Well, ladies and gents, we can now move ahead toward a time of economic prosperity and racial harmony, because Barack Obama has been sworn into office. What's that? You're still unemployed and your boss keeps referring to you by prejudiced terminology? Oh, bummer. Guess one man can't change everything.
But even if you haven't been swept up in Obama-as-Messiah fever (ironic given his presidency signals an end to high government as guise for holier-than-thou demagoguery), we can all agree it was pretty sweet to see George W. Bush (and don't call him Prez) sent off on that helicopter one last time.
Not as sweet as seeing the likes of Mike Myers and Cameron Diaz get sliced and diced by the Razzies of course. So without any last-minute presidential pardoning, here are the top 5 things we learned this week.
5. Katy Perry may pretend she likes to kiss girls and is preciously cute when calling other people gay, but apparently she'll settle for nothing but the straight dish when tabloids report on her sex life, or lack thereof.
4. Britney Spears is somehow being raked over the coals for the suggestive phonetic pronunciation of her new single. Meanwhile, no one raised an ounce of cain over Van Halen's non-too-subliminal epithet placement within the titular acronym of their 1991 album. Guess parents were less afraid of Sammy Hagar gettin' their teenage tots in a heated lather.
Yes, this is my life: Scouring the wires for stories about adolescent celebrities because I missed the boat on formerly teenaged Hollywood elite getting busted for assault, like loathsome Kelly Osbourne.
But alas, aren't those preciously lucky daughters of Barack Obama, Malia and Sasha, the luckiest little twosome on earth? Because while their mother, Michelle, was giving daddy his first presidential knob-polisher, they were having their hormones manipulated via a visit from The Jonas Brothers last night.
Unbelievable. I get within 100 feet of the White House fence and am considered a threat to national security, but slap on a tux and single a few Disney-friendly ditties and you're ushered in like Secret Service to make an inaugural bid for the hearts of the two most powerful pre-teen girls in the world.
During today's inaugural luncheon for President Barack Obama, Senator Ted Kennedy apparently suffered a seizure and was removed from the premises.
No further details about the incident or his condition are known at this time, but the venerable Congressman and health-care-reform warrior was, of course, diagnosed with cancer last May.
It's an auspicious beginning to Obama's tenure in the White House, but well wishes go out to Kennedy and his family.
January 20. Every four to eight years, depending on whether there's a second term, it becomes the day that a new
president is sworn in. And today, Barack Obama, the 44th (and first
black) president will be the focus of the whole world's attention. It
also happens to be my birthday.
It always seemed like people who were
born on Christmas had it bad. They have to share their
b-day with Jesus, and frankly who are you compared to the son of God?
But let me tell ya, it's nothing compared to sharing yours
with the biggest historical event of our lives.
Quick news flash, in case this small detail has escaped your attention, despite its corresponding event poignantly taking place the day after Martin Luther King Day. And, oh, regardless of it coming on the heels of domestic economic collapse and international diplomatic uncertainty that stems almost exclusively from the errors of George Bush's administration.
But, just in case you spent the last two-plus months stuck in a water-logged airplane floating atop the Hudson River's surface, Barack Obama is being sworn in as our President tomorrow. And Bush will spend his remaining days in a manic, Richard Nixon-like stooper of self-doubt and bullish, unapologetic self-assuredness.
I could overstate the siginficance of the precipice we're currently perched upon, but I'm just going to use the final pre-Obama NCDSUV post to let us all take a deep, collective breath and soak that in.
Ohhhhh yeah. It's like taking a bubble bath in a tub of Democracy, ain't it? Just make sure to keep it out of your eyes. That shit burns.
A couple months back, NCDSUV began broadcasting a new feature known as Just Because, highlighting something inane, obscurely amazing or just plain jaw-dropping from the outlines of pop culture and viral content.
These differ from, say, insanely retarded local ads, or eccentric YouTube karaoke performers,
which can be grouped into their own self-referencing regular
spotlights. Nor do they need to be burdened by standards of timeliness
or having been as-yet-unearthed.
They are the standalone wonders of the cybersphere that made us all
get a computer in the first place, and occasionally need to be inserted
into a day of normal online programming. Just because.
So while the last installment of Just Because celebrated the late Estelle Getty's giddy inhabitation of wiseass Golden Girls matriarch Sophia Petrillo, today we hop in our pop-culture time machine to 1994, and in recognition of Barack Obama's impending inauguration, revisit an unforgettable moment in political-office swearing-in history, and its 14th anniversary.
They say Levi Johnston, soon-to-be-husband of Bristol Palin, son of recent drug-ring arrestee Sherry Johnston and future-son-in law of Alaskan Governor/never-would-have-been-VP candidate Sarah Palin, is an apprentice electrician. Sounds more to me like the only apprenticeship he'll never graduate from is being indentured in the Palin family for all the rest of his eternally damned days.
As you likely heard through the apple-blossom-vine, the Palin/Johnston child-bearing tandem gave birth this past Sunday to Tripp Easton Mitchell Johnston. Which means their son has two options: Become a stately senator who spawns generations of same-named kin, or a racecar driver. But the only one behind the wheel of poor Levi's life is his socially Satanic (er, I mean conservative) surrogate mom, Sarah, especially now that Levi's matriarch somehow trumps her in hypocritical irresponsibility.
In a s statement, Sarah and her husband Todd referred to Levi rather coldly as "the young man," and remarked that he and Bristol are "going to realize very quickly the difficulties of raising a child."
Which is code for, "You fucked up and impregnated our underage daughter with your demon dick, and because of our puritanical value system and misguided run for major governmental candidacy, you're stuck owning up to that decision by raising this kid when you're barely old enough to have voted for me and John McCain, and then marrying Bristol and sacrificing all your individual hopes and dreams."
Sucks to be you kid. Well, both Levi and Tripp that is.
Ah, the last week before the Christmas-time blitz of abusive commercialism and schmaltzy, ceremonial sentimentality. A time for celebrities to get one last headline blast before the world pretends to care about religion and family more than the dogma of tabloid culture for a few days.
Fortunately for us, there was no shortage of boob-flashing, divorce scuttlebutt and rehab-hyjinks. So without further prolonged pause, here are the top five things we here at NCDSUV (and we hope you as well) have learned this week:
4. Tara Reid, not to be outdone by her more youthful underlings Lindsay Lohan et al, finally went into rehab for undisclosed reasons. We're guessing it's because she's been chronically addicted to an illicit co-dependent substance, but what the heckfire do we know?
Pop quiz: What's more gratifying? Finding out that Levi Johnston's mother, Sherry Johnston, was arrested on six (!) counts of felony, narcotics-related misconduct, or reading about on FOX News' website? Trick question. They're equally heeeelarious.
So wait, you're surprised that the mother of an underaged Alaskan teenager who tattooed Bristol Palin's name on his ring finger would be white trash enough to get embroiled in a massive drug stakeout? I mean, with the hundreds of thousands of dollars his mother-in-law-to-be, Sarah Palin, spent on classing up her wardrobe and, by proxy, the reputation of her Hills Have Eyes-worthy extended family, this was no doubt a shock to several unsuspecting citizens.
Man, oh man, if only this news emerged during the election. Would have been pretty fascinating to see the conservative spinmeisters turn this into further evidence for Palin's persistence in the face of constant personal turmoil.
Ugh, I just got post-election hangover douchechills.
Oh Republicans: out of power, in the wilderness, adrift at sea, cast
away, lost. Where will you go? Who will you turn to? Our suggestion?
The cast of Lost. See, while the Democrats have managed to out-strategize,
out-fundraise and out-spend them, there's one area where Republicans
still hold an advantage, and that's turning bad actors into successful
politicians.
Even while the Dems
pull the celebrity endorsements, celebrity money and celebrity votes,
it's the Republicans who've proven that they can run a celebrity
candidate, and the worse the actor, the more successful the politician
he becomes.
Think about it. Clint Eastwood: talented actor, didn't make it past
Mayor Of Carmel. Ronald Reagan: co-starred with a chimp in Bedtime For Bonzo
and became President Of The United States. What's better is that,
unlike a winning on-the-ground organization or intellectual
infrastructure, the Democrats can't seem to co-opt this strategy. Even
Al Franken,
who not only starred in, but co-wrote, Stewart Saves His Family, is
barely squeaking by in the Minnesota Senate recount.
