[Guest post by Aaron Worthing; send your tips here.]
Lots of interesting things around the web, many of them with video involved.
Lots of updates throughout. Jump to the end for a particularly sweet one involving the Alaska Senate race.
First, it’s October! And guess what? Surprise! There is a late hit on Christine O’Donnell. That would be the same O’Donnell who is getting pummeled in the polls.
I won’t link to this vile thing by Gawker, where they paid for the account of a man who claimed to have a sexless “one-night-stand” with Christine O’Donnell. You will feel dirty even reading a little of it. I think Jim Treacher has the definitive take down of the whole thing. And how bad was all this? Even NOW is upset. And I have been pretty critical of NOW, but I thought this statement was excellent. The key quote:
Today the tabloid website Gawker published an anonymous piece titled “I Had A One-Night Stand With Christine O’Donnell” that takes the routine sexual degradation of women candidates to a disgusting new low. NOW repudiates Gawker’s decision to run this piece. It operates as public sexual harassment. And like all sexual harassment, it targets not only O’Donnell, but all women contemplating stepping into the public sphere.
Right on.
Also O’Donnell has released a statement, playing the victim card for all its worth. Like Conway further in, I think she hopes this is a game changer. Lord knows, she needs it. It says:
This story is just another example of the sexism and slander that female candidates are forced to deal with. From Secretary Clinton, to Governor Palin, to soon-to-be Governor Haley, Christine’s political opponents have been willing to engage in appalling and baseless attacks — all with the aim of distracting the press from covering the real issues in this race. Even the National Organization for Women gets it, but Christine’s opponent disturbingly does not. As Chris Coons said on September 16th he would not condone personal attacks against Christine. Classless Coons goons have proven yet again to have no sense of common decency or common sense with their desperate attacks to get another rubber stamp for the Obama-Pelosi-Reid agenda. Such attacks are truly shameful, but they will not distract us from making our case to Delaware voters — and keeping the focus on Chris Coons’ record of higher taxes, increased spending, and as he has done again here, breaking his promises to the voters.
Now to be fair to Coons, I have not seen the slightest evidence that his campaign had anything to do with this. But on the other hand, I haven’t heard him condemn it yet, and his campaign blog and newsroom seem to have nothing as of this writing. Which strikes me as a mistake. Update: The Daily Caller has the obligatory Coons team condemnation.
And Prof. Jacobson is not buying the leftward condemnation of Gawker. My inclination is to buy it, but he makes a compelling argument that I am wrong.
Another Update on O’Donnell: Well, not all liberals are appalled by the Gawker article. Feministe comes out defending it by claiming that O’Donnell is hypocritical. Dave Weigel answers that charge, although maybe not specifically in response to Feministe, by saying:
I’m aware that Christine O’Donnell’s public commentary career started with her going on TV to talk about how kids shouldn’t have sex or masturbate before marriage. But not only has she never called for that behavior to be punished legally, I’m unaware of her ever coming out against the actions mentioned here — which, let’s remember are drinking, fooling around, and not having sex. There is no hypocrisy being exposed here. This is anonymous creep shaming a woman who wouldn’t sleep with him, and doing so because she’s a celebrity now.
And Professor Jacobson takes the “hypocrisy” logic to its ultimate conclusion:
Should a female who advocates teaching “safe” sex in schools be outed if she doesn’t practice safe sex? Shall we have a condom police, as well as the Gawker waxing police? Where do we draw the line on exposing female sexual engagement if “hypocrisy” is the standard?
Indeed. Hypocrisy is the fig leaf used to cover up what this really is: the desire to do anything, however low, harm your political enemies. See, e.g. the attacks on Bristol Palin.
Back to the original post…
Now that heavy stuff is out of the way, let’s get to the “funner” stuff.
First, we get the most “WTF?” moment I have seen in a debate in a long time. Bob Reilly (D-umb), a New York assemblyman decides to… um… you know nothing can really prepare you for what he does, so just watch it.
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