Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

But frankly mr. cole, I’ll be happier when you get back to telling us to go fuck ourselves.

If you’re gonna whine, it’s time to resign!

If you still can’t see these things even now, maybe politics isn’t your forte and you should stop writing about it.

Compromise? There is no middle ground between a firefighter and an arsonist.

People are weird.

Let me file that under fuck it.

Republicans don’t lie to be believed, they lie to be repeated.

Accused of treason; bitches about the ratings. I am in awe.

I would try pessimism, but it probably wouldn’t work.

Bad people in a position to do bad things will do bad things because they are bad people. End of story.

You come for women, you’re gonna get your ass kicked.

The rest of the comments were smacking Boebert like she was a piñata.

Lick the third rail, it tastes like chocolate!

Our job is not to persuade republicans but to defeat them.

All hail the time of the bunny!

Oppose, oppose, oppose. do not congratulate. this is not business as usual.

After dobbs, women are no longer free.

Impressively dumb. Congratulations.

Museums are not America’s attic for its racist shit.

Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Republicans: slavery is when you own me. freedom is when I own you.

The only way through is to slog through the muck one step at at time.

There are no moderate republicans – only extremists and cowards.

One lie, alone, tears the fabric of reality.

You are here: Home / Politics / Politicans / David Brooks Giving A Seminar At The Aspen Institute / Still you’re hoping that she’s well-spoken

Still you’re hoping that she’s well-spoken

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It’s a story as old as the internet itself: someone creates a geek-friendly blog, pretends it’s written by an attractive young woman, and soon enough lots of idiots start reading the blog and crushing on the semi-fictional blog author. The fact that this particular faux hot-girl-geek-blogger was a pseduo-intellectual neoconservative (but I repeat myself) makes the story that much better.

Someone needs to do this with a Randroid blog. Some of you will protest that Megan McArdle already has, but I think that’s ultimately unfair and inaccurate on a number of levels.

(via)

Update. This thought crossed my mind too.

Reader Interactions

115Comments

  1. 1.

    MikeJ

    From the article:

    Messerschmidt’s style wasn’t just bizarre — with cryptic slang, Internet acronyms, cracked-out capitalization and posts headed with sexy pictures of college-aged girls — it was almost in a foreign language.

    Has anyone seen moko-loco?

  5. 5.

    C.J.

    Some of you will protest that Megan McArdle already has, but I think that’s ultimately unfair and inaccurate on a number of levels.

    It would be irresponsible not to!

  7. 7.

    Big Baby DougJ

    @Mark S.:

    Weird, I look nothing like him, but my cousin is an absolute dead ringer for him. He’s more of a Phish-loving do-gooder than a post-punk loving cynic though.

  10. 10.

    Spaghetti Lee

    Perhaps the opposite will also be true one day, and we’ll find that the entire staff of National Review is in fact a college girl who likes pranking people.

  15. 15.

    Loneoak

    When I first heard about her a few months ago (can’t remember where) I thought it sounded like such a neocon nerd’s wet dream there was no way it could be true. A flirty, bubbly undergrad that uses psuedo-intellectual diversions to advocate bombing the brown off the muslins? Give me a break.

    The part about getting tons of hits from WaPo is classic, tho. Which dudes in the editorial room were taking simultaneously wank breaks over fantasies of a 20-year-old in college logo bootie shorts whispering sweet realist nothings in their ears?

  17. 17.

    Big Baby DougJ

    @Loneoak:

    Which dudes in the editorial room were taking simultaneously wank breaks over fantasies of a 20-year-old in college logo bootie shorts whispering sweet realist nothings in their ears?

    I wondered that too.

  20. 20.

    JScott

    Y’all sure it wasn’t Lily? Because, y’know, on the internet nobody knows you’re a… never mind.

  23. 23.

    jl

    I can’t figure any of it out.

    “It’s a story as old as the internet itself”

    Is that true?

    How does anyone know the supposed woman blog author is attractive?

    The pic in the linked story leaves me puzzled. It ought be easy to identify a blond woman with a black mustache and goatee.

    I am totally puzzled.