Whether it's the
good hair, straightforward diction, or child-like emotional simplicity, the fact is, Republican voters love to pull the lever
for really shitty performers. So while the mainstream media argues
over whether Sarah Palin or Bobby Jindal
are the next conservative standard bearers, we look back on the top bad-actors-turned-successful-Republican- politicians, and give you a sneak
peak at some current Hollywood stars the Grand Old Party should get
busy recruiting.
8. Alan Autry
You might remember Fresno Mayor Alan Autry as Captain Bubba Skinner
from the popular(ish) TV show In The Heat Of The Night, in which case
you might have too much time on your hands. Still, Autry shares a lot
in common with some of his more famous compatriots on this list; he's
beefy with weird hair and just a little bit of stupid around the eyes.
With In The Heat's cancellation, Autry was able to parlay his role as
a Southern cop learning racial tolerance in the new south to it's next
logical step: an outspoken opponent of gay rights in the State Of
California. Most Likely Hollywood Political Successor: Vin Diesel. He's got those stupid eyes.
7.George Lloyd Murphy George
Lloyd Murphy is the granddaddy of them all. When this 1930s B-movie
star won his California Senate seat he proved that the jump from
unremarkable actor to elected official wasn't quite as far as any
correct thinking individual would have hoped. In fact, Reagan once
called Murphy his John the Baptist, because Reagan thought he was
Jesus, even before he had Alzheimer's. Aside from paving the way for
Reagan and just about everyone else on this list, Murphy is famous for
having said in defense of the laws governing migrant workers that
Mexicans were genetically suited to farm labor;
because they were "built lower to the ground," which of course made it
"easier for them to stoop." Most Likely Hollywood Political Successor: Ronald Reagan. Duh.
6. Jesse "The Body" Ventura OK,
he's an Independent, and not technically a Republican, but he's an
Independent Libertarian which, if you ask Ron Paul, is the same thing.
Plus, he's got everything a Republican wrestler-turned actor-turned
politician could want, he likes to point his finger in people's chests
and yell, he's brawny, smokes cigars and was in the cast of The Predator(along with Arnold Schwarzenegger and Sonny Landham
who unsuccessfully ran for Governor of Kentucky in 2002 and who isn't
on this list cause he was actually a worse politician than he was an
actor). He doesn't have good hair, but on the bright side, he also
wasn't a good actor, and when he shaves his head he looks kind of like
a penis, which makes him look virile, which voters love. Most Likely Hollywood Political Successor: I'm tempted to go with 2000 Republican Convention speaker The Rock,
cause you know they're both wrestlers and stuff, but I'm gonna go with
Jason Statham since he's also bald, has a propensity for poking people in the chest and an uncanny ability to
play the same character in every movie he's ever been in.
5. Shirley Temple Black
And now it's time for the ladies! Well, lady. But what a lady! She
lived the fairy tale. Child star grows up, marries a handsome man just
out of the army, divorces him, then goes on to marry an older plutocrat
and run unsuccessfully for Congress on a strongly pro-Vietnam platform.
She dared us all to dream. Still, despite the unsuccessful Congressional run, she had quite the political career as an official diplomat
under Richard Nixon, because although she didn't have the rugged good looks
and/or penis required to win an election as a Republican at the time,
she sure had crazy hair. Most Likely Hollywood Political Successor: The future Mrs. Dakota Fanning Murdoch.
Yes, the title of this post looks like its teasing the most terrifying porn film ever made, let alone a sequel. But as NCDSUV readers know, we, like much of the nation developed a post-concession spot for John McCain that was softer than the flesh beneath his elbow. And after his appearance on The Tonight Show on Tuesday night, we are merely marveling at the brilliant PR coup that is the once-disgraced Presidential nominee's redemption.
Immediately telling Jay Leno that since the election he's been "sleeping like a baby: Sleep two hours, wake up and cry, sleep two hours, wake up and cry," McCain engaged in an odd mixture of canned quips and unrehearsed mutterings. Sometimes, the two even collided in a moment of pure septugenarian bliss, like when he responded to Leno's questions about Palin by retorting back, "Did you expect mavericks to stay on message?" but then trailing off into a near, non-coy admission that his VP candidate needed a bit more media training.
Yes, that's right. We're going to take one last chance to exploit the recent months' political fervor to bring some eyeballs to the NCDSUV annals. So sue us. Actually, don't do that, because we're already surviving on Ramen and working off converted Commodore 64s as it is.
But we'll tell ya one thing: The law of the land has taken a turn toward the left in the last five days, dominating the news and conquering cultural discourse. So while it's hard to believe that a week ago at this time we were still waiting to turn our clocks back and hoping John McCain and Sarah Palin wouldn't prevent Barack Obama from moving the nation forward, a new era has dawned on America. And on that entirely too poignant note, here's the top five things we learned this week, presidentially speaking:
5. There's a reason Sarah Palin wasn't running beside the election's black candidate. If she didn't realize Africa was a continent, lord only knows what her perception of Israel's geographical determination is.
4. Michelle Obama's dress may have resembled the exterior of a black widow spider on Election Night, but it's abundantly clear she's going to resurrect the notion of an empowered and individualistic First Lady.
3. The major news networks have officially faded themselves into a desperate irrelevance, as exemplified by hologram/digital-studio-nonsense that, oddly enough, mirrored the distracting gimmickry McCain tried to deploy (i.e. his VP nominee) during his transparently inferior campaign.
Now, I assure you, I'm not suddenly becoming some kind of conservative advocate for the sake of being contrarian (for those of you recollecting my praise of John McCain's concession speech). But Ralph Nader's beginning to suck just the slightest bit.
The irony is, we just ran an item yesterday about the dearth of worthwhile TV news anchors, epitomized by a corresponding image of FOX News mouthpiece Shepard Smith. And as you likely are aware, he smugly bullied Nader around about the Green Party hero's suggestion that Barack Obama will need to avoid being an uncle Tom to corporate America (video above, in case you missed it), more or less less proving the aforementioned op-ed's point.
That being said, Nader still made the remark. But the problem, unlike what the FOX team hilariously asserted with self-righteous incredulity, wasn't the innately controversial nature of the expression. The issue was that Nader is still fixated on interrupting the inevitability of partisan politics at a time when a voter-friendly candidate for movement back toward the middle is healthier for America than futile efforts to jar us toward the extreme left.
Is there anything more obsolete than the modern-day news anchor? After closely watching the election-night shenanigans, it's apparent now more than ever that the current of model of broadcasting is about as useful as an appendix for your pinkie.
Getting your news the traditional way, with some talking head “presenting” it to you like a waiter reading items off a menu, might be nice, but reading it yourself on the Web is faster, cheaper and a lot more efficient.
Names like Walter Cronkite, Ted Koppel and even Peter Jennings used to command respect and provided an air of authority and expertise that people came to expect, bringing to the national table a level of intellectualism that most could not necessarily find on their own.
Nowadays? We’re left with the likes of Katie Couric, Brian Williams and Charles Gibson, names that elicit about the same amount of awe as a local affiliate team out of Omaha.
Nobody told me it was going to be a themed Election Night party, but the Family Obama dressed–most adorably–in costume reminiscent of either a Black Widow spider or Les Miserables. It’s hard to say which.
The kids and President-Elect were clean cut and simple. We were glad Barack went for a bold, red-striped necktie (instead of one of these), even though he normally doesn’t prefer to wear them.
But M’Obama, heretofore known as Michelle Obama, certainly evoked the strength and agility of a deadly spider with her black-and-red-splashed, hourglass-shaped dress, ushering in a new era in American Politics. Adios expensive pant-suited first ladies, nee former democratic frontrunners.
After exhausting my spontaneous observational blogging energy last night, I decided to experience Obama's victory, and John McCain's concession, among the masses.
And while there were a fair share of thoughtlessly reactionary, self-satisfied young lefties hurling mean-spirited insults at McCain at my designated watering hole, it was hard to obscure the tact and authentic passion with which the somewhat disgraced Arizona Senator delivered his speech.
