Malkin Award Nominee

by Patrick Appel

"What would have happened if Mother Mary had been covered by Obamacare? What if that young, poor and uninsured teenage woman had been provided the federal funds (via Obamacare) and facilities (via Planned Parenthood, etc.) to avoid the ridicule, ostracizing, persecution and possible stoning because of her out-of-wedlock pregnancy? Imagine all the great souls who could have been erased from history and the influence of mankind if their parents had been as progressive as Washington¹s wise men and women! Will Obamacare morph into Herodcare for the unborn?," -Chuck Norris, Human Events.

Malkin Award Nominee

by Chris Bodenner

"First they came for the rich. And I did not speak out because I was not rich. Then they came for the property owners, and I did not speak out because I did not own property. Then they came for the right to bear arms, and I did not speak out because I was not armed. Then they came for me and denied me my medical care, and there was no one left to speak for me," – Laura Ingraham, protesting the Senate healthcare bill at a rally in DC. Original poem here.

Malkin Award Nominee

by Chris Bodenner

"The Obami, in all their sanctimonious glory, will rise above the mundane concerns for safety and security and throw overboard our own judicial history and precedents. This is nothing more than an exercise in moral preening. We’ll impress our European friends and the academic Left. For the enemy is us," – Jennifer Rubin, on moving detainees to Thomson, Illinois.

Are John McCain, Colin Powell, David Petraeus, and George W. Bush part of our "European friends" or the "academic Left"? Because all of them have supported closing Gitmo.

Yglesias Award Nominee

by Chris Bodenner

"I'm sorry to say that Mr. Flint has a legitimate point when he raises the safety issue. Unprotected anal sex is the most efficient mode of transmission for HIV; female-to-male transmission of HIV is more difficult—and therefore rarer—than male-to-female or male-to-male transmission. If brothels hire gay or bi men, or gay brothels open in Nevada (which seems likely), the brothel industry will have to aggressively enforce the use of condoms and be even more vigilant about testing or it could face its [as Flint called it] "Pearl Harbor," i.e. HIV infections traced back to Nevada's brothels. But a legal, regulated market—brothels with male sex workers who are tested and who can force condoms onto reluctant/whiny/selfish clients by blaming house rules—is preferable to the boys-for-rent system Nevada currently has," – Dan Savage, on the opposition of brothel lobbyist George Flint to the new Nevada law allowing men to prostitute themselves. (As for the other point Flint raises – "Some may feel it’s a repugnant thing to do…" – Savage has a very different response.)

Malkin Award Nominee

by Chris Bodenner

They’re getting free organ transplants this Christmas.
They’re going to have anchor babies this Christmas.
They’re going to scream “sí, se puede” this Christmas.
Those illegals in my yard

They’re going to spread bubonic plague this Christmas.
They’re going to bring me lots of bed bugs this Christmas.
They’re going to pass tuberculosis this Christmas.
Those illegals in my yard.

– a Human Events carol.

Poseur Alert Nominee

by Patrick Appel

"Her vulva was opposite my face. The small lips protruded slightly from the pale, domed flesh. This sex was watching at me, spying on me, like a Gorgon's head, like a motionless Cyclops whose single eye never blinks. Little by little this silent gaze penetrated me to the marrow. My breath sped up and I stretched out my hand to hide it: I no longer saw it, but it still saw me and stripped me bare (whereas I was already naked). If only I could still get hard, I thought, I could use my prick like a stake hardened in the fire, and blind this Polyphemus who made me Nobody. But my cock remained inert, I seemed turned to stone. I stretched out my arm and buried my middle finger into this boundless eye. The hips moved slightly, but that was all. Far from piercing it, I had on the contrary opened it wide, freeing the gaze of the eye still hiding behind it. Then I had an idea: I took out my finger and, dragging myself forward on my forearms, I pushed my forehead against this vulva, pressing my scar against the hole. Now I was the one looking inside, searching the depths of this body with my radiant third eye, as her own single eye irradiated me and we blinded each other mutually: without moving, I came in an immense splash of white light, as she cried out: 'What are you doing, what are you doing?' and I laughed out loud, sperm still gushing in huge spurts from my penis, jubilant, I bit deep into her vulva to swallow it whole, and my eyes finally opened, cleared, and saw everything." – Jonathan Littell, The Kindly Ones, winner of the 2009 Bad Sex In Writing Award. Other shortlisted passages here.

Hathos Alert

by Chris Bodenner

Buzzfeed compiles 40 absurd photos of celebrities from 2009. The one after the jump – titled "Suri Cruise Calls For Help" – has pathos as well:

Suri

Bonus Scientology hathos: an internal video used to motivate members to start their own "org" in a "crusade" to spread Scientology throughout the land.

Yglesias Award Nominee

"President Obama’s Nobel address didn’t add to (or better articulate) what others have said about these matters. But that doesn’t mean Obama’s speech wasn’t impressive. It was, in terms of its ambition, in its willingness to address a morally complicated matter in a serious way, and in the judgments at which Obama finally arrived. He provided — for the first time, really — a strong moral justification for his decision to send troops to Afghanistan. Barack Obama is our commander-in-chief. Of all his responsibilities, that is primus inter pares. And it is a responsibility he seems to have fully embraced," – Peter Wehner, NRO.