• Remember how Sarah Palin sold the governor's plane to save money? Well, to make up for it, she insisted on using the Public Safety Department's plane (the one for police missions and search and rescue) and used to get pissy when she couldn't just use it. As it was, she accounted for 20 percent of its time. [MSNBC]
• By the way, her personal shopper is also the guy behind the Obama-Ayers robocalls she supposedly hates, and her vocal coach was expensed as a "Get Out The Vote" effort by the campaign. Is there anything she won't try to pull? [Huffington Post, Politico]
• Radar is shopping a new movie idea to help turn out Jewish voters for McCain: Woody Palin. Dick jokes welcome. [Radar]
• Speaking of dicks, McCain foreign policy hacks Jim Woolsey and Randy Scheunemann want you to believe that when al Qaeda operatives say they want McCain to win, they're trying to fool you, but when other terrorists support Obama, you should vote against terrorists. Up is the new down, people. [Washington Independent]

• If you thought McCain wouldn't just casually drop the word "cunt" in front of a crowd, watch as he does it on stage. Even Cindy takes a step back, because that's what she usually does when he yells the word "cunt." [YouTube]
• Speaking of, Michelle Bachmann is trying to use her Hardball appearance to raise money, possible because the RNC is pulling their money out of her race in the wake of her comments that liberals should be investigated for their un-American views. [Politico, Huffington Post]
• And Ellen DeGeneres is not a fan of Sarah Palin's idea of getting a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage or pretty much anything else Sarah Palin thinks about all the gay people she tolerates. Who is, really? [Huffington Post]

Almond argues — as I have — that McCain's supposed sense of humor is indicative of a larger problem with women. Who finds rape jokes funny, let alone what Presidential candidate is so tone-deaf that he things putting off answering a question with "And I stopped beating my wife just a couple of weeks ago..." is smart, funny or in good taste? Almond asks, and rightly so, whether Barack Obama could in a million years crack a joke about a woman enjoying being raped by a gorilla without a mainstream media uproar, as opposed to the shoulder-shrug that McCain got. And the answer, we all have to concede, is no — and not just because of his age.

But Almond's got other evidence, garnered from that scathing Rolling Stone profile of a few weeks ago, which detailed how a younger McCain cursed out two women that didn't appreciate being hollered, his profligate adultery, and how he lived with his wife for months before taking out a marriage license to marry Cindy — which, naturally, occurred before McCain divorced his first wife. There is, of course, the obligatory mention of when McCain called his wife a "cunt" in front of reporters and the joke about a teenaged Chelsea Clinton being ugly (daughter Meghan would have been just reaching puberty herself at the time). All in all, it's not an unknown record, but it's not a pretty one.

Steve goes a step further, though, and asks us to view the Palin nomination in context of McCain's many infidelities, misogynist jokes and ugly temper. He'd like us to have another look at the interview with Katie Couric where John McCain interrupts Sarah Palin and Katie Couric and talks over them about Pakistan and "gotcha" journalism, as well as the way he and his staff have attempted to shield Governor Palin from the press and keep her from answering tough questions and then ask ourselves: does John McCain respect Sarah Palin? Does he respect women voters (let alone male voters) with this choice? Would he have picked her if she looked like the much-maligned Janet Reno? I think those are all legitimate questions, and I'd add one more. When you're hugging a work colleague — if you tend to hug work colleagues — how many times do they wrap their arms fully around you if you're just grabbing their shoulders before you start to get freaked out?

McNasty? [Nerve]

Related: What John McCain's Jokes Say About His View Of Women [Glamocracy]
Make-Believe Maverick [Rolling Stone]

• Not to in any way indicate that we have anything less than the utmost horror and offense for torture, but Lt. Col. Diane Beaver who once urged our armed forces to conduct more brutal interrogations at Gitmo, testified today before the Senate Armed Services Committee about her role in torturing various people. Even when the jokes aren't appropriate, we still have to make them. [Washington Independent]
• Really, it was the fault of this video, which you should not listen to at your office without earphones, that explores in great depth why the news media didn't cover the "John McCain called his wife a cunt" story. [Erica Saves the Day, Glamocracy]
• Also, studies show you're drinking more than you think you're drinking, so tip your bartender well! [LA Times]
• Oh, what you wanted real news? Fine. Check in with me after the jump.

