The usefulness of pollsters is debatable at the best of times, and all things being what they are, this is not the best of times. We've no idea who the VP candidates will be, and these polls are universally agreed to be mostly useless until the general public starts paying attention, which usually happens circa the conventions. In most cases, the number of undecided voters in swing states (and the margin of error) is larger than the margin of difference. So, you know, take of this what you will.

( How the cookie crumbles... )

Mostly stream-of-conscious thoughts what I have thought about ( Addison on Grey's! )

( Ugly Betty )

You know how I know that my TiVo loves me? I set it to tape me Smallville tonight (I wanted to see who Chloe was engaged to in the AU; I was hoping it was Lex, of course. I am sure I will be disappointed.), and it totally did not. It has my best interests at heart!

And Paula Abdul is so full of it! The more she tries to explain, the less sense she makes! Really, she should just admit that she took notes about how Jason Castro sucked like a thing that sucks during his dress rehearsal. And, yeah, she should be really ashamed that she did that, because that's pretty crappy. If you want to observe something about the arrangement, fine, but you don't get to judge the strength of the performance BEFORE THE ACTUAL PERFORMANCE.

Either that, or Idol really is rigged. I KNEW IT.

Also, Hilary Duff turned down the role on the 90210.2! I am positively gutted! They cast some girl from Degrassi instead. TRAGIC.

Also? Obama's reverend is a dick. Not because of anything he said, but because he knowingly screwed Obama over after Obama defended him at a time when it was the POLAR OPPOSITE of politically advantageous. And then he turns around and repays him by making a spectacle of himself and voicing the kinds of superficial remarks that a.) are unfortunate in the first place and b.) were flagrantly inappropriate in that setting. Ugh. Crazy old people! What are you gonna do? (I really hope I do not turn old and crazy.)

Normally I would not do a separate post just for promotional clips, but I can't resist.

( Big spoilers for 1x15! )

But you know what's really awesome? I FORGOT ABOUT THE PENNSYLVANIA PRIMARY. I forgot until I saw the results on AOL.com! It was the best feeling in the world! I hope to forget more primaries in the future!

So I didn't watch Buffy or Firefly, but this is the most awesome post about the Democratic primary that has ever been written. Clinton supporters are like Buffy fen and Obama supporters are like Browncoats! And they both suck. I KID YOU, WHEDON FANDOM. I KID YOU.

Don't you love how I totally broke my promise not to blog about the election anymore? In less than 24 hours?

I still hate Idol, but I really do dig the whole play-your-own-instrument thing. I like David Archuleta, Jason Castro and David Cook the best of all the boys. I bet David H. (There are three Davids? How did I not realize that until tonight?) and Luke go home Thursday. Luke because he sucked again, and David H. because he's a gay stripper who also sucked. Gay strippers don't win American Idol, sry2say. Probably it would be a more interesting show if they did.

I watched with my family tonight and had a funny conversation with Little Miss Ten Whole Years. I was flipping to CNN during the commercials, and Wolf Blitzer informed us that a town in Vermont approved a resolution to arrest and try Bush and Cheney for... war crimes or something. I mean, it's Vermont. Anyway, my littlest sister said: "Good! Bush is a bad president, not like Woodrow Wilson!" This amused/interested me, so I asked her what she meant.

Little Miss Ten Whole Years: He ended the World War!
Me: That's true. He also had the idea for the UN!
Little Miss Ten Whole Years: What's the UN?
Me: You know, the United Nations?
Little Miss Ten Whole Years: You mean the League of Nations?
Me: Well, yeah. The UN was like the new and improved League of Nations. The League of Nations didn't work because--
Little Miss Ten Whole Years: DON'T TELL ME!!!! We're not there yet! *glares*

HAHAHAHA. She is such a dork. Who is afraid of history spoilers?

( Primary Politics )

This is a perfect example of what I mean when I say that a lot of Democrats are being CRAZY about Hillary Clinton. In her stupid fear-mongering "red phone" commercial, one of the little kids is wearing pajamas with a GOOD NIGHT pattern written all over them. The most prominent letters on the kid's shoulder are the N, I and part of the G in "NIGHT." Do you see where I'm going with this?

