There’s been so much neg­a­tivity sur­rounding Sarah Palin’s VP can­di­dacy, I thought I’d try and find some­thing to thank her for….
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Thank you, Sarah Palin
for taking women – and men -
back a few notches so fast
we all got whiplash.

Thank you Sarah Palin for proving fem­i­nism right;
For showing that men and women are truly equal.
That women can be just as stupid
as the stu­pidest of men.
Like the men run­ning the country
for most of the past decade.
And of course, Condi too.

Thank you Sarah Palin,
for flashing your girly smile,
and throwing back that silly Northern twang;
Your beauty queen charms warm the limp, lonely hearts
of Bill O’Reillys and Karl Roves every­where.
Thanks for being the pret­tiest beard
for frus­trated Republicans still in the closet.

Thanks Sarah Palin for charging rape vic­tims
for their own rape kits, while preaching to us all
the joys of cher­ishing our rape babies.
Because life is pre­cious -
until hunting season, that is.

Thank you Sarah Palin for helping intel­li­gent women
realize they are intel­li­gent first, women after.
Thanks for helping smart men appre­ciate
smart women more than ever before.

Thanks Sarah Palin for making George W. Bush
look edu­cated by com­par­ison.
Thanks for making Cheney look saner -
at least he shoots at things at close range and
doesn’t make couch covers from their bodies.

Thanks Sarah for not blaming us mor­tals for cli­mate change -
None of us was around 6,000 years ago
when you believe the Earth was cre­ated…
How could we know what caused cli­mate change?

Thanks Sarah.
For every­thing you do.
With every­thing you say,
you are a reminder
for every girl and every woman
of the choice inside each of us.
The choice…
to be a smart, savvy, self-aware human being
or to be
just another jackass, with lipstick.

~Kiran Mehdee, 1 October, 2008

orig­inal image © Reuters

Imran Khan voices the ques­tion on many people’s minds about the lax secu­rity pro­vided by the gov­ern­ment.
Graham Stewart pro­vides an insightful his­tor­ical per­spec­tive on dynas­ties and assas­si­na­tions.
Amir Taheri presents the chief rea­sons why reli­gious extrem­ists in Muslim coun­tries despise democracy.

more to come…

from kcd – A web­comic of romance, sar­casm, math, and lan­guage – By Randall Munroe

AP has selected Colbert as its Celebrity of the Year, which makes a lot more sense than the former KGB officer chosen by Time magazine.

“It is truly an honor to be named the Associated Press’ Celebrity of the Year. Best of all, this makes me the offi­cial front-runner for next year’s Drug-Fueled Downward Spiral of the year. P.S. Look for my baby bump this spring!”
—Stephen Colbert

Extremist Muslims and Right-Wing Westerners can agree on one and only one socio­cul­tural phe­nom­enon: hating gay people. It’s painful for the mod­er­ates of both sides to accept, but it is a reality that must be con­fronted by intel­li­gent people on all sides before any real, pos­i­tive, pro­gres­sive change can be real­is­ti­cally forged.

This should make things even more inter­esting…

“I really believe that the pagans, and the abor­tion­ists, and the fem­i­nists, and the gays and the les­bians who are actively trying to make that an alter­na­tive lifestyle, the ACLU, People for an American Way, all of them who have tried to sec­u­larize America, I point the finger in their face and say ‘you helped this (September 11) happen.’”

–Jerry Falwell (Aug 11, 1933 – May 15, 2007)

…247gay.com
…NPR news

Yes, it’s an hour long, and yes it’s def­i­nitely worth it.

Stephen Colbert imparts sage wisdom in Wired Magazine…

DON’T BE AFRAID TO MAKE THINGS UP. Never fear being exposed as a fraud. Experts make things up all the time. They’re qual­i­fied to.

PICK A FIELD THAT CAN’T BE VERIFIED. Try some­thing like string theory or God’s will: “I speak to God. I’m sorry that you can’t also.” Security experts are in this cat­e­gory: They have secu­rity clear­ances, we don’t. We can’t ques­tion the exper­tise of the NSA because we are not in the NSA.

GET AN HONORARY PHD. They work won­ders. I have a doc­torate in fine arts from Knox College in Illinois. All I did was give a speech, and now every­body has to call me Dr. Colbert.

This guy is on fire!

We’ve been taping, each night, monday through thursday, the new episodes of The Daily Show w/ Jon Stewart and The Colbert Report. Then, over the course of the week and the weekend, we watch them all.

It’s a fab system we’ve devel­oped. We don’t miss the antics of the shows, and yet we don’t end up cut­ting into our sleep time to watch them. And, as a bonus, we can fast for­ward through all the com­mer­cials! Ahh, VCRs are not obso­lete yet.

I have to say that Colbert has taken the won­derful con­cepts that were devel­oped on the Daily Show, and placed them among the heavens above. The guy is not just an incred­ibly funny come­dian, he’s also the sharpest mind on TV since Trey Parker and Matt Stone. Sheer genius. Each episode is packed all the way through with punches and jabs and acute obser­va­tions on topics as diverse as Sigmund Freud’s birthday, to Feminine Sexual Emplowerment, to Robotic Deadly Bears.

His schtick, so amaz­ingly played out by him, of being a neo-conservative, ultra right wing, xeno­phobic, homo­phobic, religious-fundamentalist is just flaw­lessly por­trayed – except for the few times each night when he breaks out into a grin mid-sentence.

I am just so happy that there is SOME quality on TV nowa­days. Being more of a book-ish person, TV is usu­ally a very dis­ap­pointing and boring waste of time for me. But when it’s Colbert time, his Lincolnish despite for the fac­tin­ista make my stomach hurt in sweet pain from unstop­pable laughter.

Don’t miss the new site: The Colbert Nation