• John McCain and George W Bush have more in common than just their Iraq, tax and environmental policies. They also both got ahead in life because they had powerful daddies. [NY Times, HuffPo]
• Obama says that Osama bin Laden is free because of the Republicans' focus on Iraq. This will likely be really unpopular among people that still believe that Saddam had WMDs and the Iraq War was necessary to stop him from nuking us.[HuffPo]
• Kansas anti-abortion protesters have decided that if they can't win hearts, minds or good legal cases, they'll just use a century-old law to harass an abortion provider. [NY Times]
• Their brothers- and sisters-in-ideological-fundie-arms are busy trying to get people not to enforce other laws though. Mostly the ones that require that California marry gay people. Assholes. [iReport]
• But there is some good stuff in the world and this country today, like the International Violence Against Women Act that Betty Makoni came here from Zimbabwe to lobby for. See? Not all lobbying is bad, people. [Washington Post]

She was the lady with three boobs in Total Recall!

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!

• John McCain called his wife a "cunt" sixteen years ago. The full quote, in response to Cindy's "playful" mention of his male pattern baldness, was: "At least I don't plaster on makeup like a trollop, you cunt." I have to give him bonus points for using the word "trollop" and also, calling her out on what looks to be an unhealthy relationship with Mary Kay, and by the same token I have to give Cindy bonus points for adopting a Bangladeshi child, weaning herself off painkillers and throwing all that addictive energy into applying nine coats of foundation. (And what can we say, Meghan: she comes by it honestly.) [Wonkette]
  
• Spike Lee is really glad he made Do The Right Thing, otherwise Barack Obama would have taken Michelle to see Soul Man and America's greatest union would have been jeopardized. Also: the "Clintons would lie on a stack of Bibles." [NY Mag]
  
• 61% of historians agree that Bush is the Worst President Ever, according to an unscientific History Network poll of 109 historians. And just how did he go about pulling that off? Well, he combined "the paranoia of Nixon, the ethics of Harding and the good sense of Herbert Hoover," in the words of one historian, and applied laserlike focus to doing "only two things well," explained one of the survey's "most distinguished" historians. "He knows how to make the very rich very much richer, and he has an amazing talent for f**king up everything else he even approaches." [History Network]

• We now interrupt our regularly-scheduled broadcast of John McCain's speech on the success of the troop surge to report on mortar fire hitting the Green Zone! [Think Progress]
• The Washington Post's Dana Priest, who won a Pulitzer two years ago for revealing the existence of those secret CIA prisons in Eastern Europe where torture — which is not the same as torment! — is allowed...won another Pulitzer! For revealing that Walter Reed Johnson hospital is not much better! Dana Priest, incidentally, is female. [Wash Post]
• But the Post won other Pulitzers, unfortunately none for their courageous effort to legalize Ecstasy, but one for Gene Weingarten, who IMHO should have won a long time ago for this epic and eerily prescient masterpiece on the state of education in America.

Related: The V-Day Event Of The Decade [VDay]
Earlier: Why Is The Word Cunt Still Such A Big Deal?

There — and in the rest of the British Commonwealth — , the word is used so much that maybe I became desensitized. (It's also interesting to note that the Brits use the word to describe men in addition to women.) But it wasn't until I began covering The Fashionista Diaries and called PR bitch Mandie Erickson out on her cunt-y behavior and rechristened her "Cunt Face" that I began to notice that people are still very much offended by the word. Someone in the comments even said that it was inappropriate for us, as feminists, to use the word when describing a woman.

The history of the word and a bid for its reclamation was explored back in the late '90s in Inga Muscio's book Cunt. (Which I read in college, but don't remember much from it. I was always stoned back then.) I thought as feminists we were beyond this. I mean, when I call someone a cunt, I'm not doing it to offend them, or to try to make an extra impact, because the word is just as common in my vocabulary as "fuck" or "like." Doesn't assigning extra significance to a word make it more powerful? Like, if we use it a lot, don't we take away some of the "badness" of it? Just the other day, I called a jar of roasted red peppers I couldn't get open a "cunt". The way I see it, using the term doesn't make me a bad feminist, it makes me a good one. How's that for some twisted logic?

Cunt [Amazon]
Earlier: Mandie "Cunt Face" Erickson: To Know Her Is To Loathe Her