The last time O'Reilly sparred with a woman over Tiller, that woman was Salon's Joan Walsh, and he memorably told her she had blood on her hands. This time, Ann Coulter is blood-thirsty. Although her calling left-wingers "pro-death" (least mature reclaiming of language ever) is a highlight, the real nadir of the interview comes around minute 1:50, when she says of Tiller's assassination:

I don't really like to think of it as a murder. It was terminating Tiller in the 203rd trimester.

When O'Reilly argues that in fact it was a murder, and that murdering abortionists is actually a bad thing that should be punished (this the only time will actually take O'Reilly's side in an argument), Coulter says, "I am personally opposed to shooting abortionists, but I don't want to impose my moral values on others." She adds, "Their logic [meaning evil, blood-on-hands, "pro-death" leftist logic] says if you don't believe in abortion, don't get an abortion. If you don't believe in shooting abortionists, don't shoot an abortionist."

It's no surprise that Coulter makes no distinction between a fetus and a grown man with a family. Really, it should be no surprise when Ann Coulter says anything insane or inflammatory at this point. However, it doesn't seem very rhetorically effective to slam "pro-death" logic while excusing Tiller's death as a "termination." Isn't "termination" something good conservatives are supposed to abhor? It's supposed to be satire, we guess, but it might work better if Coulter seemed like she was ever compassionate toward anyone. Casting liberals as heartless just doesn't fly very far coming from her. Then again, maybe she's just there to make O'Reilly look good.

An equally strange part of the interview, though, happens just before minute one, when O'Reilly and Coulter agree that people on the right haven't been talking about Tiller's death enough. Coulter's explanation: "I'd like to think it's because they're hungover from the hurray-George-Tiller-is-dead party, but I think that's not it. I think people don't like talking to abortion." Leaving aside the "hurray-George-Tiller-is-dead party" (at which we're sure Coulter was the guest of honor), on what planet do conservatives not like talking about abortion? This one? This one? The one where Kansans for Life arrived at Tiller's clinic at 6:30 every morning to place over 150 crosses outside the fence? Or maybe the one where Operation Rescue just held a memorial service for the fetuses Tiller aborted, less than a month after his death? Whatever world Coulter and O'Reilly are describing, with its "pro-death" liberals and its sober, compassionate conservatives reluctantly discussing abortion, it doesn't resemble reality.

O'Reilly hosts Coulter to discuss the "reaction" of "the left-wing media" to "our reporting" on Tiller [Media Matters]
After Tiller: What Will Happen In Wichita? [NPR]

Earlier: Bill O'Reilly Shows Why "Abortion Reduction" Isn't Really Pro-Choice

The Huffington Post's Jason Linkins is correct that O'Reilly's most ludicrous moment came when he leveled a direct accusation at Walsh, saying, "My constitutional rights say I can say what I say, you can say what you say, as vile as you say it, you can say it, and I would never condemn you for saying it. You are misguided, you have blood on your hands because you portrayed this man as a hero." But he made a number of more insidious points. First (at around minute 1:30) he said that Tiller charged $6,000 per abortion and "became a millionaire doing it." Walsh argued with O'Reilly about his figures — and in her column about the show, she explained that Tiller sometimes waived his fee — but really the numbers are beside the point. We wouldn't expect an oncologist to work pro bono, so why would we expect Tiller not to charge for his — by all accounts difficult and complicated — services? Presumably because abortion is a special category of medical procedure, one so objectionable that doctors shouldn't have the right to get paid for it.

In the wake of Tiller's assassination, this stigma against abortion in the medical world is getting some well-deserved attention. Reuters reports that assaults on abortion clinics — there have been 67 in the first half of 2009 alone — may be keeping new doctors from entering the area. And in her excellent Salon piece on the "next generation of abortion providers," Kate Harding writes that although abortion is "the second most common outpatient procedure in the U.S.," a third of med students get no training in the procedure at all. She allows that, "given that many students won't pursue specialties that would involve providing abortions, and even those who go into family practice or obstetrics and gynecology might choose not to offer abortions, you could also argue that it's a waste of time in an already overburdened curriculum." But really, not offering abortion training may just perpetuate a vicious cycle, in which fewer students receive exposure to abortion issues and techniques, and fewer and fewer doctors choose to offer the procedure as a result. Excluding abortion from the medical school curriculum just encourages people to view it as less legitimate than other medical procedures, something doctors can get away with ignoring, and something they'd better do out of the goodness of their hearts if they do it at all. In an ideal world, everyone would have access to low-cost, comprehensive healthcare, including abortion — but even in that world, doctors should still get paid.

The second deeply upsetting point O'Reilly made has to do with why Tiller's clients sought abortions. He maintained that "Tiller was aborting late-term fetuses for casual reasons." He then called in Dr. Paul McHugh, head of the Psychiatric School at Johns Hopkins University (a title O'Reilly repeated several times, as though it qualified Dr. McHugh to pass judgment on women's choices), who made some vague claims about Tiller offering abortions so that women could "go to concerts" or "take part in sports." Walsh rightly disputed whether McHugh should be the one deciding what's best for women, but when O'Reilly pressured her on late-term abortion she said,"I believe that late-term abortion, under the current circumstances, to save the life of the mother, should be legal." She also said she's working for "abortion reduction."

It's become popular for liberals to say they're in favor of reducing the number of abortions, but this is an area where the left is letting the right define the terms of the debate. Frances Kissling in Salon explains how this has happened:

Recognizing that they probably won't succeed in making abortion illegal, the Democrats' faith-based allies decided that they could still use their moral disapproval to shape policy. They asserted that the number of abortions that takes place in America constitutes a moral tragedy and called for initiatives that would reduce the number of abortions. According to their mind-set, this was common ground, an abortion-neutral prescription for ending the culture war.

But "abortion reduction" is not an "abortion-neutral prescription." It's a prescription that assumes that some abortions are okay, but that some women and girls in America are getting abortions who should not be getting them, and that we need to put a stop to this. On the one hand, reliable birth control and sex education are obviously preferable to unwanted pregnancy, and most people who seek common ground would agree that improving access to these would be good for everybody. But there's a more disturbing corollary to the abortion reduction argument — the idea that some reasons for getting an abortion are better than others, and that it's acceptable to try to keep women from getting abortions for "casual reasons." This is what Ayelet Waldman found objectionable about the website A Heartbreaking Choice — the idea that some abortions are justified (in AHC's case, because of fetal abnormalities) while some are not.

If we start condemning abortions for reasons we deem casual, if we think of abortion as something that should only happen under conditions we deem appropriately dire, then we, like Dr. McHugh, place ourselves in judgment of women. If we truly want to preserve a woman's right to choose what to do with her body, we need to accept that sometimes women will abort for reasons we might not agree with. Really, being pro-choice doesn't mean thinking every abortion is a good idea. It means realizing that the only person who should truly have the right to determine whether it's a good idea is the mother, and protecting her rights means allowing her to make decisions we might not necessarily support. If "abortion reduction" means teaching people to protect themselves so they don't get pregnant in the first place, great. But if it means reducing the number of circumstances under which abortion is sanctioned — whether those circumstances include the life of the mother, the health of the fetus, or the duration of the pregnancy — then abortion reduction is really not a pro-choice position, because it takes the choice out of the hands of the mother, where, ultimately, it belongs.

Is there a next generation of abortion providers? [Salon]
How to talk about abortion [Salon]
O'Reilly Rages Against Joan Walsh Over Tiller Murder (VIDEO) [Huffington Post]
Threats, violence seen eroding U.S. abortion rights [Reuters]
Why I went on "The O'Reilly Factor" [Salon]

• A source claims that Ashton Kutcher and Demi Moore want Susan Boyle to sing at their wedding anniversary party. Demi reportedly would also like Susan to "flash her knee" at Ashton. [Daily Express]

