OK, Hillary, You Can Stop Running Now

By Adele

Hillary Clinton did a great job of exciting the crowd at the Democratic convention – after she finished reminiscing about her own failed campaign and remembered Obama.

She proclaimed herself a proud mother, Democrat, Senator, American, and human female carbon-based life form. Everything but a proud wife, even as her husband beamed at her from the audience like Henry Higgins watching Eliza Doolittle ace the Embassy Ball.

Hillary’s comments about women’s struggles for equal rights seemed ironic after Michele Obama had to dumb herself down to seem more likable and non-threatening. The Obama camp is apparently catering to voters who can only accept Michele as first lady if she becomes the black version of Stepford Wife Laura Bush.

Even as Hillary said Obama is her candidate, the subtext was still, “Because I’m not the candidate.” She never went so far as to instruct her sycophants to support Obama, but merely implied that they should follow her lead.

So why does she still want her name up for the nomination? Why have her delegates waste their vote in an empty symbolic gesture that she herself considers moot?

By sending such mixed messages, Hillary still has some women swearing they’ll vote for John McCain out of spite.

Yeah, that’ll really show the Obamas. Let McCain get a few more neocon wackos on the Supreme Court so personal freedom can become a distant memory, and “equality” will come to mean only that anyone can carry a gun.

If the Clintons think they’ve hatched some brilliant Machiavellian scheme to set Hillary up for 2012, she’s doomed to fail even if she pulls it off. Following Bush’s lead, McCain will inflict more damage here and abroad in 4 years than Hillary or any other Democrat will be able to reverse in the following 8.

Thanks to Hillary’s ego and duplicity, McCain’s now free to pick a rotting corpse as his VP. He’s already sewn up a nice percentage of the hopelessly stupid vote.

Do Bourdain’s Wives Really Choose Obscurity?

By Karen

Apologies to Alan Jay Lerner, but… When Bourdain’s in Spain, he must think wives are a pain.

After watching No Reservations in Spain, it appears that Ottavia Bourdain has either developed “Nancy Syndrome” when it comes to appearing on camera, or she’s the second woman to be deliberately pushed into the background by Anthony Bourdain’s ego.

Tony has claimed that first wife Nancy hated being filmed, even though she looked content cuddling with him for People magazine, and on A Cook’s Tour played an anonymous extra in San Sebastian, Spain, and joined him for dinner during another episode in Oporto, Portugal. Here she is in Oporto:

During that scene, the other man spoke to Nancy, and you could hear her mumbling, but she was never identified, and it was edited so Tony seemed to ignore her.

Now he’s back in San Sebastian with Wife No. 2, Ottavia, and it was déjà vu as he dined in the last scene with his friends Juan Mari and Elena Arzak at their restaurant.

His tablemates looked at and spoke to Ottavia, and even included her in their toast, but shots of Tony were tight so he appeared to be sitting alone. But then a telltale plate of food was served beside him, and the mysterious diner even said something unintelligible.

And then as the credits rolled, Ottavia got her “Nancy moment” on the edge of the frame. For the rest of the episode, he wandered around alone with various female guides.

Just about two years ago, when Ottavia and Tony’s love was new, Ottavia appeared prominently in two NR scenes in Tuscany and he didn’t seem to mind.

Since Bourdain was already famous when they met, it seems unlikely it’s Ottavia’s wish that his fans never see them together. If Tony’s trying to cling to his “free spirit” image, the cat’s out of the bag. We now know it wasn’t authentic from Day One.

It always struck me as odd that, during his intro on Cook’s Tour, he said, “I’ve got nothing to lose,” when he had a wife sitting at home. That attitude probably didn’t help his first marriage.

Now I wonder if he’s doing it again with Ottavia. If so, he’s wrong if he thinks female fans can’t accept him as a married globe-trotting rebel. What we aren’t crazy about is watching him diss his wives in crowded restaurants.

Nikki the Tiger Won’t be Cougar Bait

By Yul

Zookeepers are saying that Nikki, a 370-lb. male Amur tiger at the Erie (Pa.) Zoo, is “too shy” to explore a new $500,000 love nest they’ve constructed. I think he’s just trying to avoid another tiger who’s really a “Cougar.”

Nikki asks, "Where's that old bat?" (Photo - Sarah Priestap, Erie Times-News/AP)

For the past 2 months, 5-year-old Nikki has been frustrating zoo visitors by only poking out his head occasionally in his new digs.

