I (unsuccessfully) discuss two unrelated news stories, OR, "you can put lipstick on a pig, but that doesn't make it a planet-devouring black hole"

If you've been watching TV, listening to the radio, reading newspapers (as if anyone did that anymore), looking at legitimate blogs, looking at illegitimate blogs, etc... you've probably heard the (phony) outrage over Barack Obama's recent comment about the art of combining lipstick and pigs.  It goes something like this..

"That's not change.  You can put lipstick on a pig, but it's still a pig."

I'm paraphrasing... you get the idea.

Simple, common enough statement...right?  Perfectly innocent bit of good ol' American folkiness intended to make someone who's obviously an arrugla-loving, latte-sipping, volvo-driving, east coast tax and spend liberal appear down to earth to us ig'nrent common folk?  Apparently not.  Turns out, it's actually a horribly sexist comment about a certain former Mayor and PTA member of Wasilla, AK!  Boy, (girl?) it sure is a good thing that the Republicans are out there looking out for women's rights!!!

This has got to be one of the most ridiculous cases of false outrage I've ever seen.  Anyone who actually believes Obama was making some snarky reference to Ms Palin's side-splitting zinger about hockey moms and pitbulls is, well, an idiot.  The distinguished Senator from Arizona demands an apology from Obama.  Surprisingly, he's not demanding apologies from the following people:

1) Himself.  Using "the phrase" in reference to Hillary Clinton's health care plan earlier this year was horribly offensive and deeply hurt Sarah Palin's feelings.

2) Dick Cheney.  Using "the phrase" in reference to John Kerry back in 2004 was about as anti-women as it gets.

3) Barack Obama (again).  He's used "it" quite a bit.  THAT must've been his problem with Hillary voters. . .

4) Patrick O'Malley (pig farmer and lipstick aficionado). Really likes putting lipstick on pigs.

If you actually--deep down in your oh so tender heart--believe that Governor Palin deserves an apology... you deserve to be taken to Switzerland and thrown underground right in the middle of CERN's Large Hadron Collider, where you'll be bombarded by tiny particles traveling at the speed of light for the rest of eternity.

Yeah... CERN (the European Organization for Nuclear Research... which apparently gives the acronym C E R N... France, this is why you can't win wars) just flipped the proverbial switch on the multi-billion dollar (slightly less multi-billion euro) Large Hadron Collider--the biggest particle collider IN THE WORLD!  It's a big, round thingy under ground that collides Hadrons, obviously... And it ain't one of those sissy hadron colliders you had in kindergarten. Oh no no no... this one is LARGE.  Some people were all freaked out because it COULD have created a mini black hole that probably would have devoured the Earth.  But, it didn't.  Technically, it COULD have also created a magical flying dragon.  That would have been much neater.

Anyway... Since the Republicans obviously aren't going to let this pig-lipstick (I'm calling it Pigstick-gate) thing go, what can Barack Obama possibly say in its place?

Here are some suggestions:

1) "You can put windmills in your campaign commercials, but that doesn't mean you have anything in your energy policy that would even remotely promote their construction."

2) "You can put lipstick on a pitbull, but that doesn't make it someone who should be one heartbeat away from the presidency after being governor for 20 months of a state of 600,000 and mayor of a town of 9,000." (probably shouldn't use that one)

3) "You can say you said 'thanks but no thanks' to a bridge but that doesn't mean you didn't support it and eventually take the money anyway... No... on second thought, please stop saying that.  I'm really, REALLY, tired of hearing about it."

4) "You can call yourself a Maverick, but that doesn't make you a Top Gun... And, seriously, you probably should avoid any potential comparisons to Tom Cruise at all costs.  He's wacko."

5) "I could say something folksey about doing one thing to something else and it not making any difference, but instead I'm going to have an intelligent discussion about how I'm going to fix the economy, solve the energy question, secure our nation, cure cancer, feed the hungry, heal lepers, and turn water into wine--that can eventually be turned into ethanol fuel."

6) "You can fein outrage over a stupid statement thus diverting media airtime from real issues, but that doesn' t mean your party has done anything to advance women's rights... and it doesn't mean  you people weren't making sexist comments about Hillary throughout the democratic primary (I'm looking at you, Fox News)."

7) "You can write a bunch of crap on a blog on the internet, but that doesn't mean anyone will ever read it."