A Drudgtaposition that didn't last very long — for good reason.

Earlier today, Drudge had this photo juxtaposition:



To become aware of the full — and, I would say, fully intended — subliminal effect, you might need to read the letters — in red — under Michelle Obama's picture: "REPORT: First lady 'likely' to meet 'commercial sex workers' in India!"

Now, expand the frame and see what else was there:



After a few hours, the picture of Michelle disappeared, and the top picture changed from the man-on-man clasp, to this:



There's a secret sex story for close observers of the Drudge Report. Playful, naughty innuendo. I'm not saying that Drudge is suggesting that Barack Obama is gay or that he wants to engage in fellatio with Harry Reid. But that's the funny image of the Drudgtaposition. Then, when Michelle and the phallic symbol were removed, Obama is in the embrace of a woman — a rather boyish-looking woman with mannish glasses — and lots of women are grabbing at him.

If we were to understand the sequence of pictures on Drudge the way we understand panels in a comic strip, we first see Obama approaching an an embrace with a man (who seems to be holding him off at arms' length), and then, in the next, "panel" he finds himself in the eager arms of a person who has some of that masculinity he thought he was about to receive, but who is in fact female.

It reminds me of the sequence in the Stanley Kubrick movie "The Shining," in which the character played by Jack Nicholson enters a bathroom and sees a beautiful, desirable woman in a bathtub. She gets out of the bath, naked, and approaches him for an embrace, and then, once he's holding her, it becomes apparent that she is a dead and rotting old woman.

Does any of this actually say anything about Obama, his sexuality, or his wife? Probably not. It's aimless horsing around, in all likelihood. But we do know Obama is out there this week, trying to woo the women.

The outreach to women — which came on the same day that the White House released a report that said Mr. Obama’s policies, including the health care and economic stimulus bills, have helped women over all — is part of a fevered push to cement a Democratic firewall that White House officials are hoping will stem losses in November.

Women are one of the most important pillars of that wall. “Make sure you’re as fired up and as excited now as you were two years ago,” Mr. Obama told a raucous rally...

Hmm... "fevered push"... "important pillars"... "fired up and... excited"... But that's not Drudge. That's the New York Times.

***

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IN THE COMMENTS: XWL said:

Instead of a Harry hand job, we have a Lewinsky hug

(and let's not forget, that's the photo that essentially launched Drudge's empire)

Click that link. The photo similarity is the amazing.

Is lust a sin? Is masturbation a sin?

Back in the 90s, Christine O'Donnell — the new GOP candidate for Delaware Senator — said: "The Bible says that lust in your heart is committing adultery. You can't masturbate without lust!" She's getting teased or denounced or whatever for saying that, but it's not a stupid thing for a Christian to say.

The Sermon on the Mount is central to Christianity. In it, Jesus calls us to a higher level of morality than what traditional law requires. The law forbids murder, for example, but Jesus says that even to be angry with someone or to call him a "fool" is to expose yourself to the danger of God's judgment. (Are you sure you want to call O'Donnell a fool?)

Continuing with that theme, Jesus says:

You have heard that it was said, 'Do not commit adultery.' But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart. If your right eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to go into hell.

So what have you been doing with that hand, eh?

O'Donnell, unlike Jesus, did not go so far as to say that you ought to be lopping off your own masturbating hand. (If you think that, I recommend masturbating with your left hand, if you're right-handed.) O'Donnell took a much more moderate approach to the sacred text (as many believers do). In her view, the real offense against God is abusing the gift of sexuality by disconnecting it from the context of deep love in a marital relationship. In that interpretation, masturbation is sinful. It is mere lust, without love. Is lust a sin? You decide for yourself. She wasn't recommending that the law enforce this higher morality, but what is wrong with it as a personal, religious doctrine? Why is it not respected?

And let's remember: This was back in the 90s. Do you remember how insane everyone was back then? Here's a quick refresher course.



President Bill Clinton, a Democrat, fired Jocelyn Elders in 1994, after people freaked out when she said that young people should "perhaps ... be taught" about masturbation, because it is "is part of human sexuality" and useful in keeping them from doing riskier sexual things.

"'I can't handle a Jaguar right now.' He said that many times. 'All I want is a Chevrolet.'"

The 2d of 3 of his wives quotes or purports to quote Newt Gingrich as he spoke to the minister who was — allegedly — brought in to counsel the couple through what turned out to be their crack up.

He asked her to just tolerate the affair, an offer she refused. He'd just returned from Erie, Pennsylvania, where he'd given a speech full of high sentiments about compassion and family values. The next night, they sat talking out on their back patio in Georgia. She said, "How do you give that speech and do what you're doing?"

"It doesn't matter what I do," he answered. "People need to hear what I have to say. There's no one else who can say what I can say. It doesn't matter what I live."

I got distracted at this point in writing this post by a little boy arguing passionately toward his mother who was walking away from him out of this café. I didn't catch what the argument was about, but I could tell from his tone and a few of the words that he was making an argument based on the kind of principles that constitutional lawyers use: liberty, equality, fairness. Like grammar, these principles are built into the human brain. Just as toddlers naturally learn to speak, they learn to use these concepts to argue for what they want. The lawyerly human little boy was perhaps 3 years old.

Anyway, you don't have to be much more than 3 to call bullshit on Newt. The things husbands say to their wives! (And wives to their husbands.) Laughably unprincipled assertions that you'd never inflict on anyone other than a spouse — these words will make a fool of you if they are ever quoted to the general public. And God help you if you're caught on audiotape: "I deserve to be blown fast! Before the fucking Jacuzzi!" Ha. That never gets old. Seriously, I think the phrase "Before the Jacuzzi!" should become a witty comeback that you use to mock your spouse when he (or she) makes an argument of the sort that is only used intra-marriage and that one would never even attempt to aim at someone who wasn't maritally bound to you. "Before the Jacuzzi" = You only think you can say something like that to a human being because that human being is your spouse.