Sure, he awkwardly tapdanced around the racial aspect, bumbling through references to Obama being "African-American" and congratulating America's minority population. Yes, the waning moments of his words were wrapped in a fair amount of naively hopeful jingoistic rhetoric.
But it was genuine, humble, thoughtful and profoundly moving, and an incredible serve to his victorious counterpart that further enabled Obama to volley back with equal grace and conviction.
OK folks. No more conjecture. No more tomfoolery. No more advantageous list features and daily commentary exploring the cultural shrapnel of the buildup to Election 2008. Consider all that the featherweight undercard to the heavyweight main event between Barack Obama and John McCain; the foreplay to the candidates' electoral tango; the peaceful Native American residency before the slaughter of Christopher Columbus and his fellow explorers; the... yeah, you get the idea.
By the end of tonight, only man will stand alive atop the steaming shitheap of economic recession and international entanglements that is the U.S. government, and the media (god bless 'em) are here to give us blow by biased, results-happy blow on the path to their poll-determined fate.
And thankfully, NCDSUV is here not so much to complement their skewed stab at proper journalistic scrutiny, but to take a magnifying glass to the larger tangential proceedings over the next four or so hours. So sit, back, enjoy, and say a prayer for democracy. Unless you're a Commie liberal. Then just count the hours till the almighty is resurrected and smites all you heathens anyway.
7:00 p.m. Testing, testing, one, two... is this thing on? Ah, excellent. One small step for blog kind.
7:01 p.m. Woah, woah, woah, let a guy get his footing. Charles Gibson's already calling Kentucky for McCain and Vermont for Obama on ABC. Which is sort of like boldly projecting a life of loneliness and despair for a high school class' biggest nerd and unwarranted success and endless casual sex for its homecoming king.
7:05 p.m. I intended to make a comment about the absurdity of NBC's regal "digital studios," but got sidetracked perusing red carpet pictures of their green-screen queen Anne Curry. Anyway, they're ridiculous.
7:11 p.m. I shall only refer to CBS analyst/former Bill Clinton Press Secretary Dee Dee Myers by her given name of Margaret Jane. At least until it's clear that any references to Margaret Jane don't translate to the readers and I undermine my larger point.
7:13 p.m. Wow, only 13 minutes in and CBS just lost audio on two of Katie Couric's correspondents. Haven't they spent the last several hours preparing to at least be solid gold right off the bat? I mean, it's not like you see me sandwiching multiple posts at once and pretending as if it's in real time because I can't keep up with the pace. Yeah, it's not like that at all.
7:19 p.m. Let the gimmickry begin! Take that, NBC's digital studios. CNN's beaming Jessica Yellin in from Chicago via a motherfucking hologram. It is, as Yellin suggested to Wolf Blitzer, very a la Princess Leia being transmitted to Luke Skywalker via R2-D2. And good thing Wolf and Jessica just wasted two minutes giggling over their nifty technology and talking about Star Wars. This is going to only get more inane per minute.
7:24 p.m. Shepard Smith (who knew he'd be anchoring MY9 in New York?) is calling a one percent lead for McCain in Indiana with nine percent of districts reporting. Yeah, that's a really relevant update. These things are like basketball games, where you may as well just tune in for the last five minutes. Also, his co-hostess (working on the name folks) just referred to these early poll results as being an "inexact science." Skeptical inexact was exactly a word, I Googled it. The sixth result was "the inexact science of penis measurement."
7:30 p.m. Interesting that both NBC and its sister network, MSNBC (its brothers and cousins were unfortunately stuck at nearby airports with weather-related delays) are furthering this whole "virtual" election coverage M.O. with tickers that almost look three-dimensionally clickable. Is this supposed to subliminally compel me to visit their websites during the evening so I can boost their page views? Mmmm, clickable.
7:34 p.m. OK. Some mystical syndication programmer (damn you, TBS!) is challenging my political diligence by showing a Season 3 episode of Seinfeld, incidentally the lone season I don't own on DVD and have ostensibly committed to memory. Hey, hey, put that remote down. If I can't watch it, neither can you.
So, here we go folks. A day that will live in infamy for some segment of the American population, and either way will signal a decline in page views for national blogs that should make the Dow dissent seem like a manageable point-dip.
NCDSUV will be on the scene (i.e. on its channel-changing couch), reporting to you live with a collection of thoughts and observations from the coverage and culture around Election Night. Because who the fuck wants another brow-beating op-ed about their preferred candidate?
But in the meanwhile, here's a wish list of five things we can only hope will happen before the cameras to make the whole several-hour mess moderately less excruciating.
5. A la the Bud Bowl's supplemental Super Bowl programming, MTV will broadcast a special edition of Celebrity Deathmatch, in which Joe The Plumber and Tito The Builder battle on two pink elephants, wielding their trade's preeminent piece of equipment.
4. Wolf Blitzer, during a particularly pregnant pause of any electoral action, has a nervous breakdown and admits to being adopted, and having recently discovered that his birth name is "Itty Bitty Little Bear Cub."
3. Lots of preemptive declarations and manic bottom-screen tickers that remind us the networks' coverage is more of a competitive battleground for ratings than the candidates' struggle for higher office, nevermind a reasonable resource for accurate poll happenings. (Oh please, oh please, make this one happen, however unlikely and unfounded a notion it seems.)
How easily manipulated are we, really? Suddenly it seems as if everyone's talking about how Ben Affleck is so much more subversive and talented than we gave him credit for after his Alec Baldwin and Keith Olbermann impersonations on SNL. All things considered, the guy came out of last weekend's program with a more refurbished image than special guest John McCain.
Now, the fact that what I saw in Affleck's impressions was boilerplate mimicking at best is nearly beside the point. That should be a given to any loyal NCDSUV readers who share my refined sensibilities. But there's two aspects of this goodwill fest that are preeminently disconcerting.
The word “inspire,” according to the Cornflax Dictionary Of Funyun Wrappers comes from the Latin inspirare, which means “to breathe upon or into." Now, if you’re like me (and if you are, I’m sorry that you’re impotent), you’re weary of the breath those fatcats in Washington have been blowing onto us. That stale, shitty scent that whispers into our nostrils and covers our skin with sores. And very likely, that stench will soon be abated, as President Barack Obama is sworn in.
However, if we wake up tomorrow to find yet another election has been stolen through massive voter fraud, please, before you kill yourself, read this list and try to find some meaning in the occasionally more uplifting world of fictional presidents. If that doesn’t work, then kick the chair over and hang out for a while.
9. Terry Crews as President Dwayne Elizondo Mountain Dew Camacho, Idiocracy
While our society looks more and more like Idiocracy with each passing moment (and that includes a meandering plot as well as a weak third act, in addition to all that dysgenics stuff) it probably wouldn’t be too terrible with this dude in charge. He obviously knows his limitations, and he surrounds himself with the best and the brightest that society of turds has to offer. The fact that this is what the future might have to offer us should inspire everyone with an IQ above 120 to get snipped and clipped in their junk region just so that it may become an absolute reality.
8. Harrison Ford as President James Marshall, Air Force One
Last time I checked, not one single president in the history of the United States ever took care of a terrorist himself, let alone saved his fucking family from one. That’s what’s inspiring about these fictional leaders: They don’t sit around waiting for proxies to do their dirty work for them. By gum, they get out there, roll up their sleeves and do it themselves. If my wife and child and some associates are taken hostage, President Marshall has inspired me to believe I will definitely fight back. Probably. I will definitely think about it.
7. Harry Shearer as President Kang, The Simpsons
Thus spoke the immortal line: "Abortions for some, miniature American flags for all!"
Or was that Kodos? Anyway, while you may think a giant, one-eyed, tentacled space alien that uses his newfound power to enslave the human race, forcing them to create a giant ray gun, isn’t inspiring, you are dead wrong. Dead wrong. You hear what I’m saying, pal? What’s more inspiring than someone with the ability to enfetter the entire planet, especially if that someone is a democratically elected slavemaster? Haven’t we learned in the last eight years that you never contradict your Commander-In-Chief? Now work harder, or I’m going to whip your spine pain-wise.