    I’ll wait until Oliver Willis looks into it. Willis will report that the whole thing is an elaborate DougJ hoax.

  24. 24.

    Rob

    Followed a link there a few months ago. The style was so put on that only a fool would believe that it was entirely genuine. I wasn’t sure if it was satire or just trying to be hip, but it was painful to read so I never considered returning.

  27. 27.

    lamh34

    OT, but some dude at West Hollywood fundraiser heckling POTUS. The heckler said “jesus is lord” and that Obama is “the anti-christ”.

    Larry O had a segment on this show with the author of an op-ed in Wash Po I think who wrote a column on why the anti-christ meme it perpretrated on the right. I guess trying to debunk the “anti-christ” meme, but IMHO he just further flamed it.

  28. 28.

    Loneoak

    @Mark S.:

    Speaking of awful internet pictures, I was googling a picture of sarlacc last night for some photoshopping purposes and I ran across a sarlacc goatse. That cannot be unseen.

  31. 31.

    Gex

    It’s curious, all these men who want to pretend they are women in order to get male attention. Dollars to donuts there are a lot of right wing closet cases considering the same thing.

  35. 35.

    Corner Stone

    2 Broke Girls may be the worst new show I have ever tried to watch. Just deleted that from the ole DVR.

  36. 36.

    Mark S.

    @Loneoak:

    I’ll take you’re word on it.

    The most disgusting picture I’ve ever seen on the Internets (it came with a warning but of course I clicked it) was the prolapsed anus of a weightlifter. Ugh, it still gives me the creeps.

  37. 37.

    Southern Beale

    OK so now I’ve read all the linkie links and caught up on the Great Satan’s Girlfriend story and learn the hot chick with the jones for neocon foreign policy is really 4 people including a 32 year old dude in Chattanooga.

    Okay fine, it takes four people to do the work of one lingo-laden blogger (problem with the business model, maybe?) but I fail to see how this qualifies as “performance art.”

    Jeebus. People think they get away with anything if they call it “performance art.”

  41. 41.

    Mike in NC

    @Corner Stone:

    2 Broke Girls may be the worst new show I have ever tried to watch. Just deleted that from the ole DVR.

    Was that on tonight? We caught it last week and it was painful to sit through, as was “Whitney”, who’s apparently a standup comic we never heard of and one of the people behind that other show. Expect them both to be canceled in a month.

    Terra Nova also sort of sucks, as it supposedly takes place 150 years in the future and people dress and talk like 2011.

  43. 43.

    Corner Stone

    @Mike in NC: I DVR’d it and my son wanted to give it a shot before he went to bed. He likes comedies and I lied to him and said it was one.
    I turned it off after the first break. Then deleted it.
    Just awful.

  44. 44.

    Ash Can

    Who gives a flying fuck?

    ETA: About the blogger, that is, as opposed to the inane sit-coms, which actually make far more sense.

  45. 45.

    Odie Hugh Manatee

    I taught our kids that everyone on the internet is a dude until proven otherwise.

    It’s easier that way. Our daughter has great fun with it because she doesn’t disclose her sex and her interests are computer hardware, game coding and animation, so she hangs out with guys regularly. They all assume she is a he, just like I warn our kids to do, and talk like guys do with her joining in the fun but in a very ambiguous way. ;) Since she likes guys, they all think she’s gay. The conversations get pretty hilarious from her end, that’s for sure. A few guys there have figured out that she is a she but they keep it between her and themselves.

    That lady you are having a dirty online chat with? Yeah, that’s a dude. That web site with the hot chick that says what you believe so you think she’s the perfect woman?

    Yup, it’s a dude.

  47. 47.

    El Cid

    Internet deception about interesting women is so passe. Reality is the true mind-warp.

    It will, however, attract fewer male internet would-be romancers, but those it does attract may be more polite.

