Uh. One problem with your evidence (although I actually somewhat agree with your thesis) is that using Althouse as the example of a blogger is like a blogger with both hands tied behind their back, blindfolded, legs broken, falling down drunk, and wheezing from emphysema.
Yeah, I think I'm pretty much sick of seeing her name in connection with anything, even in illustration of a larger point. For fuck's sake.
Jesus, she's nuts. Deeply, pitiably cuh-rayzee.
Yeah, I think I'm pretty much sick of seeing her name in connection with anything, even in illustration of a larger point. For fuck's sake.
I agree with the Left; Althouse has f***ed the shark.
Yeah, I think I'm pretty much sick of seeing her name in connection with anything, even in illustration of a larger point. For fuck's sake.
Indeed. A cry for help, or a clever plot to up her traffic? And imagine the next meltdown - at least it'll be fun to watch.
It's almost Godzilla-like, the way she rumbles through the blogosphere, mindlessly waving her arms at everything in sight. "RAHHHHH! Apology!!! RAHHHHH! That donut is a vagina!!!"
That can't be Ann Althouse you are talking about. Surely she's not as crazy as the Simpson's Cat Lady. I mean, come on, she was an honored guest editorialist on the editorial page of the New York Times. And, I've heard, she teaches law. You must have some other Ann Althouse.
Argh. With any luck, Simpson's writers are reading your post and working on a script about the Simpson's Cat Lady's blog, her rocket to fame!, and her guest stint at the New York Times. It wouldn't be parody, of course, just Cat Lady Supreme!
I'd be so nervous if I lived next door to Althouse. You just know she's gonna show up at your door some night waving a shovel around and demanding an apology for the way you mow your lawn...
She's really sensitive to cat lady comparisons. Don't know why.
Honest to god, she did her "you're banned!" trick on me when I obviously jokingly referred to her as a cat lady at another blog.
So be careful Roy!!!!
dave, that's the best thing I've ever seen you contribute. thanks for the find.
Just because someone is using relatively new technology does not necessarily mean that he or she is the wave of the future. The screaming fellow with the Bluetooth earpiece may not in fact be connected; he may in fact be screaming to himself, only using technology to conceal his madness from the world.
Heh, I like that. "Just because someone is ranting irately about Martians and fascism and getting arrested for public drunkenness while wearing a Bluetooth earpiece doesn't mean it's turned on."
Has anyone ever heard "putz" used to denote a "little" penis?
I've never heard it associated with "little".
She was once married to a Jewish guy that has written a blook, so I could very well be wrong.
...demanded an apology for something Orr didn't say.
That's our Annie!
...the Simpsons' Cat Lady.
I've always considered Althouse to be a different Simpsons punchline - aging, unhappy teacher Edna Krabappel - ever since she posted that video of herself watching American Idol alone and downing that big glass of cheap red wine. "That's okay. I don't entertain much. Usually it's just soup for one, salad for one, wine for three." Her upbeat hey-look-at-me-ism that doesn't recognize how pathetic it also puts me in mind of the Onion's Jean Teasdale.
I still can't manage to wrap my head around the fact that she's a tenured professor at a top-tier law school who publishes in the NYT, and yet argues, shifts, and obsesses over things internet people are saying like one of our stable of unemployable basement dwellers (Jeff Goldstein, Ace of Spades, Confederate Yankee, etc.). She has admitted to programming a Google Alert to notify her the moment a new mention of her name occurs online.
Her pattern is distressingly predictable. Take an inaccurate cheap shot at someone, provoke a sharp (yet accurate response), and then treat the response as an unprovoked attack on her, with several posts arguing that she's the real victim here. Lather, rinse, repeat. Although the onion rings episode is the first time she she tried that classic USENET tactic of "ha ha you all fell into my trap I totally played you". What next, sockpuppets? The lurkers support me in email?
Surely she's not as crazy as the Simpson's Cat Lady. I mean, come on, she was an honored guest editorialist on the editorial page of the New York Times. And, I've heard, she teaches law. You must have some other Ann Althouse.
The "Springfield Up" episode of "The Simpsons" shows a number of characters in previous years, through the conceit of a documentary that has followed them through their lives:
In “Springfield Up,” it is revealed that Eleanor earned an MD from Harvard Medical School and a JD from Yale Law School- both by age 24. In one scene, Eleanor is representing a client in open court and asks to be excused to deliver a baby. However, eight years later, she exhibits signs of alcoholism due to stress, and she has become very attached to her pet cat; she suggests that she might get another one. After an additional eight years, she has assumed her present appearance and behavior.
