legs and stuff. But mostly his mind.
• Are you exploiting your child enough? Or is a child exploiting you?
• Project Runway continues to suffer from boring challenges, terrible and inconsistent judging, and impossibly bland contestants. On the plus side: those ads for that movie with Ashton Kutcher and Catwoman.
• Levi Johnston is worried that his penis—which he plans on displaying in a pretend internet magazine—is not large enough to be presented in a pretend internet magazine.
• Swine flu attacked an adorable kitty cat! And also Rudy Giuliani gave it to a ferret.
• Spanx: still a thing.
• Top Chef had Fabio on it, yay!
• Oliver Zahm: he is French and he takes pictures of naked ladies and he goes to parties.
• Michele Bachmann attempted to lead a band of insurrectionists to take over the Capitol, where she is an elected legislator.
• Let's paint, exercise, and ride a private jet with a Silicon Valley performance artist/charlatan.
• Have you caught "Tardy For the Party" fever???
• Nidal Hasan, a military psychologist, shot dozens of people at an Army base, before a hero cop (a civilian and a woman) shot him. The shooter reportedly fulfilled all of the right-wing's demented deathporn fantasies.
• Glenn Beck's appendix attempted to burst from his stomach and free itself from his toxic body, but doctors kept the famous crazy person alive. Some people asked some questions about all of this!

The highlight is probably the unveiling of the conspiratorial internal organ chalkboard. All the notes—references to old and discredited texts, the Founding Fathers, transparently phony stabs at nonpartisanship, crying—are hit, though Stewart never quite reaches the operatic unhingedness of a genuine Beck performance. The glasses are a wonderful touch, though.

Glenn Beck survived his appendicitis surgery and issued the following real statement:

Glenn and his wife Tania are so thankful for all the kind words, prayers and support from everyone. Well, almost everyone. Those compassionate loving liberal bloggers were bummed things didn't end differently for Glenn.

We hear the microchip-implanting portion of the operation went just fine Fuck, that was supposed to be a secret.


A tipster sends us more on the layoffs at Essence we heard about yesterday: "Essence relaunched their digital services last week via the re-design of its new website. 18 of the 20 people who worked extensively on this until, the day of launch (10.29), were let go yesterday without previous notice. In addition to digital, essence laid off several within their sales division. Severances were extended to those who had been there over a year, however, no warning or notice was provided to senior staff members.Their method was distinctly different compared to People and Sports Illustrated, for example. It was calculated and underhanded... Apparently a lot of pissed off people there."


Keith Kelly says that the hardest-hit magazines in the Time Inc. layoffs with be Fortune and Sports Illustrated, with about 40 layoffs each. Idea for avoiding this: ... ah, we got nothing. Sorry.


"Weird," "Bizarre," and other synonyms come to mind as we inform you that, starting Monday, the dying San Francisco Chronicle will be printing on "magazine-style glossy paper." What the fuck? I really don't know.

It was during his radio program, so sadly there is no video of Glenn clutching his abdomen, vomiting, and finally collapsing in pain.

Beck is expected to make a full recovery, after his appendix was removed at "an undisclosed hospital."

Let's hope things go better than they did the last time he went to the hospital, when he had to wait for 40 minutes in the emergency room! This was back when he was with CNN, so he blamed the health care industry instead of secret Maoist-ACORN Lizard People.

On the show, it is definitely a space lizard (maybe Balloon Boy's dad's conspiracy theories about lizard people were right all along!), but like a Chicago Tribune review by Glenn Garvin points out, it could also be about our nerd president.

Welcome to ABC's "V," the most fascinating and bound to be the most controversial new show of the fall television season. Nominally a rousing sci-fi space opera about alien invaders bent on the conquest (and digestion) of all humanity, it's also a barbed commentary on Obamamania that will infuriate the president's supporters and delight his detractors.

Anna is the beautiful and charming leader of the aliens—knows as V's because they are visitors—and she tells the world that her people can fix everything that is wrong with society. She has the liberal media brainwashed, and they all go along with stories about how great and wonderful she is. Of course, there is a fringe group who rebel against her and want to expose them as the evil-doing, reptile skinned, foreigners that they really are. Of course, these are the heroes of the show. Wow, that really does sound like the teabaggers! There's even a religious rebel named Father Jack, which is basically an anagram of George W. Bush.

It certainly wouldn't be new for a sci-fi series to be an allegory about modern society (Battlestar Galactica, anyone?) but it would be sort of odd for a sci-fi show on a major network to give credence to tactics and delusions of the far right. The birthers will be lapping up a show about a foreign-born president who comes to snatch society out of their clutches, and Glenn Back and his cronies will love to see a media that is overtaken by liberals and keeps the truth away from the "real Americans." But what will everyone else think?

