"Miss Wallis, you are young and talented and deserve better. All of us at The Onion are deeply sorry."

The Onion actually apologizes.

There actually is a line that even humor can't cross, and this is evidence of where that line is:

 
We get how this is a joke, but it's aimed at a particular child. Quvenzhané Wallis is the 9-year-old who had a Best Actress nomination for "Beasts of the Southern Wild." Wallis will also star in the new film version of "Annie," taking the part that Willow Smith declined on the ground that she preferring just being a kid.

Speaking of sex jokes aimed at young girls — and speaking of girls named Willow — this reminds me of the way David Letterman had to apologize for making a joke about Willow Palin. (To his credit, Letterman was under the impression that he was making a joke about Bristol Palin who was 18 at the time.)

"Good Evening, It's An Honor To Be Used As A Political Prop By My Husband's Campaign."

That's the headline for an Onion article, linked by Christopher in the comments to my live-blogging the first day of the DNC convention.

And here's a photoshop from Lance, appropriating my photograph from last night's "café" post and putting the dreamy "pioneer of the future" into Michelle Obama's dress:



(A "café" post headline on this blog signals that commenters should write about whatever they want. The sculpture is "Pioneers of the Future," by Jeffrey Barber, located on the grounds of the state capitol in Bismarck, North Dakota, dedicated in 1989, the state's centennial, and — according to the plaque — representing young people on "a path of knowledge through education that opens up unknown truths about ourselves." Also on the capitol grounds is this far superior sculpture "The Pioneer Family," depicting the pioneers of the past.)

Here's what I'd like to say the morning after the First Lady's speech. It was a typical First Lady speech, completely old fashioned, using the candidate's wife in the old-fashioned way. She's a wife and mother, and she tells you over and over how being a wife and mother is the most important thing. Children are the future. We live and sacrifice for them. And my husband knows that. Vote for the wonderful man that I'm vouching for.

There's no indication that this woman, like her husband, has a J.D. from Harvard. Her undergraduate degree is more impressive than his. As a lawyer she was senior to him: She served as his mentor when he was a summer associate at a fancy Chicago law firm where she was a permanent associate. She has (or had) professional stature and legal expertise. No trace of that showed in the speech she gave.

Isn't it ironic? The Obama campaign has relied on a theme called "the war on women," within which the Republicans want to shove women back into the past and Democrats represent the future where women are the full equals of men. Yes, yes, yes, that's all very nice, but the man has an election to win, and his woman must reenact — one more time — the role of the traditional, modest, little-lady, helpmeet housewife.

How will Biden prepare for the VP debate with Ryan?

Leading off the comments over at the "Paul Ryan shirtless" post this morning, Brennan says:

Joe Biden will subsequently start the "Insanity" workout since he has to have completed the repairs on his Firebird -[link to the Onion] by now.

Great shirtless pictures of Biden at that Onion link. And suddenly I pictured it: What Biden must do to prepare for the VP debate! Everyone's been saying Ryan's so smart and knowledgeable and articulate and this is going to make it so tough for poor Joe "much higher I.Q. than you" Biden. Maybe you're picturing him boning up on all the substantive talking points. I say no. No boning up. Pumping up!

When the big debate day comes, the broad-shouldered, slab-o-meat Paul Ryan steps onto the stage and the crowd explodes with admiring applause. And then Joe Biden is announced. Out he comes. It's unbelievable. He's done it. He's huge. He's more massive than Paul "the torso" Ryan!

"This is a store that sells 300 rolls of toilet paper at the same time."

"And I say any customer that buys 300 rolls of toilet paper deserves a funny book to sit on the toilet and read."

Joan Rivers protests Costco, which banned her book, supposedly because of 2 "parody quotes" from Marie Antoinette and Wilt Chamberlain.

Is this like the fake Bob Dylan quotes that led to the publisher's pulling copies of Jonah Lehrer's "Imagine"?