6. Bill Pullman as President Thomas J. Whitmore, Independence Day
Of course, if aliens ruling the planet and making a mockery out of all things human burns your bunions up, this chap might perhaps be a bit more inspiring. After all, he was a military hero, and not the fakey kind that gets his daddy to swing him a sweet job. No siree! And as evidence, see him do what no other president has done since the founding fathers: murder sentient beings himself rather than just ordering others to do it.
5. Jim Backus as President/Dr. Wilbur Daffodil-11 Swain, Slapstick (Of Another Kind)
While in Slapstick, the world kind of crumbles into crap, I’ve always loved President Swain’s plan to end loneliness, and while many of the other people on this list are actually about as inspiring as a cat screaming at a driveway, Swain might truly take the cake and eat it too and eventually poop it out. Under his plan, everyone in the U.S. is randomly provided with new middle names that are a combination of a word and a number. Those with the same name are cousins and those with the same word and number are siblings. An inst-o-matic community is created for wherever one goes, and family abounds. Lonesome no more!
The majority of Americans seem to be enthusiastically awaiting the end of the George Bush administration, which has excelled in one thing: consistently sucking. We all know what hell the president, Dick Cheney et al have wrought—the war in Iraq, an inept response to the worst natural disaster in U.S. history, the virtual meltdown of capitalism. But let's not forget that with this parade of failure has come eight consistent years of ponderous, self-congratulatory "message" movies from Hollywood.
Hopefully this trend has come to an end with the release of Oliver Stones W., whose financial and critical failure surely (hopefully?) signals its demise. And taking into account that even the great political movies of the '70s—aAll The President's Men, Being There, Deer Hunter, Coming Home, etc.—came after the similarly war-monger, scandal-ridden Nixon administration's ignominious end, does this mean all we need is a little perspective? Only time will tell. But for now, we're left with Ryan Phillipe and Emilio Estevez.
10. Good Night, And Good Luck
This gorgeous-looking 2005 biopic wasn’t as heavy-handed as some of the other inclusions on this list—for instance, no one onscreen actually SAYS the movie is really about FOX News, even though it is—but it makes the cut because, well, it was boring. All the sober hand-wringing grew tiresome, even at a disciplined 93 minutes in length.
9. Bobby
Emilio Estevez’s big-screen directorial debut employed the most-beloved device of all message movies: The Robert Altman-esque interwoven narrative. Set on the day that Bobby Kennedy was assassinated, this pic rehashes all the '60s clichés you can imagine, and thensome: drugs, racism, draft-dodging, etc. Hopefully a Barack Obama administration can once and for all bring an end to would-be baby boomers’ relentless navel-gazing.
8. Stop-Loss
A critique of the Bush administration’s callous treatment of Iraq vets cleverly disguised as a sexy story about lovers on the run, Stop-Loss viewed the war through a personal lens. But even this couldn’t salvage the box office; the film barely registerd with audiences, bringing in just over $10 million. Regardless of tricky marketing, people weren't interested in seeing any war movie by 2008, no matter how sexy the leads or apolitical the plot.
7. Man Of The Year
What would happen if Jon Stewart ran for president as a joke, then won because of a voting machine glitch? That’s the supposedly hard-hitting, slightly masturbatory question asked in this Robin Williams vehicle, co-starring Serious Actress ® Laura Linney. If Williams' character was less his usual schtick and anything approaching Stewart-worthy smarts and subversiveness, it might have been easier to rally around the larger concept.
6. Charlie Wilson’s War
This Oscar-baiting film, brought to you by the chronically self-important Aaron Sorkin, is ostensibly about how a mediocre Texas congressman irrevocably shifted the course of American foreign policy in the Middle East for decades to come. However, the ads for this critical and commercial letdown prominently featured Julia Roberts clucking "Ohhhh, Chahhhhlie," in a cartoonish Southern drawl. Surely the only reason to see Wilson's War was to figure out how on earth a born-and-bred Southerner like Roberts could be so unconvincing at a her native accent. Also, her tranny hair and makeup were pretty harrowing.
Rarely have the circumstances around Halloween and Election Day's convergence been so scary. But of course, one of the things we learned this week was that political bias is for grownups, and little kids occasionally need to remind us that we can vote however we like.
So with that, and heading into one of the tensest pre-Presidential-determining few days in American history, here's a largely lighthearted look at the top five things we learned this week from pop-culture land. See ya on Monday, and y'all come back now for a week of super-packed political coverage, ya hear?
5. If the media were half as vigilant on behalf of ordinary criminal tragedies as they were fumbling for tactful ways into covering the Jennifer Hudson nightmare, we might actually be able to spread out our police forces more effectively.
We've expended a lot of energy on this site telling you what Sucks, and an equivalent amount of our blogging brainpower ruminating the many facets of the presidential election. So as our loyal (read: super awesome, attractive and intelligent) readers try to exhume the spirits of the Bush administration once and for all this Halloween weekend, we felt it was important to offer a more hopeful message.
Or at least to rely on a bunch of pre-teens to stay positive and remind us what our nation's primary tenets are theoretically all about. If you haven't seen this clip of the kids from Ron Clark Academy reinterpreting T.I.'s "You Can Have Whatever You Like" as "You Can Vote However You Like," it more or less speaks, dances and raps for itself. (Although make sure not to miss the dorky white chubster in the back, cause he's kind of hilarious.)
Grown pop stars should arguably have more of a backbone to make partisan endorsements, rather than fulfill their civic duty and merely encourage voting in some glorified PSA. But educators should absolutely be imbuing their school kids with the principles of fairness and objectivity, and imploring them to look at all situations from both sides, so that by the time they grow up and can take ownership over the political process, they make decisions out of both heart and intellect.
So kudos, Ron Clark Academy, for reminding us that Democracy doesn't suck.
Last night, Barack Obama showed up Morgan Freeman and Dennis Haysbert with his performance as the President Of The United States in the greatest infomercial ever (to not feature Ron Popeil). With production values and cinematography rivaling Hollywood’s glitziest movie trailers, all that was missing from the donkey party’s visual pitch was a voiceover from that “In a world…” guy (R.I.P. Don LaFontaine).
Although a lot of Obama’s glorified PSA was blander than the Wonder Bread made from the wheat grown in those hallowed fields of that mystical place known as the “Heartland of America” (you know, where “real” Americans live, not in those awful cesspools of sin known as “cities”) that we’ve been hearing so much about, we did learn a few things from Democratic Party’s man of the hour.
1. Tinkling Acoustic Guitars Mean Business
Just like in the movies, whenever a soft acoustic guitar starts playing in the background, you know something poignant is going on. Every time an amber wave of grain or a slow pan of a lower middle-class family came across the screen, you could be sure that some watered down, Cat Stevens-style, geetar-pickin’ was a comin’. Grab your tissues folks, you’re being told to cry and better comply. And if that doesn’t grab you, the sweeping violins and soft piano licks will.
2. Barack Obama Likes Poor People
From the housewife with those stupid stick-figure family stickers on the back of her minivan, to the various laborers and good-old fashioned, hardworking folks peppered throughout Obama’s audiovisual stump speech, the fact was hammered home over and over again: Poor people rule. It’s always amazing to observe how much power the “little people” wield during election time and how quickly that perceived power evaporates once it’s over. The give and inevitable take between presidential candidates and the poor might be the most abusive, co-dependent, hillbilly relationship of all time.
3. Barack Obama Is The Only Person Who Could Play “Barack Obama”
Straight out of central casting, Obama is so good at playing himself, it seems like no one could ever do him justice if and when the biopic comes out. What actor could possibly pull off the inimitable blend of effortless salesmanship, charisma and smoothness of delivery like the man himself? Morgan Freeman? Too old. Wesley Snipes? He’s unavailable (and going to jail). Denzel Washington? Playing Malcolm X is one thing, but even Denzel couldn’t pull this off. Looks like Barack’s gonna have to go down the Babe Ruth/Howard Stern self-performance route.
So, big fuckin' deal, the Republican National Committee has spent $150,000 on Sarah Palin's wardrobe since she signed on to the ticket. You know how much money my mom spent on my Jerzees Super Sweats at Kid 'R Us when I was a kid? OK, probably about $15 cumulative dollars.
