Mistakes Were Made
•As a reader points out, contrary to the AP item posted on Friday, "Nextel is NOT 'Blackberry's maker,' nor the maker of anything else; it is a service provider." Picky.
•In the Kerry pool report also posted on Friday, WP's VandeHei was a bit of a, uhm, smart ass: "Kerry insisted on going to the cattle barn, a massive, smelly barn full of cows with a huge no smoking sign hanging from the rafters. Apparently they don't want to stink the place up." Several readers pointed out that lighting up around such a methane-rich atmosphere would "grill burgers while they're still on the hoof."
•We had applauded Margaret Cho's drug use . But an eyewitness says Cho has slimmed down to svelte sans pharmaceuticals; of course, he's not entirely reliable: "i hung out with Margaret Cho when i was in Ptown earlier this month ... she has lost a lot of weight but she looks great, with none of that sunken, jittery vibe one usually associates with drug users. (or maybe i was just just too drunk to notice.)"
•Al Franken's Great American Shout-Out is not timed to coincide with Bush's speech on Thursday (the protest equivalent of "I can't hear you! I can't hear you! Lalalalalalala!" we had assumed ). Rather, it "will begin the moment Bush takes the stage at the Republican Convention—and then stop the moment he starts speaking," writes an O'Franken producer. "Al feels strongly that Democrats should actually listen to Bush’s speech, if only to seethe." If only more people felt the same way about Franken.
•Alan Keyes wasnotknocked off the Illinois ballot by the state election board, as we "reported" Friday , though things were kind of close for a bit. The four-hour meeting did, however, make one of the Republican board members late for a pig roast . (Yes, you smell pork.)
•Probably shouldn't have taken all that time off this month.