• But Demi says the Boyle rumors are false! Regardless, Boyle is "much happier" after her hospitalization for an "anxiety attack." [Daily Mail]
• David Carradine's manager says he was found with his hands tied behind his back, calling into question both accident and suicide as explanations for his death. [TMZ]
• But the Thai police say there's no evidence anyone was in the room with Carradine when he died. [TMZ]
• Slumdog Millionaire star Rubina Ali has written her life story, Slumgirl Dreaming: My Journey to the Stars. The book will be released in July. [AP, via WWLTV]
• Phil Spector is being moved form LA to a prison near Bakersfield. TMZ tastefully reports that this prison has private showers. [TMZ]
• Tank Girl star Lori Petty has been charged with three misdemeanors for hitting a skateboarder with her car last weekend. Neither was severely injured. [TMZ]
• Chris Martin says he's not going to record a solo album, and that he gets song ideas from "some word [that] sends your mind going," such as "falafel." Bill O'Reilly was not available for comment. [Guardian]
• Marilyn Manson says he cried when tour manager "Steve" wouldn't get him drugs. But is he also an alcoholic? "Not according to the statistics that I read," says Manson. [Daily Express]
• Dominic Monaghan's character Charlie may be returning to Lost. [New York Magazine]
• More possible evidence that Drew Barrymore and Justin Long are back together: she was spotted with him at a Green Day concert, holding his hand and wearing a picnic blanket. [E! Online]
• 50 Cent has settled a lawsuit against an engineering firm for underestimating the cost of repairs to his house — the estimate was for $500,000, but the repairs ended up costing $6 million. Sucks, but it's hard to feel too sorry for Fiddy when the repairs on his house cost 25 times the median home price in the Northeast. [USA Today]
• Sick of Jon Gosselin and young women yet? If not, here's a sort of grainy picture of him standing near 23-year-old Hailey Glassman, his alleged paramour and daughter of his wife's plastic surgeon. [Perez Hilton]
• "I don't know what I'd do if I did win, but I would run out there and kiss Elton John and kick him off stage or something." — Dolly Parton, on her Tony Nomination for "9 to 5 The Musical" [CBS News]
• "And all the tears on her guitar, I'm not bitter. But now I see, Everything I'd ever need, Is the girl in front of me, She's much better." — from Joe Jonas's new song "Much Better," which supposedly disses ex Taylor Swift and her song "Teardrops On My Guitar" [Perez Hilton]
• "I'm convinced that she'll get sober one day. But I'm afraid that between now and then, she may get a nearly mortal wound of some type. [...] I have this image that she's going to lose a limb or something before she does." — Dr. Drew, on Lindsay Lohan.[Parade]
• "That was insulting, ridiculous, and disrespectful." — also Dr. Drew, on former Celebrity Rehab star Mary Carey's film, Celebrity Pornhab with Dr. Screw. [Parade]
• "You have to make ugly faces to make pretty notes. The first thing I noticed at rehearsal is they looked really good, like models, and they were sucking their cheeks and looking like they belong in an agency for beauty." — Carlos Santana, on the American Idol contestants during his guest appearance. [Reuters]

• Madonna and Jesus Luz are reportedly planning a "commitment ceremony" in front of a rabbi at the Kabbalah Center in New York. Oooh, and a source says:

"Lourdes mocks him by calling him The Babysitter, because he is so young. She likes him, but also likes winding him up." Hee hee, "get off the babysitter!" [Mirror]

• Robin Wright Penn talked to Gotham magazine for the June issue — obviously before Sean filed for divorce — and said: marriage is "real work, but that's what you sign up for. And it pays off beautifully, it really does. The outcome, the reward is so great because then your love grows out of those hard times." Now Sean Penn is allegedly seeing Natalie Portman. So. [Page Six]
• Oprah! At Duke! Doing a commencement speech! And getting an honorary degree! She told students to "stand proudly in your own shoes while you help others stand in theirs." And! "One of the best ways to enhance your own life is to enhance somebody else's." [Breitbart]
• Oprah sent a film crew over to Blackburn, Scotland, to Susan Boyle's house. In the interview, which will be broadcast today, Boyle says: "I am not lonely. Everyone has been so nice. I've got millions of new friends now." [Telegraph]
• Paris Hilton spent a romantic week in Anguilla with boyfriend Doug Reinhardt, and updated her Twitter page constantly, with messages like "Love being in Love :) Best feeling in the world" and "Playing some golf together :) Golfing is fun" and "Loving life with my love" and "Lovers in paradise" and "My smooches from a secret island." Lots of pix of her kissing the dude, too. [Daily Mail]
• Christian Bale's part in Terminator Salvation was originally much smaller; the film's main character is not actually John Conner, played by Bale, but Marcus Wright, played by Sam Worthington. Director McG said the script had to be adjusted to "integrate" Bale more. [Hollywood Reporter]
• When Jennifer Lopez's daughter Emme was about three weeks old, she discovered a lump on the child's head. "We both got very nervous, very very nervous, and I just remember my heart sinking to my feet," Lopez says. "I looked at [Marc] and I said, 'You know if anything happens, I'm not going to be okay, you know that right?'" Emme was fine but Lopez was inspired to work with Childrens Hospital Los Angeles to help medical services to the less fortunate. "I started to wonder," Lopez said, "what if I couldn't afford a doctor, or receive the medicines, the procedures?" [Yahoo News via E!]
• Who were the stars at the White House Correspondents Dinner? Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes, Steven Spielberg, George Lucas, Demi Moore and Ashton Kutcher, Eva Longoria Parker, Owen Wilson, Donatella Versace, Stevie Wonder, Alicia Keys, Kerry Washington, Chace Crawford and Ed Westwick, Kenneth Cole, Jason Wu and "a smattering of mayors, diplomats and ambassadors." Donatella went in 2008 and says ths year "was much better." Then she told everyone to "get ooooout." [WWD]
• More from the WHCD! Rahm Emanuel seated next to Barbara Walters! Jon Hamm was there! Donatella Versace was hanging out with Jonathan Rhys Meyers! Political pundit Craig Crawford asked Jason Bateman a question! Ludacris had a "long talk" with Bill O'Reilly! [Politico]
• According to this report, at the WHCD, "No matter who's in the room, the Obamas outshine all challengers." [MSNBC]
• Noted political junkie Ben Affleck missed the WHCD! He was sick. [mediabistro.com]
• New York Mag: How did you deal with everyone in the room eating steak?
  Kate Hudson: Oh, I ate it.
  Stella McCartney: If you just give up meat one day a week, it has, like, the biggest impact environmentally.
  Kate: Well, I'm interested in change.
  Stella: You can do that! Unless you're like some kind of caveman carnivore...Or are you a cavewoman?
  Kate: Uh, me? I don't eat meat every day! Are you out of your mind? I'd have a heart attack!
  Stella: Jolly. So she's fine. She's good. [NY Mag]
• Re: Rihanna nude pix: This paper points out that she has many tattoos, none of which are see in the images purported to be her. [NY Daily News]
• Chris Brown says he didn't leak the Rihanna pix. [The Sun]
• All that cardio pays off between the sheets! A stripper says Michael Phelps "should get another Olympic gold for marathon love-making!" because "the sex lasted for about three hours." [NY Post]
• Miss California Carrie Prejean's lawyer sent a cease and desist letter to the website hosting her underwear pix saying she was underage and that one shot is a Photoshop manipulation; the site has responded: "Your client's publicity rights are substantially inferior to the right of the public to consider, discuss, agree and/or disagree with Ms. Prejean's actions and views. This is not conduct for which your client's consent is required." Oh snap. [TMZ]
• By the by, Carrie Prejean has recorded a phone message for National Organization for Marriage, asking people to donate money and sign a petition against gay marriage. [TMZ]
• And! Those "topless" pix? Taken well-after Carrie Prejean turned 18, not when she was 17, as she claims. [TMZ]
• Amy Winehouse had a crappy performance at the St. Lucia Jazz Festival, but the tourism minister says: "It's a shame it did not go better but we will bring her back in the future. We fully support her and hope she can get well. We have a lot of admiration for her." [The Sun]
• Swine flu be damned! Hugh Jackman will head to Mexico to promote Wolverine. [Mirror]
• Quentin Tarantino talks Inglourious Basterds, 70% of which is in French or German. "When you see the Germans speaking English with a German accent or sounding like British thespians, it just seems very quaint," he says. "That's one thing I don't want this film to have." Execs at the studio are not worried about the heavy use of subtitles: "Tarantino is a universal language," said one. [NY Times]
• Rachel McAdams has an environmental website, green is sexy, and says: "It's funny because when people come to my house they think everything is broken because I don't have anything plugged in. Guests are always saying things like: 'You need a new light bulb here' and I go around to the lamp and say: 'You've got to just plug it in!"' [Sydney Morning Herald]
• "WARNING: This may hurt your eyes... Beth Ditto strips down to her Spanx." Eh, fuck you, Daily Fail. [Daily Mail]
• Kim Kardashian is getting married! Eventually. "So many people rush into it and it's all this pressure because they see we've been together for a while," she says of beau Reggie Bush, whom she has been dating since 2007. "But, we're heading there. When we're ready, we'll know." [People]
• Boy George has been released from jail — early — and lost a few pounds during the four months he was in the slammer. [Daily Mail]
• This report says Paul McCartney and Nancy Shevell are secretly engaged but don't want to make a formal announcement lest Heather Mills make some kind of scene; McCartney's rep is quoted about the rumor, saying, "There is no truth in it whatsoever. They have not become engaged in any shape or form. It is utter nonsense." [Daily Express]
• Jerry Hall was writing an autobiography — being called an "explosive, tell-all account" of her life with Mick Jagger — but the book has been abandoned. Apparently the publishers were "disappointed" with the lack of Jagger dirt. In JERRY'S autobiography. There was, however, a lot of gossip about Carla Bruni… [Daily Mail]
• Bjork sang with the Dirty Projectors at "her smallest gig of the year" Friday night in a bookstore in NYC, in front of 300 people. [NY Times]
• "Serial dater Geri Halliwell's relationship gets serious as she meets aristocrat lover's parents." [Daily Mail]
• Nineteen year old JoJo Simmons, son of Rev Run Simmons of Run-DMC, was caught rolling a joint in his BMW and has been arrested and charged with a bunch of stuff. [UPI]
• Awww, on Mother's Day, Florence Henderson, aka Carol Brady, says, "I get mail from all over the world, 122 countries." [UPI]
• Shirley Jones, 75, who was the mom on The Partridge Family, may pose nude for Playboy. Her husband/manager says, "Mature women are relevant." [Page Six]
• Is Kylie Minogue gonna get hitched to her hot hot Spanish boyfriend? [Daily Mail]
• Nia Vardalos talks about becoming a mom of a toddler — overnight. She adopted a 3-year-old from a foster family agency and says her daughter "arrived without an instruction manual. I didn't know if she had a sleep schedule, food allergies – there wasn't even a note pinned to her shirt. She just walked in and looked up at me, like "got lunch?" [People]
• Barbra Streisand's personal assistant: Busted on drug charges in Malibu on Wednesday. Cops found cocaine, methamphetamines and a weapon in her car. Sometimes people who help people who need people need a bump. [LA Times]
• Label exec Irv Gotti says he is dropping Ashanti from The Inc. They haven't been on speaking terms for some time; in 2007 Gotti told Wendy Williams he and Ashanti had sex even though he was a married man. [MTV]
• Jane's Addiction frontman Perry Farrell tore his calf muscle during the first song in a concert in Atlanta. He finished the show and then took an ambulance to the hospital; doctors are telling him to stay off the leg for a few days. [AP]
• If you have £500,000, you can buy David Beckham's "modest" childhood home in east London. [BBC News]
• Blind item! "Which married TV actor used the Correspondents Dinner as an excuse to meet up with his occasional mistress?" [Gatecrasher]
• "I wasn't familiar with rugby league beforehand and I don't profess to be an expert now. But everything I do know about rugby league, I know from Russell Crowe." — Rachel McAdams, who became friends with the Aussie while shooting State Of Play and even watched a game with him via satellite at three in the morning. [Sydney Morning Herald]
• "I wanted audiences to think, ‘This guy could easily rip someone's head off', so I worked hard to achieve that physique. I ran and had to lift very heavy weights. Every morning I'd get up and there was a part of me that just wanted to collapse, but you just have to keep going, it's full-on testosterone. When I'm training, I'm fairly obnoxious, I really make a big thing of it and there is a lot of noise. I play driving music like Metallica that I would never otherwise listen to. I consulted a bodybuilder and what I realized is that how you look is 30% how you train and 70% how you eat. No carbs after lunch. Six to eight chicken breasts a day, two at each sitting, 4,000 calories in total. I really enjoyed eating pizza at the end of the movie, trust me, and I had half a dozen beers on the final day of shooting." — Hugh Jackman, on achieving the look of Wolverine. [Mirror]
• "I knew I had to build a body, and I ate a lot of wheat and chain-smoked. That will do it! The woman had to feel like she really had been drinking for 25 years. Now, I have not been drinking for 25 years. I'm a relatively healthy individual, so the first thing I had to do was make myself look like I was super-wrecked, which took a bit of time." — Tilda Switon, on playing a "ferociously dedicated alcoholic" in Julia. [USA Today]
• "I see Amelia as that fast-talking, Katharine Hepburn type of woman. She's powerful and authoritative with some chutzpah. I am much more cautious, I don't take as many physical risks as her. I see her as a woman who's ahead of her time but also having fun, embracing that sense of adventure; it's about believing in yourself and your passions and making the most of the time that you have in life." — Amy Adams, on playing Amelia Earhart in Night A The Museum 2. [Daily Mail]
• "Jack is gun crazy. Over here you can buy real guns. I have this horrible thing: I can see this movie in my head where he's messing around and shoots himself in the foot. Sharon goes to me, ‘Oh darling, he's been surrounded by guns all his life.' But there is a difference between an air rifle and a 45-calibre pistol. I said to Jack, ‘If someone got into your house would you be willing to use the gun?' He said, ‘Sure.'" — Ozzy Osbourne. [Daily Express]
• "We visited Panzi Hospital where IMC is training doctors and which has become world-renowned because of its incredible work with thousands of women who are in need of surgical repair for a condition called 'fistula,' a severe gynecologic rupture. It's a frighteningly common condition in eastern DRC because of lack of obstetric care, and the epidemic of rape. Panzi Hospital's Founder and Director is Dr. Denis Mukwege, often referred to as "the savior of women " and was named by a prestigious Nigerian newspaper as African of the Year in 2008. He shared some of his experiences with us and as you can imagine, they are horrific. The youngest rape victim he has had to treat was a three year old girl." — Sienna Miller, who is in the Congo, working with International Medical Corps. [Huffington Post]