As anyone who reads NCDSUV knows, we've taken infinite potshots at the Alaskan, oil-drilling, campaign-killer (so many so where we fear we might be contributing to her demise, which would make this website a lot less entertaining in two weeks), but now it feels like the media's just scrounging for any excuse to be incredulous at John McCain and co. and reduce the VP nominee to a cariacture of conservative sex-potism. Which she is, of course, but I think at this juncture we can hand the baton of ballot-securing over to Barack Obama.
And as for campaign contributors crying foul over unwise expenditures of their donations, your money wasn't spent foolishly on a few tit-friendly powersuits, it was wasted on the old windbag standing next to their inhabitant in the first place.
Yes, we know, you're all still reeling from NCDSUV finally throwing its support behind a presidential candidate, in the form of viral-superstar-in-the-making Eric Elvis. OK, maybe it was that whole Colin Powell bombshell that's had your jaws slacked. But fuck that guy. (What? It's not like if he wanted to hunt me down and kill me he'd be able to find the murder weapon. Ohhhh, snap.)
Even if by and large, the lines drawn amongst high-profile supporters are never as dramatic in the general election, there's been some genuinely weird-ass celebrity endorsements this campaign season, and here's the 10 that have surprised us the most.
10. Deepak Chopra
Threw His Weight Behind: Barack Obama Should We Have Seen This Coming? You would think that the basic tenets of capitalism would appeal to a self-help guru more than most famous folks. And as such ideologies go, Obama's damn-near a Commie. Chances He Will Swing Voters: About as likely as he and Tony Robbins squaring off for our highest office in 2012.
9. Jon Voight
Threw His Weight Behind: John McCain Should We Have Seen This Coming? There's a reason he and daughter Angelina Jolie have had their ups and downs. This guy's clearly got an air of humorlessness about him. Still, it no doubt hurts an entire generation's inner hippie to see the star of Midnight Cowboy ride off into his twilight years on an elephant with Sarah Palin's name. Then again, most of his fellow boomers have ballooned with self-interested glut in the ensuring years anyhow. Chances He Will Swing Voters: Name association with his much-coveted kin might actually create a kneejerk twinge of novelty interest in McCain, which is all the more reason for Jolie to start stumping for Obama pronto.
8. Anne Rice
Threw Her Weight Behind: Barack Obama. Should We Have Seen This Coming? One just assumed that with her proclivity for the undead, McCain would be her kinda guy. Chances She Will Swing Voters: The author may influence a segment of voters who happen to be swingers, but it's highly unlikely the Repubs will lose any blood over this one.
7. Rage Against The Machine
Threw Their Weight Behind: The Troops Should We Have Seen This Coming? Sad a commentary on our counterculture as it may be, Rage are probably commercial radio's most radical monarchs, so no one should have been bowled over by their threats to both candidates over immediate withdrawal of armed forces from Iraq. Chances They Will Swing Voters: It's highly unlikely many Rage fans have evolved beyond surface liberal sloganeering, but this is more or less a general statement for either candidate to take into consideration post-election anyway. Or else, ya know, they'll be real mad and stuff.
6. Wilfred Brimley
Threw His Considerable Girth Behind: John McCain Should We Have Seen This Coming? I have no idea, but Quaker Oats will never quite taste the same again. Chances He Will Swing Voters: Since neither candidate is really running on the incontinence platform, Brimley's effect should be drastically less culturally impacting than his moustache.
Ya know, we've been trying to stay neutral amidst an avalanche of biased journalism and unabashedly announced opinions on the presidential election. I mean, c'mon, that isn't clearly evident in balanced, tactful articles like this and this? But fine, if Mr. Important Colin Powell is going to pull a Joe Lieberman-worthy fence-hopper on Meet The Press (see clip above) and Big Shot newspapers like the New York Daily News are going to get behind Obama, I guess it's time for NCDSUV to finally let the public know who they are in favor of.
So, without further ado, we are throwing our support (and a burlap hitchhiking sack on a stick) behind... Mr. Eric Elvis. And why not? He's got as thorough a sense of American history as John McCain, the disarming sexual magnetism of Barack Obama, has slightly less robotic motor functions than the former and has a song selection liberal enough to rival the latter's widespread demographic appeal.
Oh, you probably thought we'd get behind Obama. Well, we figure the way things are going, we no longer need to be the Switzerland of the blogosphere, but can complacently conduct ourselves like the Vermont in this endorsement electorate. But no worries, the second he gets into office, we'll resume our role as kneejerk liberal frontrunners.
Check in tomorrow morning for a list of the most surprising celebrity endorsements.
Unfortunately, I didn't not get to see Sarah Palin on Saturday Night Live when it aired: I was too busy actually living my life, losers. Ya know, going to the club ripped to the gills on coke, dancing with tons of crazy-hot women, folding my laundry while watching last week's True Blood and then eating a fat-free chocolate pop.
However, thanks to the magic of this device called Computer II ("now with Internet Activation"), I was able to "hone in on" NBC's "webbed-site" with the use of a Uniform Resource Locator and watch til my heart was content, which incidentally was while the video was still loading. But in the interests of journalistic duty, I then forced myself to sit there and watch the Palin sketches, employing one of those devices from A Clockwork Orange to keep my eyes pried open.
As was written about earlier on NCDS after the VP debate, Palin's media performances have fit in quite well with the reigning paradigm of awkward comedies like Curb Your Enthusiasm, The Office and the granddaddy of them all, the British series Peep Show, a program that is so wince-inducing that my body seizes up grand mal-style while watching. From her catastrophic interviews to her catastrophic photo ops, each new gaffe or desperate attempt to cover up her natural incurious intellectual torpor is met by a national grasping of our kishkas as we yell, "Oy vez mir! A shondah! A shondah!" This performance was no different.
The best joke of the election so far occurred last night, and it wasn’t even a joke. In case you missed it, the moment came courtesy of Paul Shaffer and the CBS Orchestra on The Late Show With David Letterman when they played the Who’s “I Can’t Explain” as a humbled and totally clueless John McCain walked on stage.
The punchline was delivered sublimely by McCain himself, who beamed broadly as the song played. Little did he know he was selling the joke even harder.
Was this “meta-joke” that wasn’t really a joke pretentious and snobby? Heck yes. Was it awesome? You betcha. Of course, it’s not fair to expect that McCain should know Who songs that aren’t used as theme music for one of the CSI shows, and Barack Obama could’ve been put in the same position. However, he wasn’t because he didn’t cross Dave.
McCain did appear more relaxed on the Late Show than he has in any of the three debates, coming across as almost likeable. Yet still, here is what we get – John McCain: out of touch with the pop culture of that was his pop culture.
P.S.--Second place for the best joke of the election goes to Tina Fey using Sarah Palin’s actual words. And third place goes to Tina Fey using words Sarah Palin will eventually say. (Give her enough time.)
According to virtually every pundit on the face of the earth—from John Dickerson to to the guy at the pizza place last week who told me, rather presciently, “One more debate and then-boom!-it’s ovah!”—last night was make it or break it for John McCain. Basically, Barack Obama had to stay awake for 90 minutes, not roll his eyes and avoid laughing audibly at the suggestion that Sarah Palin is qualified to be President. None of which is easy, and all of which he did with aplomb.
On the other hand (the one angrily clutching the Sharpee), McCain had a lot more riding on the debate, and a much trickier balancing act: He had to go after Obama, yet try to appear slightly less cranky and deranged than he has in the last two debates. He got it half right, so that means this was his most successful debate so far. Too bad he still managed to look mean and ancient in the process.
Joe The Plumber. Joe. The. Plumber. Joe The Plumber, you motherfucker. Who the fuck are you that you've got the ear of not one, but TWO major party presidential nominees? What powers have you secreted within the folds of your overalls? What monies have you amassed to allow you command of such influence? What alien frequencies emanate from the antennae soldered to your skull, radio waves that paralyze the minds of all those trapped within the nefarious radius?
Oh, the obsequiousness on display!
