Great Moments in HuffPostery

Matt Welch | May 18, 2005

From the last 36 hours in the life of the world's most strangely compelling celebrity blog:

• Kathryn Ireland: Can anyone tell me, are they going to bring back the draft? I have three sons -- all nearly teenagers -- and am terrified that they will. Why don't they make it that just Republican kids get called up?
• Cable Neuhaus: People will come at this from different angles, but I think I F***cked Ann Coulter In the A**, Hard is a satirical work of middle-brow political genius.
• Norman Mailer: Who, indeed, was Isikoff's supposedly reliable Pentagon source? One's counter-espionage hackles rise. If you want to discredit a Dan Rather or a Newsweek crew, just feed them false information from a hitherto reliable source. You learn that in Intelligence 101A.
• Arianna Huffington: As a student of Greek mythology, I know that when a detail in a myth doesn't make sense, the problem is not with the myth, but with me.
• Diane Keaton: And the fact is, Los Angeles is a city.
• Jim Lampley: It's excruciating on a day-to-day basis to have to endure the social divisiveness, elitist arrogance and blatant media control of creeping fascism in America.

Comments

|5.18.05 @ 12:28PM|#

This is about as compelling as reading people's lists of their record collections was back when personal web pages first got going.

Yawn. Super yawn. Back to bed.

|5.18.05 @ 12:31PM|#

You gotta love the Jim Lampley's of the world. When government is used against them or their lofty ideals, then it's pure unadulterated evil. But when the "coming democratic majority" takes over all will be right in America, since government coercion is A-OK as long as a (democratic) majority support it.

|5.18.05 @ 12:36PM|#

Douglas,

Let me know, and I'll email you the link to my web page. I've got a great collection of pictures of lint balls I've collected over the years. I don't want to post the link here, though, my ISP will kill me for overloading their servers.

|5.18.05 @ 12:45PM|#

Give me a break, I worked last night until 3 a.m.

The Wine Commonsewer|5.18.05 @ 12:48PM|#

Huffington remains the world's best known fruitcake.

|5.18.05 @ 12:53PM|#

That Norman Mailer's quite the super-spy, isn't he?

|5.18.05 @ 12:57PM|#

my wife saw norman mailer fall in the snow this past winter in brooklyn heights.

snow...hmm...snow is cold...and when it gets covered in soot it turns black...black ops...CIA! holy fucking shit!

teh huff is good stuff.

|5.18.05 @ 1:05PM|#

Kathryn Ireland -- that's not Kathy Ireland, is it? The mental level seems the same, but I didn't think she was that old...

|5.18.05 @ 1:05PM|#

Oh . . . so it's Kathryn now is it. I'll make note of that the next time I inform you of my amazement that you can put together more than three words at a time - even if they are random and ridiculous.

Thanks Kathy . . . err . . . umm . . . Kathryn. (See, I am trying).

|5.18.05 @ 1:08PM|#

One more from the Norman Mailer bit:

Obviously, I can offer no proof of any of the above. There still resides, however, under my aging novelist's pate a volunteer intelligence agent, sadly manque. He does suggest that the outcome was too neat.

serioulsly, what is the point in publishing this shit? Huffy is obviously not hurting for content, and even the bad stuff is better than this.

Matt Welch|5.18.05 @ 1:11PM|#

Great Ape -- I dunno, I think having Norman Mailer describe himself as "sadly manque" on your group blog is a crowning achievement, personally.

|5.18.05 @ 1:12PM|#

I noticed that Huffington's blog doesn't allow comments for their "celebrity" writers. Does anyone know of a mirror or parody site that allows comments on these luminaries?

|5.18.05 @ 1:18PM|#

Wow, Lampley... what a howler monkey. Since Rush and Dennis Miller were kicked out of the sportscasting booth, can we kick Lampley back into it?

|5.18.05 @ 1:19PM|#

Guys, it's not Kathy Ireland the swimsuit model. I was afraid it was her, so I clicked on Kathryn Ireland's bio. Definitely not her. Kathy Ireland the (former) swimsuit model is too smart to screw up her K-Mart clothing line by talking politics with Ariana Huffington.

|5.18.05 @ 1:20PM|#

Ms. Keaton is failing to mention that we here in L.A., especially us conservatively-minded residents, didn't see the point in going to the polling booth to vote between two Democrats who are virtually indistinguishable from an idealogical standpoint. One is more colorful and energetic (Villaraigosa), while the incumbent is not. That's about it. And regardless, the mayor in L.A. has little or no power over services like schools, which are in desperate shape. It will be truly remarkable if the new mayor can live up to ANY of his promises (i.e. rail or subway transit to the ocean, more police, better schools with low dropout rates).

|5.18.05 @ 1:22PM|#

for those who haven't seen it: huffingtonstoast.com.

|5.18.05 @ 1:28PM|#

Great Ape -- I dunno, I think having Norman Mailer describe himself as "sadly manque" on your group blog is a crowning achievement, personally.

ha, well i guess if i had a blog and someone actually used the word "manque" i would close up shop like Beavis and Butthead b/c you can't go out any higher.

The Lonewacko Blog|5.18.05 @ 1:29PM|#

That Norman Mailer's quite the super-spy, isn't he?

