I don’t know who’s off yet; part one of my voting strategy seems to have come off, as Rocco is saved and I’m positive it was my eleven votes that did it. Positive!

Okay, now the important stuff. This is the first time I’ve ever had to a) look at moving footage of Jessica Simpson as opposed to still photos; b) listen to her sing.

She is atrocious. Yes, I realize I’m figuring out what many other people knew several years ago, but this is what comes of being a 33-year-old mom who keeps up rather languidly with pop culture. Okay, fine, I never really kept up with the pop culture that supposedly, to watch the media cover it, enthralls 80 percent of the American population. I watch/listen to what I like and know the basic peripherals about people like Britney. Or ‘N Sync. Or Jessica.

She is atrocious. She sings flat–out of tune, for you nonmusic types. And it seems she’s trying to compensate for that blatant shortcoming by affecting a style that is just as hideous. French-kissing the mike, cracking her voice like the worst possible combination of a country wailer and an alt-pop edgything, and wearing a one-armed bat-gown that, if it doesn’t get fugged, I ought to know the reason why. Try watching a flat singer who is jerking her head and torso in wretchedly unnatural movements while opening her mouth as wide as possible and all the while inwardly shrieking, “Where is your ARM?!” and you’ll have some idea of the crazy that goes on in my TV room after The Bean is asleep.

I wouldn’t have watched at all, only Cheryl and Maks were dancing rumba and Oh-My-God.

So now I’m letting the TiVo buffer accumulate so that I can fast-forward through any more garbage, like the Macy’s Stars of “Dance” performance. Dancing with the Stars amazes me sometimes with the risks it is willing to take for what one would suppose is a family-friendly show. The Macy’s thing tonight was an homage to S&M that would have been so lewd if it weren’t just so tacky. The amazing part is that nobody on the set seems to notice; they suck it in like it’s a football game until I think that I’m watching something different from what the studio audience is watching. Bread and Circuses. I love DwtS, but occasionally they seem to be trying to sanitize some very crappy stuff. Or just showcasing crappy artists. Like the Jonas Brothers. The only thing that made their flat, over-stylized stylings bearable was … it wasn’t, really. Just the dancing. This is what comes of loving a show that caters to that supposed 80 percent.

Time to find out who’s goin’ home … Hallelujah, Kim’s gone. Don’t worry, Mark, your dad won’t be the only Ballas on the floor for long. I hope. Ding-dong, Kim’s gone, we didn’t suffer through The Simpson in vain.

Not that persuasive … to anybody who doesn’t already think you walk on water. Sign that man up to take the lead on all future American crises immediately! Of course, as a “Look over there!” to the question of why he hasn’t been calling the individual members of his own party or why, if he has, they haven’t responded, it’s pretty classic.

I wish I had a category that, when clicked, would play the refrain of South Park’s Mormon shredder: “Dumb dumb dumb dumb duuuumb!”

…by learning that P.J. O’Rourke believes in God. He also has a malignant hemorrhoid, learning of which does not brighten my day. I hope he soon recovers the structural integrity of his nethers.

H/t Anne the Lifepundit.

Every week. Because they say you don’t get to bitch unless you voted, and I’ve got a lot of bitching to do about the Week 1 craziness I just watched on TiVo’d Dancing with the Stars. I usually don’t bother voting until it’s narrowed down to three or so couples, but it’s ridiculous, and even a bit revolting, that Ted McGinley went home while the ditzy and bitsy Susan Lucci, the wild but fragile and old Cloris Leachman, and the can’t-move-AT-ALL Kim Kardashian stay on. It pains me to watch any of the three of them, but Leachman needs to go home pronto; it borders on embarrassing that the show put her on at all. Ted was solid and capable of improvement; these three ladies aren’t. Susan Lucci is a low-budget Priscilla Presley–all the sluggish, tiny moves and less of the sexpot. Kim’s just annoying in her lack of grace or even effort–shades of Clyde Drexler. And Cloris, lest I repeat myself, is just old. She is gamely performing over the lack of capability, but it hurts to watch. I don’t know what the voters are thinking about.

What, you thought I’d have something about Congress and the finance bailout? You must be new here, eh?

PS, I find myself thinking, a little, that it’s a bit of a shame Lance Bass is gay. Don’t get me wrong, Joey Fatone is still way more my type, but I’m starting to see what girls saw in their little band a few years ago. He’s cute and charismatic, and his aw-shucks “I was the worst dancer in ‘N Sync” bit has cleverly lowered expectations until it’s a pleasant surprise to find how well he can dance and how well he comports himself. Keep it up, Lance.

Okay, now this is just naughty: Tonight Lance dances paso to “I Kissed a Girl.” Hahahah. Add “good sport” to the mix.

