“You can actually make it to the front. I did it yesterday and it took 5 hours. But once you get to the front, you can stare into her eyes for as long as you want.”
 — Computer game research professor Pippin Barr discusses his videogame “The Artist Is Present,” which “simulates the experience of waiting in line to see contemporary artist Marina Abramović, who held an exhibit at the Museum of Modern Art in New York in 2010” of the same name. It’s a funny old world. [Vaguely related]

Um, did any of you see that “The Secret Circle” TV show last night on the “CW Network”? It was basically “90210” meets “The Craft.” (With a little bit of Mean Girls?) It was also vapid, rushed and definitely not “The Killing.” Also kind of amazing! But is it okay to watch if you are like “that’s weird, the hot guy from ‘Queer as Folk’ is playing the dad… and, oh, Jesus, the target audience is half his age, right, HE’S THE OLD MAN SECONDARY CHARACTER”? Probably not. ANYWAY, this is what there is to watch now if you don’t like vampires and autopsies on the TV.

Well sure, that would do it. People always be LOVING money.

Attention alcohol enthusiasts: If you quit drinking, you will still remain wobbly, plus you will suffer all the attendant indignities of being sober. So stick with it.

by David Roth and David Raposa

David Roth: Do you think VH1 is ready for “Baseball Wives” as a spinoff of “Basketball Wives”?

David Raposa: Do you think Jerry Seinfeld asked the world if it was ready for “The Marriage Ref”?

David Roth: He only asks rhetorical questions, but you’re right. I am picturing the same level of heated incoherence and wine-faced ill will as “Basketball Wives,” definitely the same turn-back-the-clock-on-gender-perceptions vibe. But everyone wears eye-black in the opening credits and it is set in Boston. And the cast is someone who divorced Bill Mueller back in 2003, Curt Schilling’s wife, a kind of trampy lady who says she dated Mark Bellhorn, and a diva type who smokes Virginia Slims nonstop and claims to have a relationship with “a certain devout and oft-injured outfielder” but won’t be more specific.

David Raposa: You just want Kevin Millar to crash the set, don’t you?

David Roth: Oh, he’s in the cast, too. He’s the Sassy Hairdresser Buddy.

David Raposa: I was gonna say he pulls a “Kids In The Hall” and shows up in a very slimming pants suit.

David Roth: “Beth” Millar.

David Raposa: Or he pulls a Matsui and shows up with a drawing of his special lady friend.

David Roth: You are really finding the darkness in this. I am so happy to have you working as my co-producer.

David Raposa: Who needs Mario Lopez and reality TV sub-celebs when you have baseball’s finest ex-centerfolds? To be honest, though, it feels less like we’re pitching a grade Z reality show and more like we’re pitching a grade Z slasher flick. Something like Psycho meets a middle-aged Prom Night. With the aforementioned eye black.

David Roth: We need to develop another show called “Middle-Aged Prom Night.” Where are we going to put all this money?

David Roth: I think of this not just because I just saw some of “Basketball Wives” just now — a show which is pitched at a truly proctological level of enlightenment and empathy, and is basically the loudest possible opposite of entertainment — but because SOMEONE is married to A.J. Pierzynski, right? Does she like pro wrestling as much as he does? (And secondarily, could anyone?)

David Raposa: Turn-ons include Wet Willies as foreplay, endless “Jackass” reruns, jock itch, and random mid-coital yawping.

David Roth: I guess you’re right, plenty of ladies are into that.

David Raposa: Okay, pop quiz, hot shot. Is Mariano Rivera better than Mickey Mantle, better than Joe DiMaggio, or just a little less good than Babe Ruth?

David Roth: The jaded whatever-to-that-closer-bullshit answer is that he is the best at getting three consecutive outs before allowing more than three runs. But I just kind of think he’s the best. He is the only Yankee I really and legitimately enjoy watching and think is kind of neat, and has been since, I guess, Glenallen Hill.

David Raposa: Glenallen Hill belongs to all of baseball, though. And not just because his MLB passport looks like a Carmen Sandiego prop.

