Opinion

S.E. Cupp’s Diary: Thanks for the directions to Easy Street, Plouffe

S.E. Cupp Contributor
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Been a hectic and unrewarding couple of days, marked by an unending line of annoying tasks and some very uninspired decision-making, after which there is little or no sense of satisfaction besides the angry left-to-right sweep of a pen through an item on my to-do list. You know, the kind of work that might get done but doesn’t actually accomplish anything; the kind of work that makes me wish I had a job where someone just told me what to do. And I’d do it. And then I’d go home and play with the dog I don’t have in the house I don’t live in by the river I am not fishing.

There were some highlights, however:

I read David Plouffe’s op-ed in the Washington Post, and was relieved. Plouffe, the supposed Svengali our tin-ear president has brought back to turn his term around, suggests that Democrats can regain momentum by, among other things, pushing ahead with health care as hard and fast as it can, and defending profligate spending. Things are going to be okay for us.

Thankfully, the Saints beat the Vikings and I won’t have the unenviable task of rooting for Brett Favre but against Minnesota in the Super Bowl. Now, as it turns out, I don’t even have to watch the damn thing.

I realized there may be an opening for me in a new line of work. The trailer for Mel Gibson’s new film “Edge of Darkness” reveals that the best don’t-mess-with-me lines its screenwriters could come up with for their pissed-off avenger are the recycled catch phrases of, well, every other pissed-off avenger. They include, “Welcome to hell,” “Fasten your seat belt,” and “I’m a guy with nothing to lose.” Really?

True story (because I will never lie to you here): I was simultaneously watching coverage of the Senate hearing on the Underwear Bomber and re-reading P.J. O’Rourke’s “Peace Kills” over the weekend. As John McCain asked Janet Napolitano, Dennis Blair and Michael Leiter whether they were consulted about trying Fruit of the Loon, (they were not) I came to O’Rourke’s 9/11 diary. In it, he wrote of the post-attack intricacies of navigating an American airport and the lunacy of some (albeit necessary) new security precautions. He predicted, “A generation hence will be living in a world of metal detectors in nudist colonies.” Unfortunately, he was wrong—unless six years now counts as a generation hence.

While picking up some Annie’s white cheddar mac & cheese, paper towels and pomegranate juice at the grocery store, I saw a W Magazine cover with a half-naked, purring Rihanna on it. The caption read, “The pop princess proves looking hot is the best revenge.” If this isn’t the death rattle of modern feminism I think our necrologist needs a hearing aid.

David Shuster used to be mildly interesting. Now he is merely a cartoon. He just tweeted, “NRO says Haiti wasn’t colonized long enough. NRO conservative intellectual thought = oxymoron.” This is neither smart nor droll. It’s just smug. If it’s possible, Shuster is officially more smug than the bespectacled, turtle-necked, pseudo-intellectual guy in the New York Times commercial who’s “fluent in three sections, actually.” I hate that guy.

I read Bill Heavey’s cover story in the new Field & Stream, about a badass Alaska trapper named Marty. Like every Heavey piece, it’s fantastic. And makes me want to fake my own death, change my name, and move to the wilds of Alaska. Or New Jersey.

I am positive I am left with permanent damage from a food poisoning bout I suffered from a few weeks ago. Never mind that amnesia and paralysis are exceedingly rare—or that I didn’t eat the kind of shellfish that can carry the toxins that lead to these long-term effects. I read about it online, and am certain I have it. Also, I may have phantom limb syndrome.

I figured out why my grandmother (and probably your grandmother) thinks Obama’s doing such a swell job. She has seen one of those low-rate mortgage commercials on television—you know, the ones that look like a breaking news alert, with a Jane Pauley look-alike at a news desk? As was the intention, I’m sure, she and countless others her age must think these ads are actual news bulletins, and that the housing market is on the rebound and Obama’s out there putting a chicken in every pot. Just like there are laws against using police sirens in radio commercials, there should be laws against using Jane Pauley look-alikes to deliver fake news in television commercials, especially in between episodes of Judge Judy and The Price is Right.

One of my good friends posed a fantastic question to me that I encourage you to consider and then pass around. If you could put two different bands or artists on stage together for a duet—even if from different eras and genres—who would they be? I said Old Crow Medicine Show and Imogen Heap—and then got so excited about it I forgot it wasn’t actually going to happen. Let that be a warning to you….

S.E. Cupp is co-author of “Why You’re Wrong About The Right,” (Simon & Schuster, June 2008). Her second book, “Losing Our Religion: The Liberal Media’s Attack on Christianity” comes out in April 2010. She is a columnist for the New York Daily News and a regular guest on “Hannity,” “Larry King Live,” “Fox & Friends,” “Geraldo,” “Red Eye with Greg Gutfeld,” and others.