Texas and Ohio Cannot Come Soon Enough

Oh Hillary, your sincere moment was just that...for about five minutes that is until some smart people with great memories and video editing software decided to call your patronizing, pandering and dare we say, plagiarizing ass out.

The CNN Democratic Debates with Me, Veejay and Ugly Betty

Only an idiot would not realize that last night's Democratic debate was going to be the hottest ticket in Hollywood. I say only an idiot, because our intern Silvio once again screwed the pooch and forgot to get us on the list. This led to me having to call in some marks with an old girlfriend over at CNN (and let me tell you, that blond kitten can hold a grudge). After my crow-eating, Veejay and I were soon northbound on the 5 fwy to see the Brutha and the Mutha smack each other around east of Hollywood Blvd.

Well, you know how it all went down: "kiss, kiss, punch you flat for friends, hee-hee, Republicans suck and are evil, kiss, kiss some more". Don't get me wrong, there were some choice one-liners from Barack, but the whole thing looked like they both got the email from Dean to get off the pissy train before Super Tuesday, suck up to Edwards, go after the Republicans and put Bill in the same suspended acrylic cage they put Magneto in from X-Men 2.

But the real news was whose asses were filling the seats watching the debate and how those asses were kissed afterwards. Sure, we went to cover it for the blog but mostly we went to unload most of our inventory of Dick Cheney/Do Not Resuscitate t-shirts. We felt that we couldn't be throwing redder meat into the den of Hollywood liberals than having those t-shirts sold out of the back of my Porsche for $150 a pop. Apparently word got out what we were selling, because within 20 minutes of the debate ending we were flush with about five grand cash and had a special order from Rob Reiner for 32 more shirts all in XXL. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

The pre-debate reception was surreal. You will not find another time in Hollywood where there has been such a clash of A-list and D-list. Some schlock actor's stock went up just by breathing the same air as Spielberg, Diane Keaton, Warren Beatty. And then there were some people who pretty much changed their political affiliation because they got to see who else was on their team. Case in point, when you belong to the same political party as Fisher Stevens (Michelle Pfeiffer's dating mistake) and Topher Grace (that 70's Show residual check recipient and friend of Brad Pitt) you have got some serious soul searching to do to see whether you want to vote the same ticket. Stevie Wonder was downright pissed off when someone told him he was in the same room with out-of-work homophobe, Isaiah Washington. I had an Obama staffer tell me security was going to be dispatched immediately to get Jason Alexander the hell out of the place because everyone knows that any project he's touched post-Seinfeld has taken up residence in the shitter; they didn't want to take any chances. It was just sad though to see L.A. mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and S.F. mayor Gavin Newsom trying to get Chelsea Clinton to do jell-o shots with them. She politely declined and resumed chatting with the Spielbergs.

As I tried to work the room, Veejay had already charmed America Ferrera by commenting that he too was a supporter of Hillary (when in fact he's a Ron Paul nutjob). After Cameron Diaz, Ugly Betty comes in a close second who Veejay would like to shower with. Although, I can tell he was crushed to learn the she really doesn't wear braces and top out near 250 lbs (Veejay likes his girls to be of some size and slightly less aesthetically appealing than him so he can feel good about himself) he still soldiered on hoping for a love connection. Apparently he was successful or broke several laws because I still haven't heard from him and her agent just called me looking for her - ah, young love (I gotta call my lawyer again).

If CNN could blow itself, they would never get anything done

As most readers of the Cerebral Itch Scratch Pad know, we enjoy covering the presidential debates and giving our special take on the pageantry and, um, oh hell, bullshit shot out of cannons otherwise known as the candidates mouths. But the bullshit cannons that shot the farthest and loudest belonged to debate co-host CNN.

CNN teamed up with YouTube to bring an "edgy" and "youthful" vibe to the debate format by interlacing Anderson Cooper's pathetic moderation, which frankly reminded all who were watching that he was once indeed the host of the ABC reality-show, The Mole, with YouTube videos made by "normal" people. Cue the webcam wingnuts: Snowmen, Lesbians, Rednecks, Church Pastors and the like. It was entertaining and for the most part embarrassing. Side note: CNN has essentially created a new Internet to support their marketing juggernaut promoting this union, check out YouTube's front page and see if you can find their cross-promotion. They look like the guy that got drunk and slept with the easy homely chick and really isn't too proud of it.

CNN promoted this thing like they were channeling souls of dead presidents. "Never been done before", "groundbreaking" and "history-making" were just a few of the hyperbolic ejaculations this husk of a news channel used. Every single one of their commentators and anchors trotted this thing out like some pathetic middle-aged guy who just bought his first Corvette and was repeatedly cruising it by the high school cheerleading practice. So proud were they that they had finally aligned themselves with something somewhat hip that they managed to do something truly "groundbreaking", they actually upstaged the candidate's bombast with their own.

So what happened in the debate? Obama pissed off Clinton, Clinton pissed off Obama, Mike Gravel wanted to pick a fight with all of them and the rest just held up their podiums and tried not to nervously fart on live TV.

Democratic Debate Wrap-Up

So the New Hampshire CNN Democratic Debates were on last night, yeah, I know: BFD.
Here's the 10-second wrap-up:

Obama: More polished and beginning to exit political larval stage to becoming fully developed political slickster
Clinton: Mommy Bad-Ass takes the gloves off and starts naming names on who f*cked up what over the last seven years; as well as smacking Wolf Blitzer around (always worth the TV time)
Edwards: Jab, jab, cross, uppercut, cross: Pissed he's still in third place, he decides to take a page from his courtroom theatrics syllabus and start playing to the jury by calling out the accused (i.e. Clinton and Obama for their wussified senate vote on the Iraq bill last week)
Biden: Substantive answers on Iraq and keeps a lid on it (should've been given best of show just for that)
Kucinich: Peace brother, peace is how we is gonna do this whole she-bang
Gravel: Tertiary syphilis has set in and he is now officially crazy - we look forward to his next appearance
Richardson: Well, his candidacy looked good on paper and he makes funny commercials
Dodd: Chris Dodd was there?