    Buddhist nuns embrace the power of kung fu
    __
    Nepalese monastery is enjoying a surge in popularity after spiritual leader introduces martial arts classes
    __
    A Buddhist monastery near Kathmandu is enjoying a surge in popularity after its spiritual leader directed its 300 nuns to use martial arts techniques.
    __
    Enrolment is rising and Buddhist nuns as far afield as the Himachal Pradesh in India want to become kung fu instructors…
    __
    …Jetsunma Tenzin Palmo, a former librarian at the School of Oriental and African Studies in London, says she will introduce kung fu at the nunnery she has set up in the Indian state of Himachal Pradesh.
    __
    “It’s excellent exercise, good for discipline, concentration and self-confidence,” says Palmo. “Also, when any young men in the area know nuns are kung fu experts, they stay away.”

    This sort of thing is usually the quickly-recited backstory to how one of Batman’s lethal female enemies got her start, or some such.

    Are there any female Buddhist super-villains in the comics genre? If not, well, here’s the buddhing writer’s chance.

  50. 50.

    RareSanity

    @Odie Hugh Manatee:

    The only places on the internet that it really isn’t a dude, are places that dudes don’t frequent, that’s for sure.

    Or at least not frequented by the kind of dudes that go looking for “girlfriends” on sites not even remotely related to dating. By dating sites, I mean the kind that require some kind of verification of your identity, not just verification of a credit card.

  54. 54.

    Kola Noscopy

    @Loneoak:

    Because this is supposedly her picture.

    Hey, asshole. Do NOT link to Sullivan without a warning. I don’t want to give that psycho motherfucker one unnecessary hit.

    Until just now, I hadn’t been to Daily Douche in more than four weeks.

    Asshole.

  57. 57.

    El Cid

    I would like to emphasize that I’ve been re-reading that kung-fun nuns story several times, and there is a very high proportion of sentences which make you wonder if you’re awake while reading them.

    Sister Karuna, a soft-spoken young nun from Ladakh in the north of India, says kung fu has given the nuns self confidence and also helps in meditation. “We love kung fu,” said Karuna, as she prepared to swap her maroon prayer robe for a martial arts suit with a bright yellow sash.
    __
    “Now we know we can defend ourselves. We also have the fitness for long spells of meditation.”

    Normally your martial arts movies have initiates learning meditation in order to better practice their martial arts.

    For once I’ve encountered the opposite plot line.

  63. 63.

    TooManyJens

    @Odie Hugh Manatee:

    I taught our kids that everyone on the internet is a dude until proven otherwise.

    Not really the case in the parts of the internet I frequent, but ymmv.

    My husband used to play a lot of World of Warcraft. Women gamers would assume that he was a woman because the female character he often played was fully clothed.

  66. 66.

    Martin

    Sorta-kinda good news. China is expected to order a nationwide minimum wage increase of 13% on Jan 1. Good for Chinese workers. May even shift a few jobs stateside.

  68. 68.

    debit

    @RareSanity: See, I didn’t click that because you’d obfuscated it, but Loneoak hadn’t obfuscated his.

    ETA: Doh! I thought you were replying about the other thing. Obviously I am up too late and should go to bed.

  69. 69.

    Martin

    @TooManyJens:

    My husband used to play a lot of World of Warcraft. Women gamers would assume that he was a woman because the female character he often played was fully clothed.

    So, he’s gay then?

  72. 72.

    Odie Hugh Manatee

    @RareSanity:

    See, you’re making it too complicated with your exception!

    Everyone on the internet that says they are a woman is a man until proven otherwise.

    It easier that way. ;)

    @debit:

    Yup!

    Hey Dude, wassup? :)

  77. 77.

    Odie Hugh Manatee

    @TooManyJens:

    That a woman would assume someone was a woman on the internet isn’t odd at all. It’s like men who assume that a woman is a woman, they are seeing what they want.

    I’ll allow that someone on the internet who says that they are a woman is one indeed but in the back of my mind will always be the idea that they may not be what they say they are, just like anyone else on the internet.

    Thus the ‘dude until proven otherwise’ at my end. It’s easier that way.

  78. 78.

    lethargytartare

    @Corner Stone:

    2 Broke Girls may be the worst new show I have ever tried to watch. Just deleted that from the ole DVR.

    I may think you’re an insufferable douchebag, CS, but truer worse than this have never been spoken.

    my wife almost stabbed me with a fork for making her watch just 5 minutes of that dreck.

