Where Sam doesn't play anymore ...Rick's Cafe Americain

Pretend you’re Barbara Walters or the news person of your choice. You’re planning an upcoming special interview that millions of people are expected to watch. You can interview anyone you want. Who do you choose, what one question do you want answered, and why?

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Who does the aptly named Irritable Blog Syndrome want to interview?  Why, it’s Mohammed!  Why?  Nothing less than World Peace, my friends.  How, you may ask?  Well, by asking one question: “Is this the path that you envisioned your faith taking?”.  That’s right.  See, if the answer is “no”, well then all those billions of evil Mohammedans will die of shame—but if the answer is “yes”, well, then its open season on Muslims, baby!!  Look for next week’s interview, in which Bull asks Jesus Christ, “Does The Passion get it right?” (of course it does).  2.

For her Chosen Post, Bull offers up a paean to blogging that is long on nostrums and short on analytic thought.  Here’s a taste:

I have to admit I liked the Renaissance line, which is surprisingly clever considering the rest of the piece, but Bull completely ignores the dark side of blogging—that it can be used to obfuscate as well as to illuminate, and that it brings out the worst in some of us (like those malicious trolls who waste bandwidth making ad hominem attacks on other bloggers).  5.

Next up is Lobowalk, whose interview with Osama is very short, and includes the phrase “Down on my DICK, ASS NUGGET!!”, which I believe is a mixed metaphor.  1.

Compared to his Challenge Post, Daniel Medley’s Chosen Post is a thoughtful, well-reasoned analysis of George W. Bush’s position on gay marriage.  Here’s a sampling:

As I said, compared to his Challenge Post.  2.

We turn now to Ecumenical Insanity, whose Challenge Post interview (which is apparently not posted on his blog) would be with Moammar Qaddafi, of whom he woud ask: “What is the real reason you decided to give up Libya’s weapons of mass destruction programs?” Let’s put aside the fact that I don’t know anyone who doesn’t think that the reason ol’ Mo’ decided to give it up is b/c he didn’t want Libya to become the next Iraq, so why waste your one interview on that.  I’m truly disappointed that Athanasius decided to cash in his golden opportunity for a relatively worthless political gambit that wouldn’t have worked anyway.  Also, points off for aggravating my pet peeve: talking about “rogue states that support mass murder” and leaving out Saudi Arabia. 2

Before I get to Anathasius’ Chosen Post, let me say to him what anyone who just tried to click on the previous link already knows:

There, don’t we all feel better now?
Now, I won’t get into the substance of Anathasius’ views on gay marriage, with which I disagree, but I will take issue with the following: rampant spelling errors and making up facts and statistics (i.e., “GM, particularly in men, is not likely to result in any greater degree of sexual fidelity and will probably produce significantly higher rates of divorce, given that the average gay male relationship only lasts three years.” and “gay marriage--an opportunity that would likely be grasped by less than .01% of the American population"). Kinda fun to read in the same way it is kinda fun to watch monkeys masturbate.  4.

Miniluv chose Jesus, and asked three questions (the Challenge specifies “one question").  Points for trying to be funny, points off for failing. 5.

In his Chosen Post, Miniluv announces his candidacy for President.  If the link doesn’t work, you can find the same level of discourse here. 2.

Blog Supplement‘s interviewee of choice is Mikey, the Life Cereal kid.  And all I can say is, despite myself, kids swearing is funny.  8.

As for the Chosen Post, well, that’s actually kinda funny too. 7.

Saving the best for last (not that that would be difficult here), the reigning Blog King himself, Walloworld:

Challenge: He asks Kim Jong Il about his favorite movie!!  Nice.  Clever, subtle humor with some nice jabs at Chris Matthews and himself. 8.

Chosen Post:  Triggerman makes a well-reasoned, well-written argument for imposing certain limitations on advertising directed at kids and/or aired during “family time”.  I like it.  8.

Learn from the King, people.  Learn from the King.

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ChristWeb, the reigning King
Submitted Post: This post appears to be a hybrid: half USA Today article, half ChristWeb’s own observations about our policy on illegal immigrants. I say “apears to be” because although the quality of the writing takes a turn for the worse about halfway through, I stopped comparing the post to the article it links to after the fifth identical paragraph.  If you are going to quote from a source, there must be some way to indicate which words are yours and which words you are quoting.  If only . . . hmmm… wait—there are these funny symbols on my keyboard: “ yes!  that’s it!  One could use these: “”.  Nah, it’ll never catch on. 4
Challenge: Christweb want’s to be the Highlander, but doesn’t really give any compelling reason why (other than “they don’t die").  Devoid of style or originality.  If there can be only one, this isn’t it.  4.