[Image by Steven Klein via W Magazine]

• Sarah Palin is going to skip this weekend's White House Correspondents Dinner because some town in Alaska flooded and she needs to appear like she's committed to this "governing" thing. [Politico]

• Michelle Obama knows the difficulties of maintaining one's work-life balance as a working mom, but (jokingly) said that it would be helped by everyone getting a full-time staff. [Washington Post]
• Equally difficult? Getting the Kindle to pronounce "Barack Obama." It currently refers to him at "Black Alabama." Can we live in a post-racial society if even our robot overlords voices are racist? [NY Times]
• In an article that Kindles around the country would mispronounce, Barack Obama announced his plans to increase funding at the FDA. [Reuters]
• He is not, however, going to fund needle exchange programs because that's condoning drug abuse in the same way that providing condoms to people promotes promiscuity! [Huffington Post]
• Pat Robertson has announced that gay marriage will lead to the molestation of children. [ThinkProgress]
• Whoa: Even Ann Coulter thinks Bill O'Reilly is a sexist piece of shit. [ThinkProgress]
• The economy is still fucked, as 10 banks failed the Administration's stress tests. [BBC]
• Unemployment is almost at 9 percent now. [NY Times]
• But Dick Cheney doesn't think Republicans should change a thing! [ThinkProgress]
• Orrin Hatch will vote against Judge Sonia Sotomayor if Obama nominates her to the Supreme Court because she had the gall to point out that lots of laws — like the Miranda Law, say — were actually made by the courts. Apparently acknowledging the obvious is too liberal. [Politico]

•  A recent survey has named "To Kill a Mockingbird" the most inspirational book of all time, beating out the Bible, which came in at number two. • Click here to watch an awesome video of a fox tracking mice in the snow. •  British women are more likely to have a baby before the age of 25 than they are to get married, according to a new report. • At the end of WWII, an estimated 2 million German women were raped by Russian soldiers. For decades, the suffering of German women was considered taboo, and it is only now that the first scientific study of the rapes is being conducted. • Researchers have found that women who sit up, walk, or kneel at the first signs of going into labor are likely to have a quicker labor than those who are in a reclining position. •  Ugh. A 20-year-old student from Colorado is facing felony animal abuse charges after she taped her boyfriend's eight-month-old puppy to the inside of his refrigerator. •  Aw: a widow in Japan has published a book full of text messages that she sent to her dead husbands phone. • Freakonomics compares ballet dancer's amazing leg lifts to basketball player's free-throw shooting. • Mental Floss has unearthed a very old clip of Bill O'Reilly reporting on Super Mario Bros. •  Some reasonable legislators in Vermont are working to reduce teen "sexting" charges so that high school students wont be charged with child porn for sending pictures of themselves via text message. •  eMarketer has found that way more women use the internet than men, but men visit more sites and stay online longer. • Outside Los Angeles, an order of nuns are praying for a new oven. The Dominican nuns are suffering from the recession, and without their funds brought in from sales of their pumpkin bread, times are even tougher. • Some very bored guy invented a chair that twitters his farts. If you are so inclined, you can follow his tweets here. • Just what the dying world of print journalism needs: Pumpsmag, a rag devoted entirely to gentleman's clubs and the women who work there. •

Having just gotten a Twitter account this weekend, Elisabeth Hasselbeck was offended by his comment that people updating their friends, via the internet, on mundane aspects of their lives, isn't contributing to their own mental advancement. (But somehow talk radio does?) Anyway, Hasselbeck went after him, but really, I think she was just annoyed at him because she thought she had a conservative ally in O'Reilly, and wanted him to agree with her that President Obama's "Special Olympics" comment on The Tonight Show was glossed over by the liberal media. But Bill said that it's not an important political issue and he doesn't care.

• Madonna is in Malawi, asking the court for approval to adopt a second child. [Times of London]
• Madonna's adoption ruling has been delayed until Friday; the court has not revealed why.

