So overweight former baseball technician Curt Schilling will not be America’s new beloved Republican Ted Kennedy after all. Here are the known conditions that might have been factors in his proto-failure:

• He’s not even actually a registered Republican, which many political Beltway D.C. Boston insiders speculated would interfere with his ability to run on the Republican ticket
• Aggressive unpopularity

“Regardless of the amount of support and outreach that’s been given to me, it just did not make sense,” Schilling told someone at some point in response to all this. [CNN]

The race to fill Ted Kennedy’s ample seat in the Senate is heating up like a corpse in the summer tide! (Sorry, Denby.) Curt Schilling, world champion quarterback for Boston’s “Mighty Ducks,” loves George W. Bush and jacking off in bloodstained sock, so he is qualified to be the Republican candidate. Schilling, heir to his family’s spice fortune, joins a crowded Republican field that includes former Lieutenant Governor Kerry Healey and pretty much nobody else. MORE »

Thursday, August 20: Womenfolk don’t like baseball, so to lure them to a game, the Nats are hosting a women-friendly pre-game tomorrow night. Recognizing that ladies may be frightened by this unnatural habitat, the Nats are offering things only women love: massages and manicures. And because all women love to shop, jewelry, handbags, cosmetics and more will be offered for sale, to women. Will women stay for game? Or will they be overwhelmed by their perfect nails and new handbags and leave before the, uh, “kickoff”?
MORE »

The most humiliating moment in our national history — “America’s Waterloo,” they called it — occurred when President Obama threw that pitch to Albert Pujols like a total sally. Compounding the embarrassment was the pair of high-waisted, pouffy jeans he wore, which will be forever associated with deficit-inflating naifs as surely as a cardigan says “Jimmy Carter.” But President Obama will not apologize for his mom jeans! Today he told NBC, “for those of you who want your president to look great in his tight jeans, I’m sorry. I’m not the guy.” President Sarah Palin would never had suggested something so outrageous. [Political Ticker, White House Flickr page]

After eight years of that alky teetotaler George W. Bush, it’s always a delight to see that your president is man enough to have a beer without turning into some raging drunken elder-abusing asshole. Here is Barack Obama just cold slurpin’ a cold one with his powerful baseball-fan friends. On the left, let’s see, that’s probably Bill Gates. Hi Bill! And on the right … hmm, maybe Madonna? Let’s say Madonna. [White House Flickr]

Former federal prosecutor and current National Review smart person Andy McCarthy has a number of interesting political opinions about such things as Barack Obama’s memoir, Barack Obama’s attitude towards Iran, and the Uighurs. Now he has a new interesting political opinion about Barack Obama’s first pitch at the Baseball All-Star Game Tuesday night. What does he have to say? MORE »

Alert UK journalist “Richard” sent us this Reuters pic, wondering what kind of movie Willie Mays and Robert Gibbs and the sleazy White House press pool enjoyed last night on the flight over to the MLB All-Star game. What do you people think? MORE »

TODAY WAS A COMPLETE WASTE OF THE U.S. SENATE JUDICIARY COMMITTEE’S TIME, AND AN INSULT TO BASEBALL AND AMERICA: So many times today your Wonkette editors have prepared to write posts about the Sotomayor hearings, but it all just sucks too much, these people reading their pieces of paper. Maybe we should post a clip of the heckler interrupting Al Franken’s first hearing speech? How about no! Where is all the VIOLENCE? Anyway, this clip is the best distillation on the entire Internet of today’s evil Opening Statement Marathon. (Thanks, John Roberts!) [Gawker]

You didn’t think we’d forgotten the baseball post, did you? Never! Our full coverage of last week’s annual Roll Call Congressional Baseball Game was always destined to come on Sunday, because Sunday is a day for watching baseball after Church. This was always the plan. Always. Always time infinity. (Lies.) So let’s take a photo tour of Republicans vs. Democrats playing a sport, terribly, in their tights (YES, THAT MEANS JOE BARTON) at Nationals Stadium. Up top: escaped Uighurs from New Jersey sneak into the field! MORE »

We knew there had to be a “paying off some 19-year-old boy” aspect of this dull John Ensign story, and here it is: A Republican committee paid Nevada Senator John Ensign’s illicit girlfriend’s son $5,400 during the SAME EXACT TIME Ensign and the lady were humping. This teen-ager was given the dirty GOP money for “research policy consulting,” which is even more bogus-sounding that our business expenses. ALSO: Our friends at the Las Vegas Gleaner inform us that Ensign was putting his peen into this lady before he was legally separated from his wife. MORE »

How many daughters does Sarah Palin have? Like fourteen? Well, David Letterman made a CRUDE REMARK about one of them, apparently intending to refer to the oldest one ( “Bridgeport”) but inadvertently referring to the middle one ( “Jester”). And voila just like that a harmless “gals is always gettin’ pregnant” joke turned into a “isn’t it hilarious when 14-year-olds get raped by baseball stars” joke, so he had to apologize for that. Ugh. Everybody just needs to wash out their minds with soap — Ivory soap, the soap of virgins. [Political Ticker]