Stuff like this is why I have been so frustrated. It is ridiculous nonsense. There is plenty to complain about in the commercial without turning Hillary into a racist, which she is so clearly not. We're seriously going to entertain the notion that her campaign deliberately planted racist subtext into that commercial? Assuming the commercial wasn't 90% stock footage, we're entertaining the notion that the devious Clinton media consultants deliberately dressed this poor little African-American kid in Good Night pajamas, oh-so-carefully arranged them so that the NIG would be most visible, and then crossed their fingers that all of those gigantic racists in Texas would notice the two second frame? YOU HAVE GOT TO BE KIDDING ME.

And there is such a double standard! For example, when Obama actually says something sexist*, it's okay because he obviously didn't mean it that way! Whatever, liberal blogosphere.

( * )

And just so this entry isn't ALL about politics! Did you guys hear that:

1. Addison is going back to Grey's for at least one episode? I will be watching!

2. Mischa Barton was offered a reoccurring role as Georgina Sparks (Georgie!) on Gossip Girl! QUELLE HORROR. keenai, you have been weirdly and creepily prescient these past couple days. STOP IT. The good news is that she turned it down, thank God.

3. Ausiello says that Gossip Girl looks like it's going to cruise to a second season, so that makes me incredibly happy. New seasons of Chuck and Gossip Girl mean that for the first time I can ever remember, I will be sitting pretty during renewals!

The Daily Show and The Colbert Report are on hiatus now? Just as soon as they'd finally gotten their writers back?! I get that this probably has something to do with Jon's Oscar gig, but seriously?! Without Jon and Stephen, there is LITERALLY NO NEW TELEVISION WHATSOEVER for me to watch. The tearing of hair, the rending of garments... yeah, it's happening.

I mean, okay, there is American Idol. But I totally hate American Idol! So that doesn't count.

I am thinking now would be a good time to check out one of the shows that I have been vaguely interested in watching, only I am sort of unmotivated to do so.

Poll #1142346
Open to: All, results viewable to: All

Which television show that I sorta kinda think I might want to watch should I actually really really want to watch?

I watched the debate tonight, which was generally a pretty boring time. But this statement from Hillary at the very end was totally surreal. It really feels like the writing is on the wall, and it seems like she knows it. It makes me really sad. If/when she concedes, I will probably cry a lot. It is kind of weird how even though I voted for Obama and everything, I am way more emotionally engaged in Hillary's candidacy. I wouldn't have expected that would be the case, back when this all started.

1. I have officially been declared a casualty of the flu. This weekend was awful. I was so sick that I actually had trouble sleeping; I barely slept for more than an hour or two at a time on Friday and Saturday. Now I've got this prescription antihistamine that's helping me sleep, but it is also giving me weird, scary dreams that I can remember in detail. (I rarely if ever remember my dreams.) But I do feel better today, so I guess it is working.

2. I couldn't sleep and I couldn't seem to focus on reading, so I spent a lot of time fooling around on Photoshop and fiddling with LJ customizations. My new layout is all thanks to minty_peach, although I did modify the CSS quite a bit. I like it so much that -- apologizes in advance -- I've turned off simple comment pages for the time being. I know some consider that bad manners when you have a custom layout, but I think it is clean and should not take long to load. ( But I noticed some funny business! )

3. I discovered a Tiny LJ Icon Generator! If you've ever wanted to change the default tiny icon next to usernames or communities (i.e. caitiedidit hates ohnotheydidnt), this makes it really simple. All you have to do is plug in the URLs and size of the tiny icons you want to replace the default ones with. It generates code that you simply paste into your custom CSS box. It is literally as easy as 1 2 3! (The only catch is that there is a fix you have to do for certain layouts, but it's still really easy.) You can get custom icons from a lot of places, but I recommend FamFamFam.

