When Laura Ingraham covered hosting duties for Bill O’Reilly on the O’Reilly Factor last week, she sought out to answer the age-old question: Why do feminists hate Sarah Palin so much? Hmm—I can think of a few reasons. The resulting discussion between Ingraham, Washington Post columnist Sally Quinn, and Republican pollster KellyAnne Conway produced some pretty interesting theories. Let’s check them out:

Theory #1: We hate her because we’re childless spinsters.

Read More “Feminists Hate Sarah Palin Because She Lost Her Baby Weight” »

Dan Gainor of FOX News has had it up to here with the mainstream media! No, not FOX News: The other mainstream media. “Excuses, excuses from the mainstream media for everything from child-rape to the Letterman using the office as a dating service to explaining why the president failed to win the Olympics!” Gainor opines in today’s column.

I’m totally with you on the child rapist excuses, Gainor. I’m a little bit less with you on the Late Night womanizer excuses. Remember: just because a man’s legal relationships with consenting adults happen to be aired the same week that a notorious child rapist was arrested does not mean that the two incidents are related. And I’m really not with you on the mainstream media’s Olympics “excuses,” which amount to Katie Couric announcing, “Despite a high-powered, star-studded U.S. appeal from Oprah to the Obamas, the Olympics are awarded to Rio.”

Which is worse: Hollywood filmmakers excusing child rape, or Katie Couric alliterating on “Oprah,” “Obama,” and “Olympics”? To Gainor, it’s pretty much a draw!

Read More “FOX News Compares Raping Child to Losing Olympic Bid” »

On July 3, Alaska Gov. Sara Palin announced her impending resignation from the Governor’s seat, citing “a higher calling.” In the wake of the announcement, Palin hasn’t demonstrated much interest in unsolicited advice from newspapers, bloggers, and Tweeters. But with all of the contiguous United States now at her fingertips, Palin could use our help more than ever. As Anne Applebaum wrote in today’s Washington Post: “what is that higher calling? If you don’t tell us, we have to guess—or make jokes about it.”

Weighing the pros, cons, and probabilities of our best guesses for Palin’s next steps, after the jump.

Read More “Sarah Palin’s Next Move” »

I missed this segment last week, when the Daily Show skewered Fox News for making a stink about Sasha Baron Cohen’s bare-ass Bruno stunt on MTV, and then staging a lingerie football party full of female T&A. It turns out you don’t have to be a liberal to support nudity from females while shunning the same from males. Bruno landing has bare ass on a noted homophobe makes sense. Fox News’ scantily clad football players landing their assets on sexists doesn’t pack the same kind of societal-commentary punch.

Cruuuuush heeeer

IF SHE DID RUN, HE WOULD CRUSH HER, a new poll finds [PDF]. “A new national [Public Policy Polling] poll finds that nominating Palin could be a death wish for the party, with Barack Obama leading Palin 55-35 in a hypothetical contest. The key reason Palin would lose to Obama by so much is that even though she might be the top choice for a certain segment of voters within her party, there’s also a number of Republicans who say they would vote for Obama if their party nominated Palin.” [via ThunderPig].

Read More “Daily Palin: 2012 Obama Crushing Edition” »

* FOX News is concerned that the inauguration will just be one big, gay party. In a sea of boring inaugural coverage, it’s S.E. Cupp for the win! Drink this in, sinners:

But the gay-themed events have some conservative critics expressing concerns that while the celebration may be gay-friendly, it won’t be family-friendly.

Read More “The Morning After: “Decadent” Gay Lifestyle Edition” »

The Oct. 13 issue of Newsweek features an up-close-and-personal photo of Governor Sarah Palin on the cover. The photograph (above), by Nigel Parry, is a tight shot of Palin’s face. In person, the image is more striking: the wrinkles are deeper, the stray hairs darker, the pores more defined.

Fox News yesterday had a field day with this one. (video below)

“Have you seen the latest cover of Newsweek,” asked the anchor, the disgust evident on her face, before introducing her two pundits: “Republican Media Consultant” Andrea Tantaros (hated it) and Julia Piscitelli of American University (thinks you guys might be exaggerating a little bit).

Tantaros called the cover a “gross slap in the face,” objecting to the fact that the photo appeared “un-retouched.” Said Tantaros, “it highlights every imperfection that every human being has, but we’re talking unwanted facial hair, pores, wrinkles.” The anchor chimed in, saying, “When they put you up close and personal on a magazine, even the gorgeous super models in the world, they retouch you to get rid of the normal flaws that human beings have. That’s what they do in the magazine business. They didn’t do it for Governor Palin.”

The cover was particularly grating to Tantaros when compared to Newsweek’s cover shots of Barack Obama. “After Newsweek has done so many favorable covers of Barack Obama that make him look presidential, that are clearly retouched. He looks flawless,” she says, adding: “He looks perfect, Julia. He looks perfect.”

“This is reality,” countered Piscitelli, after noting there was no evidence that an Obama cover had been retouched, either. “Demanding that political figures get retouching like super-models on the cover of news magazines is going a little far. What’s wrong with showing women the way they actually look, especially a woman as beautiful as Sarah Palin?”

I agree with Piscitelli that it’s absurd to ask news publications to adhere to standards set by fashion magazines. Photoshopping women’s bodies and faces—a process that takes even the most beautiful women in the world and distorts them to flawless, often anatomically impossible Barbie dolls—is out-of-control in women’s magazines; we don’t need Newsweek reinforcing an absurd standard of beauty on politicians, too.

But Tantaros raises an interesting point when she describes Obama’s photos as “flawless” and “perfect” (even though my guess is that Obama wasn’t Photoshopped, either). Obama and Palin are two of politics’ most beautiful people, but the playing field for political playboys and girls is uneven: When women show flaws, they’s called unattractive; when men do, they’re called “rugged.” (And when they’ve got spit on their mouth, they’re called “Internet Gold.”) So even without a delicate post-shot softening, Obama is a lot closer to “perfect” from the get-go. It’s not because Obama is implicitly more attractive (though he is, for the record, extremely, achingly attractive). It’s because he’s a dude.

Still, let’s take a moment to remember why the standards of beauty for women are so absurdly, unnaturally high in the first place. Oh, right, it has something to do with Photoshop (Exhibit A, Exhibit B, Exhibit C).

There is one point where Tantaros and I agree. Tantaros objects to the headline “She’s One of the Folks (And that’s the problem),” saying it’s an “insult [to] the folks of America [to] call that a ‘problem.’” I think Newsweek did well in putting a real Palin shot on the cover. But by pairing that “real” photo with the assertion that Palin’s “realness” makes her unqualified to be president (true), Newsweek also implies that Palin’s physical realness is a “problem” (problematic).

To recap: Showing real women, flaws and all—good thing; using a woman’s physical flaws to illustrate flaws of character, politics, and experience—bad thing.

MORE: Sarah Palin’s Entire Existence is Sexist..

More on Nigel Parry: Parry also shot Palin for Newsweek during the Republican National Convention, alongside McCain. For the July 16 issue of Newsweek, Parry shot Barack Obama (the photo is in black-and-white and not-so-close-up). Check out Parry’s other work here.