For some time now, anonymous YouTube (and Twitter) user Are You Surprised has been posting videos about Don’t Ask Don’t Tell and being in the closet in the military (and giving workout updates via photos), and today he came out on video to the public and also came out as gay, by calling his dad. Now I’m sure this is all incredibly moving and socially important and a landmark breakthrough in social media or something, so congratulations to us all, but that is really not why we are all watching this video. Congratulations to gay members of the armed services today (and congratulations to all the rest of us). (via)

Here you will find a roll of toilet paper The Beatles declined to wipe their own bottoms with.

by Abe Sauer

At a recent New Hampshire tea party rally, Sarah Palin spoke of the regulatory burdens on the area’s Yankee Fisherman’s Cooperative, a group that she compared to “our own commercial fishing family.” Back in June, on a previous trip to New Hampshire, she said, “Well, commercial fishing is near and dear to my heart of course. You know, having fished for so many years. And I understand fish politics. I understand what these fishermen are going through.”

But an open records request by The Awl found that Palin, once again, failed to apply for a license to fish in Alaska this season. The request follows our report from earlier this year that revealed that Palin had only secured commercial fishing licenses for fewer than half of all the years she’s claimed to have been in the business.

Palin will continue to pass herself off as a hardcore commercial fisher despite clear evidence to the contrary. But for some time now, profiles and criticism of Palin have become far more about the profiler and the audience than Mama Grizzly herself. Then again, as Palin herself once wrote, “Never hurts to rumormonger.”

Hitting what few bookshelves are left in America today is The Rogue: Searching For The Real Sarah Palin. What new information the book offers is not in its title as, currently, Amazon lists five other books about Palin with “rogue” in the title, not even including Palin’s own Going Rogue: An American Life. Sure, Joe McGinniss’ The Rogue is a hatchet job, but it’s performed with a high quality Alaskan made-in-the-USA hatchet — built to last. For those whose own happiness comes from despising both Palin and her variety of unintellectual flyover dope, the book offers a wealth of fossil fuels. Drill baby, drill.

The Rogue is mean. Mean and uncivil and ruthless. In that sense, it is the biography Sarah Palin deserves, but it won’t hurt her. The former governor has now passed into a realm where those who despise her will do so for life, and where her most ardent fans have invested so much, and believed so hard, it’s now necessary to go to the grave on her side.

To those whose first presidential memories are of George Bush Part 1, that voting Americans once got their knickers in a bunch over the one-time marijuana use of Bill Clinton must seem like it’s from an era with separate drinking fountains for blacks, suffrage, or when men had those separate collars they slipped onto their shirt-necks. But the Clinton episode was just 19 years ago.

Just how fast did popular opinion on presidential drug use change? Every commander in chief since Clinton has at least tried cocaine, and nobody cares. That The Rogue reveals that Palin did as well will surprise nobody.

The more subtle condemnation The Rogue makes in its coke revelation is that she did it off an overturned oil drum, an act so stereotypically Alaskan hillbilly that if it weren’t real, “South Park” would have to do a sketch on it.

And when it comes to the more raunchy details, everyone has focused on Palin sleeping naked, or the affair, or the Glen Rice fling. But the most damningly redneck revelation is how Sarah’s future husband saw himself. Todd, the book claims, wooed women with lines about a “great heart-shaped ass,” a come-on he probably lifted from Mickey Rourke, whose character used it to describe Kim Basinger in 9½ Weeks back in 1986.

This all misses the point that conservative voters just don’t care about youthful transgressions, largely because the reborn social conservative of today is vastly different from the permanently repressed social conservative of just 20 years ago (when Bill Clinton “didn’t inhale”). Nowhere is this better represented than in the Episcopalian subscription of George H. W. Bush and the evangelical faith of his son, George W. Bush.

Social conservatives today have no problem supporting candidates with sordid histories because those candidates are simply echoes of the voters themselves. It’s hard to be pure and young in America today. But just because you had a young and wild life doesn’t mean you can’t grow up to “recover” from (and then be hypocritically self-righteous against) the life you once led. It’s something that began when evangelicals realized they could write new rules for who is and who is not allowed to be a legitimate politician when they took a recovering alcoholic and all-around basket case and said, “Him. Yeah, that guy!”

In essence, the electorate looked at conventional wisdom on politicians and drew themselves into the picture. Overnight, they turned politicians from a group of guys nothing at all like their own reformed deadbeat asses to a group of guys just like their own reformed deadbeat asses. A look at the current slate of banner-carrying hard right darlings and dynamos proves that “recovery” is practically a resume requirement.

