Someone is due to come out on the Simpsons this season, according to its producers. Who will it be? It cannot be Waylon Smithers: he’s already out. Patty, Marge’s sister? Carl, Homer’s workplace buddy? Jimbo, Bart’s school bully? My own favorite: Groundskeeper Willie. No straight man has that good a body at his age. Dark horse: Ned Flanders. He’s a born-again with a very well-manicured mustache. Hmmm. Any other suggestions?
THE CRAWFORD WIVES: A below-the-belt but relatively amusing NARAL ad.
QUOTE OF THE DAY: “Europeans mock American religiosity. But American religion, for all its attendant idiocies and cruelties, has never prevented Americans from acting pragmatically. Secular Western European intellectuals, however, have their own version of religion. It is a social-democratic religion that deifies international organizations such as the Red Cross, Amnesty International, and, above all, the U.N. Not NATO, which is about waging war, and which has for that reason been the target of much European criticism in recent years; no, the NGOs are about waging peace, love, brotherhood, and solidarity, and, as such, are, for the elites of Western Europe, beyond criticism, for they embody Western Europe’s most cherished idea of itself and of the way the world works, or should work. The elites’ enthusiasm for these institutions, whether or not they are genuinely effective or even admirable, is a matter of maintaining a certain self-image and illusion of the world that is intimately tied up with their identity as social democrats; America’s unforgivable offense, as Kagan notes, is that it challenges that image and that illusion; and the degree to which the reality of America is distorted in the Western European media is a measure of the desperate need among Western European elites to preserve that self-image and illusion.” – from Bruce Bawer’s excellent review-essay, “Hating America.”
GOP GAY-BAITING: Check out the top right-hand picture of Edwards and Kerry on this Republican site, challenging the Democratic convention. They make it look as if Edwards and Kerry are about to lip-lock. This has been a mild tactic so far, but it’s getting blatant. And it’s another indication that gay-baiting is now a central plank of the GOP.
The Dish 