But a comedy book is different from the kind of nonfiction pop science stuff that's written by semi-serious authors like Jonah Lehrer — the Malcolm Gladwell-type book. Comic writers make up quotes all the time. Is the Onion in trouble? They're always running with fake quotes, like, for example, Michele Bachmann expressing relief that "not a single American died" in the recent temple shooting. It should be okay in the realm of comedy. People get what comedy is, especially when there's a well-known it's-a-joke brand like "The Onion" plastered on it. Except they don't.

People can be pretty dumb. Should we set up the world for the safety of the dumb?

"[T]he things that matter in the world don’t have to be boring and guilt inducing."

"And the addictive stuff we love doesn’t have to be completely substanceless."

To that end, Upworthy, which is meant to be spread via social media, is using strong visuals along with arch, but serious, curation to find the sweet spot between things that are both “awesome” and “meaningful.” Among the memes they’d like to start, the “17 sexiest pictures about income inequality.”

A nice NYT boost for a very early stage effort at a political website (which I'm not sure is really ready to be looked at).

The site is small and rudimentary, but it has some backing from Chris Hughes, one of the founders of Facebook who recently doubled down on seriousness by buying The New Republic.

The founders of the website come from The Onion and MoveOn.org.

Syracuse University College of Law threatens to bring "harassment" charges against a student who blogs about law school life.

FIRE reports:

[Len] Audaer's ordeal began on October 15, 2010, when he was summoned to a meeting with SUCOL Associate Professor of Law Gregory Germain due to "extremely serious" charges. In the meeting, held on October 18, Audaer learned that the charges involved "harassment" for his alleged involvement with SUCOLitis. The anonymous, satirical blog attributed obviously fake quotes to SUCOL students, faculty, and staff. The blog included a disclaimer stating, "No actual news stories appear on the site."

So the blog names students and quotes them saying things that they did not say, and the idea is, it's satire and everyone should know that the quotes are fake. But how would you feel — in a tough job market — knowing prospective employers will Google your name and see that quote?

This is similar to a problem I have had with the blog Sadly, No!, which allows commenters to use my name and comment, pretending to be me. I complained, because I don't want my name attached to quotes that aren't mine, and the answer was that readers know it's satire.

Not all readers pick up on satire. (Remember Fox Nation picking up an Onion story about Obama and presenting it as news?) And satire usually has some element of truth in it. A real individual — especially a student who is looking for a job — has to worry about what people will think. And when readers enter a blog because they've Googled a name, they may not stay around long enough to absorb the context. If non-idiots can make a mistake about The Onion, which is a well-known and well-done satire, I would have even more anxiety about an obscure and possibly not-very-well-written satirical blog. 

The Chronicle of Higher Education has picked up the story:

SUCOLitis aspires to be something like The Onion of law-school life. The Syracuse, N.Y., satirical news blog has attracted thousands of views with fake headlines about beer pong, third-year students serving burritos, and the election of the university’s “sexiest Semite.” It delights in attributing fake quotes to students and faculty, as well as to famous alumni like Vice President Joe Biden, who is quoted as calling SUCOLitis “even funnier than me.”

Syracuse University officials aren’t laughing....

A spokeswoman for the law school, Jaclyn D. Grosso, won’t discuss details of the case. In an e-mail, she tells Wired Campus only that a faculty prosecutor has been appointed to investigate claims that a student violated the code of conduct, and to file a charge if appropriate.

She adds, “According to the faculty prosecutor, a motion has been filed with the hearing panel for a protective order to prevent public disclosure of the names of the students, faculty, and staff who were targeted in the blog, or who testify in the case, unless they consent to have their names disclosed. This was done to protect their privacy rights.”

I'd really like more information about this case, and the law school is suppressing it — apparently in order to protect the students who worry that their reputations are suffering injury. The blog is no longer public, so I can't see what kinds of fake quotes were used and how obviously satirical the writing was. Free speech is important, and I'm suspicious of charges of "harassment," but defamation is different. If you report that a person said something they didn't say, that can be seen as a lie.