The child in question is four years old and named Mercy; her unmarried mother died soon after she was born. Madonna brought both Lourdes and David to Malawi with her and David visited with his biological father. "I was very happy to see him," the father told The Associated Press, adding that David did not recognize him. "He asked me who I was." [Yahoo via AP, Guardian]

• Madonna has purchased land in Malawi so she can build a school for girls. Some residents are afraid they will lose their homes and fields. [People]
• Save The Children is not happy about Madonna trying to adopt and a spokesperson says: "What Madonna is doing verges on a puppy parade. People like her are looking for the most beautiful child. They wouldn't choose a child with a disability or special needs. It doesn't help to take one child out of an orphanage to a huge palace and buy them a pony." [Mirror]
• Is a Russian model/pop star named Irson Kudikova about to get engaged to Mickey Rourke? [Page Six]
• Britney Spears had passed President Obama in Twitter Followers, taking the #2 spot (CNN Breaking News is number 1). She tweeted: "#2 People!!! You guys continue to make me SOOO happy! I truly have the best fans on the planet! CAN'T WAIT for TEXAS tomorrow… - Bri." Then Ashton Kutcher stole the #2 spot. [PopDirt]
• This report claims that Britney's Gulfstream jet is a mess: "The plane is stocked with Twinkies, beef jerky and M&Ms," says a source. "When she's done, she just throws the wrappers on the floor." Plus, there are two puppies adding to the chaos, who "scoot" around like crazy. [Star]
• Breaking: Victoria Beckham seen in flip-flops! [JustJared]
• Michael Jackson's son, Prince Michael I, might join MJ on stage at the first of his London shows. That would certainly be… interesting. [MSNBC Scoop]
• Apparently Zac Efron's ears are dirty, because he was recently pelted with Q-Tips by a paparazzo. There's video, but chances are it will just make you sad. [ONTD]
• More Zac Efron ear wax news. What a world we live in. [TMZ]
• Rihanna went dancing and a spywitness says "It was like the queen of England was out clubbing. You couldn't even get anywhere near her, between the bodyguards and the people wanting to touch her. And it was so morbid, too — it's all because she was beaten." [E!]
• By the by, there is nothing going on between Rihanna and Frankie Delgado. But you knew that. [TMZ]
• Miley Cyrus cried upon winning Favorite Female Singer at the Kids' Choice Awards. "I really thought I was going to lose, so thank you, guys." [E!]
• Some are saying the crying was staged because Miley already knew she would be winning the award. She Tweets: "For all the haters saying I knew about my KCA before hand have nooo idea what they are talking about! I was so suprised! :) thank u again xo" [PopDirt]
• Neither Chris Brown nor Rihanna attended the Kids' Choice Awards. Rapper Soulja Boy was sad! "I was looking forward to seeing them here," he said. [Yahoo News via AP]
• A woman harassed Ricky Martin at a club in South Beach, where he and "several male friends" were trying to have a good time. [Gatecrasher]
• John Mayer works the short-shorts on his cruise, the "Mayercraft Carrier." [The Superficial]
• Mariah Carey was seen drinking glasses of red wine with a straw. Classy! [Gatecrasher]
• Lipstick Jungle is canceled. For real this time. [EW]
• Paris Hilton attended Perez Hilton's birthday Party in a convergence of things that seem so three years ago. [PopDirt]
• Fox is developing a dating show with "average-looking" people. By that, they mean overweight. It's called More To Love and the bachelor is a "Kevin James type." [Yahoo via Reuters]
• Fox News' Bill O'Reilly boycotts Sean Penn films. Think Sean Penn cares? [Yahoo via Reuters]
• Joely Richardson has returned to work, ten days after her sister Natasha died. [The Sun]
• Ugly Betty star Ana Ortiz is pregnant and expecting a baby girl at the end of July. She says: "I've had a great experience so far. Talk to me in another month." [People]
• Amy Winehouse is a thumbsucker. [People]
• Yes, the ShamWow guy punched a prostitute. Police say "Both parties had a strong odor of an alcoholic beverage emitting from their persons." [The Smoking Gun, Hollywood Rag]
• Monsters vs. Aliens scared up $58.2 million at the box office; big numbers. [USA Today]
• But one of the reasons Monsters vs. Aliens made so much? 3-D tickets cost more. [NY Times]
• Rhys Ifans has been cast in the next Harry Potter flick; he'll play Xenophilius Lovegood. [Daily Express]
• RIP composer Maurice Jarre, who wrote the music for Doctor Zhivago and Lawrence Of Arabia. [Independent]
• Blind item! "Which top actor got caught with his pants down in a club's closet with two very unattractive women, which his friends all proceeded to laugh at?" [Gatecrasher]
• "I was assuming that [my character's days were numbered] at one point and I got a lot of shrugged shoulders and shakes of the head, so I don't know if that's a yes or a no. No one will tell me and I don't know how this is going to go. I don't know if I live or die. I don't know how Izzie fares." — Katherine Heigl. [E!]
• "In the film we made penises, and I'm walking around them — we have made them more or less the same dimensions, but there are bug penises, giraffe penises, goat penises. They are like a forest of penises. … I was already playing a starfish, or a bug. I thought that stretch was much bigger, to be a sea creature than to play a male! But the real reason is sometimes [males] move more. For example, the female spider sits on the web, and she is three to five times bigger than the male, so he has to approach her. I was reluctant to do mammals, because they look so similar to us. But what's interesting about the whale is the female puts her vagina on the surface of the water, out of the reach of the male. Then she can see the males fight and she can select which one she likes, and then she turns over and lets him get to her. I thought, I can do that!" — Isabella Rossellini, on playing the parts of animals, in her web series Green Porno. [NY Post]
• "I'm looking forward to knowing what's going on - I still have no clue. The only thing I ever got right was the island moving, which was pretty good. But that's it. I don't know what the story is or where we will end up." — Josh Holloway, aka Sawyer, of Lost. He also says when the show ends he will get a haircut: "One of our camera operators had a beautiful Mohawk. I've always wanted one." [The Sun]
• "Rule one – you don't play on the snooker table unless you've been asked. And, secondly, you never, ever, take the shepherd's pie unless Keith Richards' broken the crust first." — Mick Jagger, on touring with the Rolling Stones. [The Sun]
• "My first bra was not very exciting. I was a late bloomer-the last of my girlfriends to get one. It was this horrible training bra-type thing, but it prompted me to save my money and buy my own darn bra. My mom was like, ‘You can't have the black lace one.' And I was like, ‘Why not?' I've never equated beautiful lingerie with seduction or sex. It's not about trying to get a man. Not at all. It's about surrounding myself with beauty in my everyday life-whether it's a bra or a notebook. I want everything around me to be attractive because I look at it every day." — Dita Von Teese. [JustJared]
• "The biggest misconception about me is that I am not a real person. The assumption is that my eccentricity is not who I really am, but it is. I have lost my mind." — Lady GaGa. [NY Mag]

MEGAN: Are you excited for the final showdown? The claws will come out, hair will get pulled, someone will get bitchslapped for sure, I am way excited. But, enough about Project Runway, we should probably talk about the news.

SPENCER: Don't talk to me about TV. I came home yesterday to find that my fleeing roommate has absconded with the Flophouse's massive flatscreen, one of the only things that makes my house livable. At least he seems to have left the speakers.

MEGAN: So, I guess you'll be listening to the debates then? Or just bargain hunting at Best Buy? If you want, we can make use of my Sam's Club card sometime. Sadly, Obama won't be perched on a stool looking damn cool this time while Crankypants paces around trying to figure out why he's losing.

SPENCER: I'm too elitist to shop at Sam's Club.

MEGAN: They have arugula, I checked!

SPENCER: So what's the format this time?

MEGAN: Seated behind a desk instead of standing behind podiums, they will both get to deal with Bob Schieffer's questions and McCain won't be able to condescend to anyone but the two of them and the viewing public writ large.

SPENCER: The debate going back and forth in liberal circles: is McCain really stupid enough to think Obama doesn't have a good response line to Ayers; or does Obama really... not have a good response line to Ayers? WHO YA GOT?

MEGAN: I think he ought to have a good response to Ayers, but his ability to pull it off depends on how the question is framed. He didn't do so well with the whole preconditions thing in the first debate. But this is a decent start, from someone willing to call Ayers "friend."

SPENCER: I just sent a desperate email to my old roommate begging her to move back to the Flophouse. I'm sorry — yeah, Tom Frank. I wonder: does the country have the maturity to handle this line:

Nor will I quibble with those who find Mr. Ayers wanting in contrition. His 2001 memoir is shot through with regret, but it lacks the abject style our culture prefers.

MEGAN: Even Paris Hilton had to find God in prison, so, my answer would be: no.

SPENCER: So much packed into that one. And right you are: Would conservatives actually be satisfied, even if Ayers performed a full renunciation? But when you're down a massive 14 points in a two-candidate field you take your satisfaction where you find it, if I can butcher a Murder City Devils line.

MEGAN: Well, I think this is probably at least an equally accurate description of their motivations:

There are a lot of things to call this tactic, but "country first" isn't one of them. The nation wants its hope and confidence restored, and Republican leaders have chosen instead to wave the bloody shirt. This is their vilest hour.

I think they are salting the earth, basically.

SPENCER: There'll always be something viler, though. You can't expect them to have found the bottom floor. Even after the guns go off...

MEGAN: That's true, but, technically, you don't salt the earth after you retreat, you salt it on your way out.

SPENCER: In fact, I want to outsource my crazy-winger morning commentary to my friend's Twitter feed today:

O'Reilly tonight: "Democrats complain about personal attacks, but WAIT TIL YOU SEE Doonsbury's attack on Sarah Palin."

MEGAN: I believe that is when the Republican Party jumps the shark. Are there non-dittoheads who didn't roll their eyes at that? Because I rolled mine so far back I gave myself more of a headache.

