Tonight was the most appalling X-Factor show of the season. Judge Nicole Scherzinger should hang her head in shame. She copped out of voting in the final sing-off round and the choice wasn't difficult. As a result, Rachel Crowe, who sang her best performance of the season in the safety round, went home. Rachel, who is only 14, fell apart crying out her eyes out. Unbelievably, Nicole went up to the stage as if she was going to comfort Rachel. Nicole has always been the weakest judge, replacing Cheryl Cole at the last minute. After her dereliction of duty tonight, I hope she's not brought back to judge next year. She was roundly booed by the audience and rightfully so.

Another hall of shame award today to Spirit Airlines, for offering special "slammer fares" to Chicago in honor of Rod Blagojevich's sentencing. I'm not linking to the ad because I don't want to send them business, but it says:

"you don't have to live in the 'Big House' to take advantage of these fares" to among other places, Chicago. But hurry... You don't want to get convicted for missing this seat-selling sale!"

This is an open thread, all topics welcome.

Lots of TV on tonight: The X-Factor, Survivor, Harry's Law, the finale of America's Top Model, even a new Restaurant Impossible.

The Wall St. Journal reports the Today Show has been recruiting Ryan Seacrest to replace Matt Lauer.

In Bachelor news, the show has had enough of spoiler Reality Steve. It filed a federal lawsuit today against Reality Steve and owner Stephen Carbone. The plaintiffs are NZK Productions Inc. and Horizon Alternative Television Inc., which are indirect wholly owned subsidiaries of Time Warner, Inc.

The Complaint, available here, alleges intentional interference with contractual relations and unfair competition. It accuses Steve of contacting show participants and other cast, crew members and employees, and seeking information in violation of their contracts. In some instances, it quotes e-mails from him to show participants offering money for information. Steve doesn't seem worried and posts some e-mail correspondence between lawyers. He's always said on his site he doesn't get information from the cast or participants. But the suit now includes "other employees." Steve has already revealed the final four contestants on the upcoming Bachelor with Ben Flajnik.

This is an open thread, all topics welcome.

Chuck Klosterman writes:

I doubt many Christians believe that God is unfairly helping [Tim] Tebow win games in the AFC West. I'm sure a few hardcores might, but not many. However, I get the impression that especially antagonistic secularists assume this assumption infiltrates every aspect of Tebow's celebrity, and that explains why he's so beloved by strangers they cannot relate to. Their negative belief is that penitent, conservative Americans look at Tebow and see a man being "rewarded" for his faith, which validates the idea that believing in something abstract is more important than understanding something real. And this makes them worried about the future, because they see that thinking everywhere. It seems like the thinking that ran this country into the ground.

(Emphasis supplied.) I don't think the Tebow haters are as smart as Klosterman thinks they are. Merrill Hoge? Chris Carter? Puhleaze. But I was struck by the reverse -- the irrational view that not playing Kyle Orton was an act of insanity. What kind of rational person thinks that? Kyle Orton is a terrible quarterback. How could anyone get offended by his benching? In fact, when Orton was released by the Broncos, I was astonished at the view that Orton was some prize for a team to pick up. Kyle Orton as Tom Brady?? Really? That attitude seems driven by irrational hatred of Tebow. More . .

Via Glenn Greenwald, Ruth Marcus reveals again something is not right with her:

Emma Sullivan, you’re lucky you’re not my daughter. . . . If you were my daughter, you’d be writing that letter apologizing to Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback for the smart­alecky, potty-mouthed tweet you wrote after meeting with him on a school field trip. . . .

Marcus states that "I may sound alarmingly crotchety here, but something is upside down in the modern world, which has transformed Sullivan into an unlikely Internet celebrity and heroine of the liberal blogosphere[.]" You don't sound crotchety Marcus, you sound insane. Sullivan was too mean in her tweet about a politician? And you claim to cover these people?

Something is upside down in this world when a so called journalist can get this up in arms over a tweet that is disrespectful to a pol while being just fine with the past decade in Washington, DC.