4. I'd say that Johnny Weir should shoot whoever costumes him if I wasn't 100% certain that he designs every inch of his horrendous outfits, meaning he'd have to shoot himself. (Which, actually, I don't have a problem with! I KID YOU, JOHNNY WEIR. NEVER CHANGE.) But even I have to admit that he was pretty great at nationals and was totally robbed of the title. I bet he would have won if his outfit wasn't so HIDEOUS and embarrassingly literal.

5. TV Guide got a great letter about last week's stupid cover story in which the "women of House House" were profiled based on their relationships with House, all of which were approached in romantic terms. And this has been my problem with House for awhile. House is supposed to be a misanthropic jackass, but most of the women who cross his path are attracted to him, often inexplicably so. His superiors and his underlings react to him in generally ridiculous ways. It drives me up the wall when characters' flaws cost them nothing. I recently had the same problem with Beka Cooper and her so-called shyness in Terrier.

6. I know Pitchfork is... Pitchfork, but the score they gave In Rainbows was much with the lulz.

7. I think the Scientology protests were ridiculous. I understand that the event was organized to protest censorship by the church, but that's not how it came off, and I'm sure that's not why most of the protesters showed up. I get that people think Scientology is really weird and creepy, but the fact of the matter is that all three major religions also believe some pretty crazy stuff and have branches that are also pretty freaking creepy. It is all very people-living-in-glass-houses-throwing-the-first-stone to me. Most annoying of all is that if such an event was organized to protest Christianity I'm pretty sure we never would have heard the end of it. Bill O'Reilly would totally have gotten off on it.

8. This is iiiinteresting! A while ago, Obama pledged to abide by public financing in the general election if the Republican candidate would also agree to do so. Well, John McCain has agreed. And since Obama's nomination is looking more and more likely, McCain is already demanding that Obama honor his pledge. I am very nervous about us losing our huge financial advantage, and it's totally the opposite of pragmatic, but I still think this would be a really cool thing. It would also go a long way towards proving to me that Obama is the kind of candidate he claims to be.

9. I saw the most depressing Valentine's Day documentary on Current this weekend, all about roses, chocolate, and diamonds. I already knew the bad stuff about chocolate and diamonds, but apparently most of the roses we buy are grown in South America. And since South America's safety laws are much more lax than ours, the growers use awful chemicals and insecticides and herbicides. Since the roses are grown in greenhouses, the chemicals are even more dangerous. There were even a few cases of greenhouses asking women to submit proof that their tubes had been tied before they could be hired. They claim it's a productivity issue (which should not even be legal; can you imagine if pregnancy was allowed to be considered a liability against hiring women over here?), but it's a flat out lie. They just don't want to have to pay out the ass when their workers' children are born with mental and physical problems because they exposed them to chemicals on a daily basis that no living thing should ever be exposed to. Just so our flowers look pretty! So there's another thing I won't be buying anymore.

10. Attn: Avatar fans! Since Nick has remained silent on the issue of when we'll finally be seeing episode 3.14, boosette is hosting a very clever Pi Day (3/14) ficathon. Be there or be square, etc.

P.S. Barack Obama held my hand when I was frightened! (by way of carrielh)

So I had this rotten cold I could not beat, and then I got to where I was genuinely sick, and now I am so miserably sick that I am pretty sure I will have to burn all of my possessions, The Secret Garden-style, when I get better. IF I get better! (Being sick makes me melodramatic, it's true!)

Anyway, the real reason I'm posting is to pimp this online petition (yeah, I know they are intrinsically lame, but this is an official-ish one) to pressure L.A. officials to count nearly 100,000 "Decline-to-State" ballots they claim were cast incorrectly by Independents in the California primary. The ballot design was flawed and confusing, and the intentions of the voters were completely clear. It's just stupid that L.A. won't count them.