Here's a hypothetical: A satirical blog aggressively goes after an individual law student, attributing all sorts of damaging quotes to him: confessions to drug use, cheating on exams, and plans to sexually harass co-workers instead of getting any work done if he gets that job at the law firm. Imagine a satirical blog, written anonymously by another student who's interviewing for the same job. You see the point.

And by the way, to be admitted to the bar, your need to pass a character review.

"To tell you the truth, I'm not 100 percent certain America is made up of states. We might be living in a fiefdom, for all I know."

"Am I spelling that right? 'Wisconsin.' It looks weird written out.... Ladies and gentlemen, isn't it time you elected someone who only learned five minutes ago that there are three branches of government, not 14?... Russ Feingold could point out Washington, D.C. with his eyes closed, and I have never quite grasped the difference between a map and a light-up globe. That is the difference I bring to the race, and that is the kind of leadership we need.... What we don't need is Russ Feingold, who is a Democrat capable of conjugating verbs and composing thoughts in sentence form. I'll be honest, I have absolutely no clue what I've been saying here this entire time. What is time? Where am I? Who are you? How do telescopes work, and why am I writing this right now? I don't know, I don't know, I don't know. Because I am an outsider and Russ Feingold is a man with dark hair. Furthermore, overspending, the left-wing media, tax cuts, class warfare, Muslims, Obamacare, Nancy Pelosi, corporate giveaways, socialism, Nancy Pelosi. Washington, D.C. Voter-people of Wisoncassinn, my name is Rob Jameson, and I want to be your congressman or Parliament or surgeon general or whatever the hell it is I'm running for. Thank you."

Just ran across that Onion shredding of Ron Johnson. It's really funny. Especially now. The voters are pretty damn stupid.... ha ha ha.

The too-easy satire of The Onion's "Supreme Court Upholds Freedom Of Speech In Obscenity-Filled Ruling."

Everyone's linking to this thing, and it is pretty funny, but see what my problem is with it:

"It is the opinion of this court that the right to speak without censorship or fear of intimidation is fundamental to a healthy democracy," Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg wrote for the majority.... "In short, freedom of speech means the freedom of fucking speech, you ignorant cocksuckers."

The decision came Monday in response to the case of a Charleston, WV theater troupe that had been sued by city officials for staging a sexually explicit play with public funds. Reversing the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals' decision, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of the theater, an outcome free-speech advocates are calling a victory and Justice Ginsburg called "a bitch-slap in the face of all those uptight limp-dicks."...

The Onion goes after social conservatives clamping down on sexually explicit speech.

"I'm beginning to wonder if you really understand what 'abridging the freedom of speech' means at all," said Stevens, a 34-year veteran of the court known for his often-nuanced interpretations of the First Amendment. "I'm also wondering whether you and your fat-faced plaintiffs over there need to have some respect for constitutionally protected expression fucked into your empty hick skulls."

Hicks.

Are hicks the threat to free speech? Maybe 20 or 30 years ago.

The Onion quotes Justice Breyer:

It likewise bears noting that, even if everyone on this court got brain damage and ruled against protected speech, we're sure as fuck not starting on some harmless bullshit play. We'd start on that ignorant-ass, Bible-thumping, Fred Phelps homophobe shit. How would those Jesus-blowing backwoods cracker motherfuckers like that?

See? The liberal urge — which is what motivates The Onion's writers — is to repress the speech it disapproves of. And that is the real threat to free speech that we experience today. At first glance this satire appears to be vigorously pro-free-speech, but I suspect that it's only pro-liberal speech. Maybe my suspicion is wrong, but I'd find The Onion a lot funnier if its satire caused its readers a little pain, instead of nudging them to laugh at people they already hold in contempt.

