First you tried to get her to share your knee-jerk reflexive "All Americans are fat, disgusting gluttons - let's sneer at them!" attitude...but Ludivine responded in a humorous, classy way (noting the French you j'adore don't all exactly have ripped physiques themselves)...

THEN, you knee-jerk reflexively assumed that she, being talented & smart, ONLY could like American independent movies and not Hollywood movies - 'cos we all know that only plebian mouth-breathin' fanboys and the unwashed (fat) Yankee masses like Hollywood movies - and what does Ludivine do?

She rejects your film-school groomed elitist snobbery and dares to be honest - by saying that she actually thought a Brad Pitt / mainstream movie was *gasp* good!!

-----------

Did those responses cause you to spew coffee back into your "I Heart Godard" mug, Andrew?

Rock on, Ludivine. I thought you were a cool actress before - but in rejecting the film-hipster dogma (Anti-American, Anti-mainstream) and naive assumptions O'Hehir makes about you, you've definitely become on of my fave celebrities...and I look forward to seeing your new flick!

Ummm...THAT excerpt is supposed to represent the best female writing on Salon? Really?

Will there be any writing that focuses on women's issues - abortion, breast cancer, equal pay, the blind eye feminism turns to female obesity rates in the US - instead of the de rigeur navel-gazing by aging self-absorbed boomers and early Gen X-ers, as celebrated in that excerpt??

Guess not. *sighhh* Ah well - keep regaling us readers with tales of how thoust previously perky big tits are heading south for the winter of thy life, Ms. Anderson-Lee & other writers...

Miss Sey, did you ever win an Olympic gold medal?

Did you ever win ANY medal at the Olympics?

Ok - but you did qualify for and go to the Olympics, right?

Right?

No? So what exactly qualifies you to write about / comment on the US OLYMPIC gymnastics team?

I could understand Mary Lou Retton blogging on this topic - you see, she's a true "elite" athlete who attended the Olympics and won medals.

But you? Who cares what Miss Broken Femur has to say?

Just sayin'...you writing about Olympic teams & competitors is like Tara Reid writing about Judi Dench's or Katharine Hepburn's acting.

Walsh hired this cut-rate hack to generate attention for Salon...

And nearly 300 letters later (including one of mine), it worked.

------------------------

But come on, Salon / Joan - are times this desperate for your e-zine that you have to resort to this level of attention whoring?

What's next? A "Michael Phelps is Gay ('cos, um, he's on my GayDar)" piece from Sey's soulmate Sarah Hepola tomorrow in Broadsheet...with a goal of, what, 500 angry letters?

Or better yet: "Barack Obama Secretly Hates America because he's NOT at the Olympics", perhaps? Written by special guest writer and Hillary-lover Tina Fey?

Maybe these Jerry Springer tactics will get y'all some new Premium Subscribers, right?

Except instead of chanting, JERRY!!...JERRY!!, they'll be chanting SALON...SALON...

Kitchen Girl, I think I love you. ;-) Your posts rock!

Inane-a: we letter writers don't enable assholes like Sey. You want to apologize for people who steadfastly behave like jerks and refuse to change their behavior and become better people?

Leave this site and go to FoxNews.com or AnnCoulter.com. You'll be much happier there.

So I should just love the xenophobic racist white guy who accuses me of being Mexican / illegalito just because I'm dark-skinned?

Or the Bible-thumpin' sweet old Evangelical lady who, when I responded that I respect all faiths but am an agnostic - asked what my parents were...and when I said they were Hindu, she told me they would burn in Hell and I should disown them?

Should I love her for who she is?

Or the drunk Native guy who harassed & tried to paw at my sister on the bus...or the well-dressed, white-collar guy who started talking to her...then asked her if he could give her a facial? (She's 16, by the way.)

Should I love them for who they are?

---------------------

Look, there are a few good people in this world. For all my many flaws, I consider myself one of them.

But the majority of people out there are psychos, assholes, racists, misogynists, sleazebags, con artists, judgemental holier-than-thous and beggars lookin' for sympathetic suckers to leech off of.

And while I am progressive, I refuse to subscribe to the liberal naivete that Keillor spouts..."We're all wonderful, we just need to get to know each other, gosh darn it."

No, we are are not all wonderful. Most of us are slaves to our basest human impulses - greed, lust, self-centeredness, hate.

And I will not love people for that.