After the final presidential debate last night, where Joe was not only the focus, but the main interlocutor for the nominees (to the chagrin of Bob Schieffer, who is known the world over for his neediness), I decided to put my correspondence degree in investigative journalism to work and find out just who this presumptive ne'er-do-well really was. If he is to wield so much influence over the government of the people, for the people and buy the people, should not the THE VERY PUBLIC he is to lord over not know the basic details of their master? Oh, your imminent Eminence! Prithee, thouest must not crush us lowly mortals beneath thy golden feet when thouest have ascended to the seat of omnipotence!
Ladies and gentleman, start your engines. Actually, don't do that, because you shouldn't be reading blogs while operating a vehicle. It's still questionable whether that should be done while sitting motionless on a couch.
Anyway, tonight's third and final presidential debate was full of more of the same. But just seated. And without hilarious audience interaction. John McCain still herked and jerked around like Yul Brenner in Westworld. Obama still smirked and chuckled arrogantly at some of McCain's more empassioned attacks. McCain still glossed over Obama's consistently nuanced dissections of his fiscal policy in favor of generalized accusations. And Obama occasionally peed his pants in fear when McCain looked like he was gonna snap and put him in a figure-four leg lock. And unlike his opponent, the Illinois Senator wasn't wearing Depends.
Anyhow, here are the top 25 thoughts and observations from a night that will be completely irrelevant when whoever wins is mired in all manner of domestic and international clusterfucks come 2009 (in no remotely sensible chronological or conceptual order).
25. Hey Obama, why don't we just manage chronic illnesses with the muthafuckin' chroooonic? Hm, yeah, that doesn't come across as well without being exaggerated with faux-street-slang intonation.
23. Hey McCain, fuck you and your $5,000 tax refund. The government is not your personal Publisher's Clearing House. (On that same note, how are we going to pay for the gas to go across America, and what good does it do me to have portable insurance when I've broken my leg and can't leave my neighborhood?)
22. McCain's really digging his own grave with this whole taxes thing. And Sarah Palin is standing behind the maverick to push him in. (OK, I just wanted to say your name so I could put a tag for you at the bottom of the article.)
21. Education is a civil rights issue but health insurance is a responsibility? My dear boy McCain, if only your points of view were as consistent as your bowel movements.
20. Kind of hard preaching about sex education to a guy whose whole image revolves around his missionary position. Or was that military? Sorry, I'm halfway through my Joe Six-Pack of Budweiser.
19. Every time John McCain blinks, you drink. Which means you are now all dead.
18. When McCain corrected Bob Sheefer about the climate control/climate control discrepancy, couldn't you just see the guy fuming to himself, "Oh yeah, well how are you gonna like it when I change the question to how many times you've renewed your Flomax subscription in the past year, you old, desert-loving fuck"? Eh, maybe you weren't watching it in HD.
17. Man, McCain sure looked like he wanted to abort that Roe V. Wade question.
16. Why do conservative judges need to be put in quotes? I thought they reside in special chambers with fun gavels to bang and silly black dresses.
15. Hearing these guys field the same questions three times over in different contexts is like watching two actors run through redundant sexual positions across multiple rooms of a house during a shitty fuck flick. Except in this case it seems masturbatory for the performers.
14. John McCain looks more defeated than when he was a POW. Or at least from what I gathered after watching The Faith Of My Fathers.
13. McCain actually had a good little jab when suggesting Obama should have ran four years ago if he wanted to run against President Bush. But why do that when he would have lost?
We're headed into the final stretch, America: Don't hit the wall! The longest, sprightliest, bumpiest, zaniest, stereotype-transcending, toe-tappin', forehead-slappin' presidential race in our country's history is finally winding down – and it looks like tonight's third and final debate at Hofstra University in Hemptstead, N.Y. may draw us into the final lap with a snooze-inducing cup of lemon-infused chamomile tea instead of the nut-packed PowerBar we're all craving.
What do we want? A rip-roaring catfight that reveals what the frig Barack Obama and John McCain would actually do as president about the fact that Wall Street has gone up in flames, the housing market has been shot through with a cannon and the job market has been chewed up and spit on the detritus-strewn ground like a worn-out piece of Juicy Fruit.
What a week, what a week. I'm personally all verklempt. Between the election race warming up, the economy cooling and down, and celebrities still indulgently frolicking around, it's been tough for NCDSUV to keep its panties unbunched. Or maybe that's just the fabric softener we've been using.
Well, in any case, from fetishizing the Obamas to taking a piss on your favorite movies and DirecTV scaring us with their tasteless Poltergeist ad, here's the top five things we learned this week.
In a recent NCDSUV post, An American Carol caused us to question the cherished comedic ideals of our youth, but I think it brings up an even larger question: How fucking interesting is parody in the first place? Maybe if you're a newly minted teen, brain exhausted from just discovering masturbation, then the genre offers up a cornucopia of hilarity. ("Oh! That's like something I know, but kind of not!")
You get the warm, motherly embrace of the familiar, but it's not so foreign that you have to step out of the narrow confines of the existence your parents created for you. It's a straight shot to the grave from here, shitheads; hope you enjoy the dull, dull ride.
While Mad magazine and Weird Al and Airplane might have been staples of my youth as well, I've now had the staples removed, and the comedic membrane surrounding my body is healed, creating a stronger sensibility, one that enjoys satire.
I've heard enough about people wanting to tame Sarah Palin's moose knuckle. Come on! It's like shooting wolves from a helicopter. Of course you want to play "gotcha-crotch-a" with her. She was a beauty queen and she's got the hot librarian thing going for her, but I still think her butt reminds me too much of my mom.
If Palin is going to cause any men to vote with their tiny ticker I'd like to speak for the women who want to get their ballot stuffed.
We're all human, within the first five seconds of meeting someone we put them into one of two categories: People we would have sex with or people we would definitely NOT have sex with. John McCain is definitely in the NOT category. Then I saw the first presidential debates and they showed footage of him as a younger man and I realized he was actually handsome, like a young Paul Newman. Young McCain is in the first category, but I still wouldn't get busy with old McCain. But Barak Obama, he still IS the young guy.
By now we've all offered our two cents (more like 69 cents, eh? eh?) about Sarah Palin being hatefully fuckable. But what finally dawned on me during last night's debates was the powerful sexuality exuded by Michelle Obama.
It's like she has the rugged, intelligent, all-business maturity of my beloved Hannah Storm, with the visceral hormonal magnetism of Pam Grier. And, upon further observation, has an almost elegantly beautiful face.
So, while I've drawn fairly clear lines as to which presidential candidate I'll be voting for in a few weeks, I've made an even more important partisan decision this fall. If I'm going to have a strange, MILF-y compulsion toward a female that's crucial to the race, I may as well opt for the one who's value system and personal vernacular wouldn't have me bleaching my soul after a one-night tryst.
As NCDSUV readers know, we're quite fond of round deuxs, so our above-ground sequel sonars were on full alert for the thrilling oratory rematch between presidential candidates Barack "The Hope" "Obama and John "Adam Raised A" McCain.
And we were not disappointed. From the opening handshake, to the first offensive right hooks, to referee, er, moderator Tom Brokaw's bravely getting in the middle of these two fireplugs, Obama V. McCain: Round Deux was one for the ages. All ages in fact, thanks to the evolutionary-chain-length disparity between the two candidate's birth dates.
Here's a few observations about what happened between the rhetorical blows:
You know, we spend so much time on this site raking poor Sarah Palin over the coals that we occasionally forget to do our civic duty and encourage people to vote.
But why listen to NCDSUV when you can take inspiration from Diddy, Jay-Z, Mary J. Blige and some dude named Kevin Liles? (Okay, he's actually a big record exec, but seeing his name kind of lacks the same cachet, no?)
You can imagine my surprise when, right in my very own inbox this morning, there was an "Open Letter" from the four entertainers/moguls (I keep telling celebrities to stop opening my mail, but que sera), reminding me that, "If you have not registered to vote, you are disrespecting everyone that sacrificed their lives for you to have the right. You are also disrespecting your future. The time is NOW for us to use the voices with which God has blessed us."
Easy for you to say, Grammy-winning vocalist Mary J. Blige. The only voice God blessed me with was one akin to the sound of a '70s game show host.
Like last night's vice presidential debates themselves, it seems only fitting that NCDSUV provides you, our opinion-starved readers, with two points of view (that's code for, "I just felt like giving my two cents since I'm the editor of the site and I can.").