SPENCER: Speaking of Twitter, I'm taking an aside: Is anyone else getting porn spam on their LOCKED Twitter accounts? And furthermore, do you have any idea how porn spam is supposed to work on Twitter? (@unsuspectinguser, just finished shooting a bukkake movie. less gross than suspected)

MEGAN: Um, some porny person tried to add me, but I blocked him and also, ew.

SPENCER: Speaking of bukkake, Palin's negatives are extremely high in that NYT poll

MEGAN: I am not sure I will ever be able to write as good a segue as that one, so I have decided not to try.

SPENCER:

Ms. Palin’s favorability rating is now 32 percent, down 8 points from last month, and her unfavorable rating climbed nine percentage points to 41 percent.

John McCain: so few opportunities to shoot his load, and this is where he aims... Sometimes I forget people read this in the morning.

MEGAN: Yes, I briefly had a mental image of John McCain's Oh face, there, which means I won't eat until lunch but I had a big dinner and baked cookies, so I probably don't need to eat breakfast anyway. And I won't be needing yogurt, that's for sure. In a completely not awkward segue, we should probably talk about John McCain's crazypants brother, who thinks that the campaign is run by idiots who write bad ads and don't let John be John. He apparently spammed the entire Republican party with his missive.

SPENCER: Not to use a cliche, but it's interesting that Joe "Northern Virginia is Communist Country" McCain thinks the campaign has been too restrained. What in the world would count as "unshackled" to a man like him?

MEGAN: Well, it is the People's Republic of Arlington. I'm sure he just got confused. But let Joe McCain put to rest all thoughts that John McCain got his crazy on in the Hanoi Hilton.

SPENCER: And "Let John McCain Be John McCain"? This isn't a campaign strategy, it's a coping mechanism. I have no inclination to believe at this point that McCain isn't being McCain — he disgraced himself in the Keating 5 scandal and he disgraced himself in the 2000 race when he pandered to racists on the South Carolina confederate flag and he's disgraced himself today. Three points determine a line. Look, if he were my brother, I'd blame everyone else too, but the only thing more consistent than John McCain's willingness to disgrace himself in the pursuit of his ambition is the willingness of the press to believe that he didn't really mean it.

MEGAN: I mean, I never really understood that, actually. Is John McCain really that much more charming than other politicians to political writers? Can you do this for a living and really buy the Straight Talk Express gimmick so easily?

SPENCER: It goes back to self-loathing. If you hate yourself that deeply, then the way he uses you can be a ready substitute for caring. So think about it, press corps! Rediscover your self-worth. You're better than this man.

MEGAN: So, John McCain is just the boyfriend who shines you on that he cares about you and you accept it because you don't know the difference?

SPENCER: And you just end up in his bukkake movie that he leaks to the internet.

MOE: Hey we can sort of start now if you want, though I'm still mostly reading through stuff. I just bought some beer because I think I'm the soberest person in Philadelphia right now. (The Eagles won a REALLY CLOSE game with the Rams today.) But here's something fun:

Mr. Rove said Mr. Schmidt’s increased authority — which came about after what amounted to a coup by Mr. Schmidt and other McCain aides with ties to the 2004 campaign, that gave him equal status with the campaign manager, Rick Davis — has been the best thing to have happened to Mr. McCain.

Oh God, Karl Rove. How do you do it, Karl Rove? You secure the election of a president so incompetent and widely loathed he decimates your party, then you leave the business for the media. Once in the media you commence bashing the media. You bash the media for asking questions about — not reporting, just asking around about — a rumor.

MEGAN: I am well on my way to non-Eagles-related drunkenness and I still cannot believe Steve Schmidt. Or Karl Rove. Like, seriously, did we watch the same speech? Only I thought it totally bombed and I talked to a shit load of Republicans at the wake today and people thought it fucking killed.

MOE: The sordid details of which are clearly, creepily reminiscent of the (much more easily refutable) rumor you disseminated to nastily defeat your boss's rival in the 2000 Republican primaries. And eight years later, said rival's distance from your old boss being the single-most compelling trait for Republicans to safely rally around, your old cronies take over his campaign, choosing a running mate whose most salient characteristic besides her nice bod is that she was the only member of the shortlist with a dearth of accomplishments deeper than that of your old boss in 2000, and then exploit the scurrilousness of said (much less obviously mendacious) rumor about said running mate's "personal" life to smear the "media"… (And who is paying for this? The media. "I'm not in the media, I'm around the media" is I believe how Rove put it…)

MEGAN: I wonder, honestly, if Rove even takes himself seriously at this point. I mean, the Palin Blake Slate is one of the reasons she was chosen.

MOE: Nah, he can't possibly. I actually find him more amusing than offensive at this point. Although maybe that's just because I read Safire today.

MEGAN: I did not read Safire today. I honestly feel like reading columnists is like a job that I don't get paid enough to do.

MOE: Don't let it hurt your teeth too much.

MEGAN: Honestly, at the point at which he says that Broder was the only fair pundit in attendance that night, it's hard to gag while I'm laughing so fucking hard.

MOE: And in shades of Friday's "Wow, I can't believe I'm going to calm myself down by talking about Bill O'Reilly," I entreat you to calm yourself down, after taking a gander over there, with the soothing relative sanity being preached by Chuck Krauthammer.

MEGAN: Oh, wait, he said something true:

The McCain acceptance speech reads better than it was read.

Oh, wait, here he's back to teabagging McCain:

That called for McCain to set aside his longtime reluctance to recount publicly his wartime suffering.

Ummmm, you know, except for his FUCKING MEMOIRS.

MOE: Oh shit, I am starting to find Palin so relatable though! Back in Wasilla they used to call her base of support the Liquor Cabinet.

MEGAN: Man, I would totally vote for the Liquor Cabinet.

MOE: Oh dear, and here her ex-brother in law admits he used a Taser on his 10-year-old son.

MEGAN: Ugh, that is super lame. Also, did you notice that after her announcement, she took her bouffant-y twist out? One of my reporter friends was like, she wears it like that to seem taller, she's gonna have to take it out for the campaign, McCain isn't tall enough.

MOE: Oh God Janice Min Janice Minnnn I'm boycotting you now:

“She out Obama’ed Obama with her speech,” said Janice Min, the editor of Us Weekly, who said the criticism of its coverage would pass soon enough. “She came on like a supermom who is not going to take a lot of guff from anyone. The way media works now, it is impossible to separate the personal from the political, and I think her role as a celebrity — how she does on that level — could have a significant effect on the election.”

Yeah I noticed it; I believe they decreed it to be Hepburn-esque in the New York Post. Here, exhibit five.

MEGAN: I didn't tell you! David Carr interviewed me for that piece at the Vanity Fair-Google party... and didn't use my quote. But it might be because I was drinking enough that Ana Marie Cox was like... um, what are you drinking? Because I was sort of lapping her on her alcohol acquisition. That's not the best sign, probably. Ok, I've found my first reason to be actively and yet completely unreasonably against Sarah Palin, other than the whole anti-choice thing: the use of multiple exclamation points:

"New administration finally allows new input, fresh ideas and ENERGY to work with the public to shape this city!!!"

MOE: Ok and I've found my first reason to reconsider my general assertion that the media hasn't been overstepping:

And yet, you get the feeling that at the end of the day, she could shake out that lustrous mane (longer than any other major female U.S. political figure's) and get it on with her man. She wears skirts that are quite form-fitting and often goes without stockings. As ZZ Top might say, she's got legs, and she knows how to use 'em. When Sen. John McCain introduced her at an Aug. 29 campaign rally in Dayton, Ohio, she was wearing open-toed red patent leather shoes.

That is the resident fashion critic at the LA Times.

MEGAN: Um, fucking gross. Also, I have peep toed pumps, that obviously means I'm a fucking whore.

MOE: Well you're obviously a fucking whore. But so am I and I have three pairs of shoes, everyone knows that.

But, oh my God and she is totally the Britney Spears of MILFs.

Palin held her baby in her arms as the warden drove a short distance around the facility, said corrections director Joe Schmidt, who sat next to Palin. A few days later, the governor got a warning from her public safety commissioner that someone had complained that she did not strap Trig into a car seat for the ride.

Palin dismissed the complaint as petty, and the commissioner, whom she appointed, took no formal action. But the incident shows the degree to which family and politics are bound together in Palin's career.

MEGAN: Yes, I mean, shoes do not equal whore, like, wtf is the LA Times fashion critic talking about?

MOE: Um, is that really what "the incident shows" Washington Post?? Or does the incident show that SARAH PALIN IS A TERRIBLE MOTHER WHO NOT FOR NO REASON AT ALL LEAKED AMNIOTIC FLUID ALL OVER THAT PLANE (or whatever.)

MEGAN: Ok, well, that doesn't say back seat or front seat, plus it doesn't mention whether she was breast feeding or not. I dunno, I got kicked out of a bar for being there with a pregnant friend who was like I JUST WANTED ONE GLASS OF WINE. Also, my vagina leaks a lot, particularly when I'm ovulating. I'm like sloppy, annoyingly wet.

MOE: Ugh that is so annoying. Didn't they read the story about how you can actually binge drink during pregnancy so long as you only do it a few times a month or so?