To test your commitment to free speech rights, think of some expression you hate and imagine protecting that. Don't think of something you love and imagine someone else repressing it. That's the test of whether you support free speech rights. The Onion doesn't test itself or its readers. And that makes The Onion's speech too bland. Come on, it's The Onion. Onion. Bland isn't true to that name.

For some reason, people are interested in what Andy Williams thinks.

This story — "Andy Williams accuses Barack Obama of following Marxist theory" — is featured at Memeorandum and Drudge. Andy Williams is an 81-year-old singer. Here's what he was like in 1966:



In case you weren't around then and can't quite figure it out, let me assure you that this sort of thing was disturbingly square at the time. I'm laughing at it now, but I remember that back then, it would actually make me angry.

No one in the 60s, when he was popular in some quarters, would have cared what Andy Williams thought about politics. I can't imagine why anyone cares now. Really, that linked story looked like it belonged in The Onion.

"Think about it—your own mom? Looking for sex? Disgusting!"

Did I ever tell you about the time The Onion — intentionally (don't ask how I know) — used my name but — unintentionally — got my name wrong?

"An Obama presidency would be great for comedy, as it signals a rise in the intelligence level of America..."

ADDED INTRO: Welcome, Village Voice readers. Roy Edroso sends you here with the lines "The news in the final days of the campaign offers scant hope for rightbloggers... In the final hours before their presumed electoral Armageddon, the rightbloggers' last, desperate assaults have sprayed fire at all kinds of collateral targets." But you ought to know that Edroso's characterization of me is entirely wrong. I took a vow of "cruel neutrality" on March 4th -- intended to last until at least October -- and "spread the attacks around and [gave] credit where credit is due." On October 7th, I revealed my emerging support for Obama. Over the past month, my posts have still been balanced, but my support for Obama has crystalized. I'm no "rightblogger," though Roy is clearly a leftblogger, and a pretty dumb or dishonest one. With that correction, please read the original post, which follows.

***

"... which makes for better, more ironic and layered jokes."

From an article about how an Obama presidency will change comedy, that's a quote from a famous American comedian. Try to guess which one before you look. I guarantee you'll be wrong.

So, anyway, there's the issue whether it will be too hard to joke about Obama. There are really 2 problems:

1. He so wonderful and well-liked -- at least by the usual comedians! -- that there's no basis for edginess, anger, and sarcasm. We're not going to laugh at jokes about how there's nothing to joke about. So what can be funny?

2. He's black, and white comedians feel they can't go all-out exploiting that characteristic for jokes. If McCain wins, comedians can make jokes about his age and his rage, the way they mocked Bush's speech and stupidity and Clinton's gluttony and lechery. But wait, I had 2 conventional characteristics for the others, so comedians could get past Obama's race and pick... something funny. Not that he's so articulate. Maybe that he's pretentiously professorial and consequently boring.

From the article:

"Comedians haven't been hitting Obama that hard because he hasn't made a lot of missteps - yet," says [Carol Kolb, head writer of the Onion News Network]. "If he actually becomes President, there's no way he will please everyone. The left-leaning comedians are supporting him in opposition to John McCain, but they're probably not going to agree with all of his policies. He'll be working in government and dealing with bureaucracy and pleasing voters, so he'll start making mistakes.

"I have no fear that there will be something to make fun of. It may take awhile for that to emerge, but when it does, the humor will be more nuanced and informed. We will pounce when the time is right. Now we're just biding our time."

Blah! I despise all the comic writers who have held their fire because they so want Obama to win. Comedy first, you traitors to your craft. And, by the way, Onion News Network is unwatchably dull. The Onion has been fun to read for years, but the translation to video sucks, perhaps because the writers have been so keen on helping a politician win. (But it's not just that.)

"No particular aspect of Obama's life will be off limits for us," says the Onion's Kolb. "That's just not how we do things at the Onion. I'm sure there's some joke to be made about race. Just give us time."

