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| Lena Dunham remembers her first time – and Republicans are outraged | Lena Dunham remembers her first time – and Republicans are outraged |
| (about 1 month later) | |
| • As every social conservative knows, sex is fundamentally disgusting – so we shouldn't be too surprised at the outrage greeting the Obama campaign's latest ad, entitled The First Time, in which Lena Dunham makes a sex joke. | • As every social conservative knows, sex is fundamentally disgusting – so we shouldn't be too surprised at the outrage greeting the Obama campaign's latest ad, entitled The First Time, in which Lena Dunham makes a sex joke. |
| "Your first time shouldn't be with just anybody. You want to do it with a great guy," Dunham begins. It sounds like she's talking about one thing, but it soon becomes clear she's talking about another thing, a comedic technique as pathbreaking as we've come to expect from the 26-year-old writer and director of HBO's Girls. | "Your first time shouldn't be with just anybody. You want to do it with a great guy," Dunham begins. It sounds like she's talking about one thing, but it soon becomes clear she's talking about another thing, a comedic technique as pathbreaking as we've come to expect from the 26-year-old writer and director of HBO's Girls. |
| "It should be with … someone who really cares about women. Who cares about whether you get health insurance, and specifically whether you get birth control. The consequences are huge. You want to do it with a guy who brought the troops out of Iraq… My first time voting was amazing. Before, I was a girl. Now I was a woman." | "It should be with … someone who really cares about women. Who cares about whether you get health insurance, and specifically whether you get birth control. The consequences are huge. You want to do it with a guy who brought the troops out of Iraq… My first time voting was amazing. Before, I was a girl. Now I was a woman." |
| Clearly, Democrats hope to motivate college-age first-time voters, but it's hard not to wonder if they also just wanted to enjoy the predictable spectacle of the furious response from people whose fury can only fuel Obama's support. | Clearly, Democrats hope to motivate college-age first-time voters, but it's hard not to wonder if they also just wanted to enjoy the predictable spectacle of the furious response from people whose fury can only fuel Obama's support. |
| The ad, various rightwing outlets agreed, was "astoundingly tasteless", "cringeworthy", "cheap" and "disgusting"; it showed, the Washington Post's Jennifer Rubin added, that Obama was willing to "debase the presidency". "Obama has young daughters," wrote Ben Shapiro on Breitbart.com, "but that didn't stop him from releasing this commercial. Because this is what Obama thinks of your daughters." | The ad, various rightwing outlets agreed, was "astoundingly tasteless", "cringeworthy", "cheap" and "disgusting"; it showed, the Washington Post's Jennifer Rubin added, that Obama was willing to "debase the presidency". "Obama has young daughters," wrote Ben Shapiro on Breitbart.com, "but that didn't stop him from releasing this commercial. Because this is what Obama thinks of your daughters." |
| But wait: this ad, plainly, is aimed at women in their early twenties, who don't have voting-age daughters. Who mentioned daughters? | But wait: this ad, plainly, is aimed at women in their early twenties, who don't have voting-age daughters. Who mentioned daughters? |
| Oh, it was John Nolte, Breitbart's editor-at-large, who demanded on Twitter: "How could a president with two young, blossoming daughters…" Actually, on second thoughts, let's leave that disturbingly creepy observation right there. | Oh, it was John Nolte, Breitbart's editor-at-large, who demanded on Twitter: "How could a president with two young, blossoming daughters…" Actually, on second thoughts, let's leave that disturbingly creepy observation right there. |
| • What dark secrets, one wonders, might be exposed by the publication of a new "angry tell-all" memoir, written by a disaffected former aide of Joe Biden's? That he harbours a burning hatred of trains? That he's never set foot in Scranton, Pennsylvania? That his mother did not, in fact, sit him down at their kitchen table and say "Joey, now listen to me," followed by a folsky version of whatever message the Obama campaign happens to be emphasising on any given day? | • What dark secrets, one wonders, might be exposed by the publication of a new "angry tell-all" memoir, written by a disaffected former aide of Joe Biden's? That he harbours a burning hatred of trains? That he's never set foot in Scranton, Pennsylvania? That his mother did not, in fact, sit him down at their kitchen table and say "Joey, now listen to me," followed by a folsky version of whatever message the Obama campaign happens to be emphasising on any given day? |