( And the negative ads have arrived! Whooo! )

I think that astronomers must be the most Zen people ever. Because when I watch The Universe or read about the discovery of a truly ancient galaxy, it is a very humbling experience. Life exists on Earth because our galaxy, our solar system, our sun, our planet, our orbit, our moon and our atmosphere all came together to create an unlikely primordial cocktail of hospitality. And in the grand scheme of things, it will be fleeting. The 200,000 years of human history are next to irrelevant on the time scale of Earth's planetary history, and even less relevant in terms of the universe's. Which is not to say we should feel insignificant or anything; for me, the scheme doesn't get much grander than my day-to-day life. But if studying this stuff is what you do, and you're thinking in terms of billions of years and millions of light years on a daily basis? I can only imagine the amount of Zen that requires.

So, yes, I am sick and currently making my way through the TiVo backlog, which includes many episodes of The Universe. I also really like the new Jamie At Home show on Food Network. I cannot believe that Globag moved into the Abbott mansion! And I am watching Hollywood Week right now. Unfortunately, I am kind of loving a lot of the contestants. They are playing instruments! I do not think it will manage to hook me again, but it is looking kind of possible. Is anybody else watching Idol this season?

( Primary Politics )

( Electoral SNAFU! It involves Florida, naturally. )

I am just... utterly bemused and kind of rageful about this NONSENSE. If I ever see Howard Dean in person, I will be sorely tempted to kick him in the shin.

My next entry will not be about politics, I promise.

P.S. I enjoyed this post about how the Clinton campaign cleverly (one might even say sneakily) played the media this week wrt the "financial troubles" that turned out to be non-existent. I also liked the link within that about how people underestimate the base's love for Hillary at their peril. If Hil' does end up losing the primary, I totally think she should get to be Senate Majority Leader. She would kick so much more ass than Harry Reid.

Sometimes it is a little sad to be an agnostic slash apatheist. Unfortunate circumstances involving a busted radiator necessitated that I make a three hour round trip that had me driving through the line of storms that caused all of those tornadoes in Arkansas and Tennessee last night. So I'm driving through crazy insane rain with my windshield wipers going as fast as possible and squinting to try and see what's in front of me. And I'm talking myself through it, all like: "This is fine!" and "This is good!" and "Oh please, God, let me get through this." And then it's like, oh wait, I don't really believe in a God who cares about my windshield wipers. It is a little depressing sometimes.

Super Tuesday was interesting. The Democratic race was about as close as close can get. Hillary and Obama split the overall popular vote 50.2%-49.8%, respectively. With 99% of the ballots tallied, Hillary and Obama are separated by a mere 50,000 votes. The shitty and archaic delegates system is difficult to predict, but the best estimate is that Obama picked up around 845 while Hillary picked up about 836.

( What does this mean? )

On a less relevant note! ( Feelings wot I have felt about Super Tuesday... )

It's Super Duper Tsunami Tuesday! Vote, vote, vote like the wiiiiind!



Ed Westwick is obviously sad because he can't rock the vote, what with being British and everything. Probably his sadness is also related to Chuck's penchant for turtlenecks and paisley pants. (Speaking of Chuck's killer fashion instincts! Apparently he provided the inspiration for a menswear line at fashion week. GREATNESS!)

Anyway. Voting! This entry is not about Gossip Girl! It is about voting! Even though Gossip Girl > voting! But whatever. I am up at this positively obscene hour because I have to drive a ways away to my old precinct. And, really, I shouldn't even bother because it's not like Obama isn't going to win my precinct whether I vote or not. But I didn't spend the last week obsessing and worrying and practically making myself sick over this decision for nothing. I mean, I know ridiculous amounts of information about Hillary and Obama's (remarkably similar!) voting records. I can recite their entire environmental platforms (also remarkably similar!), down to the exact amounts they've pledged to invest in clean energy. So, yeah. I need to go vote. You should vote too! It's going to be really close; in most of the races so far, Obama and Hillary have only been separated by a very few thousand votes. And the race has tightened up over the weekend. Your vote is definitely not a meaningless formality in this primary.

I mean, dude, when was the last time that Super Tuesday (and this is like Super Tuesday on steroids!) didn't sew up the nomination! And there's no way that this ends tonight. It's exciting!

