Wonkette

Yesterday, this vaguely unsettling contest campaign email from one Philippe Reines, Clinton flack and nominee for hottest media type in Washington (PR division), entertained everyone on the whole internet. Sadly, it appears we broke the poor man’s spirit. MORE »

As FishbowlDC continues its “Hottest Media People” contest, the campaigning and politicking grow more desperate. Yesterday we mocked their appearance, but today we’ll mock them personally.

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FishbowlDC is concluding its “Rising Star” contest. We’re not entirely clear on what the contestants were competing for, or what qualifies one as a rising star, but it seems to involve internet polls. And, naturally, massive voter fraud. As can be expected, it quickly became a popularity contest, with someone from something called “Two Mundos Magazine” duking it out with Kara Rowland, an attractive metro reporter from that bastion of respectable journalism, the Washington Times.

As the polls close, it looks like Kara’s gonna take it. Kara won! What put her over the edge? Her work on September 11 widows? Her series on utility regulations in Maryland? Sure, that shit’s ok, but we think it just might’ve been the Facebook picture we’ve attached after the jump.

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FishbowlDC’s Patrick Gavin took a trip to the White House Press Corp’s new temporary digs across the street from the White House. What he found may shock you. MORE »

Sadly, neither of these two men are nominated.

FishbowlDC, scraping a barrel even we are scared to open, is currently holding a competition to find the “hottest” journalists in Washington D.C. (it’s not often we use the scare quotes around a word other than “journalist” when talking about this crowd, but desperate times and all that). You are asked to select which candidate is the least unappealing, in two categories by gender. We don’t have a dog in this fight (though Original Wonkette and Liz Gorman, Intrepid Girl Reporter are both nominated — and we’re sure they’re both thrilled to be the targets of your gin-soaked, middle-aged lust), but we do feel that we’d be lax in our duty if we didn’t start documenting the race itself — starting with a brilliant self-promotional email, sent out not minutes after polls opened. It’s after the jump.

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* The Marine Corps Marathon registration started today, but that information is totally useless to anyone reading this. [Metroblogging DC] MORE »

* The Washington Wire’s sense of humor isn’t dead after all; it’s just very badly burned. [WSJ] MORE »

* We hope Neil Young will remember some words that rhyme with “war” besides “door.” [Brooklyn Vegan] MORE »

You came through again, everyone. This week’s sightings are all over both the map and the stratified Washington hierarchy. Helen Thomas apparently likes to eat with the kewl kids, even if she’s just gumming it. Kevin Nealon, Newt Gingrich, and Marion Barry pull some nice trim. Ted Koppelhas a death wish. Morgan Spurlock keeps trying to supersize his career and Tom Friedman’s mustache of wisdom has nothing to do with Napoleon.

A whole rack more, as standard, after the jump.

Please don’t forget that Wonk’d is entirely tipster driven. So when you spot someone famous out there, make a note in your PDA, ’cause you’ll have other hazy memories to sort through in the morning. Once you feel that reminder buzzing you, email us here, with “Wonk’d” or “Sighting” in the subject line (along with the name of the celeb that you saw). Thanks!

And speaking of sights to see: YES, we are aware of the frightening photos of Katherine Harris “getting her cougar on” with a cute young college journalist. We will be blogging about them shortly.

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We like the crew over at FishBowlDC and admire their work, which we link to frequently. But given our weakness for irony, as well as our obsession with all things media, we’d be falling down on the job if we didn’t pass along this reader email.

This may take a little concentration — so put down that plastic salad fork and focus. First, read this FishBowl DC item:

Washingtonian’s Kim Eisler is not at all happy with Howard Kurtz. Personally, we’re just amused that at the end of a column spent documenting some other reporter’s conflicts-of-interest, Kurtz profiles a correspondent on the network where Kurtz himself moonlights. Irony alert!

Second, read this “meta-irony alert!” from a Wonkette reader:

Stay with me here as I go all David Foster Wallace on your ass — Um…. the writer of said FishBowl item, Garrett Graff, is the editor at large of the Washingtonian. So — let’s say that Graff highlights how a colleague is not at all happy with Howie Kurtz (whom Graff blowjobish-ly profiled for, uh, the Washingtonian, and what a PLEASELIKEME hummer it was!).

And we are personally amused that Garrett Graff — at the end of his item on how a colleague is upset at a subject of a previous Graff profile AND how said subject has a conflict of interest by dint of his moonlighting job… neglects to so much as intimate that, in the very act of blogging about a guy who’s mad at another guy, who also has a conflict of interest… Garrett soi meme is moonlighting and creating an even more bizarre conflict of interest by reporting about a colleague and refusing to mention it.

Whoa! Didja get all that? If so, then here’s one more thing to note for the record. At the very end of his column, Kurtz at least discloses his potential conflict: “Howard Kurtz hosts CNN’s weekly media program, Reliable Sources.” As noted by our source, Graff does not.

Our musings on this tempest in a teapot — or bubbling in a fishbowl — continue after the jump.

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