God bless Ann Althouse
January 25, 2009 10:09 am ET by Eric Boehlert
Because honestly, what other prominent conservative blogger delivers unintentional hilarity as consistently as she does? (Talk about a crowded field of contenders.) She's a treasure for the funny bone.
Her latest bout of comic relief is here. The gist is that while visiting a random bookstore she spotted a display put out during inauguration week of a bunch of books and magazines featuring Barack Obama. But--and this was the newsworthy part, according to Althouse--there were not swarms of people crowded around the table. And she posted pics to prove it!
"Despite shrines to Obama, bookstore was nearly empty," read the side-splitting headline.
Ah, right-wing blog logic. Borders Books, which is in the amidst of an economic free-fall by the way, put out a lots of Obama-related products. But when Althouse stumbled into a store in January (a traditionally dead time in the publishing industry), on a Friday night at dinnertime, there weren't many shoppers around.
So Althouse, naturally, suggests the media interest in Obama is misplaced. That people don't really care, or maybe don't even like him. Actually, Althouse seems to suggest Obama is causing people to stay away from bookstores. That he' s responsible for the downturn in shoppers because before the Obama shrines, bookstores were packed with people. (I told you she's comedy gold.)
Her bookstore visit was all the proof Althouse needed to prove her point.
She ignores Obama's sky-high approval ratings.
She ignores the record-breaking number of people who turned out in D.C. for the inauguration.
She ignores the nearly 40 million people who watched the swearing-in on TV.
She ignores the new online-traffic records set during the inauguration.
She ignores the fact that newspapers geared up for historic inauguration press runs in order to meet demand for Obama news.
None of that matters people, because Ann saw what she saw. And conservatives wonder why their end of the blogosphere isn't taken seriously?
Oh, speaking of. Ann, did you ever figure out who slipped that listening device into Obama's ear during the prez debate last autumn? Just checking....
And she is not the only one ignoring or misrepresenting Obama's poll numbers. Today, Politico & Drudge both claimed that because Obama only had the 3rd highest first set of approval ratings, not an all-time record, that his numbers are down & have "normalized".
The right wing nut cases do not know what to do with themselves. It is going to take time for these guys to "normalize" themselves.
Come on, stop exaggerating. Including kids and infants, the average weight of people at the Inauguration was about 100 pounds. It would only take 20 of those people to make a TON.
You liberals can't ever get your facts straight. There were at least 50 people at the inauguration, and that makes at least two and a half tons.
Obama merchandise might be the only thing solid in the entire economy. They estimated that blackberry increased their sales by 50 million over Obama fighting to keep his and that was a few weeks ago.
The wing nuts are so clueless.
Actually, Ann Althouse is doing a blog post on this article. She voted for Obama, so I doubt she would mind a liberal point of view.
http://althouse.blogspot.com/2009/01/media-matters-doesnt-understand-word.html
She is an endangered thing: She thinks for herself.
Does she ever do this BEFORE she blogs? Evidence suggests, not as often as she should. You need to do more than just "think for [your]self." Actual critical thinking skills and basic analytical ability are important elemnts that appear to be lacking here. "Think for yourself" all you want, but try to reflect on reality, at least occasionally, huh?
The errors in this are too numerous. Conservative blogger she is not. Many lame conservatives inhabit her blog and she does toss out red meat topics. But I think she delights in watching the pack tear at the bones.
It's like this blog somewhat. Although here mad dogs toss the meat back at the least human among us.
Don'cha just hate it when lawyers use those fancy words you don't uinderstand? Like "Despite"? Which means "in spite of". Here's a translation for you:
"Even though the Borders bookstore has a shrine to Obama, it was still empty."
So she's saying that even with Obama's power to draw attention, the Borders bookstore was still empty. Pretty much exactly recognizing the same attractive power that you then try to refute her, by example.
Okay, I admit "refute" is another one of those hard words, but look it up.
OK, let me get this straight:
1) Althouse is a "right-wing" "conservative" blogger.
2) Her post demonstrates the inferiority of mind of right-wingers compared to left-wingers.
Now, #1 confuses me, because she's an Obama supporter. Unless she has some nefarious right-wing plan that involves voting for Obama.
And #2 confuses me, because her post is clearly about what dire straights Borders is in, when the place is empty despite being well-stocked with books about the most popular guy in America.
Now, since left-wing bloggers and their commenters are of superior mental stock, #1 can't be such an obviously lazy, Manichean mis-labeling, and #2 can't be such a complete mis-reading. That combination would be, in the hot 'net phrase du jour, an epic fail. So I can only guess that when Eric talks about "unintentional hilarity" and "comic relief", it's some sort of self-reflective circular meta-satire. Or something.
