You know quoting Dennis Miller won't win me over to begin with, (face it, he's an intellectual fraud who thinks dropping the occaisional "hip" bon mot exonerates him from cowardly selling out his beliefs when the winds of change blew in a lock-step uber-patriotism after 9-11), but this whole nonsense about appreciating their "diversity of thought" is a load when they are themselves preaching intolerance and spreading ignorance cloaked in paranoid notions of righteousness to teens who are seeking a sense of belonging in this troubled world. I'm not out to stop them but, am I wary of them? You bet I am. Take a look at the movie "Jesus Camp" and if you don't think that kind of fundamentalism isn't worrying then you are a fool. What's worse is the fact that a 2-bit actor like stevie B has the ear of our president. Sorry, but that shit scares me and it has nothing to do with the fact that we don't share the same "God".

More and more it is becoming apparent that what this administration values overall is a blind adherence to agenda and ideology rather than the "nuts and bolts" of governing. If this situation existed at the root level of such a tentative and costly a venture as the overthrow and reconstruction of Iraq, is it any wonder that they continually fuck up evrything else they touch?

Joe Scarborough is a rarity on TV these days;

a true conservative who is true to his principles and doesn't stoop to the kind of shameless demagoguery that many of his contemporaries traffic in. I don't always agree with him but that is not important. What he brings to the table is a levelheadedness and the willingness to put country over party. If we are to do the same; that is, agree that the future of our country is more important than the election of a democratic congress, then it's people like Mr. Scarborough we need listen to and encourage to continue speaking their minds. Air America might be nice but mostly it's preaching to the converted. When people like Joe or Andrew Sullivan reevaluate their postion and say as much unapolegetically it changes the national discourse to something beyond hyperbole and talking points. For that I am thankful.

It's odd how many people are falling all over themselves to state how unimportant and/or misguided (and therefore forgettable) Mr. Colbert's performance was. It's strange the amount of vehemance being leveled at such a tepid performance. The complainers seem to want it both ways; he was "airless" and "uninspired" but he was also too "biting" and "pointed". The idea of "speaking truth to power" is dismissed as only being appropriate when applied to situations in which apparently death is the outcome (how these right-wingers wish for just such a political landscape), but then they go on to prove it's aptness by piling on and lending their voices to the throng of great pontificators crying "foul" and worse yet, "unfunny!". If indeed his only crime was being unfunny then his performance would have been relegated to the dustbin of past performers who agreed to do "nice" and then forgotten. I'm sure Jay Leno would have been perfect.

So obviously it was some words that were said that has caused this great outcry, but worse than that, "ideas" that were inferred that were not agreeable to the Boy King and those who rush about trying to shelter him. This administration is allergic to words not scripted and approved well in advance so it's pretty rediculous for Cohen to demand that Mr. Colbert say things that were "needed to be heard". Colbert's whole routine is predicated on the fact that the press consistantly assumes that commenting on artificial constructs passed off as "policy" by the administration is real journalism. It's always surprising to me how many right-wingers don't "get it" and regularly appear on Colbert's show as if the fact that he plays a mock conservative mouthing garbled, distended versions of sanctioned talking points is "good enough". It's almost as if just hearing a proximation of what stands for "conservative" is just as acceptable as the "real thing" because they spend so much time spinning reality into a pretzel shape that they are unable to recognize irony when it bites 'em on the ass which, sorry to say, is what happened to all of the tender-minded members of the press and the administration who are now working really hard to ignore the sting.

This sounded like a good idea but I shoulda known better. Camille Paglia praises the love theme from Titanic but dismisses Wallace and Gromit as "crap"?! Jeesuz! Get someone with a clue! You know, I love Cintra and would read almost anything she has to say about celebrities and actors but this chatty dismissive shit is handled better by Kathy Griffin on "The D-List". But really, the Oscars are so worn-out as a cultural event that it doesn't really matter. I only watched for John Stewart and some of the bits were inspired but in the end even he couldn't save this from sagging under the weight of it's own inertia. Oh well....

What an odd pairing. I guess it makes sense seeing as how both are verbose pop culture critics. I just hope Cintra can get a word in edgewise what with Camille's speed-freak allocution. With Stewart at the helm this should make for an entertaining car wreck of an evening. I think it's a great idea!