Something tells me Kolb will never be funny... about anything.

African-American comics, though, may not have to wait. From Chris Rock to D. L. Hughley to "30 Rock" star Tracy Morgan, this may be a watershed moment for comedy as in politics.

"Here's the thing," says Larry Wilmore, the "Senior Black Correspondent" on "The Daily Show."

"If you're in power, you become The Man. If Barack Obama becomes The Man, you've got to make fun of The Man. Those are the rules.

"But you know, McCain may win. And then you have to work on an 'angry Obama' impression. That might be much more fun than his being President, really."

Here's Carlos Mencia:

"If Obama becomes the first black President ... to make fun of his blackness is going to be great. Like, he's not black enough, or maybe he's too black. If we find Osama Bin Laden in Pakistan and he drops a bomb in Pakistan, that's thug, man. You're going to be like, 'I didn't realize he was that black! I thought he was just Huxtable black!'"

Obama has not won yet, so what these folks are saying is still what they say before he's elected. Mencia reflects the current situation, in which non-white comedians get to make jokes the white comedians avoid. Will that change? Or will the shows rely on the use of black comedians to tell racial jokes?

I think the best solution is to observe Obama closely and find specific things about him instead of giving yourself permission to fall back on racial stereotypes for humor. (I know, I'm being transracial, which is still in the pre-Obama admininstration mode, and is also not at all edgy or funny.)

"That's nothing. Have you ever seen the stuff on Justice Scalia's website?"

The Onion picks up the Kozinski story.

(Via Above the Law.)

A "yoga-practicing, public-radio-listening, Wrigley Field-visiting, Wes Anderson-movie-watching, Arrested Development-championing white dude"...

... somehow is not amused or chastened by Stuff White People Like.

So, I guess that blog is pretty popular, or why write a whole TNR piece about it? I gave the front page a look. I got the feeling you could "read" it by just glancing at the titles and noticing there were some paragraphs under them — the way you read The Onion, right? But I decided to really read one post, because it was on one of my long-running themes: men in shorts. The post is called just called "Shorts" (along with its number, 86), and not what it's really about: men in shorts, and already I get a vibe that this blog is about white men, not white women. The "white dude" who wrote the TNR piece, Adam Sternbergh, is not concerned with the maleness of the perspective, but with what he perceives as a thinly cloaked attitude of white superiority.

But back to the post on shorts (and good lord, that post has over 400 comments). ..Eh, I was going to find something to excerpt, but it's not that interesting.

So, let's look at the full list and pick something else.

Aha! #8 Barack Obama!

Immediately, I suspect Adam Sternbergh of being an Obamaton and this is his real grudge against the blog. Does this hit a little close to home, Adam?

Well, then, may Suzanne Pleshette wake up next to God.

The last words of her NYT obituary are an Onion headline:

Arguably Ms. Pleshette’s most memorable television moment was not in “The Bob Newhart Show” but in the final episode of “Newhart.” On May 21, 1990, Mr. Newhart’s character, Dick Loudon, was hit in the head by a golf ball and woke up to find himself in Dr. Robert Hartley’s bed, with his beautiful, unfailingly sane wife, Emily, at his side. The whole second sitcom had been a nightmare.

The episode was considered one of the most successful series finales in television history, partly because it managed to remain a secret until it was broadcast. As time passed, some found the scene a useful metaphor for hopes that a difficult situation might turn out to be just a bad dream. In 1999, a headline in the humor publication The Onion read, “Universe Ends as God Wakes Up Next to Suzanne Pleshette.”

And here's the original Onion squib:

The 15-billion-year-old universe came to a surprise-twist end Tuesday, when God woke up next to actress Suzanne Pleshette. "What a crazy dream I just had," God said to Pleshette at the conclusion of the popular, long-running universe. "I was the Creator of all things, I had this crazy Son who was always getting arrested and wouldn't get a haircut, and My children were always hurting and killing each other in My name." Pleshette reassured God that He had imagined the whole thing and urged the beleaguered, well-intentioned deity to go back to sleep.

