McCain to Democrats:

"I see your pantsuits and raise you one corsage."


John McCain just announced Alaska governor Sarah Palin as his VP pick, to the surprise of many. (WP) He is sure gunning for Hillary Clinton supporters and I imagine this choice fits into that plan.

Palin is young (44), anti-corruption, firmly anti-abortion, has posed for Vogue, and differs with her new running mate on the subject of drilling in the Arctic Refuge.

She also really likes to wear giant flowers on her lapel, a la Carrie Bradshaw in 1999. I thought the pic above, from her gubernatorial inauguration, was an anomaly, until I ran across this one too.

If you happen to have any other documentation of Governor Palin's floral fashion statements, send them my way. It is certainly a distinctive calling card.

Guess what: I'm wearing pants right now!

I still don't understand the obsession with "Hillary's pantsuits."

ABC News: A Look Back at Hillary's Year of Pantsuits
Glamour Magazine Salutes Hillary Clinton's Rainbow Coalition of Pantsuits

You know, technically, Obama always wears "pantsuits." Not that he doesn't have the legs to carry off a tasteful above-the-knee hem.

And no one ever writes about those.

The Omnivore's Hundred

My friend Joe Wang points out this excellent list of foods that "every good omnivore should have tried at least once in their life" from Very Good Taste.

What a fun exercise! I am bolding the ones I have tried. I think "tasting menu at a Michelin 3-star restaurant" has got to be next on the list, and I will wait on "crocodile."

The VGT Omnivore's Hundred:

1. Venison
2. Nettle tea
3. Huevos rancheros
4. Steak tartare
5. Crocodile
6. Black pudding
7. Cheese fondue
8. Carp
9. Borscht
10. Baba ghanoush
11. Calamari
12. Pho
13. PB&J sandwich
14. Aloo gobi
15. Hot dog from a street cart
16. Epoisses
17. Black truffle
18. Fruit wine made from something other than grapes
19. Steamed pork buns
20. Pistachio ice cream
21. Heirloom tomatoes
22. Fresh wild berries
23. Foie gras
24. Rice and beans
25. Brawn, or head cheese
26. Raw Scotch Bonnet pepper
27. Dulce de leche
28. Oysters
29. Baklava
30. Bagna cauda
31. Wasabi peas
32. Clam chowder in a sourdough bowl
33. Salted lassi
34. Sauerkraut
35. Root beer float
36. Cognac with a fat cigar
37. Clotted cream tea
38. Vodka jelly/Jell-O
39. Gumbo
40. Oxtail
41. Curried goat
42. Whole insects
43. Phaal
44. Goat's milk
45. Malt whisky from a bottle worth £60/$120 or more
46. Fugu
47. Chicken tikka masala
48. Eel
49. Krispy Kreme original glazed doughnut
50. Sea urchin [WORST FOOD EVER!!! The only food I have ever tried and not liked.--Ed.]
51. Prickly pear
52. Umeboshi
53. Abalone
54. Paneer
55. McDonald's Big Mac Meal
56. Spaetzle
57. Dirty gin martini
58. Beer above 8% ABV
59. Poutine
60. Carob chips
61. S’mores
62. Sweetbreads
63. Kaolin
64. Currywurst
65. Durian
66. Frogs' legs
67. Beignets, churros, elephant ears or funnel cake
68. Haggis
69. Fried plantain
70. Chitterlings, or andouillette
71. Gazpacho
72. Caviar and blini
73. Louche absinthe
74. Gjetost, or brunost
75. Roadkill
76. Baijiu
77. Hostess Fruit Pie
78. Snail
79. Lapsang souchong
80. Bellini
81. Tom yum
82. Eggs Benedict
83. Pocky
84. Tasting menu at a three-Michelin-star restaurant.
85. Kobe beef
86. Hare
87. Goulash
88. Flowers
89. Horse
90. Criollo chocolate
91. Spam
92. Soft shell crab
93. Rose harissa
94. Catfish
95. Mole poblano
96. Bagel and lox
97. Lobster Thermidor
98. Polenta
99. Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee
100. Snake

Speaking of suckers, I have a chupacabra in my crisper drawer

This is ridiculous. I feel bad even calling further attention to it. Go ahead--ask CNN why they have been covering the bigfoot revelation story. *shakes head*

Researcher says bigfoot just a rubber gorilla suit
By JUANITA COUSINS
ATLANTA (AP) --Turns out Bigfoot was just a rubber suit. Two researchers on a quest to prove the existence of Bigfoot say that the carcass encased in a block of ice -- handed over to them for an undisclosed sum by two men who claimed to have found it -- was slowly thawed out, and discovered to be a rubber gorilla outfit.

Trust the kids and trust the facts: lower the drinking age

Right now I am loving and supporting the Amethyst Initiative, which is enlisting the support of university presidents in a call to reexamine the legal drinking age in the U.S. (U.S. News & World Report) Especially after confirming more or less to my satisfaction that no beverage industry money is involved. It's a project of Choose Responsibility, a nonprofit founded by the former president of Middlebury College (you know those Middlebury kids...woo HOOOO! no wonder he's concerned).

I buy Choose Responsibility's arguments in favor of lowering the drinking age. For various reasons, some related to personal responsibility and some related to legal exposure, I spent an inordinate amount of time in college trying to keep people from killing themselves with alcohol. And I'm telling you,

1) A legal drinking environment is almost always safer than an illegal drinking environment, regardless of the age of the drinkers.

2) Our unusually high drinking age is unquestionably a factor in many college students' unhealthy relationship with alcohol, which includes binge drinking.

3) I'm much less worried about a college kid drinking a couple of beers and getting behind the wheel--not that it isn't cause for worry--than I am about a college kid drinking 20 shots of hard liquor and then falling asleep on his back and drowning in his own vomit. There is a good case to be made, as Choose Responsibility does, that the age 21 limit contributes to college-aged binge drinking in a big way, and that it's binge drinking that is the greatest threat to the health and well-being of teenagers and those around them.

Anyway, food--or drink--for thought.

Our bartender is running for Congress

Well, shadow Congress...that's how we do it in the District. (CityPaper)

Julia Child was a U.S. spy?

And Arthur Schlesinger, Jr.? And Ernest Hemingway's son?

Newly-released documents reveal a bunch of unlikely (or all too likely?) people as WWII era spies for the U.S. Office of Strategic Services, forerunner of the CIA. (AP)

This is all nuts, and further convinces me that Rachel Ray is actually a stone-cold assassin in her spare time.

And you thought McGruff the Crime Dog was tough

WP: Marijuana Garden Found With Help of Researcher's Turtle


Yup. Some Chevy Chase kid was cultivating weed in Rock Creek Park. But he wasn't counting on a narc turtle running across his operation. It's like they say in College Park. Fear the turtle.

Only in DC...

The banality of graft

The formidable Dirty Dozen regular Sen. Ted Stevens, (R-AK, seen below in his characteristic Incredible Hulk tie) has been indicted on 7 counts of lying about gifts he received from an oil company. (WP, also see Google News results)

Stevens, it is pretty convincingly alleged, took $250K worth of goods and services from Veco Oil in exchange for help with the company's legal troubles in Alaska. The offense was failing to report these gifts.

Offensive enough. But to me, the worst offense of all is what these gifts consisted of. Did Stevens send his nogoodnik son to school with these funds? Pay off his mortgage or something? Tithe to the church? Pay off debts owed to a dangerous mobster in order to save his life?

Nope. He remodeled his bathroom and installed some high quality kitchen appliances.