• Rick Perry worked not just for any Democrat, but for GOP boogeyman Al Gore (not to mention he was a state secessionist who is now running for President).

• Michele Bachmann campaigned for Jimmy Carter and today spins her former service to (what the Tea Party considers) the most evil organization imaginable, the IRS, as “know thy enemy.”

• Propaganda minister Andrew Breitbart? Former Democrat.

• Mike Huckabee has called himself a “recovering foodaholic” and made his struggles with food a core appeal of his personality.

• In Wisconsin’s recent recalls, it was revealed that evangelical Tea Party candidate Kim Simac had engaged in some kind of wife (husband?) swapping arrangement with another couple, but her base did not care. (What they did care about was that she had not been paying her taxes.)

• And Newt Gingrich’s 237 previous wives don’t hurt him with the GOP’s new base; his unwillingness to debase himself about it does. (See also: Rudy Giuliani.) He only needs to pull up his flimsy metal folding chair and say, “I am Newt Gingrich and I am a wifeaholic.” His poll numbers would jump 15 points overnight, a night which he would probably spend sleeping on the couch. (But, Newt, do you want to win or be liked by your family?)

At the CNN-Tea Party debate, Perry’s ability to loudly admit his own former policies were “a mistake,” and to look confident and macho doing so: this was a thing not possible for a Republican presidential candidate 20 years ago. This is a demographic that gold sellers carefully looked at, and then chose as a trustworthy advertising spokesman G. Gordon Liddy. (G. Gordon Liddy!)

Further revelations about Palin, no matter how leering or vile, will do her no harm. She’s born again. She needn’t even address the most recent accusations, because her followers all understand. They too all once snorted cocaine off some overturned oil drum with a bunch of drunk guys playing grab-ass with them, and they too wanted more for themselves, something better. What are you gonna do at the age of 22 in goddamn Alaska?

Meanwhile, The Rogue shares much in common with Nick Broomfield’s documentary, You Betcha!, due in limited release Sept 30th.

Both insert the journalists as characters in a pursuit of the Palin truth. Each make the trials of getting the scoop on her both a part of the story and a sly indictment against her — as if all other politicians were open books constantly inviting “journalists” to diary-reading parties in their Capitol Hill bedrooms. The cover of McGinniss’ book even features his name in larger type than Palin’s, as if it was another Tom Clancy novel. A former Seal of some kind from Worcester, Mass., whose best days are behind him, has to use his wiles and cunning to track down intelligence on an elusive domestic terrorist. But will he publish the truth, and cash in, before she becomes culturally irrelevant? You won’t be able to put it down… without also taking a shower.

For Broomfield’s part, what he brings to bear on Mama Grizzly might be considered the third installment of his American Women trilogy, joining his films Aileen: Life and Death of a Serial Killer and Heidi Fleiss: Hollywood Madam.

But what’s the point? McGinniss has gone on record that 90% of what he learned isn’t even in the book, which makes the author both the world’s greatest receptacle of Palin trivia and its most potentially insufferable dinner guest. McGinniss says he decided what was true and what was questionable simply based on decades of journalism (and meetings in Starbucks with bloggers). Known technically in the industry as “winging it,” this approach to fact checking is often used by seasoned journalists, including legends like Dan Rather.

Why not? Everyone’s winging it. Publishing his own book on the same day as McGinniss, Levi Johnston says he fell into “an unintended role in America’s most delicious drama.” There are compensations, however. Palin’s daughter Bristol has also already cashed in. Willow and Track cannot be far behind.

Meanwhile, America continues to idly wonder if Palin will run for something or other. She’s caught between a rock and hard rat race. If she doesn’t run, she risks irrelevance. But a Palin campaign could be even more damaging, as she would face her own party — a foe against which almost none of her rhetorical weapons will work.

Worst of all, though, would be a Palin campaign victory of some kind, where she would face the personal disaster of governing — an unwelcome fate that has, of late, eaten everyone attempting it.

But right now, in the eyes of her core supporters, Palin remains beautiful, meaningful, worthy. Listening to Palin’s supporters at a rally or touring her Facebook page’s comments is to wander into a world so free from reality and doubt it that can probably only be compared with North Korea.

In a few years though, when Palin’s Dorian Gray lurches into the sitting room and looks at those closest to her, she’s likely to find the devastating picture of spiritual and familial disfigurement, as rendered by projects like The Rogue. But by then it will be too late.

Abe Sauer can be reached at abesauer at gmail dot com. He is on Twitter.

“[A] new study finds that people who get out of bed by 7 a.m., on average, do better in the workplace and have a lower chance of being depressed, stressed and overweight.” They also probably think life is worth living and stuff. Sigh. I’m going back to bed.