"And when in doubt, go with the particularly American feelings about gender that would rather see Martha Stewart go down than Lee Iacocca..."

"... that would choose almost anybody, for any public office, over Hillary Rodham Clinton. Sarah Palin's entire narrative is based on the audacity, the sheer gall. Accusations of female arrogance have been big over the last year, taking up about half of the political discourse and even more of the conversation about entertainment...."

Peter Beinart asks a question that annoys me even without the thesis I know he's working on: "Put a Mom on the Court."

The question is: "Why should we want more women on the court at all?" Grr. Shut up.

But let's see how deeply he steps in it:

[Why?] For two reasons. First, because female justices, on average, will be more sensitive to the problems women face. Since they will have likely encountered gender bias themselves, they will be more likely to support government action to remedy it. And that firsthand experience of injustice may also sensitize them to the plight of other groups that have historically experienced discrimination. These are crude generalizations, of course, but they have a basis in fact. Just look at the women in Congress, who are far more likely to be pro-choice—and to lean left more broadly—than are the men.

In other words, you want more lefties on the Court, and femaleness is a rough proxy for leftism.

Our government is actually doing a pretty good job of providing role models for the 20 percent of American women who don’t want kids. Where it’s failing is in providing role models for the 80 percent that do.

But there’s a second reason we should want more women on the court. It’s not just that they may alleviate gender injustice through their rulings; they may alleviate it through their example as well. Just as Barack Obama empowers African-American kids to believe that there are no limits to what they can achieve, female Supreme Court justices send the same message to young women. As anyone who has ever watched their daughter eye a Barbie Doll can attest, role models matter.

Oh, for the love of God! As if it's 1975! I was irked in 1985 to be told that I had the role of being a role model. I thought the male law professor who told me that was discriminating against me. The men didn't have that extra dimension to their job — that basis for being valued apart from the strength doing the real work. Frankly, I found it diminishing. So that's me being "be more sensitive to the problems women face." One of the problems is men portraying our success as some kind of Oprahesque self-esteem lesson for the backward.

And that’s why it’s important not just to have lots of women in positions of political power, but to have lots of women with kids. It’s important because otherwise, the message you’re sending young women is that they can achieve professionally, or they can have a family, but they can’t do both. 

Hey, buddy. My career is not your messaging device. My birth canal is not a beacon of light to the unenlightened.

And without quite realizing it, that is the message our government has been sending. According to the Census Bureau, 80 percent of American women over the age of 40 have children. But look at the women who have held Cabinet posts in the last three presidential administrations. Only two of the Clinton administration’s five female Cabinet secretaries had kids.... In the Bush administration, the figure was two of seven. In the Obama administration, so far, it is two of four. And if Obama chooses Elena Kagan for the High Court, the figure there will be one of three.

Let's roll back to Reason #1 for wanting a woman on the Court: to get a bigger leftist. So why are you knocking Kagan? Because she's childless, or because you prefer Diane Wood, the woman with kids who is — so they say — the bigger leftist?

Beinart, I call bullshit.

AND: Consider this NYT article from 1922 (as reacted to by me, pretending to be a blogger of the time):

The NYT contends that the 12 greatest women "are women that have never been heard of outside of their own homes, and seldom appreciated there; who have put aside their own ambitions ... to build careers for which their husbands got credit." But the [National League for Women Voters] is looking for famous women, so the Times names 12 famous women: Geraldine Farrar, Edith Wharton, Carrie Chapman Catt, Molla Mallory, Alice Paul, Ida Tarbell, Jane Addams, Amy Lowell, Minnie Maddern Fiske, M. Carey Thomas, Mary Pickford, and Agnes Repplier. Ah, but "six of the twelve have never married," and the married ones are all childless. "Let those who think it is easy to manage a first-rate career and a first-rate home simultaneously find an explanation for that."

Well, my first attempt at an explanation would be to guess that the NYT composed its list of twelve with an eye toward who was childless. But, yet, it's certainly true that it's not easy to balance career and family. Why can't we factor that in as we select the greatest women? First, you say the really greatest women are the ones who put aside all career ambitions for the sake of the family, and then you present us with a list of great women who are all childless. It's obvious what you want to say. You want to warn women away from careers. Unless we are willing to abandon the hope for a good family, we should forget about having a career. This is a terrible message. Try harder to find good examples of women who have balanced family and work and show us how they have done it — or modern women should toss this reactionary newspaper aside. We deserve better.

"This activity was not eligible for reimbursement" — this "Eyes Wide Shut"-themed sex show.

And the Republican National Committee has now fired the staffer who expensed it.

The late-night excursion followed an official RNC event in Los Angeles for donors in its “Young Eagles” program...

[Erik Brown,] the donor who was reimbursed for footing the bill... “has verbally agreed to repay the funds to the RNC.”

... Brown, a church-going mid-level political operative, “was not entirely thrilled with the venue that people ended up at,” but nonetheless agreed to foot the bill after the RNC staffer in question told him the committee would reimburse the cost.

Why is Brown's name in the article and the staffer's name isn't? Seems Brown got screwed. He didn't even want to go. Apparently, he paid only because he was going to be reimbursed. And now he's the one whose name has a sex-smear on it. And he's out $2,000.



ADDED NOTE: This post isn't meant to excuse Michael Steele or any other RNC fool. It's just a shred of sympathy for the devil Brown.

UPDATE: The staffer has been identified as Allison Meyers, the director of Young Eagles.