ETA: It went smoothly. No drama over vaguely political t-shirts, no poll workers muttering about crackers and oreos. I'm actually kind of disappointed!

+ Remember when Jon Stewart had Ishmael Beah, who wrote a memoir about being a boy soldier in Sierra Leone, on The Daily Show? And Beah went on to sell hundreds of thousands of books and become a spokesperson for UNICEF? Well, now allegations have surfaced that he embellished his autobiography, James Frey style. I can't help feeling like I've seen this episode of television before.

+ The final Democratic debate was truly excellent last night, but all the cutaways to celebrities were distracting and unnecessary. When they caught Josh Lyman on camera, for two seconds I actually wondered which candidate he was working for.

+ Look at mailers the Obama campaign is sending out! They are just like the notorious "Harry and Louise" ads that targeted Hillary back in the 90s. (I'm also not a huge fan of his Committed Christian mailers, but at least I understand why he's sending those out. He said himself last night that his healthcare package is 95% similar to Hillary's, and these mailers are unfair and unhelpful.) So, you know, a politician is a politician, and it's not just the Clintons who play games. I would appreciate less sanctimony is all I am saying.

+ The Nation has posted a pretty persuasive case for Obama's nomination, from a liberal perspective.

+ The newest Gallup poll says Obama and Clinton are separated by a mere three points nationally. DailyKos says we might not know who our nominee is until as late as March 4th. This had better be the ONLY close part of this presidential election, you guys.

+ ( that make-your-fake-album meme... )

+ ( that top five songs of the moment meme... )

I've been depressed all day about John McCain winning the nomination. (Basically.) Flipping through the Republican debate has made me even more bummed. Romney is such a train wreck! We could have wiped the floor with him!

( I've officially decided who I'm voting for, if you care. )

According to the national polls, Obama is only down six points nationally. Now that John Edwards has dropped out (ILU, John! You would make an awesome Attorney General!), who knows what they'll look like tomorrow? And it will be huge if he decides to endorse somebody. This is turning into a real nail-biter!

So, you know, plan to vote on Tuesday! Your vote definitely matters. This isn't a done deal by any stretch of the imagination.

The Obama camp is such a bunch of porcelain kittens. There was never any doubt that the Michigan and Florida delegates would be seated at the convention! And it's not exactly surprising that the candidate who won the states is the first one talking about seating them. (HOW DASTARDLY! Twirl that mustache, Hillary!) And this is all so completely ridiculous, anyway. They only did it to placate the jerks in Iowa and New Hampshire who feel entitled to twenty plus times the electoral power of their fellow Americans. Michigan pushing their primary up to draw attention to their economic problems was awesome, and the DNC can go to hell as far as I'm concerned. And I'm sure that Florida Democrats who bothered to show up to the polls even though the DNC won't deign to represent them for shitty and archaic reasons really appreciate the implication that they're a.) too stupid to know what's going on in the national race and b.) don't matter. It's just a floor show! Way to treat your base in the most populous swing state!

If Obama had won Florida, I should hope that he would be doing exactly what Hillary is doing right now; I would like to actually WIN in November, thanks. There is no honor in losing nicely so we can sit back and watch the Republicans destroy the country some more for another goddamned decade. Spare me your fake outrage or save it for something that actually matters.

Speaking of Republicans, it is so tragic that John McCain won Florida. I really wanted to run against Romney. I mean, McCain looks elderly as hell, and his stance on Iraq is so far to the right of where the majority of Americans' heads are at that I'm thinking we'll still be able to smoke him. But it might be a little more difficult -- people really seem to like Mr. Straight Talk Express.

I can't believe that the Republicans will have their nominee before we do! They were supposed to be the ones with the blood-letting and the eating of their own and the spending of too much money fighting amongst each other! Craaap.

P.S. You know why Hillary won Florida? Because approximately seventy percent of the state qualifies for the senior citizen's discount. I am not even joking.