For the most part, things played out as I expected, to the point of shockingly perpetuating media stereotypes about each candidate. But seeing them so acutely polarized while standing several feet apart made both their strategized personas and particular appeal abundantly clear.
Palin does the George Bushian thing of avoiding actual debate and staring straight into the camera, hypnotically and telepathically beaming her message to a core set of converts and near-congregants, while the rest of America wishes she'd answer a straight question and arrogantly assumes Midwestern soccer moms will ultimately have adequate horseshit radars.
Biden, meanwhile, provides unexpected warmth and humanity to counter Palin's role as a surrogate heartbeat for McCain's icy veins and ailing ticker. And sublime cockiness that practically peels of the enamel on his preternaturally pearly whites.
But there were more tangential observations to be had as well, whether it pertained to Palin's plump behind or the serindipitous mysteries that connect our current president to Chuck Norris. Here's a few:
If I have to hear one more “Drill, baby, drill,” double, ahem, single entendre, I think my dick might go limp eternally out of exasperation. But while watching the debates last night, I think I finally understood what so many people find attractive about Palin. At first, I found the rally to bathe in her womblight rather anti-feminist, as if the only thing Palin had to offer America was her vagina. Don’t forget though, she’s also anti-choice, and let me tell you, my friends, nothing gets me harder than the possibility of having sex with a rigid, moralizing lunatic.
But watching her last night, I deeply understood the scads of sad, lonely sacks that professed their libidinous desire to thrust away incompetently at her for a few seconds, only to spurt out an orgasm as bleak as The Killing Fields.
The desire to fuck Sarah Palin doesn’t stem from some misogynist impulse or Oedipal wish, but rather from our death drives. As an empty shell, Palin doesn’t represent a woman, but rather the apotheosis of emptiness; she is annihilation pure and simple. To fuck her is to fuck death, to find sweet release not in le petite mort, but in le grand mort.
You may have heard that tonight’s regularly scheduled programming will be suspended for the Vice Presidential debate. With all the preemptive spin coming from all sides, even professional psychics, it’s hard to know what to expect, with predictions ranging from a NASCAR-style pile-up of mutual gaffes to a repeat of Sarah Palin’s despicable attack dog performance at the RNC.
My prediction is this: It will probably seem fitting that the debate is on Thursday night, at the same hour that The Office usually airs. Much has been made over the rise of “cringe comedy” over the past few years. Traditional, so-called “multi-camera” shows are out of fashion, with network execs and critics (if not always audiences) preferring “single-cam” alternatives like 30 Rock, Arrested Development and Curb Your Enthusiasm. Warm and fuzzy plots about adorable families are passé, in favor of stories where one or more characters are constantly embarrassing themselves, to the delight and amusement of the viewer.
Okay, I admit, I first saw the coming attraction for An American Carol last night. And have subsequently caught up with the public discourse. And I'm not really concerned with whether it's a pox on the face of parody, or if I should be appalled as a liberal by its condemnation of lefty America's Great Wide Hope, Michael Moore.
I'm suddenly wondering, "Wait? David Zucker, creator of Airplane! and the Naked Gun films, is behind this? Does this change my entire retrospective outlook on the pop culture of my youth?" Realizing Zucker is such a conservative is like my own personal cinematic Crying Game moment, and the director has just whipped out his partisan penis.
Granted, Lynne Spears is the most cravenly attention-seeking celebrity parent this side of Michael Lohan, as evidenced by her lunatic tell-all, which more or less amounted to reading your daughter's diary aloud to the world.
That said, she's shockingly dead-on in her attack on the hypocritical response to Bristol Palin's pubescent pregnancy saga, at least as it relates to how the media assaulted Lynne and her daughter, Jamie Lynn. You can read the chat here at Newsweek (I particularly enjoyed their choice of "Grandmother Speaks Out" for an annotated second-page headline).
In fairness to the 'bloids, Jamie Lynn got eviscerated because it was a further stripping (pun heartily intended) of the Spears clan's own internal hypocrisy, after they allowed elder child Britney to be propped up for years like the Virgin Mary in head-to-toe latex.
But how on earth has Sarah Palin so quickly warped and inverted this country's value judgments, regardless of what politically correct party lines they straddle? She and her handlers may be this nation's greatest magicians since this guy.
Actually, NCDSUV doesn't have a whole lot to say about the Emmys. A bunch of underdog shows won but still won't get watched by anyone; presenters stared woodenly and incapably into telemprompters and read mundanely scripted introductions, reminding us how useless actors actually are without hours to memorize their lines and guidance from a top-flight director; attendees dressed up in their best sophisticated garb for a ceremony that now awards programs like Dancing With The Stars and lets Ryan Seacrest co-host. Etc. Etc.
If anything, the broadcast was notable for several political tangents, particularly from a manically hypnotized Tommie Smothers, who made it awfully hard for even the most patient, liberally sympathetic producer not to cue the orchestra.
Fitting then, that the true purpose of luring you in to this post with all those catchy Google keywords in the headline was mostly to draw your attention back to this heeeeeelarious story about Republicans we'd like to make sweet, sweet, revenge-fueled, angry, nastily positioned love to.
Sarah Palin, there's so much you and your Republican Lady-peers have taught us. Before you came around we thought chicks in glasses were really smart, polar bears were worth saving and teenage pregnancy was a bad thing. We didn't know about the mysteries of Republican Lady-hair, the difference between a pit bull and a hockey mom, or that Wasilla was a place. But the most important realization was that we'd really really like to hate-fuck a Republican, preferably a really conservative one, maybe while wearing that sex harness from Se7en. Sure, Sarah's busy with her campaign (and the possible subpoenas), but she's opened up a whole world of perverse possibility, one not that different from the territory explored in last week's piece about strangely sexy animated sweethearts. We call that world Planet RILF (Republicans I'd Like to Fuck) and here are our top eight picks.
8. Barbara Bush
Axis Of Power: Former First Lady to the first President Bush; once provided nutrition, via cord-and-sack apparatus, to a then-gestating President George W. Bush. Sex Appeal: Barbara Bush is what we in the sexist media call a "handsome woman," and while it's true that she is by no means conventionally hot, she's got that Palin fight in her. Don't let the crazy clown hair and diaper-concealing outfits fool you, Barbara has been smiling sweetly while stabbing her enemies in the back (and then also in the face) since the early '80s. Think Sarah's feisty? Barbara called her husband's vice-presidential rival Geraldine Ferraro a bitch in the middle of their 1984 campaign, which would place her higher on our list if she weren't pro choice. RILF Hairdo Of Choice: Blindingly white Republi-fro Favorite Position:Reverse Cowgirl
7. Carly Fiorina
Axis Of Power: As CEO of Hewlett Packard, succeeded in halving the companies value in under three years(!); John McCain's current chief economic advisor. Sex Appeal: As McCain's media surrogate, she made the brave and entirely apolitical decision to defend Hillary Clinton from the Obama campaign's relentless sexist attacks. Read: bi (partisan) girls are hot. Also, she's really (really) rich. RILF Hairdo Of Choice: Lesbian tennis coach meets Nascar dad. We call it the power mullet. Favorite Position:Viennese Oyster
6. Elisabeth Hasselbeck
Axis Of Power: Came in fourth place on Survivor: The Australian Outback; Co-hosts The View, where she's often referred to as the "Pretty" "Conservative" or "Dumb" one. Voted "worst interviewer on television" by 1.5 million AOL members. Sex Appeal: If you're trying to seem smart and serious, even when you're doing something completely inane and beneath you, it helps a lot to sit next to an ignorant moron. This phenomenon is called the "Hasselbeck effect," and it was discovered by Barabara Walters in 2003. I've never been to a Dairy Queen, but if I did, I'd like to imagine that Hasselbeck would be working there. She'd dip my cone, I'd impress her with some kind of shiny moving object, offer her manager some trinkets and/or beads in exchange for her, and off we'd go. RILF Hairdo Of Choice: Soft, like a pony's Favorite Position:Froggy Style
5. Condoleezza Rice
Axis Of Power: As National Security Advisor, didn't want Saddam Hussein's "Smoking gun to be a mushroom-cloud"; once accidentally referred to President George W. Bush as "my Husband..." Sex Appeal: Some might find it odd, or even suspicions, that Condoleezza seems to have no personal life at all. I think that makes her hot like a nun. Plus, once she's loyal to you, she'll lie to Congress, misrepresent facts in interviews and ignore subpoenas... and she doesn't care if you're already married. RILF Hairdo Of Choice: Oddly James Brown-ish Favorite Position:Spoons
Hmmm, is that the christening of a new regular feature, you ask? Maybe. Or possibly just a way of avoiding pissing off Jack Handey. Or better yet, using this amazing image of Lindsay Lohan one more time.
