Lewinski in teh news

The news that Monica Lewinski earned a M.A. from the London School of Economics is...news, apparently.

I don't really want to talk about that.

What I did want to mention was something I just noticed - the Washington Post allows comments on articles now. The results are about what you'd expect.

It doesn't seem to matter what the topic is - everyone with an opinion on SOMETHING will find a way to use the article at hand as a launching point for their particular soapbox.

The column on Lewinski is a snarky bit of riffing on "smart but dumb" and "dumb but smart" that name-drops celebs in every sentence. It's not a great article, but it's got plenty to respond to, and people do.

Boy, do they.

Yes, an article that features Jessica Simpson's mom talking about "jessica's, like, 160 freakin' IQ" - thankfully, we're not treated to her dad's drooling comments about her rockin' body - is enough for a number of commenters to ask "why not talk about how we entered Iraq under false pretenses."

Okay. I guess it's relevant - readers who are dumb and dumber.

I spend yesterday listening to Orson Scott Card's latest book, Empire. He suggests a possible scenario for a red/blue, rural/urban, wackjob left/wackjob right civil war complete with assassination of the president and the potential end of the Republic (hence "Empire"). I could quibble with some of his characterizations, but he points out the poisonous rhetoric of the current state of our *cough* "union", which hasn't been this toxic since the 1850s.

I'd like to say "yeah, right" to such a book. But reading the carnival of idiocy that passes for 95% of the commentary on the WP's stories, drowning out what could have been interesting debate from the other 5%, I confess he has a point.

So...congratulations, Monica Lewinski, on your academic achievement. Unlike your smart-but-dumb former boyfriend, you appear to have truly moved on, and I wish you every success. Ignore the jibber-jabbering classes and enjoy your life.