John McCain has picked Alaska governor Sarah Palin as his running mate.

[EDIT]

Do you really want to go there Obama? Really?

“Today, John McCain put the former mayor of a town of 9,000 with zero foreign policy experience a heartbeat away from the presidency,” said Obama campaign spokesman Bill Burton.

[update]

It begins.

[update]

Ugh.

Thanks to OC Alum Ian Spencer for sending in this video. It warms the cockles of my heart.

Nancy Pelosi Techno Chicken from wreckandsalvage on Vimeo.

This is one of those images that’s all the more horrifying because you can’t quite pin down what’s going on. Creepy-close family members or jazzercise/swinger group in the midst of undress before an orgy? How can a mustache exude that much of a pedophile vibe without causing a rip in space-time? The ad exhorts us to “stock up for school.” What kind of school are these people attending?

After a week or so of below-the-radar furor on the blogs (Mikey Kaus, take a bow), possible future Attorney General and Vice-Presidential contender John Edwards has finally come clean over allegations that he lied about having an extramarital affair. Okay, so Edwards is a lying scumbag. We all knew that. Big deal.

The real story, I think, is that most major media outlets kept a lid on this story — despite the fact that they were well aware of it —  and even going so far as to discourage people from writing about it.

Without taking this into “Team Red vs. Team Blue” territory, the media’s handling of this case should be instructive, at the very least. If the writing of bloggers like Michael Yon and Michael Totten, among others, has brought into question the accuracy of the media’s often-hysterical coverage of Iraq, then the non-coverage of the Edwards story should make consumers even warier about taking what they read in the paper or see on the nightly news at its word.

Until today, if you never read the Enquirer and never looked at blogs, just about the only inkling you might have had that this was even happening at all would’ve been a quip or two during Jay Leno’s monologue, and you probably wouldn’t have gotten the joke.

• One Chemical Brothers CD, “Dig Your Own Hole”. Condition: Possibly playable.

• Several more issues of “Out” magazine.

So… “lifestyle” magazines and techno music…

Some members of Congress, along with certain “women’s groups” (the Times article doesn’t mention which ones), are pushing for gender quotas in the sciences, and Congress “quietly ordered agencies to begin the Title IX compliance reviews in 2006”:

Applying Title IX to science was proposed eight years ago by Debra Rolison, a chemist at the Naval Research Laboratory. She argued that withholding federal money from “poorly diversified departments” was essential to “transform the academic culture.”

Because that’s what’s important, isn’t it? Not good science. Transforming the culture. Science be damned. As usual, every other consideration is to be sacrificed upon the altar of “diversity”.

Thankfully, some people aren’t having it:

“Colleges already practice affirmative action for women in science, but now they’ll be so intimidated by the Title IX legal hammer that they may institute quota systems,” Dr. [Christina] Sommers said. “In sports, they had to eliminate a lot of male teams to achieve Title IX parity. It’ll be devastating to American science if every male-dominated field has to be calibrated to women’s level of interest.”

I’m not sure the diversity gang cares a whit about “American science”. Diversity must come first. Always.

In case you didn’t find Norman Solomon whining about the media erotic enough, The Nation (AKA “The Never-ending Block of Grey Text”) has just started a sex column titled “Carnal Knowledge.” Written by JoAnn Wypijewski, the column “will explore sex as desire, as work, as play, as the screen against which America projects its fantasies and fears.” Why, that almost sounds interesting! I wonder what the first column, “The Shadow of His Smile“, is about?

In politics as in pop, legions of little girls jumping out of their panties can’t be wrong. That’s the vital lesson so far of Election ’08. I watched a throng of them in November 2006, teenagers in their short skirts and breathlessness, jumping and jittering, hands to cheeks, screaming for Barack Obama.

Sigh. For reals? I can’t say I’m surprised. Just disappointed. But wait, it gets worse. So much worse:

Those girls represented what they always have in America, a cultural longing. By ’07 even the boys were Obama Girls, and their parents were borne along on the energy, feeling young and hip and a little damp in the drawers themselves […] Like someone ground down by years in a bad relationship, America needed a seduction and, then, like the starlet on the crooner’s arm, the reflected shine.

Wow, projecting much? The column also compares Obama to Frank Sinatra, compares and contrasts his libido with JFK’s and opines on the significance of his “mingled blood.” See if you can read the whole thing without plugging your eyes out. Hat tip to Wonkette.

P.S. “Wypijewski” sounds like it should be the name of one of the sweathogs on Welcome Back, Kotter.