[quickly looks for a place to hide the Bluetooth earpiece, represses urge to mumble, wipes drool from chin]
anon @ 12:46:
Harlan Ellison once characterized the perjorative "putz" as a word that one should *never* hurl at another, unless ready to defend oneself, preferably while equipped with automatic weapons. Not sure why that one in particular was so touchy for him.
Re blogging:I think it's one of the greatest things since sliced bread, and I don't think I'm being 'triumphalist'. Rather, I think of it as perhaps the last, best, albeit feeble hope that some artifact of the thinking of quote-unquote reg'lar folks might actually be seen in real time, rather than after being dug up from the ruins of cave-dwellings a thousand years hence.
I'm looking forward to the day when Althouse and Malkin inevitably target each other. We'll be treated to six years of enraged tough talk, implied victimhood, and shaky videos of people making deranged faces at each other...
That first comment thread at The Plank cracked me up. One of Althouse's (and her sad and silly little posse's) favorite retorts is to criticize anyone who brings up the fact that the Deep-Fried Cat Lady's a professor. "Blah blah blah. Here we go: 'And-you-a-law-professor.' Get some new material," they chortle.
And what does she do in that thread? "And you, The New Republic! I should cancel my subscription!"
How anyone can see TNR's BLOG as part of the "MSM" makes as much sense as how they can see genitals in an appetizer.
My favorite comment is the one that says explaining your own jokes is always the sign of a true humorist.
And this vortex thing is just beyond the beyond. Shorter everything she says: "You dare to mock me? I'll give you something to mock, then when you fall into my clever trap by mocking me, I'll mock you!"
Wow. I just read one of those threads at The Plank...man, that shit is just too weird on too many levels.
Re: the Bluetooth thing, that cracks me up. I live in Boulder, where we have a middlin' average population of schizophrenics, at least during the summer, and I went through a weird phase a couple of years ago when I saw well-dressed, seemingly sane people waving their arms around, screaming at nobody. My God, I thought, is it contagious? Only later did I learn to look for the bluetooth earpiece.
Summed it up nicely.
Yet another urine sample from Dame Dementia, as she pisses her way through the internets... What a friggin' loon.
Bluetooth earpiece = Not A Good Look
"I'd be so nervous if I lived next door to Althouse. You just know she's gonna show up at your door some night waving a shovel around and demanding an apology for the way you mow your lawn..."
Wally Whateley
-Why be nervous?
I'd call the cops and let them deal with her.
I can't tell any more whether the people I pass on the street in midtown are schizophrenic or just wearing headset phones.
There's one memorable fellow who rides the seven who appears to be both (or at least that's what I glean from the fact that his heated conversations keep going well after we've entered the tunnel under the river.
"I agree with the Left; Althouse has f***ed the shark."
Spokane Moderate
-...and the shark wanted an apology from her.
Who Killed The Newspaper? Roy Did It!
Conference on State of Newspaper Industry Draws Huge Crowd
by Ian Elwood‚ May. 18‚ 2007
On May 14th, Stanford University and McClatchy Company co-sponsored a free community forum at Cubberly Auditorium to discuss the fate of the newspaper industry. Speakers included Bill Keller,Executive Editor of the New York Times, Gary Pruitt, Chief Executive Officer of McClatchy, Marissa Mayer, Vice President of search productsand user experience at Google, and Harry Chandler, a former executive at the Los Angeles Times. It was the 41st of such events sponsored by McClatchy.
Titled, "Pressing Times: Can Newspapers Survive in the New World of Journalism?," the event drew a capacity crowd and left the impression that these executives had very little hope for the newspaper industry of the future.
"The inevitable conclusion is that newspapers are dying," offered Pruitt. Joel Brinkley, a journalism professor at Stanford, gave a summary that the four panelists had a hard time denying — the survival of the newspaper industry is threatened, and the Internet is the cause of it.
Other assertions floated by Brinkley were that only newspaper reporters can do ethical journalism and that radio, television and online reporting routinely "lift" newspaper content. Newspapers and journalism were often conflated by panelists as one and the same without separating the craft from the medium. But Pruitt said "it's the business model that is under stress," and that was what is harming journalism, not simply heavy competition from other media.