MEGAN: I don't know, they were complete assholic assholes about it.

MOE: OOOOOOH maybe you are just female ejaculating all the time like those women in those other stories who have orgasms all the time and have to strap miniature vibrators to their underwear just to get through the day????

MEGAN: Nah, when I was a teenager, I went to my doctor and she said it was normal. Like, it's my body being like IMPREGNATE ME!! But, fuck that bitch, I have an IUD.
Anyway, so if she got 600 votes in her first election and 900 in her second, then despite what Mitt Romney said, she didn't get as many votes in two elections as Joe Biden got in Iowa.

MOE: Hahaha oh Mitt Romney, please watch him now in this clip I made of that speech — well actually I had Nick McGlynn make it, thank you Nick — but I sat through the speech for the purpose of conveying in 42 seconds how insane it was. And I was pretty sure that crap about Biden getting fewer votes was, in Noonan parlance, "bullshit" but thanks for that.

MEGAN: I heard that and I was like... yeah, there's no way that's true. I used up 90 percent of my internet connection Wednesday night proving it.

MOE: Yeah, the thing that sucks about these Republicans is that they don't care if you fact-check them. I really wish Plouffe or whoever could just get up and say something equally outrageous and blasphemous like…hold on…like how about, "Sarah Palin ran a town that is smaller than many high schools!" Oh wait, that's true, hm, or like, what about "Sarah Palin's fiscally conservative policies managed to sink that tiny little town into enough debt to buy a brand-new Prius for every household in it TOO BAD HER HUSBAND IS THE TOOL OF ALL THOSE STUPID OIL COMPANIES." Ughhhhhh but that would also be true I think!

MEGAN: Oh, shit, another convention story I meant to mention: I met David Gregory in a Starbucks. He's replacing Matthews and Olbermann as anchors. Only, back at Wonkette (now erased in this server migration), I posted this video of him dancing to Mary J. and my friend Eric Brewer tracked him to a video of Obama dancing on Ellen and he had a poll about who was better and Gregory won. So, I was like, hey, so, like, I did this video of you and Obama dancing and he was like, oh, I totally saw that. And then I blushed and got totally awkies.

MOE: Well in lieu of lending credence to the scurrilous rumor I heard about Palin's heroic son in the Army I am going to ask you if you read today's Filkins piece in the Times Magazine about how Pakistan has turned into the Minneapolis of the Terrorist Convention and part of that is flaky Benazir Bhutto's fault for thinking it was a good idea to arm the mujahadeen back when we also thought that was a good idea, oh and did we mention history and that repeating itself thing, as comforting as it is to know that people make the same stupid mistakes and repeat all the same fuckups even in places where the average citizen doesn't consume a metric tonne of alcohol every month, it is not very comforting at all actually. Here it is. Obama was good on this issue the other night with O'Reilly, incidentally, not that O'Reilly had any idea.

MEGAN: I keep meaning to watch the O'Reilly shit, but my parents don't have cable. Anyways, anyone who elects Zadari deserves what they get, sort of like how I feel the overwhelming majority of people who either voted in GWB for a second term or — more likely — didn't fucking bother to vote better not now be bitching about their adjustable rate mortgage, I tell you what. Even people in Pakistan know he's a Thaksin-level corrupt asshat — and they probably have some idea who the fuck Thaksin is, too. Also, I object to the assertion that I consume a metric tonne of alcohol a month. That's why I mostly drink wine and hard liquor, to keep the tonnage down.

MOE: Oh god yeah Thailand, we could discuss that too, and Freddie and Fannie, THE NIGHT COULD LAST FOREVER. But what's hot right now? I thought the Times magazine story by Frum on Republicans and income inequality was interesting, if namely for its incongruity following a week during which the proverbial Bullshit, as Janice Min so eloquently pointed out, triumphed so decisively over Shit That Actually Matters.

MEGAN: Wait, income inequality? Get yourself some fucking bootstraps, yo. Does anyone even fucking know what bootstraps are?

MOE: Whoa, the origins of all the Palin kid names! Turns out that taken together they all come together to mean "CANNY ATTEMPTS TO DEFLECT OBVIOUS CORPORATE BEHOLDENNESS BY INGRATIATING SELVES TO NATURE FETISHIZING IDIOCRACY" or just "FLAGRANT POLITICKING RIGHT FROM THE START." Fuck I somehow didn't realize Sarah Palin married Todd because she was knocked up. That is so rouge cou.

MEGAN: I mean, it's like a month, tops that they knew. Chances are, like other super-Catholic friends of mine, they boned a little early and found out a couple weeks after the wedding regardless.

MOE: Nah nah Track was born eight months after they eloped "to save money." I dunno, it's funny. God, who gets pregnant the first time they have sex? Well, I have a friend whose parents did, but how crazy. Oh man it's getting late though I guess. And there's still so much! Damn the weekend for being over.

MEGAN: Well, luckily, I opened a magnum of wine! I got plenty of time!

MOE: Ok i'm getting another beer. Dogfish 90 minute IPA, not that they're sponsoring me. Not that i would LET THEM.

MEGAN: I've got a Yellowtail Cabernet. I am not going to pretend if a winery wanted to sponsor my blogging I would deny them the opportunity, but I would rather it be something non-corporate like Guglielmo or Hecker Pass, two of my favorite family wineries.

MOE: Ugh are we too far-gone — and too far down on the moral authority pay grade — to weigh in on Biden's belief that life begins at conception? Because personally I am inclined to say "well sure it does, so what" but you all know how paranoid I am about seeming "flip."

MEGAN: I mean, Biden's a Catholic, that's the party line, right? I just don't buy that. I don't believe it in the slightest. I'm not sure I believe in a soul. Potential life? Ok, maybe, but all evidence is that plenty of potential lives are ejected regularly from women's bodies. I just... I just don't buy that a zygote is A Life.

MOE: Right, well the "soul" is a different matter. As I think we might have discussed before, there's a genuine debate within the believers in souls as to how a soul could be formed at conception, then split into two separate souls two weeks later. Anyway "Life" …bacteria is life. Now human life is more important than animal life, but ughhhh if embryo life or fetus life was as precious as regular fully formed human life you would think there would be a huge public health campaign to finally put an end to the mysterious plague that silently kills as many as one in four humans before they even have the chance to get heartbeats! But there is not. And now I am tired.

MEGAN: My sister's fiancé was just asking when I was going to bed. I could stop drinking and try that out.

MOE: Yeah this is the longest Crappy Hour ever already I think. I've been drinking really slow and am still tired and I think that is a sign.

MEGAN: Ok, so, I'll check you at an abortion-esque ungodly hour on Tuesday.

MOE: Oh, but that David Gregory story was awesome.

MEGAN: There's nothing like embarrassing oneself in a Starbucks full of Republicans to make embarrassing oneself on the Internet seem totes minor.

MOE: OH FOR CHRISSAKES PEGGY

This is the authentic sound of the American mama, of every mother you know at school who joins the board, reads the books, heads the committee, and gets the show on the road.

Don't you mean bans the books??? Can I go back to bed now?

MEGAN: Didn't you read? We the elitist media are sorry for daring to ask questions and will stick to just parroting whatever it is that Sarah Palin has written for her! No more questions! No more questions! Anyway, technically, I am in bed because it was so nice and warm and I didn't really want to get out of it anyway. My back hurts from the crappy chairs at the Xcel Center.

MOE: I need to puke.

Her averageness accentuated her specialness. Her commonality highlighted her uniqueness.

Right, because the middle class has done so much evaporating in the past 18 years and she hasn't changed her hair since the Reagan administration! Because in any other state, Sarah Palin's "First Dude" would be a Ford salesman. UGHHHHH KILL BABY KILL ME NOW Also, who fucking called her Baberaham LIncoln? Isn't that something from like Wayne's World? That used to be Blakeley's commenter name if I recall.

MEGAN: No, now, let's be fair. Sarah Palin had some righteous 80s hair in the 80s, hair the likes of which I found it personally impossible to ever achieve. The little bouffant-twist thingie is not 80s, it's totally something out of the 50s. Yes, I believe that is from Wayne's World: "If she was a President, she's be Baberaham Lincoln." I'm sure some important information no longer resides in my brain so that tidbbit could remains. Also, frankly, the Palinphilia was the least offensive portion of the night. Watching the 9/11 film that made Rudy's refrain seem tasteful really drowns out all the Palin shit.

MOE:

Campbell Brown of CNN did nothing wrong for instance in pressing a campaign spokesman on Palin's foreign policy credentials. She was unjustly criticized for following an appropriate and necessary line of inquiry. But endless front page stories connected to Mrs. Palin's 17-year-old daughter? Cable news shows that had people insinuating Palin, whom America had not yet even met, was a bad mother, and that used her daughter's circumstances to examine Republican views on abstinence education? That was ugly.

MEGAN: Campbell Brown was completely justified, but that didn't stop the campaign from pulling all MSNBC interviews after that.