  80. 80.

    Ben H.

    GreatSatansGirlFriend looks like a vehicle to get page-views and attention for the two uncredentialed, unknown neo-con doodz who did the writing. One of the two women supposedly involved in the collective was the photographer (probably because the 32 y.o. main writer had that stalker-milgeek vibe that makes it hard to photograph covens of laughing sexytime college chicks). The other was Courtney… and nobody has actually said that she contributed anything other than her name to the effort.

    Milgeek bloggers of the female persuasion are disgusted.

  81. 81.

    Comrade Mary

    Many years ago, I counted on my fingers as I heard a familiar song playing in a restaurant, and realized that I was double the age I was when My Aim Is true came out. And tonight, as I cranked up TYG, I realized that I’m almost triple the age I was when TYM came out.

    I think I’m going to bed.

  82. 82.

    TooManyJens

    @Odie Hugh Manatee: I was thinking more of the fact that in my other internet life (wherein I read and write fanfic, including slash), women are the large majority and I tend to assume that someone is female until I find out otherwise. In fact, I can think of one popular male author about whom it is rumored that he is really a woman pretending to be a man to get attention.

  83. 83.

    El Cid

    @MikeJ: Don’t try to talk a bunch of samyak to me, pal. I’m ready to go toe to toe on the absence of desire any time you want, pal.

    MONK GLOATS OVER YOGA CHAMPIONSHIP
    __
    ‘I am the serenest!’ he says
    __
    The Onion
    __
    LHASA, TIBET – Employing the brash style that first brought him to prominence, Sri Dhananjai Bikudasi won the fifth annual International Yogi Competition yesterday with a world-record point total of 873.6.
    __
    “I am the serenest!” Bikudasi shouted to the estimated crowd of 20,000 yoga fans, vigorously pumping his fists. “No one is serener than Sri Dhananjai Bikudasi – I am the greatest monk of all time!”
    __
    Bikudasi averaged 1.89 breaths a minute during the two-hour competition, nearly .3 fewer than his nearest competitor, second-place finisher and two-time champion Sri Salil “The Hammer” Gupta.
    __
    The heavily favored Gupta was upset after the loss. “I should be able to beat that guy with one lung tied,” Gupta said. “I’m beside myself right now, and I don’t mean trans-bodily.”
    __
    Bikudasi got off to a fast start at the Lhasa meet, which like most major competitions, is a six-event affair. In the first event, he attained total consciousness (TC) in just 2 minutes, 34 seconds, and set the tone for the rest of the meet by repeatedly shouting, “I’m blissful! You blissful?! I’m blissful!” to the other yogis.

  84. 84.

    Comrade Mary

    Wait:

    Prine of Departure: Ready for your interview?
    __
    Courtney Messerschmidt: yes methinks so…

    Jesus hopscotching Christ. Wouldn’t the word “methinks” be an instant erection wrecker? (Yeah, pictures of fictional hot young thing with ducklips win out over everything else, I know …)

  85. 85.

    J. Michael Neal

    I pretty much assume that everyone on the Internet is exactly who they say they are (unless they claim to be a Nigerian prince). I’m never going to meet them in real life, and I’m just not sure what’s so hard about treating people the way they want to be treated.

    Now, I often find men who are being women on the Internet to be boring and/or offensive. In that case, I turn them off, but it has nothing to do with their claimed identity and everything to do with their content.

    The major exception to this is if they use some part of of their fake identity to claim expertise or insight into what they’re talking about. Then it becomes important that they are who they say they are. Other than that, though, I just go with them.

  93. 93.

    El Cid

    It was my background as a Special Forces CIA Covert Action Astronaut which taught me a degree of caution about peoples’ chosen internet identities.

  94. 94.

    Yutsano

    @Odie Hugh Manatee: I know for a fact Southern Beale is a woman. So are CaseyL and opie_jeane. MikeJ the jury’s still out on though.

    I’m still gay as a plaid rabbit. But I have outdoor plumbing. :)

  95. 95.