When he agreed to give up his swinging bachelor pad at the Brookfield Zoo near Chicago to relocate to Pennsylvania, he probably had no idea they were scheming to mate him with Anna, a 300-lb., 10-year-old, single mother of 3 who left the Beardsley Zoo in Bridgeport, Conn., for the chance to hook up with a young stud like Nikki.

Anna the "Cougar" (Photo - Ryan Randolph, Erie Times-News)

She could be his great-great-great-great-grandmother.

Nikki’s understandably upset about the whole May-December thing and has refused to even meet Anna. During her solitary visits to the new enclosure, the humans are encouraging Anna to leave her scent all over the place, which features high grass, ideal for amorous trysts, a pool, and a romantic waterfall. They’re hoping Nikki will eventually be overcome by lust and join her there.

Nikki, I say stick to your guns and hold out until they provide you a shapely lioness who won’t be putting her teeth in a glass every night.

Out in the wild, you can bet the last thing Nikki would want to become is some old Cougar’s gigolo, so that lifestyle shouldn’t be forced on him in captivity.

When Did Bourdain Lose Touch with Commas?

By Karen

Anthony Bourdain is my favorite writer these days, bar none, but what’s up with his punctuation?

I’m thrilled he’s regularly blogging about his new season of No Reservations, giving us his behind-the-scenes perspective on things. Those posts read like rough first drafts, pounded out on the fly, never to be reread, edited, or even proofed. I’m OK with that. They sound like he’s talking directly to you. Even on his worst days – with perhaps a raging hangover – his innate wit enables him to express himself more vividly than most people.

But in Envy, his latest post about his visit to Spain, I couldn’t help noticing some commas deliberately, glaringly, in inappropriate places. I quote:

An interesting visual, phenomonen occurred during the editing of the Spain show.

Understand: Albert, along with his brother, Ferran, is a chef/owner of the three Michelin starred El Bulli, the hardest to reserve, restaurant table in the world.

A jarring, flood of endorphins, then brain overload, and for a second, a blinding light.

And if I wanted to get nitpicky, I could rag on his peculiar misuse of semicolons:

Suffice to say that just about anywhere in the world of fine dining, from Shanghai to San Francisco; when Albert walks in the door, the whole place goes on Red Alert.

But let’s not go there.

These aren’t bold stylistic quirks, but rookie boo-boos that typically make writers wince with embarrassment if they get published.

It’s got me wondering if we’ve ever seen Bourdain’s true technical competence as a writer in his books, or if some devoted editor with a stake in boosting his literary career has been making his work look much more polished than it ever really was.

Tatiana the Tiger’s Tormentor Gets Caged

By Fred

Last Christmas, Paul Dhaliwal was at the San Francisco Zoo getting chased and clawed by an escaped tiger. This Christmas, he’ll be learning how it feels to live in a zoo – at San Quentin.

The 20-year-old man, who had a varied criminal history before and after the tiger attack that killed his 17-year-old friend Carlos Sousa, Jr., has earned himself 16 months in the slammer after violating his 3-year probation for felony reckless-driving while fleeing the police at speeds that went above 130 mph.

Obviously, one judge believes the world will be a better place with this guy in a secure enclosure.

Paul and his older brother Kulbir were hoping to get rich off a negligence and defamation lawsuit against the city of San Francisco and the zoo for failing to protect them from Tatiana, whom they allegedly goaded into leaping out of her enclosure, and for making them look like the “bad guys” with the media.

Tatiana was shot and killed by police before she could shred the brothers.

Kulbir, another model citizen, faces his own court date on misdemeanor charges of public drunkenness and resisting arrest during a September 2007 scuffle with police at their home, in which Paul has already pleaded guilty to hitting a police officer.

It was a California jury who found O.J. Simpson not guilty of killing his wife Nicole and Ron Goldman. But let’s hope they can’t find another jury stupid enough to make this pair of thugs millionaires for causing the death of an innocent tiger and posing an ongoing challenge for local police.

Hillary Supporters, Grow Up, Get Over It

By Adele

Like Hillary Clinton, I was the lone white female trying to prevail over black and white male cats during the presidential primary season. We both failed.

