Pop Star

So Kathleen Parker, perhaps aspiring to be the WaPo MoDo, not realizing that the one is quite enough, vaingloriously and tediously attempts to cast performance artist Sarah Palin as some sort of postmodern feminist icon. Ahahahaha. Oh wait, she's (somewhat) serious.

This is, I believe, the selfsame Kathleen Parker who, not so long ago, ired thousands of knuckle-dragging cyber-troglodytes with her heretical analysis of Saint Sarah as being slightly out of her depth.

Apparently that was then, and this is now, and Parker's sage analysis has -- well, what's the opposite of deepened? Shallowed?

For what it's worth, I get a kick out of Sarah. May I call her Sarah?

She and I apparently share a certain genetic predisposition to annoy all the right people. These would be the folks who take themselves and their ideologies a tad too seriously. Thus when I was promoting my book, "Save the Males," I wore an aggressively feminine suit -- pink with a bow in back -- just to irritate hard-line feminists, who, without bothering to read the book, would hate it on sight.

I happen to hate bows, but it was worth it.

Likewise, Sarah knows just what drives us all nuts and, instead of changing her tune, she turns up the volume -- and triples down. Don't like her little red shoes? She'll add a red leather jacket. Got gloss?

Oh, sisters really are doing it tofor themselves, aren't they? Here's the thing, and even Parker should be able to grok this simple observation -- there is a substantial difference between a columnist peddling a book under the guise of comfortably suburban pseudo-contrarian claptrap, and a former vice-presidential candidate hitting the rubber-chicken circuit and angering rubes with a St. Vitus' dance of choregraphed winks and glances at her scrawled palm, lying every step of the way. Parker and Palin are both trying to sell easily-replicated compendia of smartassery, true, but Palin is also catering -- no, deliberately antagonizing -- the addled assumptions of fairly large swaths of aggrieved morons, with the clear purpose of disrupting what's left of our political process.

This would be one thing if the country weren't on the verge of implosion, but this breathy sister-bonding with a noisome dingbat while serious people are trying to figure out serious solutions to serious problems, it's just bullshit. Palin appears to be not a whit more informed or astute about the world around her or the mechanics of US government than she was when Parker rightly called her out. Yet now Parker feels some lame kinship with Palin's increasingly tiresome narcissism.

This woman is not to be feared or loathed. She is to be taken with a grain of humor and a dash of admiration. A different version of Madonna, she's a public relations machine who manipulates public perception with well-timed and, recently, sophisticated messaging.

Again, Parker writes as if she should be talking about Lady Gaga or Lindsay Lohan, rather than someone who actively aspires to have an impact on the political process. Frankly, I'd rather have Madonna in high political office than Sarah Palin, and I can't fucking stand Madonna. The "grain of humor and a dash of admiration" was done with about 18 months ago; Palin is little more than a reality-teevee stunt-cast at this point.

So why the fuck are we hearing all goddamned week about her hypocrite daughter's impending crossbow wedding, like we should care that she put her legs behind her ears for a drunken hockey oaf and let him knock her up again? Happens every day around the world, the only difference here is that Levi is slightly smarter than we gave him credit for, insofar as he reads the papers enough to know that his future maw-in-law made $12 mil last year.

The genius of Sarah's message, whatever it is, is that it doesn't matter what it is. Of course Americans want their country back. We'd prefer that China not own us. Most don't like unfunded federal mandates, takeovers or bailouts. Except when it benefits us directly.

Reread that, because those five sentences are, inadvertenly one fears, the truest part of the entire column. The moment it doesn't matter what someone says, just so long as they say something, that person is just a parody of themselves with a brain-dead fan club -- in other words, Lady Gaga once again. So break the rest of it down -- "Americans want their country back" from whom? We had an election, you fucktards, it was in the papers and everything. And why does China own us, exactly, can our new pop goddess enlighten us? Does she know fuck-all about how the working class has been bled dry for 35 years, and now since the top 10% own 70% of the assets, they can pretty much trade with each other and write the rest of us off? Seriously, I've asked this many times, and I'll do it once again -- if anyone knows of any specific instance where Palin has proposed even one (1) actual serious policy, foreign or domestic, financial, job-creating, energy, whatever -- please do speak up. I think we'd all be very surprised.

In the meantime, Parker cuts to the heart of the teabaggers' deal, whether she knows it or not. Everyone gets bent over the idea of handouts, until some of the pelf lands in their hands. This is the core of the "get the gubmint out of my Medicare" morons' deal, which is why they need to die off all the sooner, since no one should expend energy trying to explain this shit to them.

Well, who's to argue with a lotta women comin' together? It's the sisterhood, baby. Wear pink and put a bow on it.

Sarah's long-term plans are anybody's guess. Anyone who thinks she won't run for president because she's making too much money on the celebrity circuit is missing a big point. You make money as a presidential candidate, too. If you win, you're president. If you lose, you're rich.

And don't tell her she can't. If you do, she's just gonna get feistier and cuter. Next thing you know she'll be a dadgum lioness givin' heck to those media hyenas, just the way they can't stand it.

Yes, she's showed us all, hasn't she? She really has, you know; where else can you lie through your fucking teeth, make millions, have thousands of morons adoring you at every stop, and even have formerly cogent media commentators fawning over your wardrobe and your bullshit attitude? But it's just good fun watching supposedly professional journamalists write these wretched screeds, like they're auditioning for a job at Entertainment Weekly.

It's not a coincidence that Bristol and Levi announced their immaculate engagement to some cheesy gossip rag, you know. Considering the "legitimate" media we've got, I'd guess we're about 10-20 years out from electing a Kardashian to national office, since neither the people nor the media can tell the difference any longer. Idiocracy will turn out to have been an eerily prescient documentary.

I'm so goddamned sick of all these people, the assholes yanking the world's chain with their prima-donna bullshit, and the highly-paid media monkeys writing brainless odes to them, instead of something useful. How do we get rid of them? They are ruining what's left of the country, but maybe we really want it that way.