Lee Siegel on steroids

After having been reminded what a "narcissistic sockpuppet" and "failed fathead" Lee Siegel is, I returned to examine a December column by a man desperately in search of his own legend. Mistaking himself as the punditry equivalent of Mount Vesuvius, he huffed and puffed but, poor thing. He could only y-a-a-a-a-a-w-w-n:

Authority in America is something like the picture of Dorian Gray. As democracy stretches its muscles, as increasing numbers of people have "access" to just about everything, as more opportunities are created for resentniks and mediocrities to hurl excrement at niches they covet but cannot breach with talent alone, the face of authority grows more and more decrepit. But a scandal a day keeps honest analysis away.

This, dear readers, is the lede minted under the banner of Arts&Letters as Commentary about steroids. WTF, you say? Aye, mateys, steroids. Author Lee Siegel mysteriously transformed the steroid abuse in professional baseball into a spectrum of cultural malaise as threatening as the Frankenstein monster lumbering willy-nilly, terrorizing the villagers. A Siegel metaphor, you see, stumbles during its earliest steps then slithers akimbo to wallow disgusted.

Shall I cut to his bogus contention?

[Keep reading... more after the jump.]

We have been ravaged, consumed with sundry indulgences under the pressures of a modern, permissive-driven society to ride the painted pony on the merry-go-round until we're staggeringly drunker than Cooter Brown.

Just about everybody, it seems, is on one kind of steroid or another these days. They're trying to find a way around reality with steroids that boost their career, or conceal their motives, or propel them into a crowd that magnifies their personal power.... ...The religious fundamentalists have the steroid of fanatical self-righteousness, and the scientific fundamentalists who react to them have the steroid of, well, fanatical self-righteousness. The political bloggers make use of the steroid of implacable outrage. The libelous, or seductive, or predatory Internet user rides high on the steroid of an "avatar."

Someone, please, remove the obtuse-colored crayon from Lee Siegel's hand before he scalds his palm with a fireball of furious scribbling. Please, before he manufactures another cubic zirconia as valuable as blogofascism. Readers, beware.

This is your brain on drugs.



This is your brain on Lee Siegel.


What took hundreds of words -- if you managed to sift the fines of Siegel's meandering excavation -- distills into some people cheat, lie, even kill to get ahead, a modern story as ancient as Cain and Abel.

Hat tip Wolcott.

UPDATE: Thanks to Avedon for the Roger Ailes link.

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At the end of the day

Whistlin' Dixie with South Carolina conservatives in mind, the Huckster flapped the Confederate flag. An "independent group" sponsored a "flag issue" radio ad that smacked McCain and poured a heaping helping of praise on how Huckabee "understands the value of heritage." On Huck's values, Joe Conason at Salon wrote about his religious extremism and his ties to it. His face was sharp as a butcher’s cleaver... Look away!

None of the above -- 19% of SC GOP voters are undecided. Is that big? No, it's "HUGE."

What's a GOP code word for heartless bastard? In, SC, Fred Thompson dissed Bush's global AIDS initiative because "Christ didn’t tell us to go to the government and pass a bill to get some of these social problems dealt with. He told us to do it... ...we need to keep firmly in mind the role of the government, and the role of us as individuals and as Christians on the other.” Countering Fred's criticism, Bush's former speechifier Michael Gerson said of Fred, "he clearly is playing to isolationist sentiments." TP offers more, um, insight.

Mr. and Mrs. Obama took a swipe at Hillary's voting record. When it comes to taking a stand on an issue, you're either fer it or agin it. Oh, wait...

Picking up from Manifesto Joe, the Bush-league economic stimulus plan refrains that one-hit wonder -- Tax cuts, baby! Via Sam Boyd at Campaign for America's Future, the CBO applauds the Democratic solution.

Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA) "ain't buying" WH spokesman Tony Fratto's kooky denial, "We have no reason to believe that any e-mail at all are missing." Oh? Emptywheel explained why Tony should have kept his piehole shut and today connected a few dots to the Plame investigation. Way to go, Fratto! Fred Fielding must luv u.

The No. 3 U.S. diplomat -- R. Nicholas Burns -- will leave the State Department in March for personal reasons. Uh huh. He'll remain involved "as a special envoy on India." U.S. Ambassador to Moscow William J. Burns will replace Burns. The two are not related. Tomorrow's WaPo.

Bob Somerby aptly covered the truncated, bogus apology from Tweety. Transcript at Media Matters. Corpus Juris posted the video .

First, Lee Siegel called us blogofascists. Now he whines that we're Stalinists (h/t Avedon).

Passive-Aggressive: In today's NYT column, David Brooks compared presidential frontrunners, Democratic to GOP -- "...a daughter of the feminist movement, a beneficiary of the civil rights movement and a self-styled proletarian. These are powerful Democratic categories" vs. "a pastor, a businessman and a war hero. These are the three most evocative Republican leadership models." Is Bobo aware of his unconscious cognition? Doorknobs say maybe, maybe not.

[That's all...no more after the jump.]

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