Well, we do have friends with in vast right-wing conspiracy, it turns out. But they’re still unwilling to give us dirt, alas — they’re so loyal, why can’t they be like our “unnamed” Democratic friends who so readily trash themselves in print? Our off-the-record sources insist that the Regnery statement on Domenech was totally on-the-level no-funny-stuff, and, speaking very politely on-the-record is Ben Domenech himself, who sends this along: MORE »

Ok, NPR? You are having way too much fun with this. Yeah, it’s cute, but you’re missing the point of the “six degrees” game. See, all of these people are one degree from Abramoff. Like, he gave them money and hung out with them and stuff. Well, Reid is like two degress, but still. Look, we’ll show you how it’s done:
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* “Hungry” and “angry” Dems star in Steve Benen’s so far unscripted and plot-less Democratic presidential campaign. [The Carpetbagger Report]
* DarkSyde likes his Dems — and unregistered’s — even angrier. Vote for us, Joe Undecided, because Karl Rove hates you. Um, plot development? [DailyKos]
* Tony Blankley drank his latte, watched an MLK Jr. clip, tore Tuesday off his Norman Vincent Peale calendar, and smugly blogged for despondent congressmen types. [Real Clear Politics]
* Port controversy, violent hurricane, bloody civil war with no foreseeable end: we got that goin’ for us, which is nice. [The Jawa Report]
* If you’re not angry enough to vote, maybe it’s because April 15th isn’t here yet. John Irons’ take on tax reform (alternatively: “tax reform”) — unlike the empty promises of rap mogul PSA’s — will actually make you die. [Think Progress]

We here at Wonkette would like to announce that in the interest of affirmative action balance, we have decided to hire a conservative contributor. The new member of the team, who will be blogging under the name Sergeant Wonkette, is a long-time commenter at Little Green Footballs, occasional leaflet photocopier, and former senior editor of The New Republic. His first contribution begins below:

Look, we won. That’s it. Go home, everyone else, because the game is over. Republicans OWN you, bitch. We run Congress, the courts, the White House, most of the state capitols, and the Washington Times. We got The West Wing canceled. We made Mark Warner look creepy as hell. Despite all this, you MSM types (that’s “main-stream media” for you MSM types) still don’t get us. Look, it’s simple: we like God,guns, kids, cars, and our country. We don’t like commies and terrorists. And we’re in the majority. MORE »

Pierce Bush! He’s the super-cool laid-back son of Neil (the black sheep Bush brother), just chillin’, brah, down in Austin, checkin’ out the scene, scorin’ wit’ bitches, knahahmsayin’? MORE »

Is the cartoon riot thing over yet? We don’t remember hearing about it this week at all. That’s always a good sign, right? Good work Hitch and Sully!

We do hope that episode ended, or fizzled out, or whatever. ‘Cause we don’t think people should be blowing up Danes, sure, but also because we want to go back to the world where no one gave a shit about cartoons. The world of, like two months ago. When editorial cartoonists, secure in their obscurity, could repeat the jokes they stole from 1950’s Herblock cartoons with crosshatching and textual labeling of strained metaphors straight outta vintage Thomas Nast.

We miss that innocent time. And so does our buddy the Comics Curmudgeon. CC’s been blogging about daily, non-political comics for a while now, so we asked him to take the impressive skills he’s developed as America’s Premier Comic Strip Mocker and train them on the political cartoonists of our nation’s newspapers. His analysis is after the jump.

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* Reliable Source: J. Robert Oppenheimer biographers try to get his reputation restored, but reopening of case is nixed by judge’s son … Oscar Predictions: “Andrew Sullivan… pegs… Philip Seymour Hoffman….” (quote edited for hilarity). [WP]
* Under the Dome: Silvio Berlusconi gets an enthusiastic reception from Italian-American Congressmen, including Pat Leahy, who is a “Grand Official of the Republic of Italy” … Bottles of Pepto-Bismol sent to members of Congress by group protesting changes in state food-safety laws … Sheila Jackson Lee (D-TX) makes rhetorical leap from Thomas Edison to criticism of ports deal. … Congress about to let smoking ban pass. [The Hill]
* Lloyd Grove: Senator Hillary Clinton (D-NY) bashes Ports deal. Her husband Bill, meanwhile, praises Dubai as an “ally,” may have a financial stake in seeing them get the deal. [NYDN]

To prove that they, too, are just like us, Dubai Ports World has a very helpful, very informative, very half-assed kids site, explaining who they are, what they do, and why we should let them run our ports. As connoisseurs of Federal Government Websites For Kids, we have to call this effort merely serviceable. While we do like stories, and want to hear stories of little Afghani Arab girls learning about the operations of government from a totally cool cartoon mascot, this website is not only missing an anthropomorphic talking animal character, it also promises a “Game Zone,” but definitely doesn’t deliver. MORE »

Hello, I’m Rich Cohen. MORE »

You know, we haven’t come out strongly one way or the other on this whole UAE ports controversy (”Zzzzzzzzzzzz”), but if this is true, then, uh, we have to say we’re starting to come around to Dubai Ports World. MORE »