Reuters photo

Since Obama clinched the nomination, Yul’s been rubbing my nose in it. Poor Fred’s still washing the egg off his face after learning his boy Edwards is an inept tomcat.

I stuck with Hillary until she showed me she’s not the best option. Enough humans apparently agreed with me.

But since some of Hillary’s supporters won’t let go, she’s going to be pointlessly up for nomination at the convention.

While feigning graciousness, saying she’ll vote for Obama herself, Hillary has been encouraging her supporters to stir up trouble and oppose him by telling them they need to be “heard.”

They were heard. There just weren’t enough of them.

The Clintons have finessed prime-time speeches for themselves so they can foster the notion that they’re somehow letting Obama be the candidate. It’s a wonder Hillary didn’t demand that Obama lick her shoes.

What they’re really doing is wasting everybody’s time with a pathetic, greedy grab at the limelight, and giving Republicans unwarranted hope that McCain has a chance in November because the Democrats are too fractured.

Hillary’s stupid supporters who plan anti-Obama demonstrations should forget it, unless what they now want in the White House is an old dog who will keep us at war with somebody and do nothing for women but set them back a hundred years.

Has Anthony Bourdain Had a Facelift?

By Karen

Cats Working reader, Merrida, has suggested that Anthony Bourdain had some “work” done to minimize the 20+ year spread in age between him and his wife Ottavia. Could it be true?

He could certainly afford it. Forbes just revealed that Bourdain is the 10^th highest paid celebrity chef, pulling in $1.5 million a year. That’s quite a feat, since he hasn’t even been a chef since his book, Kitchen Confidential, hit the bestseller list in 2000.

I’ve been watching the new episodes of No Reservations closely and, frankly, he doesn’t look any better (or worse) to me.

See for yourself: Here’s a close-up that Drive-Thru blogger Cinnamon Cooper snapped of Bourdain just last week while he was filming NR in Chicago.

Bourdain at Hot Doug's - Photo by Cinnamon Cooper

I see a wrinkled forehead, crow’s feet, puffiness under the eyes, a bit of sag in the jowls. If some plastic surgeon did any of that, he needs to be sued for malpractice.

I’d be disappointed if Bourdain resorted to such artifice to hang on to the shreds of his youth. He strikes me as a man who’d see his wrinkles and bags as trophies won after too many hours under the blazing suns of exotic places, and proof of a life lived well – and hard.

But if Tony’s even contemplating plastic surgery, I suggest he check out the once-sexy Peter O’Toole, who has been rendered a sad, smooth caricature of himself:

Flaky Fugitive Obsessed with Canine Boogers

By Adele

Fifty-eight-year-old Bernann McKinney made news recently for paying a South Korean firm $50,000 to clone 5 puppies from her late beloved pit bull Booger. As her photo cuddling the puppies was flashed worldwide, some thought she bore an eerie – if bloated – resemblance to Joyce McKinney, a former beauty queen who allegedly kidnapped a Mormon missionary in England in 1977, tied him to a bed as her sex slave, then jumped bail and prosecution.

Bernann McKinney with Booger clone - Photo Ahn Young-Joon, AP

At first Bernann denied being Joyce, although both women’s full names happen to be Joyce Bernann McKinney, they were both born in Newland, N.C., on the same day in the same year, and they share the same Social Security number.

Now she admits it’s her, but says the alleged sex crime was a tabloid fabrication because the missionary was willing. She was caught stalking him again in Utah in 1984 and skipped out on that trial, too.

My question is: Should she be propagating pit bulls? Bernann claims she did it out of love for the dog she saddled with a gross name, who died of cancer two years ago.

She found Booger on the side of the road nearly 12 years ago. A month later, he saved her life by throwing himself on her mastiff Tuffy, who was chewing Bernann to bits. Joyce survived, and once Booger recovered from his own injuries, he became her self-trained service dog during her long recovery. He could pull her wheelchair, open doors, retrieve clothes from the dryer, and help her remove her shoes and socks.

Brenann had tissue from Booger’s ear preserved, then gave up her home to raise the money to produce 5 replacement dogs, all of which bear variations of the name Booger. She just can’t let that demeaning, gag-inducing name go.

The innocent puppies, just a few weeks old, are now being raised by 2 surrogate Korean mutts who bore them.

Bernann plans to keep 3 pups and donate 2 to be trained as special needs dogs. She already has 5 other dogs and 3 horses.