Dan K. O’Leary
Submitted Post: I gave this post a 0 last week, and yet he picked it as his submission this week.  Minus one for being that boneheaded.  -1.
Challenge: This guy just gets stranger and stranger.  Given his choice of any movie character, he chose “Commando”.  Why?  Because he would be able to “get freaky with Rae Dawn Chong” and have Alyssa Milano as his daughter.  Also, he thinks Arnold’s accent is “the smoothest . . . on the planet” [NOTE TO CHRISTWEB—SEE HOW EASY THAT WAS?]. Points off for questionable taste and judgment, and because there is something very wrong with some of his symbols (like those funny ones I just discovered), but points for writing a coherent, somewhat amusing response.  5, unless it wasn’t completely ironic, in which case 0 and a shower for me.

Southern Musings
Submitted Post: A good friend is getting married, and Southern Musings will be there, in a place of honor.  Warm fuzzies all around, but Rick likes his posts with more Edge(TM). 5
Challenge: SM clearly put a lot of thought into this one, and it paid off.  Insightful, revealing, well-written and—if Rick cared for chick flicks—a fine movie recommendation. 8

Walloworld
Submitted Post: Wonderful! Walloworld has discovered a totally different way to indicate when he is using someone elses words!  He has also thoroughly examined and explained the digital music pricing market.  Rick finds these things interesting, but then Rick erratically refers to himself in the third person.  A bit long, but points for pulling together two other threads to get started (thereby spreading the link-love), and major points for the Affleck/Lopez jab.  8
Challenge: Walloworld clearly put a lot of thought into this one—maybe too much.  Too long, I lost interest in the process before I got to the punch line.  But I liked the Eyre Affair, and am glad to hear the next book is out.  Legolas is pretty cool, too, though I think I might have to dye my eyebrows if I were him.  7

Where the Heck Was I
Submitted Post: I changed the name of this blog, because it’s real name is offensive: it uses the word “Hell”.  Shit!  Anyway, um, I don’t know, I guess it is kind of big. 6
Challenge: Roma’s a good choice, if only to get to deliver some of those fantastic lines (the one you picked is probably the best, WTHWI).  But seriously, I think you need to get laid.  The constant, incessant, repetitive references to chicks and naked chicks and well, it’s enough already. 8.

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ChristWeb (Reigning King): As mccaskil acknowledges, he doesn’t really answer the question.  Instead, he takes the high road (so high, this Judge could barely read it) with a thoughtful, eloquent piece that strikes exactly the right tone—but did I mention he didn’t answer the question? 4 points, but only because there is an implied answer: “I am a bigger [in a spiritual sense] blogger.”

Pragmatic Conservatism (a.k.a. Dank O’Bleary): OK, I know why I suddenly became a raging asshole and started pounding the shit out of poor innocent blogs, but this guy ain’t a Judge.  From the typo in the picture to the (hopefully) inadvertent claim that Where the Hell Was I was going to cause him to shit his pants to the totally unfunny ad hominem attacks (c’mon.  Mine were funny.), this is one long turd.  The biggest failure, however: his reasons are wrong.  He criticizes the other pretenders for flaws they don’t actually have, and gives totally unconvincing reasons why he should be King.  He may have a loyal following, be the most experienced blogger, write most of his own stuff and be very proud of himself, but from what I can tell, the blog still sucks.  To the Reverend Queen, Emperor of King of the Blogs, Dank writes, “Well Nick, I don’t play if I’m not going to win.” To Dank I must respond on Nick’s behalf: “Well, Dan, thanks for playing”. 0.

Cranial Cavity also took the high road, but came a bit closer to answering the question.  I liked the “game” pun, and the image “Ringmaster for a circus of two daughters”, but he gave the same single reason that Christweb offered, so unless they both win, it ain’t such a compelling one anymore.  4

Wallo World: I like this one a lot.  He gives some serious and respectable reasons why his blog is worthy, and then puts together an amusing list of his best traits—as determined by various online polls.  It’s a cute gimmick, and it worked for me.  8.

Southern Musings: Unnecessarily self-deprecating entry gives some good answers.  The best: she is committed to the blogosphere.  I thought the overall tone ("I know I’m not worthy but . . .") hurt the piece—take some pride in your work and your efforts!  6.

Where the Hell Was I:  For the love of all that is holy, if you are going to write that much, please, please, please use a “More” script, or something like what Triggerman does.  This one was pretty funny (and long—did I mention long?), and I actually enjoyed the digression in which he responded to Dank’s Rick impersonation, but he may not fully have thought through the implications of “‘Everybody Change Your Passwords to ‘Foo’ for a Day”.  7

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The fantastically unorgininally eponymous Dan K. O’Leary dot com managed to piss me off before I even saw the site, as his site takes longer to load than an ISU 122S heavy assault gun.  Then, imagine my delight when I found that what loaded wasn’t even the blog, but the Home Page from which you can access the blog.  I don’t have the time for this shit.  Nevertheless, I clicked on the “Blog” link and went and got a sandwich.  And a hooker.  And made the hooker a sandwich.  And waited some more.  Finally, I got to the actual blog, called Pragmatic Conservatism (NOTE TO DAN: SEE WHAT I JUST DID THERE?  IT’S CALLED LINKING TO THE ACTUAL BLOG.  NOT THAT HARD.), and guess what?  The third post down is the @#$%ing Challenge, which means I have to pick another one.  I’m tempted to just give up on this guy and give him a 0, but that might hurt his feelings, so I’m going to save him for last and give him a chance to post something new in the meantime.