    Brachiator

    @Odie Hugh Manatee:

    It’s easier that way. Our daughter has great fun with it because she doesn’t disclose her sex and her interests are computer hardware, game coding and animation, so she hangs out with guys regularly. They all assume she is a he, just like I warn our kids to do, and talk like guys do with her joining in the fun but in a very ambiguous way. ;) Since she likes guys, they all think she’s gay. The conversations get pretty hilarious from her end, that’s for sure. A few guys there have figured out that she is a she but they keep it between her and themselves.

    If your daughter has a serious ongoing interest in computers, you both may find this story encouraging:

    Since taking the position of president of California’s Harvey Mudd College in 2006, Maria Klawe has earned herself some bragging rights among her peers, specifically this astounding statistic: 42 percent of the college’s computer science majors are female — that is more than triple the number of women pursuing that major since Klawe’s arrival just five years ago. That’s not all she’s accomplished in her short time at Mudd — she was also responsible for expediting changes in the curriculum to keep the school and its students ahead of the programming industry curve. Her success is already making an impact on nearby Silicon Valley, and she also has plans to attract more underrepresented minorities to the field. Oh, and she skateboards around campus.

    As an aside, I don’t have young kids and am not a gamer, but I found this long blog from a gamer to his someday daughter to be very interesting.

  96. 96.

    Odie Hugh Manatee

    @TooManyJens:

    As a guy, even if I was a member of that group the possibility that one could be a dude would still be with me.

    I guess I’m just suspicious by nature. That and I really don’t care what sex someone on the internet says that they are unless they seem to be pushing it.

    @Yutsano: “I’m still gay as a plaid rabbit. But I have outdoor plumbing. :)”

    So gay plaid rabbits have no plumbing or is it all indoors for them? If they don’t have any then being gay must be very difficult.

    Or do you mean gay in the sense of being very happy? ;)

  99. 99.

    Odie Hugh Manatee

    @Brachiator:

    Very interesting and I forwarded the link to her, thanks! I’m not surprised one bit that women excel in computers as well as they do. Our daughter got in to computers young (she was three years old with her first computer, a 286 in the late 80’s) because of my profession. I learned several computer languages back then and she was there watching me do it. She knows computers, inside and out, and built/loaded her last two systems herself. All aspects of gaming interest her and she is active in several developer communities.

    That father you linked to wants to raise his daughter like I did, with full exposure to what it means to be who she is from the perspective of a guy who is coming from the same place that father is. Her Mother and I are both proud of her independence and spirit, knowing it will carry her far in life.

    She doesn’t get discouraged or let assholes get her down, she fights for what she believes in and stands her ground.

    Again, thanks for the links!

    @Yutsano:

    That’s ok, I wouldn’t believe you anyway.

    It’s the internet. ;)

  100. 100.

    Yutsano

    @Odie Hugh Manatee:

    She doesn’t get discouraged or let assholes get her down, she fights for what she believes in and stands her ground.

    All I can say is that will be one helluva wedding. :)

  101. 101.

    suzanne

    @Mark S.: When I was in college, I shared a dorm room with a friend of mine, and this other girl who was a right-wing Jesus-humping idiot. My friend and I decided to hang some disturbing imagery around the room in order to piss off our other roommate. (We contemplated tampering with her birth control, as we found it HIIII-LARIOUS that this ultra-religious judgmental douchenozzle was on the pill.) So we went looking for freaky porn. It only took a few minutes before we found scat more horrifying than Tubgirl. We both screamed. LOL.

  103. 103.

    Brachiator

    @Odie Hugh Manatee:

    Again, thanks for the links.

    My pleasure.

    Some days, the folks on my commute include people coming from JPL, and people on their way to CalTech. It is very good to see that a number of these engineers and scientists, and perhaps a few future Nobel prize winners, are women.

    Whatever path your daughter takes, I wish her much success.