MOE: You know what about the media is ugly? That you can get away with, all on the same day, writing a column slamming the media "bubbleheads" for tonedeafly ignoring a candidate's powerful "narrative" on the basis of the rampant falsehood that it's a "nation of Wasillas," then admit in the studio in a gaffe heard round the internet that you think it was dumb for the Republicans to choose a running mate on the basis of this "bullshit about narrative," then watch said candidate give a speech that's inanity is trumped only by its meanness that is for some Bubbleheaded reason considered widely successful

MEGAN: By the way, one of the Republicans I know has the Gchat status "Palin-McCain!".

MOE: And then write a column praising the candidate's fucking narrative (including how she kept that Down syndrome baby!) while attacking the media scrutiny of the veracity of the FUCKING NARRATIVE.

MEGAN: It was successful because it was mean and because it didn't address hard issues. Republicans don't want to talk about issues, they want their Weltanschauung reinforced without the use of foreign words. Also, I looked this up earlier this week but don't have the statistical chart handy, if I recall correctly, older women are more likely to bring a Downs baby to term than younger women. And they probs ought to stop referring to it as her "choice." If they don't want to be pro-choice, they should say stuff like "It was my moral obligation to bring Trig to term. There was no 'choice.'"

MOE: You know what Peggy? I thought it didn't get much more galling to watch fucking Sarah Palin slam Barack Obama's memoir writing when she has achieved so very little herself and her running mate has in fact written more memoirs than Obama, I thought it was audacious to watch fucking Sarah Palin get up and lie yet again about how she singlehandedly shut down construction of the Bridge To Nowhere, but this column, all things considered = actually more audacious!

MEGAN: Also, if Steve Schmidt uses that line, my fees are totally as reasonable as Mark Penn's.

MOE: Ughhh anyway this is probably a first for liberalkind but I am actually going to calm myself down by thinking about what I saw on the O'Reilly Factor last night.

MEGAN: Ummmm, that is kind of completely a first. Watching the boring lead-in speeches, I wished my Internet connection was good enough to have watched a live feed or something.

MOE: Did you watch? It was funny. Bill O'Reilly was a kind of hilarious combination of bullying and deferential. He is so doglike somehow. At the end he told everyone that he'd looked Obama in the eye and said, "This guy is not a wimp. He is tough, that Obama." Obama might have pointed out when O'Reilly kept begging him to promise him he was prepared for war with Iran that Al Qaeda actually funds much of the Iranian resistance, but as it was he just sort of shook that dirt off his shoulder as one does. Then O'Reilly made some hilarious proclamation about how Carrie Underwood was a patriot and Lily Allen and Elton John were pinheads. All around a good night. And then I went out. Did you see McCain? I have no idea what happened between then and now and will probably need coffee to figure that out.

MEGAN: Dude, the reason I didn't see O'Reilly is that I was sitting in rapt boredom at my computer at the Xcel Center waiting, waiting, waiting for John McCain. He came, he saw, he got less applause that Sarah Palin and twice as many disruptive Code Pink protestors.

MOE: Are you afraid of Palin? I cannot get inside the head of someone who doesn't find her vapid, vacuous, one those nice ladies around town that seems harmless enough until you have reason to glimpse inside her soul one day while watching her skin a moose or summarily dissolve a PTA or perjure herself in an attempt to get a state trooper fired. In that sense I think Peggy's right, there was something "I know this lady" about this lady, but what America also knows about that sort of lady is that if that lady is in a position of power chances are she is a total phony.

MEGAN: I don't know that I'm scared of Palin. I think she plays well with a certain demographic. I am scared that the media has decided that she's almost untouchable on the issues and that McCain is using her to argue that they needn't talk to the media anymore and that her written-by-committee speeches delivered to the American People will suffice because the media is eeeevil coming and going . And I'm more scared that too many Americans will buy the Evil Media theme and stop actually trying to learn anything about her.

MOE: Oh wow huh.

MEGAN: Yeah, that's what I was saying earlier. It was seriously amazing offensive. It was like "If you hate 9/11, love us!" as though Democrats are pro-9/11.
Oh, hey, look, my criticism of Sarah Palin was premature! She took a question! Phew. Never mind.

MOE: Ugh as a semi member of the media I can say I feel like letterbombing everyone who has attacked the media in the media over the past few days. The only outlet I believe "overstepped" in any way was Us Weekly and not from a factual perspective but from a "Uhhhhh this is not going to help you at the newsstand" perspective. But I get it now, I get it all; the media is going bananas because somehow this Sarah Palin thing has re-bestowed upon Republicans their ability to tell bald faced lies and repeat them and repeat them and repeat them some more with impunity! (And who knows if there's actual impunity, the point is that Republicans know that the assumption of impunity is more than enough to get them through the next few wars!) Read this little missive by McCain admirer and frustrated media member Jake Tapper . The GOP has everyone riled up. It's totally nuts.

MEGAN: Well, but, Chelsea was, like, an elitist awkward nerdy girl. And you and I were both elitist awkward nerdy girls, and EANGs are always fair game for people to make fun of. It's like a rule in life. John McCain probably started doing it when he was "popular" in high school and, like many asshole jocks, just never stopped. You can't blame him for thinking that making fun of a EANG was still cool, it's like an enduring part of Americana. Now if Sarah and Todd Palin had an unfortunately awkward child... But, instead, they have the brunette version of the Gore girls.

MOE: And what I mean is, because the Republicans no longer feel chastened, because they have this cute little governor mom who bakes cupcakes unironically — does she so much as know about ironic cupcakes? — telling them it's ALL OKAY. Go ahead kids, keep on lying about the Bridge to Nowhere and that eBay plane and my phony record of cutting down pork. Go ahead and use that footage of the terrorists attacking New York to send the message that only Republicans care about the big festering bacchanalian urban centers where no one ever actually votes Republican.

MEGAN: Look, after 10 days of eating on the road, if bitch wants to give me an homemade cupcake, I'm not going to pretend like I wouldn't enjoy every last second of eating it. But I still would be offended by the 9/11 film.

MOE: Oh man and catch Ta-Nehisi Coates with the updates. I feel his pain. And related: half?? why just half??

MEGAN: Maybe for the same reason that even poor Republicans don't like raising taxes on the rich ones? Because they expect to be rich — or VP — some day? Or because after 8 years of GWB, our expectations of what it takes not to send the country spiraling into Armageddon is somewhat... reduced?

MOE: That's just it. The soft bigotry of low expectations etc. etc. Anyway I guess "only" 42% think she's fit to lead. Like only 40% of people thought Saddam Hussein bankrolled September 11 etc. etc. Okay I just went in and tried to make some coffee hoping it will put me in a better mood.

MEGAN: I would be in a better mood if I was back to sleep.

MOE: Doubtful; while I was grinding the beans it occurred to me that O'Reilly and Westmoreland and Mitt Romney are as stubborn and bullying and useless in the face of reason or even advanced rhetoric as CERTAIN DUDES I HAVE DATED. If only America could text message breakup with the GOP.

MOE: Okay sooooo … you know how I always say I genetically don't have the capacity to get "offended"? Uh, well. Ummmmm…holy shit. And here I thought we could maybe get in some real news today, like about how Mugabe is sort of doing on a mass scale with Zimbabweans what that weird New Jersey couple did with their foster kids and getting a few fat while leaving the less-special ones to starve…
MOE: Or how pirates control the seas off Nigeria or how this Genocide Olympics stuff has finally put pressure on China to ask the Sudanese government to uh “push forward the peacekeeping mission and political process in a balanced manner" or the great Korean Beef Beef.

MEGAN: I was just about to send you the Michelle Obama thing, too. Query: what other potential first lady has been referred to not as "the wife and the mother of his children" but as a candidate's "baby mama?" Because I'm going to say none. I guess it's apparently ok, though, because she's, like, black and that's, like, what "they" call each other, right? No subtext there, let's just make sure to remind everyone that the Obamas aren't white.
MOE: Unrelated: The Boy Scout leader they are interviewing on Fox re some natural disaster is kind of, you know, foxy. But why the open shirt, kid?
MOE: Okay, back to my belle though. Whoever approved that needs to be fired STAT.
MEGAN: Yeah, I'm gonna guess: not. Though E.D. Hill did get the ax for the terrorist fist bump thingie, even though she was, apparently, quoting an overblown story from the crazy right-wing site Human Events which I'm not going to link to.
MOE: One thing that actually really surprises me about all this too is that yesterday I was watching Fox, and O'Reilly had on that guy who made "Hillary: The Movie" — he's made a new movie about the Obamas! — and O'Reilly was all, "Oh just shut up about Michelle's antiamericanism already, she's explained it, that was back in February, she seems like a nice person, why beat up on the guy's wife," etc. etc.
MOE: And dude, that was O'Reilly.
MEGAN: Yeah, for real. But the HTM guy is, like, a total wack job, did I tell you I met him?
MOE: Incidentally he also told the guy to stop kvetching about how the campaign hadn't released Obama's college thesis on nuclear disarmament. "We all write boneheaded stuff in college, get a life."
MEGAN: Oh, and you know why they had to rush "production" of the movie? So they can advertise it without FEC intervention.
MOE: I still haven't watched it but I found it the other day whilst looking for important documents.
MEGAN: I'm just sad no one is trying to read my college thesis. It was like a solid 6 months of my life and in the whole universe, only 4 people read it.
MEGAN: Oh, well, totally get drunk and watch the movie, it's only worth watching altered.
MOE: Seriously dude, though, WHAT THE FUCK MEGAN.
MOE: Oh by the way, readers who were offended by my addressing Geraldine Ferraro "sweetie" in my Hirshman rebuttal; the original line was: "Sweetie, John McCain left his first wife in the wake of a debilitating car accident and called his second a "cunt" in front of reporters."That was a sort of rhetorical device, meant to contrast "sweetie" (representing the Obama's most noted offense against womanity) with "cunt" (representing McCain's.) It didn't work out so well in the edit, because apparently you aren't allowed to use the word "cunt" in the Washington Post, though "sweetie" is apparently passable.
MEGAN: Also, Jesus Christ, people, a little satire?
MEGAN: Oh, wait, I forgot, we're all supposed to be humorless and opinion-free. This is a news outlet!
MOE: This is getting me off-topic, but there is a (very very bronze) Hillary supporter making the rounds on Fox saying Hillary supporters are choosing McCain because they can't tolerate a "less experienced" candidate than Hillary, which I think is a crock of shit, but it was probably smart that they reverse their "sexism" argument in time for Fox to employ the term "Baby Mama." Unless Tina Fey told them it was okay?