| None of the above, sadly. The Payoff, by a former Senate staffer named Jeff Connaughton, paints the vice-president as an "egomaniacal autocrat" who sometimes swears angrily at his assistants, all of which suggests, troublingly enough, that Biden may be a politician. The juiciest detail concerns Biden's clunky observation, on the 2008 campaign trail, that Obama would "be tested" early in his term by foreign enemies. "Biden told us that Obama had called him and told him sharply that he didn't need public tutoring," Connaughton reports, quoting the president as telling his deputy: "I don't need you acting like you're my Henry Higgins." | None of the above, sadly. The Payoff, by a former Senate staffer named Jeff Connaughton, paints the vice-president as an "egomaniacal autocrat" who sometimes swears angrily at his assistants, all of which suggests, troublingly enough, that Biden may be a politician. The juiciest detail concerns Biden's clunky observation, on the 2008 campaign trail, that Obama would "be tested" early in his term by foreign enemies. "Biden told us that Obama had called him and told him sharply that he didn't need public tutoring," Connaughton reports, quoting the president as telling his deputy: "I don't need you acting like you're my Henry Higgins." |
| Biden's response, the way his Connaughton tells it, was this splendidly Bidenesque observation: "I'm going to have to earn his trust, but I'm not going to grovel to this guy. My manhood is not negotiable." Perhaps this helps clarify Obama's reference to Biden, in the final debate, as "my current vice-president"? Enough snippiness, guys! When I was a kid, growing up in Scranton, Pennsylvania, we'd have settled this with a simple old-fashioned knife fight. | Biden's response, the way his Connaughton tells it, was this splendidly Bidenesque observation: "I'm going to have to earn his trust, but I'm not going to grovel to this guy. My manhood is not negotiable." Perhaps this helps clarify Obama's reference to Biden, in the final debate, as "my current vice-president"? Enough snippiness, guys! When I was a kid, growing up in Scranton, Pennsylvania, we'd have settled this with a simple old-fashioned knife fight. |
| • In a game-changing development, the singer Meat Loaf has made his first ever political endorsement, backing Mitt Romney for president because of… well, because of storms. | • In a game-changing development, the singer Meat Loaf has made his first ever political endorsement, backing Mitt Romney for president because of… well, because of storms. |
| "There has storm clouds come over the United States," Loaf -- that's his surname, right? -- told an Ohio rally, as quoted with mean-spirited precision by the Los Angeles Times. A terrifying storm is indeed headed America's way in the coming days, in the shape of Hurricane Sandy, but Loaf was speaking in metaphors. "There is thunderstorms over Europe," he went on. | "There has storm clouds come over the United States," Loaf -- that's his surname, right? -- told an Ohio rally, as quoted with mean-spirited precision by the Los Angeles Times. A terrifying storm is indeed headed America's way in the coming days, in the shape of Hurricane Sandy, but Loaf was speaking in metaphors. "There is thunderstorms over Europe," he went on. |
| "There are hailstorms, and I mean major hailstorms, in the Middle East. There are storms brewing through China, through Asia, through everywhere." | "There are hailstorms, and I mean major hailstorms, in the Middle East. There are storms brewing through China, through Asia, through everywhere." |
| And Romney, he explained, was the man to quell those storms. Meat Loaf ought then to have presented the Republican with a special Romneyfied version of his most famous album, entitled Bat Out Of Heck, but did not. | And Romney, he explained, was the man to quell those storms. Meat Loaf ought then to have presented the Republican with a special Romneyfied version of his most famous album, entitled Bat Out Of Heck, but did not. |
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