Perhaps some of you smart left-wing folks can help me out here.
Now, #1 confuses me, because she's an Obama supporter. Unless she has some nefarious right-wing plan that involves voting for Obama.
Even a blind pig finds a truffle every now and then.
"Because honestly, what other prominent conservative blogger delivers unintentional hilarity as consistently as she does? (Talk about a crowded field of contenders.) She's a treasure for the funny bone."
Speaking of unintentional hilarity, you take a light-hearted post, analyze it to death and beat it over the head.
Or are you just insecure?I thought the next four years were going to be rather grim. Instead, they're looking to be quite amusing.
Thanks!
Eric wrote: Borders Books, which is in the amidst of an economic free-fall
I'm sure that's a typo, but when attempting to poke fun of someone else, you should try to avoid making such mistakes.
Here's another: Eric claims that Althouse "ignores Obama's sky-high approval ratings." A quick scan of Althouse post titles reveals that she did not ignore the polling data.
http://althouse.blogspot.com/2009/01/obama-numbers-normalize.html
But the big error, as pointed out above, is the failure to understand what Althouse meant by her Borders photo commentary.
Eweston wonders how a liberal would be treated in the Althouse comment threads.There are a few liberal regulars who have earned the respect of the more conservative regulars. When Katrina hit, many raised concerns when our favorite New Orleans liberal didn't comment for a few days.
LOL, Peterhoh! So you try to claim something erroneous about Eric's assessment and say that it is flawed because he used "amidst" instead of "midst"!?! And, btw, a simple post headline that Obama's sky-high approval has "normalized" with just saying "68%" in no way is an admission of his popularity nor was it taken into account in her post.
But I am sure that if I misspelled or used incorrect gramar here, that I will be completely misstating the conservative viewpoint.
An open letter...
Dear Ms. Althouse:
If you want to come on here, and spam articles about yourself with glowing reviews about how great you are, please use your own name, or maybe just one anonymous persona. It looks weird, and "fishy" if you have one glowing comment after another about yourself. Something is rotten and Denmark, and I'm sure all of the positive comments came from the same IP address, I just can't prove that right now, but one has to imagine that you're the one writing all of these.
Knock if off, and please go back to la la land from whence you came. We've all heard the good old line of how everything is a "joke" when someone is called out on it, seems as though, you're taking that same exact track. It doesn't work, and doesn't pass the sniff test.
Best Regards,
Magnolialover
"Something is rotten and Denmark"
And we have a winner!
Oops, it's called a typo, and the last bastion of "you have nothing to say" on comment boards is to point out someone's small mistakes, when you know what they were trying to say in the first place.
As in, "There is something rotten IN Denmark"
And I see, that it continues with ever vigilant postings from the same person, probably Ms. Ann herself, to defend her website and her blatherings.
Why can't I prove that the IP addresses are all the same? It's got nothing to with intellect, it has everything to do with I don't have access to this website to be able to do it.
"And I see, that it continues with ever vigilant postings from the same person, probably Ms. Ann herself, to defend her website and her blatherings."
You're slipping into paranoia. Or else sockpuppetry is something that you do, and so you're projecting.
"Why can't I prove that the IP addresses are all the same? It's got nothing to with intellect, it has everything to do with I don't have access to this website to be able to do it."
Then why not just keep your bizarre ravings to yourself if you can't back them up? Or write to whoever can get this information so they can disabuse you of this ridiculous notion.
I say you're really Althouse, trying to make leftists look crazy. Nice try, Ann! But a little too much.
"I'm sure all of the positive comments came from the same IP address, I just can't prove that right now"
That's OK, we'll wait.
Now, would this be the superior Leftist intellect I keep hearing about? Because again I'm confused. If you go to Althouse's blog, her posts generate a sh**load of comments. So it stands to reason that she has a lot of readers. And since she linked to this page, and the post she linked it on was linked on Instapundit, that means even more people have read this. Which creates a rather large pool of people to comment here.
But hey, I eagerly await your proof of sockpuppetry. When do you think you will have it ready? You will mention it when you find out there was none, yes? Shall we say by, oh, 4:00pm EST Monday? I don't know how ISP tracing works - will that be enough time? I'm in southern Maine, if that helps.
"And we have a winner!"
Of what, rhopkins? Is there a prize for writing the third foolish mistake to complete the Trifecta of Self-Beclowning after Eric's two?
