SPITBULL

If bloggers were smart, they'd stay away [from the corridors of power] too [as Nick C. has ... at least since his last invite by Gov. Perpich]"

If our governor decides to give national politics a whirl in 2008, his respect for the new media might mean access to the White House and the corridors of power for the new media as well.

A few slices of leftover luncheon cheese, a glass of cheap wine, a picture of you standing next to greatness, and you begin to dream of going to the White House Christmas Party in 2009.

That creepy mansion puts a hex on people.

• "[Governor Pawlenty] proved to be an engaging, affable host who genuinely seemed to enjoy the opportunity to converse with members of the emerging 'alternative' media." Chad The Elder - Invitee.
• "If you like to handicap Presidential primary candidates, I'd suggest including Tim Pawlenty in your calculations." Cap'n Ed - Invitee.
• "It would be universally acknowledged by those who had the privilege of attending that we were in the presence of a rare talent." Kennedy v. The Machine - Invitee.
  

• "Governor Pawlenty must be brought down." KAR - NON Invitee.
• "Why not just invite the M.A.W.B. Squad in for a friendly chat? You know how it is with men when they're lost. They can never just ask for directions." M.A.W.B. Squad - NON Invitee.
• "The real reason for the snubbing is that Pawlenty knows he can’t buy us off with a few free drinks. And unlike certain bloggers who (surprise) were invited to the mansion, we’re not going shamelessly cheerlead for the Governor. We relish our outsider image." Nihilist in Golf Pants - NON Invitee.

... Governor Pawlenty and the Warrior Monk from SPITBULL shake hands after the Governor agrees to consider WM's request to call out the National Guard and wage brutal and uncompromising war against the insurgent squirrels who keep the WM awake at night.

They appeared in Bethesda, Silver Spring and Chevy Chase in the 1960s, perhaps using the Rock Creek Stream Valley as a highway north from the District. One survey of Bethesda in 1990 found that about 25 percent of the squirrels there were black.

To the east, the squirrels crossed the city a few decades ago to colonize the National Arboretum and Capitol Hill. To the south, they made it across the Potomac River into Arlington, where naturalists say they've seen black squirrels since at least the 1980s.

A professional-looking sign has been erected in Short Tony's garden, staked into the lawn by the bushes.

...

I take a photo of it, for my interested readers, but I'm a bit rubbish at photography. It reads:

"SORRY. NO MOLES ALLOWED. TRY NEXT DOOR."

I shake my head in pity at his poor attempt at mole control. Then I catch a glance of a similar sign that has been erected in my own front garden.

But they [hired a geek] less with honest curiosity than in the spirit of a beleaguered visitor to Morocco hiring a tour guide; pay off one so that the seventy-five others will stop trying to trade you their camels for your wife. Which one you pay off is largely irrelevant.

One time he destroyed the dugout toilet; another time ... he went after a fan in the stands, and proved, to everyone's satisfaction, that fans, no matter what challenges they hollered from the safety of their seats, were better off not getting into fistfights with ballplayers.

• Would it have hurt to include a glossary of baseball terms (for example, what's a "hit & run"?) The Warrior Monk supposes that Michael Lewis expected the book to be read only by those who had a least a little knowledge of the game but even so, I repeat, would it have hurt to include a glossary? I have no idea what a "box score" is and I kept timidly thinking stuff was jargon even when it wasn't (what's a "dead player?" I asked. It turns out to be someone who once played baseball who has since ... well, died).
• A book that goes on and on about the foolishness of baseball professionals who think they can judge ballplayers by their looks ("we're not selling jeans here" says the book's wily contrarian hero) and exalts the cleverness of discerning the value of tubby draft rejects ought to have some pictures for us baseball novices. Although there are plenty of examples of both ends of the spectrum named, I haven't the faintest idea what any of them look like.
  

Saban's generosity did not go unrewarded. During the Clinton administration, the entertainment executive served on the President's Export Council, advising the White House on trade issues. He also took an unusual pride in being a top contributor. When Saban learned that another donor had topped his contributions to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee by a quarter-million dollars, he immediately sent the DCCC a check for $250,000, with a $1 bill attached to it

It took me ages to understand that many of the people I was encountering in the cultureworld weren't charming eccentrics or engaging oddballs. What I finally woke up to was the simple fact that many people in the cultureword are real weirdos -- people who are so deeply off as to be close to mentally ill, if not actually mentally ill. They aren't crazy with a small c -- crazy as in eccentric. No, they're Crazy with a great big C -- crazy as in loony-bin-worthy, or something close to it.

I also woke up to the fact that many inhabitants of the cultureworld aren't sweetly nuts. They're destructively nuts. In my clueless smalltown way, I'd had trouble imagining that anyone -- anyone short of a Hitler, a Stalin, or a Jeffrey Dahmer -- might wish the general run of humanity ill. Yet what I found was that a fair number of people in the American cultureworld seethe with bile and contempt towards the mainstream.