Wonkette

Local media insider blog FishbowlDC for the past few weeks has been holding its annual “Hottest Media Types” competition and yesterday, after 512 nominations, intense voting, you name it, they announced the winners. And WOW, we knew the Washington press crowd wasn’t exactly a model shoot, but… seriously? Has it always been this bad? For what it’s worth, we think it’s a crime that a certain someone didn’t make the cut. He’s a known slut, and he happens to be the editor of FishbowlDC itself: Patrick Gavin, seen here mocking poor old Henry Kissinger in a Wonkette archive photo. Gavin is always drunk and unprofessional and we have more photographic proof of this that we’ve been using as blackmail for months. Well, he stopped paying us a week ago, so here goes. MORE »

Ha, so get this. John McCain and pals very recently came up with the MEDIA PLOY OF THE CENTURY: they were going to Take The Media Back from Barack Obama during his big speech in Berlin tomorrow, which at least 400 million people will attend (hurrah), by speaking from an oil rig off the coast of Louisiana. Surely all reporters and cameramen would’ve rushed to cover this instead, because what’s a better venue for a media grab than some tiny offshore piece of metal that’s only reachable by helicopter? But now, after publicizing this brilliant coup, McCain has had to cancel it because of, whatitscalled, THE MONSTROUS HURRICANE THAT IS DESTROYING EVERYTHING IN THE GULF. MORE »

The Obama campaign is all about IMAGE CONTROL these days and GOOD OPTICS, which is why nobody can wear a green Hamas shirt around the candidate. Now Barack Obama is stone cold ignoring the press on his Middle Eastern Hope ‘N Basketball Tour, leaving it to some military nobody to hold the camera while he shoots three-pointers when really such hard-hitting news coverage should be left to trained journalistic professional nobodies. MORE »

Well, we’re glad that the planners of the Democratic National Convention have so diligently put together their celebrity cameo list for Denver. They have announced that Kanye West, Wyclef Jean, and N.E.R.D. will perform music shows. Ben Affleck, Scarlett Johansson, Warren Beatty, Annette Bening, Forrest Whitaker, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Cheryl Hines and Edward Norton Jr. have promised to smile for the cameras. Corporate sponsors include United Airlines, Google, Coors Brewing Company, Anheuser-Busch, Xcel Energy, Motorola, Qwest, and AT&T. So many announcements, and such organization! At this rate, the DNCC might actually review media applications soon and let members of the press know whether or not they should buy expensive plane tickets. [WP/The Sleuth]

For 400 glorious years, John McCain has gotten daily handjobs from the national press corps because he lets them sit in the back of the bus with him while he dispenses salty bons mots and makes inappropriate jokes. But now all the favorable press coverage goes to Barack Obama, because he gets more people to come to his rallies. John McCain knows how Hillary Clinton feels now, which is why he’s stealing such winning moves from her playbook as “Change you can replicate with some sort of technology” and hiring a campaign team that fights pitched internecine battles on the front page of the New York Times. MORE »

Barack Obama has a new ad called “Dignity,” and it is all about what a candidate loses in the process of running for President. Ha ha, just kidding! But the part in the end where he strangles the old lady is pretty undignified. [YouTube]

The national press corps is not used to covering a “confident” Democratic presidential candidate, at least in this decade. So much confidence, in fact, that the candidate won’t always bend over backwards to talk to the press, or to leak internal drama to the press! Ergo, the press has decided that Obama is arrogant. And when they saw Obama speak behind this new “great seal” of his on Friday — definitely the lamest stunt we can remember from Hopey — this confirmed to the press that Obama is too arrogant. Obama arrogantly got the message and arrogantly ditched the great seal and did some other arrogant stuff, like believe he might actually win this thing. [Marc Ambinder]

We have read this elitist New Yorker profile of your annoying loudmouth boyfriend Keith Olbermann and, like most profiles of MSNBC personalities, it confirms everything you learned about current MSNBC dynamics during the first five minutes of its Iowa caucus coverage. MORE »

Despite the fact that he now leads the Democratic nomination race by every conceivable metric, Barack Obama will not be the candidate running against John McCain. Legions of Clinton die-hards will turn out in West Virginia tomorrow to stick it to MSNBC, Robert Reich, non-hard-working white people, and other members of the sexist cabal who want Hillary to throw in the towel before she has humiliated herself in all 50 states (plus Guam, Samoa, the Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico, and Tatooine). MORE »

The Politico’s Democratic blogger Ben Smith is now simply “The Politico,” if this front page is any indication. Jesus, I know I’ve linked to him twice already today. And just who the hell does this “Carrie Budoff Brown” think she is, keeping a whole byline for herself? [Politico]