"Died ... after a long and remarkably courageous struggle with cancer..."

I feel sorry for the man who died and sympathetic to his family, so I won't name him here. I only want to comment on the phrase quoted above.

Old Onion headline:

Loved Ones Recall Local Man's Cowardly Battle With Cancer

Sample text:

According to [Russ Kunkel's] personal physician, Dr. James Wohlpert, the type of cancer Russ had generally takes at least four months to advance to the terminal stage. But because of what he described as a "remarkable lack of fighting spirit," the disease consumed him in less than one.

"It's rare that you see someone give up that quickly and completely," Wohlpert said. "Cancer is a powerful disease, but most people can at the very least delay the spread of it by maintaining a positive outlook and mental attitude. This, however, was not the case with Russ.

Cancer inflicts terrible suffering. But you don't step forward to endure it in place of others. It happens, and you do what you can. Is one victim really more "courageous" than another? What does it mean to be "remarkably courageous"? What unnamed persons are you implying were courageous, but actually significantly less courageous than the newly departed? And does anyone ever not get credit for courage? We're bound to the script: cancer, therefore courage. There's never a Russ Kunkel.

I think you know why. It's why you laugh so much when you read about Russ. It's because we -- if we don't already have terminal cancer -- have so much anxiety about the prospect of becoming the next victim. We're comparing the dead one, who behaved like everyone else under the circumstances, with the vision of ourselves discovering that is our fate.

The "Special Women's Edition" of The Onion.

I love it!

Woman In Coffee Shop Judges A Record 147 People
Area Woman Not Yelling At You, She's Just Saying
Mommy Not Moving
Express-Lane Cashier Confirms Her Nails Are Real
Mother, Daughter Exchange Encoded Menstruation-Related Message Over Dinner
Woman Who Claims Book Changed Her Life Has Not Changed
Nanny Appears In Child's Drawings More Than Mother

"Blues Singer's Woman Permitted To Tell Her Side":

"Despite what Mr. Jackson would have you believe, I am not an evil-hearted woman who will not let him be," Dobbs told reporters. "I repeat: I am not an evil-hearted woman who will not let him be. To the contrary, my lovin' is so sweet, it tastes just like the apple off the tree."

An indescribably cool job.

The Onion lead story "CIA Asks Bush to Discontinue Blog" is currently the most linked thing on Blogdex, unsurprisingly. I was out this afternoon having a brat on the Terrace and strolling down by Lake Mendota, taking some photographs, when I ran into into the father of Onion writer Peter Koechley, who let me know that Peter had written the now-famous Bush blog article. I congratulated him on the extreme coolness of his son's job. He told me Peter was the Onion's representative at the Democratic Convention, which is also indescribably cool. I found this story on CNN.com:

The world's great news organizations are here at the Democratic National Convention: the all-news networks, the broadcast networks, NHK and the BBC and The New York Times and the Washington Post.



And, of course, The Onion.



The Onion, "America's Finest News Source" (see Web site) is represented in the person of one Peter Koechley. And he is, indeed, one: Not just the one Peter Koechley here, but the one Onion representative.



"That's 10 or 15 percent of our entire news outfit," Koechley pointed out.



Koechley isn't in Boston so much to report with daily dispatches than to gather material for future Onion stories. "There's no direct reporting happening," said Koechley. "Our concept of what's topical is a little more glacial."



Koechley, 23, "grew up with comedy newspapers," he said, starting one in his hometown of Madison, Wisconsin (also The Onion's place of origin), when he was 13 and another when he was 15. Now he's part of a staff that puts out one of the most notable humor publications in the country ....

Congratulations to Peter. That "comedy newspaper" referred to was "The Yellow Press," written by West High School students, who frequently met at my house. They were a great bunch of kids!