The sci-fi culture usually veers to the left in its political allegory (again, see Battlestar or this summer's upbeat Star Trek that was an endorsement for the hopeful future that the Obama administration promised to usher in). The original 1983 miniseries that the show is based on was an anti-fascist message that preyed on "the aliens are coming, the aliens are coming" invasion fears of the Cold War. This is what it has been warped into. We find it hard to believe that thinly-veiIed conservative propaganda will find a strong foothold with the core sci-fi audience, and as for those leaning to the right, they tend to like their entertainment much more straightforward. Why try to figure out what all those lizard people mean when they can just watch Jack Bauer bash people's heads in on 24? That's their idea of fun.

Our prognosis, keep picking on the president and the only letters that V will get are D.O.A.

[Computer simulation of what you did after watching this video]: WHAAAAAAAAAAA!?!?!?!

If you are worried about not being able to sleep for the next week because of how curious/excited you are about the announcement this announcement announced, think of this: By getting a full night's rest instead of obsessively Googling "'Glenn Beck and Bill O'Reilly' + Announcement," you will be that much more alert for the announcement itself!

Can't believe Glenn and Bill's wedding is off, though. Anyone in the market for a matching set of offensive "Illegal Alien" Halloween costumes I bought for them as a present? (Yes, it was on the registry.)

The Washington Post's Jason Horowitz offers a who-put-this-chocolate-in-my-foul-rancid-tub-of-weeping-peanut-butter profile of leftie PR operative Hiltzik, pegged to the fact that he works for Beck. It's crazy, because Hiltzik is a liberal Democrat who worked on Hillary Clinton's 2000 Senate campaign, Eliot Spitzer's 1998 attorney general campaign, and Harvey Weinstein's lifelong megalomania campaign. So how can such a mensch, with all these Hollywood liberal friends, work to advance the career of an increasingly popular nativist demagogue?

The close friendship and lucrative business relationship that has developed between the 45-year-old conservative firebrand and the 37-year-old former Democratic operative shows how partisan media personalities get discovered, promoted and catapulted into the political stratosphere, even when the talent and the talent broker have opposing ideologies. But for Hiltzik's former Democratic allies, the alliance is still mostly shocking.

It is truly a puzzle. It's almost as though Hiltzik is more interested in making money, or accumulating power, than in devoting his life to advancing the political ideals he has claimed in the past to endorse. What sort of self-respecting flack would work for a client whose ideas he doesn't personally advocate and live by?

And how can someone who has flacked for souls as pure as Hillary Clinton, Eliot Spitzer, and Harvey Weinstein turn around and offer his services to a monster like Beck? It's a crazy, crazy world.

Earlier this year, Dunn spoke to a class of graduating high school students and asked them to go fight a war in Calcutta as per the recommendations of her "two favorite political philosophers" Mao Tse Tung and Mother Theresa. While it is not known what became of these newly militant American schoolchildren armed with maps, Fox News' resident Crazed Crybot discovered this footage in his continuing quest to expose the violent red heart of the Obama White House.

What a fright for Glenn Beck!

Would you be a little alarmed if somebody in the White House had cited Adolf Hitler in a speech to high school students as the person they turn to the most? What is the difference? Mao was worse. Plus, he took away the freedom of hundreds of millions of Chinese, and now he's being revered? How did we get here?

Now Andrew Sullivan thinks all this talk of a Red House is just silly. But he does have an answer for Beck:

Dunn would never have used Hitler as a source for perseverance and setting the right objectives. Why Because Hitler's evil is self-evident. So why is Mao's rancid evil not self-evident for a person like Dunn? Because she retains a double standard for far left totalitarianism over far right totalitarianism. It's that insulting and morally disgusting double standard that gets my goat. Mao was responsible for the deaths of up to 70 million people - and Dunn sees him as a useful strategist.

Oh, that's right. Lefties only ever truly despise righties. That explains the overwhelming love for Stalin... no?

Asked to comment, Dunn says she got the quote from noted Communist Lee Atwater, which leaves us back at square one: why doesn't the world feel about Chairman Mao the way it does about Hitler and Stalin? He definitely felt he deserved to share space with Stalin at least - even had a little tiff with Khruschev when he thought his heir apparent status was being infringed upon.

Perhaps it's because he never bombed our grandparents nor made our parents hide under schooldesks. Or maybe it's because the strongest proponent of the Cult of Mao is still the very country where he once had those millions of people tortured and killed.

[Pic: IntelligentLife]