Next up is Cranial Cavity, the genius who couldn’t even make it through Round 1 last time.  Let’s see what he’s got to offer . . . Unbelievable.  This jackass also posted his challenge response as the third one down.  Kee-rist.  Who’s next?

Thank God.  Wallo World has a non-Challenge post as his third post.  That’s the good news.  The bad news is, it’s his “thoughts (for what they’re worth) on the Academy Award nominations released today. “ Not very much, Triggerman, not very much.  I am almost as tired of seeing bloggers post their “Oscar Picks” (here’s mine) as I am of reading people’s primary predictions.  His big limb-treader?  “I think we’ll all be seeing a lot of Rings.” Well, that is a shocking prediction, especially from the guy who wrote the twice-honored fantasy screenplay Cold Iron.  4. Next!

Oh, great, a redneck.  At least the gal from Southern Musings probably won’t look like this.  Luckily, her third post isn’t a Challenge either—nope, it’s just a link to a bunch of other posts!!! Lucky me.  Maybe next week she’ll post a page from the Mayberry phone book!  Actually, now that I have bled away precious hours clicking on all those links (some of which are broken), I realize it is more than just a string of links.  It is a string of links to the worst post each linked blog has to offer*.  What a tremendously moronic perversion of the grand tradition of link-whoring.  3.

Ahh, finally, the last one.  Where the Hell Was I got on my last nerve right away by making me scroll way the hell down to get to his third post.  I mean, either incorporate a “More" script or write less!  Then, when I finally get to the third one, I realize it’s gonna take longer to read this post than it does to load up this guy’s website (is that silk?).  The post is prefaced by an intro so inane it includes the “words” burstage, burstated, and burstitality, in the context of—and this is a direct quote—“I would just burst if I didn’t tell you about it.” Kill me now.  The first part is answers to Charlie‘s five questions, which reminds me of the one guy who is possibly more of a tool than this guy.  Actually, Charlie gets big points for this section, because he seems to be doing an admirable job of creating, expanding and sustaining an interactive blog community.  The next section is an update on the various contests (including King of the Blogs) that this guy is begging to be humiliated in.  No worries, my friend, there is plenty of humiliation to go around (oh, wait, that’s the other guy).  The last part is also pretty good, mostly because he links to a clip of the longest 2 minutes of stand-up ever.  Seriously.  I give Charlie an 8, because he is either the heir to Andy Kauffman‘s legacy of stone-faced irony, or he’s got serious stones for posting such garbage.

Oh, wait, I still have to do the reigning Blog King, ChristWeb.  There is nothing particularly wrong with his third post,“Kerry claims victory in NH Primary", except that he didn’t actually write it.  The spelling is ok, the format is nice enough, there are no embarassing photos, but that is not surprising, since all the King did was cut and paste the words of CNN.com producer Sean Loughlin.  This post gets 0 points because it is plagiarism, and minus one more for not including anything else: you didn’t write it, you didn’t tell us what you think about it, so what’s the point of posting it?  Total score: -1.

Now, back to the first two guys.  Since neither has posted anything new, I’m just going to look at the topmost post.  At Cranial Cavity, that would be “A Wife’s Free Speech Is Threatened”, a post that may be even more imbecilic than I think, as I stopped reading after the third spelling error in the first sentence.  And do you really need a freakin’ masthead after each post?  2.

Last and least, this guy, who, if his topmost post is any indication, is writing a mildly amusing liberal blog based on the tired conceit of satirizing boneheaded conservatives.  However, it is too over the top, with lines like “more students identify themselves as conservatives because liberals abort their children” and “Liberals on college campuses tend to be closed minded, smelly, and irrational”.  I mean, what kind of ignorant, closeted, repressed, pathetic loser would write such crap?  0.

* Actually, this one at Musings from Brian J. Noggle is pretty good.

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ChristWeb, the Reigning King of the Blogs:
The red-and-white theme is a bit harsh/simple/stark for me, but then I’ve been told Rick’s looks like a gay bar at the moment so . . ..  No link to me as a judge, but then I didn’t know I was a judge either.  I like the three-column layout a lot, and the framing of the posts is nice. 
The “My Thoughts” conceit is also pretty neat.  Content-wise, the only post I found really interesting was the one about the Rabbi who invented a prayer for non-surfing Jews.  Overall, I give the site a 7.5.  One final comment: if you’re going to capitalize “News” and “Christian Views”, shouldn’t you capitalize “fun”, too?

