"Listen, we’re just politicians. I wasn’t elected to play God."

Said John Boehner:

The American people probably aren’t going to fall in love with Mitt Romney. I’ll tell you this: 95 percent of the people that show up to vote in November are going to show up in that voting booth, and they are going to vote for or against Barack Obama.

Mitt Romney has some friends, relatives and fellow Mormons ... some people that are going to vote for him. But that’s not what this election is about. This election is going to be a referendum on the president’s failed economic policies.

Mitt Romney believes, just like we do, that if we’re going to get the economy back, if we’re going to put the American people back to work, we need to fix the tax code, we need to stop the regulatory juggernaut that’s going on in Washington and we need to fix our economy. Solid guy, he’s going to do a great job, even if you don’t fall in love with him.

I think we've had enough love for a while. Let's not idolize politicians.

Siri on iPhone 4S.

My son Chris emailed to say he thinks it's creepy and...

If Steve Jobs were still in charge, would he have thought it was a good idea to put Hal the computer from 2001 on your iPhone as a primary feature?

... but I watched the video about it, and... wow! I love it!

And yes, I know, some article in the NYT said brain-imaging shows people literally love their iPhone.

I can tell you the point in the video when I fell in love: 0:50. A woman putting a cupcake batter in the oven tells the iPhone to set the timer.

On second viewing, I was struck by the low-key introduction of a blind woman: We see hands on Braille. She receives a spoken-word message and responds with speech. And that's the end of the video, the music comes up, and it's Ray Charles — he too was, of course, blind — singing "What'd I Say." Perfect!

His love for "I Only Have Eyes For You" by The Flamingos must be a kind of blind love.

Jaltcoh says: "I almost regret finding this, since I've been watching it compulsively over and over. It might not be the best song ever, but it's at least in the running."

This lushly romantic old song makes an interesting soundtrack to the news of the last couple weeks. Why didn't Anthony Weiner only have eyes for Huma Abedin? You could say that if he'd stuck to sexting — i.e., writing — he'd have saved his eyes for her. But he only started the writing when he liked the woman's photograph.

Is there really any love so fixated on one woman that the man can't even see other women? What a grand fantasy of love! I have no idea if this is the best song ever, but it is surely in the running as the song that creates the most unrealistic expectation of what love will be like.

"It's like being in a cartoon."

Billy Corgan and...  Jessica Simpson.

But watch out, Billy, "that girl is like crack cocaine":

"And drugs aren't good for you if you do lots of them..."

"It was like napalm, sexual napalm."

Let's talk about Lady Gaga.

This is great fun. Make sure you watch all the way to the end. It's funny. Great costume changes too.



Ooh, that really was a bad romance. Love the shoes.

"It's amazing, Molly. The love inside, you take it with you. See ya."

A line from "Ghost."



Patrick Swayze, dead at age 57.

"For God to really work in my life I shouldn’t be getting off so lightly. While it would be personally easier to exit stage left...."

A message from Mark Sanford about God and the governorship.

Jeez. This lightweight religion kills me! Couldya at least quote Jesus? Not Snagglepuss:



And, speaking of Mark Sanford, after I'd said this...

[Link, replacing embedded video.]

... it really hurt yesterday to hear Rush Limbaugh say this:

The latest from the chicks in the State-Run Media is, hey, wait a minute, you know, this guy loved her. This is not like Clinton. This is not like the Breck Girl.... So you've got the Breck Girl, you've got Clinton, Eliot Spitzer, and they're all, "Yeah, I didn't love 'em. No way did I love them."....

But this chick, Jocelyn Noveck: "If you're a governor who's in the doghouse for marital infidelity, is it better to have loved and lost or never to have loved at all? Granted, South Carolina's Gov. Mark Sanford may be too busy to wonder... but to some one of the most fascinating aspects of our --" No. It's fascinating to the chicks in the Drive-Bys. "One of the most fascinating aspects of our nation's latest ritual public apology from a straying politician is that Sanford, unlike many straying politicians before him --" spit, spit, "-- seems to really be in love with the object of the straying. Stephanie Coontz, a professor of family studies at Evergreen State College in Washington state --" how did they find her? Evergreen what? Evergreen State College? She said, "Yup, he's got it bad. There's enough out there to make you realize he just has a head-over-heels crush on this woman.

"Could the 'love factor' ultimately play a role in helping get this governor the forgiveness he seeks? To family therapist Elana Katz, the fact that Sanford displays passion, be it true love or mere infatuation, doesn't make his behavior more excusable or forgivable. But it might make it more explainable. "'All those things they say about love being blind - well, it's true, love changes us chemically,' says Katz, who counsels couples and families at New York's Ackerman Institute. 'People get into complicated situations.'" The whole thing is about it's a good thing he loved the woman, he loved her. The chickification of the news. It's on display all over....

Do you understand what's happened to the news? The chickification of the news. This guy's a Republican. Normally he would be roasted at the spit by now. He'd be politically finished. You've got women in the news propping him up because he loves the babe. I find that incredible and quite telling and, frankly, I find it a little interesting at the same time.

"He's squooshy in love with her, quite obviously."

Writes John Stodder in yesterday's Mark Sanford thread:

He was obviously dumped by the woman, who has more common sense than he does right now. He'll wake up in a few weeks or months and go, "what the hell did I just do?" But as of now, he is still immersed in the psychosis of mad love.

I don't think the gal pals of Clinton or Edwards were ever anything more than pleasant vanities and erotic vessels. I get the feeling that Ensign is a creepy power addict and bonking his aide's wife was just a way of asserting his alpha status, his right to humiliate the men who serve him.

This guy, on the other hand, seems to have gone over the moon. His inner self at war with his stated convictions. He's like the professor in "The Blue Angel," desperate to give up all that he earned just to be a clown in his beloved's circus.

Have you been there yourself, John? Have any of you?

"With its emphasis on equitable marriage, 'choice feminism' has endorsed a tyrannical habit of trying to subordinate passion to reason."

"... And along the way it has demonized obsession. What, [Cristina] Nehring asks, is so wrong with being crazy in love? At the core of this polemic lurks the age-old dilemma of how we resolve our desire for security with our need for passion. Nehring's answer is simply: Let go of security and embrace the radical alertness that comes with the fullness of feeling."

Are you alert? Radically alert? Don't get too comfortable!

500 miles later, I'm back in Madison.

Did you understand the previous post? If not, the answer — along with much congratulations and debate — appears in the comments, notably here. Let there be no doubt about it: A blogger — Althouse — is engaged to be married to a man who began his connection to her as a commenter on her blog. After 4+ years of writing at each other, we met in real life and found real love.

ADDED: Here I am on July 25, 2008, expressing a near obsession with solitude:



IN THE COMMENTS: An Edjamikated Redneck says:

My congratulations to you both!

My only concern is whether Ohio has gained a Law Professor, or has Wisconsin gained a good Ohio man?

Or has Indiana gained the betrothed?

Although 250 miles one way is a long commute.

Later, he says:

I just heard that Xavier (in Cincinnati, but no law school) beat Wisconsin in the NCAA.

Guess that answers my question!