But should an unrepentant sexual predator be breeding a herd of potentially vicious dogs? Doesn’t it sound a little too Boys from Brazil?

With so many harmless, homeless dogs dying in shelters, it would have been a greater tribute to a former stray like Booger to save already-born dogs. For what Bernann paid for clones, she could have given many dogs good lives.

In the end, this nut case is just setting herself up for heartbreak x 3. Those puppies have identical biological clocks. If she thought Booger’s death was traumatic, how’s she going to take it when his 3 descendents pass all at once? Will she go pounce on another missionary?

I don’t think she should be given a chance to find out.

John Edwards Makes a Lousy Tomcat

By Fred

John Edwards, what the hell were you thinking?

The National Enquirer has proven again, “You can’t fool all the people all the time.” Who would have guessed that John Edwards’ secret erotic fantasies would materialize as a divorced, opportunistic flake named Lisa Druck aka Rielle Hunter?

Rielle Hunter - AP photo

The only thing about this whole mess that seems in character for him is his naïvete in letting her be responsible for birth control.

Apparently, it flattered him to have this New Age nut job with no video experience follow him around with a camera to show his “other side” (whatever that was supposed to be) on YouTube. It never occurred to him that she might be desperately seeking the 15 minutes of fame which had eluded her for 40 years, and that having a presidential candidate’s love child was the big break she’d been looking for.

Edwards denies he’s the child’s father, although he’s willing to take a paternity test, claiming the affair was long over before she ever got pregnant.

If that’s true, then Hunter wasted no time mourning their breakup. Today, she’d rather leave her daughter’s birth certificate blank and milk the mystery for all it’s worth, while claiming she wants “privacy.” As long as she maintains any possible link to Edwards, she can pretend she’s “somebody.”

And as if Elizabeth Edwards doesn’t have enough on her plate with cancer, she finds herself on common ground with the woman she gladly vilified on John’s behalf during the primaries – Hillary Clinton.

They’re both proud, card-carrying members of the Stand By Your Man Even When He Doesn’t Deserve It Club.

And if it’s true that Hunter is history and the baby is a stranger, why was Edwards caught just last month sneaking out of Hunter’s room at the Beverly Hilton Hotel at 3 a.m.?

With one giant leap, Edwards has cast himself onto the sleaze pile with Newt Gingrich, Rudy Guliani, Bill Clinton, and John McCain.

Since anyone who bought his campaign rhetoric about truth and honesty in government feel like we’ve been slimed, Rielle Hunter should have plenty of privacy real soon. John Edwards is finished.

Anthony Bourdain Inspired by The Simpsons

By Karen

About The Simpsons, Anthony Bourdain once wrote on eGullet: Far and away the smartest funniest thing on television – and the font of all truth and wisdom.

As I watched a still-mellow Bourdain tearing through the U.S. Southwest in a borrowed BMW in the latest episode of No Reservations, I noticed him invoking The Simpsons several times. Has having a child put him in touch with his inner Bart?

First, in Indio, Calif., while he was watching a documentary called Romance and Sex Life of the Date, he was dead-on with one of Homer’s lecherous sighs, even though in the end he dismissed the film in true Bourdain fashion as “not as good as Debbie Does Durian.”

At Cooperstown, Alice Cooper’s restaurant in Phoenix, while eating Randy Johnson’s Big Unit (an incredibly long hot dog), he briefly went into one of Homer’s typically donut-inspired trances, muttering, “Ummm, must rebel against parents, must wear only black.”

Homer's Dream Donut

He also let his inner Bart shine through a couple of times, as in Texas when he cruelly challenged newly returned cameraman Jerry (who apparently had been traumatized by the Beirut episode) to eat a 72 oz. steak in 60 minutes, then sat there gloating as Jerry stuffed himself, but failed. Welcome back!

Then when he toured a desert facility housing a huge preserved bomb, he revealed antipathy toward the Swiss, which he just explained on his blog. Reaching for the bomb’s launch button in true Bart style, he said, “Eidelweiss this, you yodeling freaks!”

Then, in a shameless play on Homer’s description of the French as “cheese-eating surrender monkeys,” he called the Swiss, “neutral, cheese-eating, peace-monkey Cuckoo-clock makers.”

They say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, but I’ve always expected Homer Simpson would someday do Bourdain, not the other way around.