Difficult Simple

Word has it that Barack Obama has a whole slew of superdelegates just waiting until June 3 to come out for him. I certainly hope that’s true, and then we can put this silliness to rest.

Grand Theft Auto IV looks absolutely incredible. Now all I need is an Xbox 360.

Salon’s Joan Walsh is semi-closeted racist with little sense for what is news and what isn’t. Glenn Greenwald’s a much sharper mind with a far more balanced outlook. For proof positive of this, see his Swiftian skewering of media coverage of Rev. Jeremiah Wright:

I think the most important thing to note about the Jeremiah Wright Story is that we’re a Nation plagued by exceedingly few significant problems; blessed with a quite healthy political culture and very trusted political and media institutions; composed of a citizenry that is peacefully content with its Government and secure and confident about their future; endowed with a supremely sturdy economic foundation free of debt and other grave economic afflictions; vested with the ability to command great respect and admiration from the other nations of the world; emancipated from the burdens of war and intractable conflicts which have toppled and destroyed so many other great nations of the past; and, most of all, we’re becoming freer and more prosperous by the minute.

Not only that, but we have an extremely impressive, serious and honor-bound ruling imperial class devoted to the preservation of all of these blessings.

So it isn’t as though we really have anything else to talk about besides Jeremiah Wright. There are some countries in the world — probably most — which have so many big problems that they could ill-afford to devote much time and energy to a matter of this sort. Thankfully, the United States isn’t one of them. I believe it’s critical that we keep that in mind as we discuss him for the next seven months.

I let this entry sit for a couple of days because I wanted to let the idea percolate. Calling someone a racist seems reflexive for some, much as some women make a career out of claiming sexism. Joe McCarthy didn’t have a corner on ugly labels used for political gain and I don’t want to be one of those people.

At the same time, I have to wonder if Joan Walsh, Salon’s Editor-in-Chief, is a racist. And the evidence is accruing so quickly that pretty soon I don’t think I’m going to have to wonder anymore. I’m almost there now.

Ms. Walsh has made such a habit out of extolling the virtues of Hillary Clinton while minimizing those of Barack Obama that it’s become a joke. Perhaps it wasn’t so obvious at first, or maybe I simply wasn’t paying attention, but it wasn’t until she actually stood up — literally stood up, against a wall, for a video podcast — and said she was disappointed there aren’t more racists in America that my eyebrows hit the ceiling.

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Though I have no talent for drawing, sculpture, painting (finger or otherwise) or, in fact, any other kind of visual art, I love a great image as much as the next guy. I won’t go so far as to say a picture is worth a 1,000 words because: 1) it’s a cliché, and 2) I make my living with words and don’t feel like being replaced. I will say that I find good art an inspiration for my writing and, in the case of things like comics (natch), it’s an absolute must-have.

I get my art fix all over, but I enjoy trolling the depths of deviantART looking for good stuff, often by artists I’ve never heard of before and wouldn’t have run across otherwise. It’s much like the late, lamented mp3.com that way.

At any rate, I thought maybe I’d do a semi-regular feature pointing out some of the artists I run across, some of whom are established and some who aren’t, but all of whom are talented.

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