Time for vote strategy: Put it all in for Rocco DiSpirito. He’s cute, he makes Karina smile for a change, and his dance was not as bad as the judges made out tonight. Most importantly, aside from the three women who must go (KIM KARDASHIAN leading that pack–she is that girl you tried to do a group project with in high school and to any criticism always responded that she was doing her best until you want to point out that if that’s so, that’s a sad commentary on what the rest of her life will be like), he will be on the chopping block because a) the judges marked him down and b) he’s not a rock star. I want him to come out ahead of one of the Trio of Suck so that hopefully one of them will drop off the bottom of the scale. Vote Rocco!

When I return, blogging shall return. You have been warned.

I mean, after all, Dancing with the Stars will be back.

The Bean’s paternal grandmother has passed on, following her husband by about five months. I’ll be absent(er).

I’m busy with too many things to blog properly, but this is a gimme. Allah quotes Politico:

Savvy readers [of her biography] might find cause for concern in Palin’s burning ambition, her ruthlessness or her complete lack of loyalty to political patrons. …

… Palin was encouraged to run for a City Council seat in Wasilla, Alaska, in 1992 by council member Nick Carney and was warmly welcomed into office by then-Mayor John Stein. Within months of taking office, she had voted against a pay hike for Stein and against a mandatory garbage collection ordinance that would have greatly enriched Carney. Four years later, Palin unseated Stein…

The scandals Palin helped prod along [while an appointee of Gov. Frank Murkowski’s administration] badly damaged the Murkowski administration. She ran against the governor in the 2006 GOP primary, easily finishing him off.

Palin had her reasons but the pattern is clear. She is invited in by well-established pols, doesn’t get her way and ends up running against the “good old boys” and defeating them handily.

Was it possible that she thought the mayor’s salary was high enough by objective standards and that Wasilla didn’t need the garbage collection ordinance? Was it an understood thing that “encouragement to run” and a “warm welcome” cost her vote on their pet issues? That is not loyalty; that is corruption. Looks to me like an unwillingness to pay back good manners with political influence might be one of the reasons McCain picked her. Will he have to watch his back around her? Looks to me like no, as long as he watches his step around voters. Which is fine by me. If she defects and challenges in 2012, it is the voters who will decide whether she had good reasons to do so.

Just very busy.

No, seriously, where are you, because I’m about to drop you from my bookmarks.

A birthday for the Bean, a big family visit, there’s a lot going on. I’ll be back.

C’mon, I’m just emulating Xrlq by going for a one-to-one ratio of weeks to posts.

Actually, Xrlq’s been posting several times per day.

Well, see, then? He’s picking up my slack. And hey, I have made one crucial blog decision–I’m no longer going to code links that automatically open a new browser window. I figure you people are smart enough to right-click and pick “open in new window (or tab)” all by yourselves.

Well, thanks for that, the extra windows were driving me nuts.

You’re welcome.

I’ll never forget.

Yes, I know I owe you sweet, devoted people a boatload of Sarah Palin content. I just haven’t been able to bring it yet. I’m floored by the last week in politics and its implications. When I’m floored I can’t write about it. So … wait. I’ll either have something or I won’t, and if you need Sarah Palin and somehow aren’t getting enough, just click through my blogroll, starting with Ace–I am so in love with him this week for ripping off the heads of people circulating lies about the Palins.

Meanwhile, I return to my regular beat, the oh-so-important, terribly critical Dancing with the Stars. Seriously. Wild stuff. I used to rail and rage against sports announcers and the stupid “interviews” they do with stars and coaches after the game. What do you MEAN, “How important was this win and how do you feel about that?” What a stupid question. Are you just a moron? till a boyfriend more versed in the sports world helpfully pointed out that the “interviews” are always boilerplate form, but they have to go through them anyway in case somebody says something out of line. Kind of like they always have to videotape the president taking off in Marine One in case he falls out, or a rotor blade flies off and decapitates the Rose Garden.

Sports interviewers wish they could interview my Maks. He talks about his partners as friends for life, and I guess he must really believe that, if he thinks he can say stuff about them in an interview while comparing them all unfavorably (however razor-thin the margin between them may be) to his new partner, volleyball queen Misty May-Treanor.

TVGuide.com: Misty is better than Mel B?
Chmerkovskiy: I was shocked, and I don’t throw that word around lightly. People are going to be very surprised by how well she’s going to dance. Laila (Ali, season four) had an incredible work ethic. But I could be too much for her. She’d say: You’ve gotta back off. And then Mel (season five) was just this incredible personality. But she had zero attention span. So here, in Misty, I have a combination of the best qualities of both. She’s like a perfect person to love. She has this aura of sweetness, and she’ll practice for as long as it takes. Let Cheryl [Burke] and Julianne [Hough] collect the trophies. I’ll collect friends for life.

Wow. I said he’d have to go far to find somebody better than Mel B. Apparently he thinks he went far enough. Now I’m stoked. Bring back the rest of my fall TV! Because I watched the Bones premiere last night and, gah. You know those writers I thought they must have hired last season when the shows were clicking right along with good plots and snappy dialogue? Yeah, they all must have quit again.