Blown Fuse is one of two pretenders this week.  Tiffany’s pictures (I assume those are Tiffany) in the title banner are great, and this blog has an immediate sense of ambiance, which I like.  Unfortunately, the ambiance itself is . . . well . . . I’m pretty sure if Tiffany could figure out a way to do it, the “i"s on this site would be dotted with hearts.  If you’re looking for new ways to get your boyfriend’s picture onto your (probably pink) cell phone, this is the place for you.  Rick prefers a bit more depth, however, so I didn’t linger.  Too much pink. (the pictures at the bottom are cool, too, though).  I give it a 5, but mostly because of the pictures, and because Tiffany is a Nina Simone fan.

Vessel of Honour is, well, a bit confusing.  The top is a Matrix-esque title animation, followed by a completely incongruous (but patriotic) title banner.  It has little animated smileys, which are cool, but there’s a big honkin’ error message screwing up the whole page, which is not.  Content-wise, I enjoyed the positive references to “the spirit of lovingkindness and charity”, which are laudable, but was disappointed by statements like “much unlike Islam, which is spread through coercion and force, Christianity is preached by ‘reasoning together’”, which are not (Crusades, anyone?).  This is the weblog equivalent of a stroke victim: one half works, the other not so much.  5.

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The Challenge was:

Most of the candidates took this opportunity to write their own little versions of Lord of the Flies.  Here are their scores:

Judicious Asininity: Not much as a story, great as a satirical metaphor for U.S. foreign policy.  But I’m pretty sure that was unintentional.  5.

Blather Review: mmmm . . .  stew.  Mildly clever—could use more salt.  6.

Clarity Amidst Chaos: A lot of work went into this one, and it paid off.  There are some real comic gems in there (and even some written by Bryan).  9.

THE KING OF THE BLOGS: On a par with Asininity’s.  Less offensive, but also less sensical.  5.

WetWired: The most Machiavellian of the group, his plan might actually work.  Just don’t eat anything he offers you.  7.

Vigilance Matters:  This one almost lost me at the beginning, but it is very creative and ends strongly.  8.

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At BLATHER REVIEW, I found “NIGGER”, a reaction to the oversensitivity some people display when confronted with words like “nigger”, regardless of context.  It’s a well-written post.  The idea is well-presented, supported with various anecdotes, and I think Tuning Spork makes a good point.  I also like the name “Tuning Spork”.  8.

Clarity amidst Chaos tells a cute story about an office holiday party/blood drive which finds Bryan going tharn.  Well-written, literary, and surprisingly engaging for a story about a holiday office party, really.  Points for the “holy night"/golf course pun.  Oh, and Bryan, you misspelled “cacophony”, and you don’t need the time and the permalink.  They’re both permalinks.  7.

Judicial Asininity suggests that Even Kyoto Is Not Enough.  Romulus makes an appealing point, and I think I agree with him, but he doesn’t really do the leg work that would allow a reader to assess the sources or merits of his argument.  I would have liked to have known, for example, what the economic effect of compliance would be on Russia, or other nations, and why Romulus believes it would be less of an economic burden to eliminate dependence on petroleum over the next several decades.  6.

Vigilance Matters took a break from their unhealthy obsession with sodomy to blog about the Free All You Can Eat Buffet (no permalink—scroll down) that is the public library.  An inoffensive feel-good post (the sort of post someone who watches a lot of Seinfeld and Andy Rooney might write), but lacks Bryan’s story-telling talent.  As an unrelated aside, it’s sad that when VM reached for a really low percentage to compare to library-card-owners, it was voters they found.  5

WetWired offers another ‘didja ever notice?’ piece about remaking songs.  And while the graphics on WetWired kick ass, pylorn’s post left me less than . . . aroused (pylorn had a brief stint in the adult film industry).  First of all, a remix is when a DJ takes a song and, well, re-mixes it.  A “remake” is usually referred to as a “cover”.  Second, where has pylorn been that he just noticed the phenomenon?  Third, it’s been a while, but I’m pretty sure the Jeff Gaines cover of “In Your Eyes” has a different chord progression.  4.

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Special congratulations to the five blogs against whom eTALKINGHEAD competed:

Adrian Warnock
Anger Management
Clarified
Evangelical Outpost
Random Fate

All were excellent.  But of course, ‘there can be only one’.  Stay tuned to see if eTALKINGHEAD can defend his crown . . .

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Here is the Challenge Question this week from King of Fools:

Also speaking of awards Wizbang, one of our permanant judges, has started the 2003 Weblog Awards at his site! Check it out!

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