  104. 104.

    fuzz

    This would be funnier were it not for the fact that Carl Prine actually has a lot of influence, and so does the captain who writes wings over Iraq, these are guys who are consulted by generals to write army field manuals and who are considered military experts/intellectuals. It says a lot about the seriousness that the country takes the wars we’re engaged in that the opinions of someone claiming to be some random hot neocon girl can be read and taken seriously by people at think tanks and in positions of power. There’s a 32 year old blogger named Andrew Exum from Chattanooga, TN, and so he might actually be one of the GSG guys, and he works for a very influencial think tank. To his credit, he is a vet himself, but one of the most depressing things I ever read was a quote from a Vietnam vet on Small Wars Journal; “Whether your son in the army lives or dies depends in large part on the opinion of Andrew Exum.” It’s sad but true.

  106. 106.

    Odie Hugh Manatee

    @Yutsano:

    She’s nowhere near wanting to get married, she’s got too much going on for that…lol! She doesn’t want to get tied down now and we don’t blame her a bit. She’s busy with her computer work and career building, which makes her happy. We’re in no hurry for grandkids and neither is she.

    I’ll tell her about your offer of services though I’m sure she’ll pass (for now anyway!). :)

    @Brachiator:

    Thanks for the kind words for her. :)

    I admire strong women and if our daughter is one because of my help, I’m proud to have helped.

  107. 107.

    Yutsano

    @Odie Hugh Manatee: Not even close to a pressure thing. I think she’s gonna be the kind where she won’t see it coming and before she knows it she’s found her Mr Damn Good. And then life gets REALLY interesting. :)

  108. 108.

    Odie Hugh Manatee

    @Yutsano:

    I thought the same thing but she’s old enough that I really think she will get her way. She’s more logical than emotional about her own life, at least for now. My oldest sister is the same way and her life went pretty much the way she directed it. Our daughter and her are very close so she has a common cause ‘sister’ from another generation that she can relate to.

    My sis works for a gaming company too…lol!

  109. 109.

    Yutsano

    @Odie Hugh Manatee: Just to go off this tangent, Nintendo was hiring for a position I was well-qualified for during my probation year at the IRS. I didn’t actually go through the application process, but it was really really tough to not jump at that. The only hesitancy was it most likely would have been a salary downgrade. And I’ll be making about $7K more by this time next year here. :)

    When you daughter’s ready she’s ready. You have lots to brag about as the proud papa as it is. :)

  111. 111.

    Odie Hugh Manatee

    @Yutsano:

    Thanks! As for the job, money talks though careers in the gaming industry are pretty damned good once you get in the door. My sis was hired as a temp to check code and ended up full time leading the programming group for the company. She loves her work and encourages our daughter to keep at her dream. They talk shop often and our kid enjoys hearing how everything works from someone on the inside. She also has numerous other friends that have similar interests and works on various projects with them.

    All we care is that she is happy and doing well. No problems on that front! :)

    Again, thanks for the kind words. :)

  112. 112.

    Bruce Webb

    @Rob: “The style was so put on that only a fool would believe that it was entirely genuine. I wasn’t sure if it was satire or just trying to be hip, but it was painful to read so I never considered returning.”

    Odd that was my same reaction when I saw Glenn Beck back in his CNN days. Seemed like an early version of the Colbert Report. Only to realize to my horror that not only did his audience take Beck seriously, so did he. And my faith in the power of rationality never recovered.

  113. 113.

    Lurking Canadian

    I would have thought Sipp E Cupp was already filling the niche of “cute, young, bloodthirsty neocon”. Aren’t they worried about diluting the brand?

  114. 114.

    KevinNYC

    Speaking of Two Broke Girls. It was terrible. I could spend long periods of time looking at Kat Dennings, but not with this dialogue.

    It’s also set in a restaurant called “The Williamsburg Diner.” I doubt any of the creators have ever been to Williamsburg, Brooklyn, because they would know there is a very famous restaurant called Diner there, which is in an old diner but they serve things like this
    Block Island swordfish w/ cranberry beans, little neck clams, nappa cabbage and toasted bread – 25

  115. 115.

    DanielX

    @fuzz: If you think that’s depressing, try this:

    “Whether your son in the army lives or dies depends in large part on the opinion of Dick Cheney.”

    Was me, I’d be contemplating funeral arrangements.

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