Because honestly, what other obscure liberal blogger delivers unintentional hilarity as consistently as he does? (Talk about a crowded field of contenders.) He's a treasure for the funny bone (and for mixed metaphors which don't make any sense).
His latest bout of comic relief is here. The gist is that while visiting Althouse's blog he spotted a post about a nearly-deserted bookstore and an abundance of books about his holiness, the 44th Dalai Obama. But--and this was the newsworthy part, according to Boehlert--Ann was being a silly little woman who doesn't know her place. And he linked to the "hilarious" post to prove it!
"Despite shrines to Obama, bookstore was nearly empty," he misstates as the title of that post, omitting the definite article and replacing the big French-derived word "deserted" with a word someone of his literacy level can understand, the Anglo-Saxon term "empty".
Ah, left-wing blog logic. Ann Althouse engages in the dangerous activity known as "thinking for oneself", believs bin Ladin is a worse person than Bush, and doesn't fantasize about swapping spit with Barack. Therefore she is a neocon fascist wingnut who waterboards Afghani babies and hunts homosexuals. He also continues to amuse us with his lack of proofreading, by using a definite article where it is not needed ("the amidst"). He then goes on to reveal that he eats dinner at 5:30 pm on Friday nights, probably so that he can be tucked-in by his 8:00 bedtime.
So Boehlert, naturally, suggests that Althouse is a big stupid-head. That she hates Obama so much that she voted for him just to teach him a lesson. Actually, Boehlert seems to suggests Althouse doesn't get it. That Obama's responsible for the oceans beginning to slow and the planet beginning to heal because before the Obamessiah, no politican had ever promised hope and change. (I told you he's comedy gold.)
His glibness was all the proof Boehlert needed to prove his point.
He ignores Althouse's sky-high approval ratings.
He ignores the record-breaking number of people who turned out to comment on her Palin posts.
He ignores the nearly 260 million people who couldn't be bothered to watch the coronation on TV and the thousands who Obama detained without trial and tortured in the now-infamous Guantanamo tunnel.
He ignores common sense, basic literacy and maturity.
He ignores that Zachary Paul Sire is alive.
None of that matters people, because Erice saw what he saw. Hmm, and liberals wonder why their end of the blogosphere isn't taken seriously?
"Does anyone really believe that Althouse voted for Obama?"
Geez, I thought it was simple-minded conservatives who saw everything in black-white, good-evil, with-us-or-against-us Manichean terms. What's so bizarre about a putative conservative (and I'm not familiar enough with Althouse to even be sure she is one - she may lean libertarian like me, which seems to confuse the hell out of you either-or lefties) thinking that a fresh face might do the country some good somehow? That's make a hell of a lot more sense than falsely claiming to vote for him for God-knows-what purpose.
I dunno, maybe you're right. She's lying about voting for Obama because of some underpants-gnome-like moneymaking scheme:
Step 1: Lie about voting for Obama
Step 2: ??????
Step 3: Profit!
As of this moment, the 12 most recent posts on Althouse have generated 700 comments. That's an average of 58 per post; not at all unusual for Althouse.
Magnolia, it's not unreasonable to consider that some of the Althouse regulars have drifted over here to leave a comment.
If the 34 comments in this thread have set a record for the County Fair, well, that might not be something to brag about.
"Stop kidding around. We know that you're Althouse. Who else would be defending her to the hilt about every little thing?"
You're insane.
"This posting has received more comments than just about any other that I've seen in the old County Fair"
That should tell you something. And it ain't about Althouse.
"I fail to believe that all of a sudden, a bunch of different folks came in here just to defend Althouse."
I didn't. I came here because there was hilarious self-beclowning going on.
Now, could you tell me what part of my explanation was so difficult for you to grasp? You've heard of Instapundit, right? You know it has massive readership, right? You know (or you may not, you might have to be a regular there) that a link from Instapundit generates something called an Instalanche, right?
Seriously, all you're proving by chewing on this bone is that (1) left-wingers tend to attract a large conspirazoid following, and (2) if this site gets traffic, it's a freakish anomoly that cannot be explained by unique visitors or even links from bigger blogs. Yikes!
Ann, Ann, Ann...I say this as a friend.
Your writing is getting soft, and you're losing readership as you slowly devolve into certifable insanity.
The only way you'll ever get any credibility back is if you show us your tits.
It's the only way to go.
Comedy indeed. Never heard of this woman before. Maybe there's just something about the name Ann that turns people in to crackpots. I do find it odd that we're boasting about (or even taking) Obama's approval rating after less than a week in office though.