Yes indeed, Emma Sullivan is VERY lucky Ruth Marcus is not her mother. She has a chance of having a moral compass and sense of what matters in this world because of that.

Speaking for me only

Via John Cole, funny Gawker:

Sullivan writes: "No one is arguing that "that black people are dumber than white," just that the distribution of IQ is slightly different among different racial populations, and these differences also hold true for all broad racial groups[.]"

Translation: "No one is arguing that black people are stupider than white people, just that black people are stupider than white people in a slightly more complicated way."

Standard deviation!!!!

Speaking for me only

I was bunkered in my Decadent Left enclave mounting a Fifth Column (actually I was working for The Man all day), so I missed the chance to engage in one of my favorite pasttimes, bashing Andrew Sullivan. Better late than never. Sully rides the Bell Curve Again. Some good responses here, here and here.

Speaking for me only

Sad news for Joe Paterno. As if this month hasn't been bad enough, his son says he has been diagnosed with a treatable form of lung cancer.

I'm sending good thoughts his way. Hopefully the media will focus on the more important aspect of the story -- Sandusky -- and give the Paternos some privacy to deal with this terrible illness.

Chelsea Clinton to NBC:

NBC announced Monday that it has hired Chelsea Clinton to become a full-time special correspondent for NBC News.

Now I 'm thinking Hillary Clinton is definitely hanging up the political spurs. This looks bad, and not just for Hillary.

I don't know Chelsea Clinton, but I always understood her image to be something better than this Russertism. Guess I was wrong.

Speaking for me only

Atrios points to Booman about, as Atrios puts it, "David Brooks s[itting] down and th[inking] to himself, "how can I blame liberals for what happened at Penn State, but in a subtle way." On MTP, Brooks said:

MR. BROOKS: I don't think it was just a Penn State problem. You know, you spend 30 or 40 years muddying the moral waters here. We have lost our clear sense of what evil is, what sin is; and so, when people see things like that, they don't have categories to put it into. They vaguely know it's wrong, but they've been raised in a morality that says, "If it feels all right for you, it's probably OK."

While Brooks' entire thought process is repulsive, I was struck by the "30 or 40 years" line. Obviously Brooks was trying to allude to the 60s I think. That was confirmed by Brooks; discussing the "bystander effect:"

Don't fall for the new book on Australian Schapelle Corby, sentenced to 20 years in an Indonesian prison for bringing 4 kilos of pot into Bali. The book claims Schapelle's now deceased father put the pot in her boogie board .

While the book doesn't go so far as to claim there is evidence that Schapelle knew the pot was in her board (its premise seems merely to be that after she was busted, she took the fall for her father, who died in 2008,) multiple media outlets are leading with incendiary headlines that Schapelle's guilt is now established. The author, Journalist Eamonn Duff, who works for the Sydney Morning Herald, has been coming up with these Corby family guilt scenarios for years. [More...]

"Smokin' Joe" Frazier, 67, passed away Monday of liver cancer.

The two-time heavyweight champion was diagnosed with liver cancer last month and spent this week in a hospice.

Joe Frazier was a symbol for a generation,” promoter Lou DiBella said. “His death is resounding for what he meant: He was the heavyweight champion when being the heavyweight champion was the most famous man on earth. He was a giant of the sport, a legend and also one of the most accessible people there was. It’s sad when the giants start disappearing. It’s a sad day for boxing.”

A documentary called “Joe Frazier: When the Smoke Clears” will screen tomorrow at the DocNYC festival.

R.I.P. Joe Frazier

Take me down little Suzie won't you take me down
I know you think you're the queen of the underground
You can send me dead flowers every morning
Send me dead flowers by the mail
Say it with dead flowers at my wedding
And I wont forget to put roses on your grave

I was hoping Barrett Brown would wake up this morning and realize he's accomplished his mission of maximizing publicity for his purported six figure book deal with Amazon and drop his plan to unmask cartel collaborators -- whether the Zetas or their rivals. Apparently not. [More...]