Either way, it felt fitting for NCDSUV to end the week with a few points of observation regarding the greatest political scandal since Abraham Lincoln first discovered his mustache didn't entirely connect with the rest of his beard. That's right: Barack Obama's denial of public campaign support from our darling Lohan (which, incidentally, might explain her recent appeal to Martin Scorsese for legitimacy).
Looks like someone else has a crush on Sarah Palin. The Hannity & Colmes show aired their interview with the Republican vice presidential candidate last night, and Sean Hannity has clearly fallen under the spell of her Alaskan charms. The interview felt more like a first date than an in-depth question-and-answer session, but I guess that’s what FOX News means by fair and balanced.
Alan Colmes, apparently relegated back to his crypt, had no part in the interview, so it was up to Hannity to smile, joke and flirt with the governess. He teed her up with questions about how dangerous Barack Obama is, made hockey mom “jokes,” told her he wanted to move to Alaska and tried really hard not to glance down at those luscious legs flowing out of her sexy skirt.
The one-time local newswoman weathered the barrage of less-than-hard-hitting questions and presented her case, and introduced some new Palin-isms. Here are the highlights:
Sure, Cindy McCain, you're a relatively young woman standing next to your paleolithic presidential-hopeful husband John. And yes, you're kind of hot in a middle-aged, buttoned-up power suit, conservatively ideological sort of way (whether you make the cut in our list of Republicans I'd Like To Fuck remains to be seen).
But, as NCDSUV will attest with every last hormonally starved breath, you are no Sarah Palin. And you know it too. So stop overcompensating by suddenly being a more visible (and audible) presence in this campaign, damnit.
At least if Plain (oh sweet, sweet Palin) were to make threats about the media picking her bones clean, she'd back it up threatening them with a semi-automatic. And if she were going to do it while wearing pearl necklaces, we're almost positive they'd be the kind you're not supposed to walk out of the house adorned with.
Of course, this particular rant only reinforces the weird mind-fuckery that Palin has unleashed. It's allowed me to foster a lesser of evils within the collectively questionable conservative ticket, rather than scrutinize them wholesale against the wholly preferable Obama campaign. But I know who I'm voting for, and I'm at least enjoying the unexpected level of spectacle suddenly springing from the right. It's like having to see a chick flick with your girlfriend but at least getting a nudity scene.
So stop blocking my view of Sarah, you vulturous first-lady-in-waiting. And while you're at it, stop putting me in the position of Googling The View so frequently on my Web browser. I can only handle so much Joy Behar in a given week.
And yes, you can look anticipate NCDSUV reaction to Palin's impending interview with Hannity & Colmes tomorrow.
Yes, it is true. Lorne Michaels has confirmed that Tina Fey is in talks with SNL to portray NSCDUV's favorite RILF, Sarah Palin. (That's Republican I'd Like To Fuck for the uninitiated. Stay tuned for an upcoming list of our favorite all-time RILFs).
It's hard to say what would be an equivalent in the pantheon of nerdy wet-dream fantasies. Perhaps if Princess Leia was played by Jackie O. in a XXX porn film?
Well, either way, two things are clear: NCDSUV scribe Kevin Johnston's head is probably exploding; and sales of Kleenex are bound to skyrocket that night to supply many a single, middle-aged man's basement apartment in their parents house. Which is good, since they'll need them for their more conventional purpose if she and her running mate actually win the election.
As I mentioned last week, I am in love with Sarah Palin. I can’t get her off my mind, and it’s getting worse. As a lifelong liberal, it has been a trying time. I should be reveling in the fact that my party has put up one of its most charismatic presidential candidates in decades, but I am distracted. Distracted by the power of Palin.
I admit, at first I was drawn in by her raw sexuality (she was 1994’s Miss Wasilla after all), but now I have seen the true extent of her power. Behind the smile, those sexy suits and those come-hither-glasses lurks a woman who can do anything. Let’s take a look at some of the amazing things she has done since entering the national spotlight:
I was more than ready to get my Tim Robbins on as I sat down for the Republican National Convention on Wednesday night. Rudy Giuliani was delivering his lispy Catskills routine (complete with contractually obligated 9/11 references), the fashion-forgotten Republicans were shouting out their tacky chants and it was just about time for me to pounce on this vice presidential candidate I hadn’t even heard of just a week ago.
Wearing my Obama ’08 T-shirt and drinking tea so my voice was perfectly tuned for lobbing “boo” and “are you kidding me?” at the TV screen, I was totally prepared. As Sarah Palin took the stage, the cascade of cheers from Denver nearly drowned out my mocking commentary… so I turned the volume down. I was winning already. Finally, the Alaskan Governor began her parade of lies and insults. But as she began to mock Barack Obama with a not-so-subtle jab at his public service record, something inside of me changed. My rage subsided and I felt a little flutter in my heart. Was her message starting to resonate with me? Nope, her looks were.
Ok, I lied. I don't really have an update. It was mostly a ploy to get you to keep reading. But I do have a couple of thoughts. Firstly, it seems a bit convenient that when the Democrats finally have a viable black candidate, and he's opposing a fiercely paleolithic opponent, the Republicans somehow manage to outhip us with all this unwed teenage mom stuff. The stage during the RNC more closely resembled a reunion of the cast from Fast Times At Ridgemont High than a conservative pulpit. And yes, I guess that makes John McCain Mr. Hand. Too bad the event didn't take place in Honolulu so the whole crowd could have greeted him with Aloha.
Also, where does Levi's namesake ring-finger tattoo of his beloved Bristol fall in the pantheon of bad digit-adorning ink? It certainly doesn't approach Ozzy's self-involved knuckle-scribbling, no doubt the result of snorting too many ants one mundanely psychotic evening. But, it's arguably less regrettable than the rest of these losers' personal acessorizing.
Oh, and just to clear up the mass public confusion: No, Levi and NCDSUV writer Kevin Johnston are not related. Although we could use the publicity, so Kevin, just lie and say you are and head down to Minneapolis.
You know the really special thing about Labor Day for Bristol Palin, daughter of Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin? She gets two of them this year. As you've probably heard, the 17-year-old unwed is five months preggers, which means she was knockin' boots sometime last spring. Here's what we know: Teenage pregnancy happens. Often. And of course Bristol kept the baby because Grandma Palin thinks abortion equals oh, I don't know, complete humiliation for the rest of a woman's life.
Already behind in the polls and terrified the disclosure will alienate voters in November, the Republican party now has a team on the ground in Alaska trying to figure out how McCain decided on Palin as a running mate (hint: paper rock scissors).
But if anyone should be scared shitless right now, it's Bristol's boyfriend, Levi. His super sperm is responsible for this mess, and he's got to do all he can to save face, should that fateful tryst jeopardize the Republican win later this year. And the best way to please those eccentric- name-loving Palins is to come up with a good one for their newest member. And while they don't necessarily flow mellifluously into her surname, here are some of our suggestions (and feel free to join in with your own below). Good luck, kids:
Before NCDSUV shutters its doors for the holiday weekend (it is almost time for the Sabbath after all), I realized some of you may be wondering about the absence of commentary regarding Barack Obama’s speech last night at the Democratic National Convention. Well, for one, I was too busy belly laughing over Van Halen’s righteously rockin’ anger at John McCain’s co-opting of “Right Now” to type coherent sentences.
But more pointedly, I have to confess: I wasn’t particularly inspired to sit through the complete director’s cut when I could get the theatrical edit on YouTube and barely miss a beat on the cultural discourse.