"We're gonna have to adapt and evolve, as Darwin pointed out," he said. The loss of classified advertising revenue to sites like Craigslist.com was the first clue that their business model was doomed... In talking about the future of online news, many had a similar outlook. More advertising, multimedia, a 24 hour news cycle, user generated content and a local focus news would be the way to keep newspapers relevant. Many ideas that panelists offered for economic survival of newspapers would create such fundamental change, that the result could no longer be called a newspaper.
It is clear that at least three out of the four panelists believed that newspapers as we know them will not exist for much longer, but their hope is that what comes will still be a venue for quality journalism, despite the loss of the printed word.
http://www.beyondchron.org/news/...php?
itemid=4530
Inre: putz, I'm neither yiddish nor jewish, but I believe Althouse was mixing up her factoids. Schmuck means big dick, leading some to suggest using schmendrik in its place, as it means little dick. Putz, to my extremely limited knowledge, just means dick.
Really, it takes dowdian levels of lack of self-knowledge for a heterosexual woman to mourn about being alone when her rhetorical default setting for "I disagree with what you said" is "You have a really small penis"
OK, I'm ready to take flak for this, but the key is in the big glasses of wine. Every time she hits the keys, she's drunker than Faulkner at a Sunset Blvd sript meeting; she's taking in enough cheap chardonnay and shiraz to take out a small Churchill because it's the only way she can cope with the abuse. The problem is, the insulation she gets from the bottle makes her totally incapable of writing anything comprehensible. God knows, I've come out with worse crap than her, but only at around 3 am and surrounded by only the very closest friends who will forgive everything, out of sympathy and empathy. She's not stupid, just the drunk attention seeking lass at the student union bar, kicking over the pints on the wooden table as she flails to the music while stripped to her pedestrian Marks and Spencer underwear. You can't maintain this level of "look at me!" when sober. I think she'll lose her job out o this soon. She reminds me of the hot german girl I went to school with who was so cool, so with it, so up for all we can offer, until she went too far, took too many Es, and shit herself, fully clothed, in a bath of icy water. After that, it was game over. Quite frankly, I think obvious alcoholism of this level is pitiable, and it's gone so far I'll no longer even be a part of the inevitable schadenfreude over her imminent downfall.
Oh, and I'm speaking as a functional alcoholic myself. Christ woman, show some professionalism.
"I am aware that my writing is popular"
so are train wrecks and multi-car pile-ups on the interstate.
I'm with al. I hate watching people crash and burn, even if I find their views odious. There but for the grace of Whoever, etc.
Well, I see my exhortations to starve the beast have failed.
"I am aware that my writing is popular,"
Yes, and everyone who went to a G.G. Allin concert was there for the music. 'Course that's how it works.
Harlan Ellison once characterized the perjorative "putz" as a word that one should *never* hurl at another, unless ready to defend oneself, preferably while equipped with automatic weapons. Not sure why that one in particular was so touchy for him.
Because Harlan Ellison is an asshole. He is a great writer and may have a point, but he'll always prove in the most irritating, combative way possible. I've always been an admirer of his writing and I can appreciate the hard-headed way he bulldozes through life, but I'm glad I've never had to deal personally with the S.O.B.
As for Althouse, I'm starting to feel bad for her. Back in my boozing days, it was my closest friends, the people that really cared for me, that'd pull me aside after some embarrasing event wherein I showed my ass - either figuratively or all too often literally - and said, "Hey, Matt...you might wanna think about dialing it a down a bit for a little while, huh?"
Doesn't Ann have people like that? Aren't these people paying attention?
Blogging can't be all that important - after all, they let me do it, and I'm a total cretin.
On the other hand, I probably stand out from other bloggers in that I have the self-awareness to recognise it.
Well, I see my exhortations to starve the beast have failed.
norbizness | Homepage | 06.22.07 - 3:27 pm | #
She's pretty much admitted that she's trolling when she does posts like this, though I think that's somewhat of a rationalization on her part. But she does seem to find some sort of validation in the response that these loony trips round the bend generate.
Everyone, I suppose, knows how to get rid of trolls.
Doesn't Ann have people like that? Aren't these people paying attention?