MEGAN: Yeah, I saw her yesterday! She said she'd really like to see Clinton on McCain's ticket, so, frankly, I don't really think she's concerned with "feminist" issues per se.
MOE: Hot new phrase alert! "Consummate political insider"…spotted in today's Times and Jim Hoagland's column…three makes a trend! As I am the consummate idiot savante regarding the Beltway corporate interest groupies, I am wondering if you'll explain to me whether this Jim Johnson thing is a big deal or like if the McCain thing is that big a deal and whether there is anyone in Washington who is going to survive a campaign that banishes anyone who takes money from the corporations who actually make it or whether we are going to be left with Kucinich as a running mate.
MOE: And speaking of Kucinich, who was on O'Reilly last night as well, WHERE DID HIS WIFE GO. I miss Elizabeth.
MEGAN: I think she's probably somewhere working for peace.
9:30 AM
MEGAN: I mean, I don't think the rich stuff about Jim Johnson is a huge deal. I think the stuff about him getting a special loan from Countryside isn't really good.
MEGAN: But I think the bigger problem is how to integrate what has essentially been an "outsider" campaign with the Democratic party machine.
MEGAN: And the people that go with it, some of whom are sketchy. It's not like all lobbyists are Republican, it's not even like all corporate lobbyists are Republican or all shady lobbyists are Republican. There's plenty of shadiness in both parties.
MOE: Okay, we gotta return to Michelle. I'm cynical, sure, but I find this shit actually chilling. But also: it is sort of fascinating. There is so little range when it comes to public stereotypes of black women. Like, part of them are trying to cast her as a cold imperious vengeful anti-American bitch, and the rest are just like "no man, just call her BABY MAMA." Think of all the illicit sex they must have had that summer with all the Spike Lee movies. I hear they had chocolate ice cream on their first date. YOU KNOW WHAT THAT'S CODE FOR????
MEGAN: mmmm, chocolate ice cream
MEGAN: Oh, wait, right, we were talking about race.
MEGAN: I actually sort of beat MoDo to the punch yesterday, after I'd read a bunch of really good bloggy stuff about it.

MEGAN: Like, where are all the women who were crying sexism two weeks ago? Because all the stuff I've seen about baby mama and Michelle Obama — until fucking Maureen Dowd — in the MSM has been written by men.
MEGAN: It seems like most of them are still crying over Clinton even as the right wingers are re-writing their 1992 attacks about Clinton's fitness to be First Lady because of her baking skills and (gasp) having a career to suit Michelle, with a lovely little side of racial overtones.

MOE: OK I guess we gotta do this today like every day but I got nothin but a sharp pain in my right temple.
MEGAN: Yeah, dude, today sort of sucks for news. Where was everyone yesterday?
MEGAN: It's so slow, Politico has a column about what Obama should go dirty about if he went dirty.
MOE: Well the DC madam was en route to... the big brothel in the sky? And NY State Supreme Court Justice Robert Doyle was in the parking lot, arraigning a guy who was too fat to squeeze into the courtroom. I was getting a facial and buying shoes and going to the National Magazine Awards, which were incredibly exciting. Hillary was getting her ass licked by everyone on Fox News for her courage and grace under the pressure of "The master" Bill O'Reilly.
MEGAN: Also, Congressman Vito Fossella got arrested for a DUI in Alexandria. Dude, that's what interns are for,

MEGAN: to drive your drunk ass home
MOE: I do kind of love something about this:

"You're a polarizing personality," Mr. O'Reilly chuckled during the interview. "You're like I am, and I hate to say that," he said.

MOE: Yeah or when you just learn that the "that bartender is TOTALLY IGNORING ME BECAUSE SHE HATES ME" sensation is a very self-obsessed one and that, if you just chill, they will come. Although sometimes at the Magician it can feel like it is taking a hysterically long time for the bartenders to remember there is another side of the bar. But hey people spend three days in line for bread in Venezuela.
MEGAN: And prolly longer for good dirt cookies in Haiti. You know, I will admit that I have in past years done better with male bartenders than female (cleavage=attention getting device) but lately I've been making friends with lady bartenders, too. I have one's card from last Friday night. She was fun. I taught her how to make a new champagne cocktail.
MOE: I don't know why I am talking so much about alcohol on this hangover but I do enjoy a Kir Royale once in awhile. I always figure bartenders respect that I stick to whiskey and the snobbiest ales they have on tap. But I flatter myself. And male or female it doesn't seem to matter in my case. Although making out at a bar you are more likely to be kicked out by females I think.
MEGAN: I've never been kicked out of a bar for making out. Being rowdy, yes. Making out, no.
MOE: Yeah, the Magician again. I guess I have some unresolved hostility toward that place.
MOE: Never kicked out for being rowdy though.
MOE: Oh wait I missed my segue.
MEGAN: Seg away!
MOE: Obama drank crap beer
MEGAN: God. Panderer.

MEGAN: Oooh, a minister asked McCain about the cunt thing! And he wouldn't say.
MOE: It worked!

Obama greeted George L Sheneman, 80, who pulled out a yellowed letter which Obama read and thanked the man for his service. Your pooler chatted later with Sheneman, who was born in North Liberty and who said he is now an Obama supporter. The letter was one of gratitude from President Truman, written in 1947 when he was discharged from Korea. He served there before the war.

"We have a man whose temper can get the best of him," Parrish said. "What I am worried about is his temper. Our country is in a serious crisis. This election is the most significant one since 1860. It appears America is asleep — so I stood up and asked the question."

MOE: Okay, I'm going to say something about Hillary.
MEGAN: WARNING: CONTROVERSIAL PARTISAN CONTENT TO FOLLOW
MOE: Maybe I am glad she has stayed around this long. Because the Republicans who are suspicious of Obama, namely because he breathes new life into Old Liberal Values and is, truly, "transformative" in terms of the ideological battle between left and right in this country, have been forced to reconsider Hillary entirely. And what started as "grudging self-serving respect" seems to have turned into something more genuine. I truly think some of the same Angry White Men who made her ankles and her cookies and her arrogance into such the Machialesbian Menace have changed their minds. I think the respect is more genuine today. I think they are listening to her when she talks. I could be wrong and it could all be a put-on. But hearing Fox News on the subject of Hillary is about the only thing I can really bear to hear them discuss that isn't, you know, celebushit.
MEGAN: I think part of it's put on, but I'd agree that being in it long enough had brought her more respect than she had before.
MEGAN: However, part of me selfishly wishes that the stupid thing was already decided.
MOE: I mean, of course it is. But in the put on I think a lot of partisan right wingers have really been forced to genuinely rethink Hillary. Ann Coulter is 95% satire, but there was some genuine fondness in her various pro-Hillary screeds, and I'd possibly say the same for Rush, and I think it's really fascinating. Because I never understood in the first place how she was so polarizing — I always thought she was just beholden, and possibly too interested in power for power's sake, and I hate Bill Clinton — and Bill O'Reilly's deference toward her I think was something of a watershed.

MOE: Oh also black churchgoers feel the same way we do about Jeremiah Wright
MEGAN: I think that's sort of where the sexism comes in. Plus they hate Bill Clinton, too, for coopting their messages and being a better politician than them. And possibly for fucking their wives/sisters/daughters.
MOE: I think the campaign has forced a lot of sexists to acknowledge their own sexism definitely. also
MOE: This funny blog called Jeremiah Wright an example of "When Keeping It Real Goes Wrong" and I just got a reallll bad case of Chapelle nostalgia.
MOE: Where the Fuck is Dave right now for this election
MEGAN: Aw, Dave Chapelle! If it helps you come back, I'll totally pretend to not find you funny!
MEGAN: Jerking off into piles of cash?
MOE: Yeah I will come see you and bring 9 black people with me!
MEGAN: And I'll pretend to be shocked and slightly horrified by your comedy!