Uh, what? “Barry Levinson and Cheryl [sic] Crow have teamed on a stage musical based on Levinson’s 1982 pic ‘Diner,’ with the tuner aiming to land on Broadway in fall 2012. Levinson pens the book with Crow on board for the music and lyrics. Kathleen Marshall, helmer of the Roundabout’s current hit revival of ‘Anything Goes,’ directs and choreographs.”

The video for the first single from Bonnie Prince Billy’s new album Wolfroy Goes to Town, which comes out in two weeks, is strikingly similar to the one for Frank Ocean’s “Thinking About You,” which we were pleasantly confused by yesterday. Billy’s seems a little bit more in context, and has a super-terrific surprise ending, but what becomes most obvious with the benefit of watching them together is that these are two artists who who should collaborate on an R. Kelly cover. I hope they do “When a Woman’s Fed Up.”

The next time you see a smiling child, that symbol of innocence and potential and happiness in a world where none of those things ever come to any meaningful fruition, look closely at his or her teeth: They are full of stem cells. Expensive, valuable stem cells that can be harvested to treat diabetes and Parkinson’s and other diseases. And what are these selfish children doing with them? Eating Swedish fish and talking back. We should rip out all those teeth now, before they wise up and start keeping their mouths shut. Or maybe we don’t have to! Turns out human fat is loaded up with stem cells as well. We may be running out of natural resources, but there is a GLUT of human fat in the American market alone. Once we harness the technology to turn all that tubbiness into treatments, no one will ever be sick again. So chow down, folks, you’re doing it for Science!

Have you read the story about the Amazon warehouse outside Allentown? You should! It’s not… good. In short, Amazon largely staffs that warehouse with temporary workers through an agency, dangling the prospect of being promoted to full-time employee. Then it parks ambulances outside for when they pass out from heat exhaustion. Then, when they don’t make quota, what with all the passing out, they’re often dismissed. (Yes, to be fair, some are promoted, and some do fine.) Hold on to your Kindles!

Here are the three most blood-boiling parts. (Your blood-boiling mileage may vary; it’s a very long story and there’s lots in it!

One hot day in June, [44-year-old Karen] Salasky said, she wasn’t feeling well. Her fingers tingled and her body felt numb. She went to the restroom. An ISS manager asked if she was OK, and she said no. She was taken by wheelchair to an air-conditioned room, where paramedics examined her while managers asked questions and took notes.

“I was really upset and I said, ‘All you people care about is the rates, not the well-being of the people,’” she said. “I’ve never worked for an employer that had paramedics waiting outside for people to drop because of the extreme heat.”

Supervisors told Salasky to go home and rest. She reported to an ISS office the next day to drop off medical paperwork, and she was asked to sign papers acknowledging she got irate and used a curse word on the day she suffered from the heat. She refused to sign the papers because she said she didn’t curse. A few days later, she called ISS and found out her assignment had been terminated.

And this:

One former temporary warehouse employee said he worked seven months before he was terminated for not working fast enough. In his 50s, he worked 10 hours a day, four days a week as a picker, plucking items from bins and delivering them to packers who put them in boxes for shipment. He would walk 13 to 15 miles daily, he estimated, and was among the oldest pickers…. He said he was expected to pick 1,200 items in a 10-hour shift, or one item every 30 seconds…. “The worst part was getting on my hands and knees 250 to 300 times a day,” he said.

But the real winner is, stealthily, THIS.

On June 13, OSHA received a letter from Allen Forney, Amazon’s site safety manager. “On June 3, 2011, the Lehigh Valley area experienced unusual, extremely high temperatures which caused the heat index inside our building to reach a temperature above 95 degrees in a few areas of the building,” Forney wrote. “As a result of these high temperatures, 15 out of 1,600 employees experienced heat-related symptoms. Six of these employees were treated at a local hospital ER for non-work related medical conditions triggered by the heat….”

Oh, okay, those were NON-work related medical conditions simply “triggered” by heat exhaustion and passing out at work and stuff. DUDE? Dude. Duuuude.

Also the CEO of the temp staffing agency has a blog called “HR Ninja,” which is grounds for some kind of punishment.

“2011 is likely to be remembered as the year when Twitter won near-universal acceptance and Mr. Rushdie’s entrance on the scene captures the zeitgeist.”

A very happy birthday indeed to Foreststorn “Chico” Hamilton. The legendary jazz drummer/bandleader/West Coast avant-gardist turns 90 today. If you’re unfamiliar with the man’s work, this is as good a place as any to get started.