She may well have such people, but as you may know, and I certainly know, these things can take time. Drunks are not the easiest people to guide towards introspection. Once we gain the insight, we're lovely folk. Now fuck off, it's drinky time.
Ah yes, leeds_man. Drinky time. I'm down to Hendricks gin rioned by warm tonic water. And by warm, I mean cans of tonic left in a bag on the kitchen table all day with the aircon off. In Dubai. Where it's currently around 40C. I might as well drink a cup of fucking tee with brandy poured in.
sorry for literals. The kittens pissed on the keyboard, and it's borderline unusable.
When I lived in Richmond, there was a guy around my apt. in carytown who was schizophrenic, and spent most of his time walking around the coin laundry with a deactivated cell phone up to his ear.
Unlike Althouse, he mostly appeared to be listening.
al_in_arabia--
good stuff, man. But you have a long way to go before you can meet the NY Mets Playoff Drunk-blogging standard, set by our host...
...from a post which apparently has been EPU'd out of existence. roy, where the hell's the archive!?
Because Harlan Ellison is an asshole. He is a great writer and may have a point, but he'll always prove in the most irritating, combative way possible.
Yup, pretty much. Still, he remains one of my formative influences...when I stole my sister's copy of one of his collections, it changed my life.
Then again, it didn't get me laid, so what's the big deal, right?
Putz means a dick. Schmuck, schmeckel, schlong. Dick, dick, dick. Hell, half the words in Yiddish describe people as either fools or pricks.
Look, Eskimos have come up with 10,000 words for different kinds of snow because that's what they're constantly surrounded by. Same principle applies.
No wonder Altmouse went out of business; how do you parody something as inane and nonsensical as Althouse herself?
Doesn't Ann have people like that? Aren't these people paying attention?
I'm thinking...no. One of the creepy, creepy things about Althouse is that she doesn't seem to have much of a social life at all. She never mentions her colleagues, never seems to hang out with friends, doesn't have a boyfriend or lover or husband, hell, has her family popped up at all? She thinks it's totally awesome to upload films of herself watching TV alone to the internet ferchrissake.
The eagerness with which she plunges into online arguments, the hours she puts into engaging her critics (in the most self-flattering and self-justifying way possible), the obvious pleasure she takes in the anonymous attaboys and approving links from basement dwellers - it all seems like a flashing neon sign pointing to someone who's desperately lonely and begging for attention. Hell, she claimed to have posted reams of embarrassingly godawful nonsense about Hilary Clinton's vagina just to drive a little bit of attention to herself. Her whole blog comes across as a cry for help. It's pathetic.
What an empty, friendless shell of a human being.
so are train wrecks and multi-car pile-ups on the interstate.
As this thread demonstrates rather well.
Oh oh, I think I'm finally starting to pity althouse more than I despise her. Hope that doesn't last.
aimai
Well, I see my exhortations to starve the beast have failed.
Also, telling us not to look at that spectacularly gruesome 30-car pileup on the freeway with dead bodies all over the place? That didn't work either.
Well Tom, the important thing is that you tried.
I think she'll lose her job out o this soon.
Heh.
You are perhaps unfamiliar with how academia operates.
The more time she spends fucking around online = the less time other faculty have to deal with her.
We'll have Althouse to kick around for quite a while now.
Cyrus: me too.
What an empty, friendless shell of a human being.
I knew we had something in common!
I've always considered Althouse to be a different Simpsons punchline - aging, unhappy teacher Edna Krabappel - ever since she posted that video of herself watching American Idol alone and downing that big glass of cheap red wine.
At least Mrs. Krabappel can get a date. And with pretty much any man in Springfield, too.
At least people notice when women are crazy. Now with men it's a different story.
Look, Eskimos have come up with 10,000 words for different kinds of snow because that's what they're constantly surrounded by.
Some days I can't tell the irony from the ironing.
At least people notice when women are crazy. Now with men it's a different story.
No, with us they just ignore us, don't return our phone calls, and hope we go away.
What's that you say, Cap'n? Your first date in three years and it went shitty? How *ever* could I tell??
At least you had a date!
We were evicted from our 'ole in the ground; we 'ad to go and live in a lake.
I'm so glad that Althouse exists. Ever since the Internet proved that not only does everyone look at porn, but that also my own tastes are relatively prosaic, I've been starved for truly guilty pleasures.
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