Found in the Willy Week’s “Queerest moments of PDX’s Pride Week 2008” editorial:

10:25 am Sunday: State Senator Ben Westlund tells me he regrets he didn’t wear his “Jizz Pimp for State Treasurer” tee.

Wow. Of course, Westlund might be referring to his former job as a bull semen collector and not his affinity for man chowder. In any case, I would vote for Westlund hands down if he actually has a shirt that says “Jizz Pimp for State Treasurer.” In fact, that should be his slogan. Imagine it – bumper stickers, billboards, yard signs, television ads.

Hat tip to NW Republican.

Henry Allingham, one of the three survivors of World War I still alive in Britain, has just had his 112th birthday. A founding member of the RAF and a veteran of the battles of Jutland, the Somme, and Ypres, Mr. Allingham’s longevity is, by his own admission, the product of years of “cigarettes, whisky and wild women”.

The Commentator salutes Mr. Allingham as an example for us all.

Word on the street is that Hillary Clinton is making a “surprise” visit to campus tomorrow. Nobody knows where; nobody knows when. My ultra-reliable sources say she will arrive as mysterious, black-masked avenger, swinging down from the chandelier, drawing her rapier and challenging scurrilous Obama supporters to defend their honor with steel. Or not. I’ll update this as more news comes in.

In Lil’ Wayne’s newest single Lollipop he states, “I get on top, and drop it like it’s hot, but when I’m on the bottom she’s Hillary Rodham.”

Personally I’d pinned Mr. Weezy as an Obama man, but this got me wondering: How many men will vote for Hil just because she’s a woman in power and they’re attracted to it?

I know all about voting based on sex appeal, I’m a Ron Paul girl, but I’d rather vote for Obama simply because (Ty Schwoeffermann, cover your eyes) I’d like to fuck him.

Perhaps this explains why I am also such a fan of Colin Powell?

The Eugene Weekly finally has their new dating and personals site, Wink + Kink, online, providing the Commentator with a new, limitless source of comedy. The only question is how many I SAW YOU’s can you handle?  For example:

Hey, um, I saw you at the VRC in the food court reading manga, “Got Rice?” Tee shirt, glasses, very cute. Saw you later watching “Smart People” alone, thought you had an adorable giggle. Me: kind of loud girl sitting in the row in front of you, red Chuck Taylors, MC Chris shirt and Foster’s sweatshirt, glasses, ponytail. I get a discount on manga at work, interested??

Or, on a slightly more disturbing note:

You activate my motion sensing flood lights practically every night when you walk by. Why don’t you stop and say hi? Is it my big telescope that distracts you?

The site currently has a free promotion going, and being the curious journalist that I am (and single), I have started exploring this strange, new meat market. The “Wink” section of the site is set up more like a conventional dating site, while “Kink” is more, well, kinky. I haven’t delved into the horrors of “Kink” yet, but the public has a right to know, dammit! Expect a full report soon.

The statewide voting pamphlets have been mailed out recently. Inside, a letter from Secretary of State Bill Bradbury urges citizens to call a certain 800 number if they need voting assistance. However, rather than electoral information, callers are directed to a phone sex line. An automated voice promises callers “an exciting new way to go live one on one with hot . . . girls.” Bill Bradbury, you ‘ol polecat!

Hat tip to my mom for the story.

According to an article in Macworld, a newly released study conducted by Nemertes Research Group indicates that “a flood of new video and other Web content could overwhelm the Internet by 2010.”

This internet slow-down is something the Internet Innovation Alliance (IIA) has been predicting for several years. Bruce Mehlman, co-chairman of the IIA agrees, saying the study gives “good, hard, unique data” on the IIA concerns about network capacity. He went on to state, “Internet users will create 161 exabytes of new data this year.”

What does this mean to you, loyal OC readers? Not only will it become painstakingly difficult to read the OC blog, but it’ll also seriously impede your ability to view porn online.

Are videos of Miley Cyrus in concert really worth their bandwidth if it means missing a busty blonde in action?

“Video has unleashed an explosion of Internet content,” Mehlman said.

I guess the question is, what type of “explosion” would you like to unleash in 2010?

Alright, I know this is redundant since most of the comment threads on this blog veer wildly off topic anyways, but seeing as how it’s spring break and and the staff has scattered to the four winds, here’s your open thread. Go for it.

P.S. And as always, drunken belligerence, vitriol and Big Lebowski references are encouraged.

P.P.S. C’mon, all the cool blogs are doing it.