I don't know Mailer's background, but Ward Beecher played a couple spies in movies (of course!), including The Cartier Project. You can read his expert take on this in Newsweek, Isikoff, and... Karl Rove?.

|5.18.05 @ 1:30PM|#

The latest edition of the Huffington Post would be worth reading for Cable Neuhaus' piece alone (Do you think Ariana edited that herself?), but Matt's right, with all the other pieces, taken together, it adds up to a must read. (That is Matt's point, right?)

...This is quality entertainment people! ...and Ariana naming it after herself makes it that much better. It's a never-ending source of amusment, and it's free!

|5.18.05 @ 1:47PM|#

I like this one , from someone named Jonah Peretti decrying the sloppy reportage of the right-wing bloggersphere. I hereby reproduce his posted comment in its entirety:

Lessons Learned

What I have learned from RatherGate, Newsweek, and the right wing bloggers:

A blogger is a person who fact checks everyone expect himself

------------------------------

[Apparently they also spellcheck, but don't proofread. I love reflexive ironic self-referential humor, intentional or not. This is an expectional example. -- SD]

[PS: I just Googled Jonah -- "I am Director of R&D at Eyebeam, an experimental art and technology non-profit." http://xenia.media.mit.edu/~peretti/ ]

|5.18.05 @ 1:53PM|#

That site seems to be a celebrity version of Democratic Underground.

Matt Welch|5.18.05 @ 2:00PM|#

Ken -- I actually don't read it every day; I don't find the design congenial. It's best to do once every three or four days, preferably around midnight, and drunk.

|5.18.05 @ 2:02PM|#

Last year, some hailed the retun of Norman Mailer because of a few poorly argued, overwrought anti-Bush screeds that ran in the New York Review of Books. "Good to see the old scrapper can still throw a stiff jab" was the general tone, but I rememer wondering why the hell the NYRB's usually scrupulous editors allowed the clearly senile old coot to whip out his dick and start dancing all over their pseudo-scholarly pages. Always a better self-promoter than writer, I wish he'd just die already.

|5.18.05 @ 2:03PM|#

Does anyone know of a mirror or parody site that allows comments on these luminaries?

I dunno, I'm thinkin' it'll take some real talent to write a parody that's funnier than the real thing.

Tim Higgins|5.18.05 @ 2:08PM|#

This is pretty good:

http://www.huffingtonstoast.com

|5.18.05 @ 2:11PM|#

matty,

So he's the anti-Buckley?

|5.18.05 @ 2:16PM|#

Dudes, I wish H&R was an audio blog. I have a killer Arianna Huffington impersonation!

The text version involves a lot of "George Bush and Dick Cheney and the big corporations." The voice is what makes it special.

|5.18.05 @ 2:28PM|#

I don't know if that IFACITA,H is old news (internet time being what it is), but, man, that's hi-larious.

|5.18.05 @ 2:38PM|#

joe,

That's exactly who he is.

|5.18.05 @ 2:42PM|#

"So he's the anti-Buckley?"

Um, no.

|5.18.05 @ 3:01PM|#

Rats, I knew I'd regret missing the "Dan Rather/Newsweek" session when I took Intelligence 101A. That day I was running the bake sale that was financing Air Force purchase of bombs.

|5.18.05 @ 4:24PM|#

Thank God that woman defected and became a liberal. I sware I think she is mole. I would laugh harder but conservatives used to sing her praises. Like laying on your back for the right millionaire husband suddenly makes you an expert on anything beyond fornication. I think the reason why the Onion stopped being funny a few years ago, is that reality caught up with it. Its no longer satire, its just a goofier version of real life.

|5.18.05 @ 6:21PM|#

"Thank God that woman defected and became a liberal."

I'm glad she went to the left too.

...I just wish President Bush hadn't gone so liberal. From using the federal government to improve the lives of people beyond our borders to going apeshit with the budget...

...tax and spend, those are the worst liberals of all! Prescription drugs on the dole? ...Ouch!

...And who thought Bush the Younger would be so hostile to free trade?

|5.18.05 @ 7:42PM|#

It's got to be a different Kathryn Ireland. If I remember correctly, Kathy Ireland the model was a Bush supporter last year.

|5.18.05 @ 8:04PM|#

Greg Gutfeld is a fuckin' legend. Taking self-parody to a new level...

s.m. koppelman|5.18.05 @ 10:12PM|#

I thought the Mailer bit was interesting and the Lampley bit's only fault was clunky phrasing. Does this mean I'm a nutcake?

|5.18.05 @ 11:44PM|#

This is like an internet version of the "Love Boat."

Will Charo post on the IMF? Will Rickles riff on the trade deficit? Will Bernie Kopel opine on the Medicare prescription program?

Just when you think the celebrity culture hits the bottom, a new level is unearthed.

And to answer your question: Yes, Koppelman, you're a nutcake.

SMG

|5.19.05 @ 6:55AM|#

What the hell has happened to David Mamet? If memory serves me correctly, he used to have a sense of humor--a very good one, in fact--and very little tolerance for Hollywood buffoons and other assorted world-savers.

Not any more. His is the most emabarrassing post I've seen so far on the HuffPost.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/theblog/archive/david-mamet/this-computer-thing_315.html

|5.19.05 @ 10:56AM|#

Apparently Mamet turned into a Marmot.

|5.19.05 @ 11:22AM|#

I am disappointed in myself when I do a crossword, and I know the answer to the frikking celebrity clues. It is almost impossible to avoid knowing more than you want about them, even if you don't watch the stupid shows. I wonder if even Bigfoot knows that the Raymond show is over?