Throughout the history of American journalism, reporters have upheld one vital standard: asking the tough questions and holding to account the most powerful person in the nation, which is to say, the First Lady. But is our national legacy of unbiased investigative East Wing reporting suddenly in peril because some black gals are writing about Michelle Obama? MORE »

Seymour Hersh, the famous New Yorker reporter, surfaces once or twice a year to tell us about all the repulsive horrors the Bush administration authorized or perpetrated overseas. The latest: a special wing of the special operations community that used to report directly to Dick Cheney and now reports to no one is “an executive assassination ring essentially, and it’s been going on and on and on. Just today in the Times there was a story that its leaders, a three star admiral named [William H.] McRaven, ordered a stop to it because there were so many collateral deaths. Under President Bush’s authority, they’ve been going into countries, not talking to the ambassador or the CIA station chief, and finding people on a list and executing them and leaving.” So! Everybody just go back to bed, put a pillow over your head, and weep quietly for a while. [MinnPost.com]

Ladies and dudes, it’s Joe the Plumber, reporting from Sderot, Israel! And … wow. This miserable slob can’t even bother to put on a collared shirt when he does his “reporting,” which is really just bitching about how he “liked it back in World War I and World War II” when you would get all your war journalism at the movie theater. Is Joe the Plumber truly the world’s largest known example of a human dildo, or is he a brilliant performance artist sent to us by Jesus/The Onion, for laffs? [YouTube]

This Draper cat is our new journalistic hero. While we were all sitting around in late August typing out “Oh who is Barack Obama going to pick for his Veep, and how does one assemble this complicated Ikea cabinet” on our elitist Macs he was in SOMALIA, trying not to get KIDNAPPED. He is basically your modern-day Indiana Jones, studied in the obscure traditions and quaintly superstitious folkways of an ancient band of bullet-headed goons and moose hunters called “Republicans.” Let’s learn how he infiltrated their tribe and got them to reveal all their embarrassing secrets! MORE »

Today your editor decided to “get serious” and go to a sober panel discussion, during the day, at the lovely Minnesota Public Radio building in downtown St. Paul. So many “famous” people were there! Jim VandeHei and Roger Simon of Politico, plus Nina Easton of FORTUNE and sometimes Fox News, and also Catalina Camia of USA Today and most famously, Mark McKinnon, who used to work on John McCain’s campaign until he quit because of his Loyalty Oath to Barack Obama. MORE »

The Pony isn’t Adele’s first brush with controversy lunacy:

Oh, Adele. You’re a girl after our own hearts. MORE »

Last night, the Wonkettes left their respective apartments and headed out into the real world, to attend an exciting event at the National Press Club. The event, “An Army of Davids or the Triumph of Goliath?”, was pitched as “a no-holds-barred debate” between these three giants: Glenn Reynolds, the Instapundit himself, and author of the just-published An Army of Davids; Joe Trippi, former campaign manager for Howard Dean, and author of The Revolution Will Not Be Televised; and Barry C. Lynn, senior fellow at the New American Foundation, and author of End of the Line. (They are pictured above, from left to right: Lynn, Trippi, Reynolds, and moderator Nick Gillespie, editor-in-chief of Reason.)

After the jump, our comprehensive coverage — plus more fantastic photos, taken by Wonkette shutterbug Liz Gorman, Intrepid Girl Reporter. Enjoy!

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“Whaddya mean ‘what’s in the water bottle?’”

Actual reporting? On Wonkette? No! Because we didn’t pay anyone! And it’s not really news, so much as an obsession with an oft-soused media whore! We didn’t go anywhere, obviously, but we did send Wonkette Photographer Liz Gorman, Intrepid Girl Reporter!

And freelance writer Mike Sanderson, responding to our call for “unemployed all-purpose contrarians,” sent us a full, first-hand report of the proceedings:

I just left the Hitch-Sully Denmark solidarity anti-protest. A perfect counterpoint, in tone, to the violent anti-Denmark demonstrations: about 75 men and women in black coats, milling listlessly at the end of a tree-lined cul-de-sac, holding little flags or homemade Danish paraphanalia, making small talk with each other awkwardly for an hour in the cold wind. Sully didn’t show up until 12:50, but Hitch was there the whole time. You’re right that he ignored his readers, and instead devoted his attention to the print and television media reporters present. Who were desperate for something to report on.

More of his report, and the rest of the gallery of pictures (Liz got all up in Hitch’s grill!), after the jump:

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