Actually, that was a brilliant response, almost perfectly suited to the subject. (He should have prefaced it with "like".) Score one for Bill Burton.

UPDATE: McCain spokesman Tucker Bounds emails:  “It sounds like Paris Hilton supports John McCain’s ‘all of the above’ approach to America’s energy crisis - including both alternatives and drilling. Paris Hilton might not be as big a celebrity as Barack Obama, but she obviously has a better energy plan.”

I knew it! McCain went vague and general with his "all of the above" approach so he could claim credit for any good idea that might pop out of the woodwork. Disgusting!

Can't wait to see what the reaction is to Paris and Gwynneth, mother of Apple, Lud.i.crous and William's vids in SE Ohio, central Pennsylvania, rural WI CO MI etc.

Sure, keep giving these idiots legs.

Funny, Bill Burton's response works as a response to the question "What do you think of Mike Crowley's blog post 'With Friends Like These....'" as well.

tep, I'd like, just once, to read something magnanimous or  sunny from you. It's summer, for crying out loud.  

Didn't the Paris Hilton ad make you smile? It was a great ending to my day, I don't care who it helped or didn't help.

It nearly made my head explode, but the Paris Hilton ad actually gave me a reason to feel some genuine affection for her.  I don't think it will make one lick of difference in the election, but it managed to make me detest her juuuuuust a little bit less.

And tep doesn't do magnanimous.

Does anyone here think that Obama's energy policy really *is better than Paris Hilton's (i.e., that because off-shore drilling won't have an immediate impact (except maybe on oil speculators' psychology) and is so dangerous environmentally dangerous that it's a complete non-starter)?  I know, his current policy is willing to conceed offshore drilling for political reasons, but unlike Hilton, he sees no substantive value in it.    

That said, I'm still waiting for Paris Hilton to make her promissed trip to Africa to raise awareness there.  Until then she's just another under-punished drunk driver (or am I conflating her with Lilo?)

BTW drdran, you asked me a month or so ago to tell you what I thought of Neal Stephenson's "Cryptonomicon."  I just finished it a few days ago.  I liked it a lot, especially for the first 2/3 of the novel, and the paralleling of the contemporary and WW2 narratives made for some powerful moments.  But I thought the ending (in the broadest sense, not just the last chapter) was incoherent and busily trying to tie all loose ends together like a nineteenth-century magazine serial.  At the end I started not to believe in Amy, Doug Shaftoe, etc.

But Bobby Shaftoe in WW2 is very convincing, although exaggerated, because he's sort of protected by distance -- he's real but also mythical.

I also had this odd detached feeling about the Randy-Amy romance, that it was like a love story written for ideological reasons.  Amy never quite takes shape.  The book tends to achieve its emotional apex when dissing Randy's former lover and her Cultural Studies circle of friends.  I enjoy a broadside against the humanities if it's done with a little nuance, but I found Stephenson too ready to scoop up every cliché lying by the wayside.  A novel should do more than reflect current prejudice, no?

The best part of the novel was the satirical inside take on the early Silicon Valley days and the cultural mentality of Randy and his fellow geeks, as well as the IT start-up language (what to tell shareholders).  I found that both comic and inspiring, which was a neat trick for an author to pull off.

Tep was magnanimous to Burton, and Burton's was a pitch perfect answer.

The Paris ad had the potential of hurting Obama, but it is so deft that I don't think it really does.  Instead, it makes McCain look like he's debating Paris Hilton, which really diminishes McCain.

By the way, the "Funny or Die" site that put out the Paris video is co-owned by Will Ferrell.  I wonder if he wrote the spot; Ferrell is brilliant at political stuff, which is why I lament his recent penchant for sophomoric (but very funny) movies.  

Paris would make a great VP pick. Her energy policy rocks, except instead of offshore, she should emphasize making a deal with Iran and getting Iraq pumping up to potential. It would be a much quicker fix, and we've already sunk most of the costs.

Summer's a fine time for drilling. We'll always have Paris.

Or at least we will until the next DUI/overdose/orange jumpsuit episode.

I bet Will Ferrell would do a brilliant parody of Obama. Jim Carrey would also be superb in the role.

The Paris Hilton ad makes McCain's renewed attack on Obama as a celebrity look sophomoric. (McCain dropped a new advertisement today that asks if Obama is too much a celebrity to help families during economic crisis -- zzzz, this attack jumped the shark.)

tep doesn't do a lot of things -- magnanimous is just the latest addition to a list of terms. (e.g. factual, accurate, honest...)