I watched the Gossip Girl special last night INSTEAD of the State of the Union. It's the first time I haven't watched since I was seventeen. IT WAS AWESOME. (I mean not watching the State of the Union was awesome, not rewatching Gossip Girl. I enjoyed the special, but Maddy was right about the pilot -- it is kind of mediocre.) Less than one year. His last State of the Union ever! Awesomeness.

I was going through my blog roll, and John Mayer wankily bahleeted his entire blog and posted an ambiguous quote and graphic. Why so melodramatic, John? I hope it's temporary because his blog is actually pretty awesome and hilarious. Anyway, it reminded me of what rez_lo always says about stuff like this. "There is no real life, only fandom wank." Or something!

Gnarles Barkley's new single has leaked. I think it's pretty fun.

And, oh my gosh, I totally love this. It's America Ferrera and Amber Tambyln interviewing Hillary Clinton. Like, they filmed it themselves and do terrible dances and talk about not letting the Man get them down. It's completely adorable. (Even if Hillary should take some of her own advice, sigh.)

Disclaimer: And, you know, just to be clear since it's got the Vote Hillary stuff at the end... I am not endorsing Hillary or telling anybody who to vote for. I know people get ill about that. I just think this is so, so cute.

Holy crap! Is anybody else watching this? This debate is INSANE.

But also hilarious, so it's not like I'm complaining. I have to hand it to Hillary for knocking Obama off his post-partisan high horse. The comments about not knowing which Clinton he's running against were funny but not in line with the image he's trying to project. And I kind of died when he called her a corporate lawyer for Wal-Mart. (Which is sort of correct, but not exactly fair and entirely irrelevant.) So I don't blame her for countering (also unfairly) with his own career history. WELCOME TO THE NEW POLITICS OF HOPE, YOU GUYS.

I still can't decide who to vote for, sigh. I really like them all. I guess this is a good problem to have!

ETA: TPM has the best roundup, and I completely agree with Josh Marshall. I really do like Hillary, but it does bother me when she goes for the cheap shot, like misrepresenting Obama's (admittedly vague, but still) statements about Reagan or his Present votes in the Illinois legislature. But it's not like the Obama camp hasn't done the same thing to her. The difference is that Hillary has shown herself to be much more effective at defending herself. Obama bungled both responses (How could he have not brought his actual quote?! He had to know it would come up! He had TWO chances to explain his Present votes, and I didn't get it until I read the NYT article Josh linked.), and he'll have to stand up to tougher and much nastier attacks if he's to go on to the general election. And because he is so caught up in this rhetoric about New Politics, he's going to have to be able to do it without getting his hands dirty. And if the candidate is John McCain, he's going to have to do it without getting schooled by someone who has a billion years of policy and military experience.

There's nothing I hate more than idiotic media narratives, so I was rooting for Hillary going into tonight, and I'm so pleased and happy for her. It's just so cool to see a woman as a viable -- likely, even -- candidate FOR PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES. It will happen in my life time! It makes me so happy!

But poor Obama was also a victim of the idiotic media narrative, because even though he only lost by a very few points and a handful of votes, now he looks like a big loser. At the same time, I'm almost glad he lost because while I am like 70% sure I will be voting for him, he has been pushing all my Bitch, Please buttons lately. I can't believe that people buy into his New Politics of Change baloney. There is no New Politcs! The era of post-partisanship is not upon us! PLEASE. Unless Obama's powers of persuasion are on the Harry Potter side of magical, there is no way he's going to be able to go to the capital and pass the legislation he's talking about by being nice to the Republicans. It is basically the prettiest, emptiest promise ever, and it pisses me off.

Even so, the most important thing of all to me is WINNING, and I feel like Obama is very likeable and totally electable, and he doesn't have Hillary's baggage. He doesn't have enough experience either, but whatever. Experience is not as important as WINNING. I simply refuse to live under another Republican administration, you guys. It am all about the FOR THE WIN this time.

And, ha, it is way late and I just finished watching a mind-numbing four hours of election coverage, so if this makes no sense... it's not my fault!