By the way, what gives Will.I.Am and those other people legs is the First Amendment. And people in Ohio are smart enough to both not care what celebrities think and not care what people who think that people in Ohio care what celebrities think think. I love all this backhanded defending of "fly-over country" by people who couldn't find the middle of America on a map.

I'll be a lot sunnier if my TNR shows a little more skepticism and even a minimal sense of humor about their guy and his fanclub's absurdities.

Case in point: now that the TNR blogs are becoming -- Mr Silver's posts excepted -- All Jon Stewart Imitations, All the Time -- where is the sendup of that ludicrous exchange on MNBC yesterday in which Bob Herbert insisted that the Obama Paris ad was filled with deliberate phallic symbols? A victory column, ce n'est pas un victory column

Where have you gone, Long Dong Silver... a nation turns its lonely eyes to you... woo woo woo

"People in Ohio are smart enough to both not care what celebrities think and not care what people who think that people in Ohio care what celebrities think think. I love all this backhanded defending of "fly-over country" by people who couldn't find the middle of America on a map."

Well said (and funny too). And it applies to any number of breathless, self-satisfied blowhard pundits.

I don't like this response - I think he should have had a funny quip.  

I know he's irritated that we're talking about Paris Hilton's energy plan (which she rolled out the day after Obama's) instead of his boss's, but funny = power, as is clearly obvious from this video.

But maybe Joe Sixpack, who we seem to live in fear of offending, might like that response.

I would assume that Will Ferrell or one of his cohort was largely responsible for the Paris Hilton "ad"--my guess is she simply showed up and read the lines (which leads to the obvious shot about how many takes it took for her to read it properly).  In other words, it doesn't improve my opinion of her much because I don't give her much credit for it, other than showing up.

As to who it hurts, all the blowback has to go on McCain.  He's the one who brought her name into the political discourse in the first place.  Obama has the gift of being able to say "instead of talking about Paris Hilton and Britney Spears, he should be ..." in virtually every speech for a little while to add to the diminishment.  

How much blowback?  Well, I doubt a lot of fundamnmentalists or other right-wingers spend much time at funnyordie.com, and much of the general population just isn't that engaged in the campaign at this point, so I would think it's fairly minimal.

tep writes "if TNR shows. . . even a minimal sense of humor . . ."

Good lord! -- Talk about the pot calling the kettle black.

jobeek2, thanks... it was very difficult for this Michigan man to type anything about how smart Ohio is.

"McCain dropped a new advertisement today that asks if Obama is too much a celebrity to help families during economic crisis -- zzzz, this attack jumped the shark."

I'd say an entire school of sharks dressed in clown suits.

"Senator McCain wears $500 Ferragamo shoes and has seven houses in five states; he gave a condominium to his daughter as a graduation gift.  Senator McCain has never used the internet.  Senator McCain: do _you_ know anything about the struggles of Middle Class Americans?"  Show him in a golf cart, in his private jet, in Cindi's private jet, laughing with Keating ... show no mercy on this score.

You got it icarusr,

"John McCain says Barack Obama is out of touch with ordinary Americans who are struggling to pay for gas, health care, and put food on the table.  Here is John McCain's private jet.  Here are John McCain's $500 shoes.  Here are John McCain's seven houses.  It's no wonder than the McCain campaign said that Americans who are struggling in this economy are just a bunch of "whiners."  In fact, his campaign said that America is a country of whiners.  John McCain has made it clear that our problems our not his problems.  Now, who's out of touch/"

icar and roid...

Spot on. Forward those responses to BHOs media arm. I'd really like to see the Potemkin village facade of the Republican "Working Class" Protector fold like a house of cards.

Meanwhile the McCain's response : "Don't pay attention to the man behind the curtain"

Single - thanks, but I think Obama's communication people - or Obama himself - are already ahead of us.  McCain has backtracked on the whole airgauge thing - and Tep said this would backfire on Obama ... - to which Obama has replied (this is right out of Dorothy Parker, by the way):

"It will be interesting to watch this debate between John McCain and John McCain."

I don't want to say I told you so, but I told you so - to all the nervous nellies out there who were worried Obama would not have the gumption to hit back ... he was gauging McCain's reactions and calibrating his own attacks, which is exactly how you run a campaign (instead of having a static strategy that fails to respond to changing circumstances).  McCain having introduced the mocking tone and Paris and Moses and juvenile stunts like the air gauge, now is mocked and pummelled mercilessly and hoist by his own petard.  Obama should NEVER do so in person and in the debates, but on the campaign trail, he should give no quarter to the "wrinkly old dude".

Ironyroad said "Good lord! -- Talk about the pot calling the kettle black."

RACE CARD!!!   (runs screaming for the hills)