David Roth: It is good to know that Three True Outcome wind turbines like Glenallen Hill will always be with us. That’s why I have J-A-C-K and C-U-S-T tattooed on my knuckles.

David Raposa: For Glenallen, I think the actual abbreviation is TMO (for Three Majestic Outcomes) — majestic sound-barrier-breaking homers, majestic plane-buzzing pop-ups and majestic spine-altering strike-outs.

David Roth: All of which I enjoy.

David Raposa: As far as Mr. Sandman goes, I only wish I was making up those “better than” examples up there; two of the three (the Mantle and the Ruth) were pulled from Today’s Headlines! Leave it to Yankee beat writers and columnists to overstate the greatness of one of their own. And at the expense of the franchise’s own legacy! George Steinbrenner just rolled over Billy Martin’s grave!

David Roth: Well, the general unpleasable weepy bipolarity of the Yankees Discourse does make Yankees Players less appealing. But Mariano does have a certain objective awesomeness going on. Although you’re a Sox fan, so does that apply for you?

David Raposa: Yes and no. I can appreciate the enormity of his accomplishments, but at the same time, watching that cutter not-cut is wicked awesome. Not to infringe on The Sports Guy’s copyright, but that ’04 happened against him made it so much sweeter.

David Roth: Yeah, it makes me like him more that he isn’t perfect. For instance, the Mets scored a run off him once, I think. Or… sorry, I mean they had two runners on base against him once, back in ‘01.

David Raposa: Well, he’s pretty close. It’s the infrequency of his failures that makes them stand out. And the fact that he’s on the hook for blowing an ALCS and a World Series. And yes, I’m twirling my moustache as I type that.

David Roth: I hope they make Mariano 600 t-shirts and put him in some budget-y Ford commercials. I also wish someone would actually make this not-real t-shirt some Mets fans mocked up for Miguel Batista’s 100th win. Do you remember where you were when M-Batis won his 100th? (It was a month or so ago.)

David Raposa: Do I? I can remember it like it was last month! I was sitting in the chair I’m in right now, regretting what I ate for dinner and watching that 88 MPH heater swerve and teeter like a car on a vaguely wet road.

David Roth: He holds this year’s Elmer Dessens Emeritus Junkballer Chair on the Mets pitching staff. Big stipend, and all you have to do is not laugh when Terry Collins’s voice gets really high during tirades.

David Raposa: I’m sure he composed some sick verse commemorating that honor. You do know of MB’s illustrious writing career, yes?

David Roth: I do. He wrote a short story for ESPN The Magazine’s Fiction Issue and it was not very good. Also: ESPN The Magazine’s Fiction Issue.

David Raposa: To quote Yakov Smirnoff, “You are having the fun with my full-of-shit leg, da?”

David Roth: My favorite story was Lorrie Moore’s re-imagining of Jim Leyland as an English professor in a failing marriage whose brisk humor masks a deep sadness. It was cool to see her stretch. Also, Aubrey Huff displays a surprisingly Borgesian playfulness in his prose. (Although it’s admittedly less surprising if you’ve read his essays.)

David Raposa: I was particularly fond of, “Repent, Mark Quinn! Said The McCutchenman,” by Joe West.

David Raposa: Speaking of milestone memorabilia, who wants a Wakefield 200 hat?

David Roth: Good thing the Sox didn’t spend much money on those hats. If you peel off the knuckleball-200 patch there’s a Nantucket Nectars logo underneath.

David Raposa: My citizenship in Red Sox Nation has lapsed some, but I’m guessing loads of Sullys are blaming Wake for the recent Red Sox “collapse” (or, if you prefer, “injury-aided deceleration”).

David Roth: I’m happy to see the Rays winning/the Sox taking a couple weeks off making a race of it. Ditto for the Angels and Rangers. As long as I don’t have to watch the drunken sack race that is the AL Central.

David Raposa: If only the Tigers or Twins had ADRIAN BELTRE HEAD RUBS.

David Roth: I didn’t know about this thing. He appears not to like it. The Late Josh Bard. Killed by a punch from a fuming Beltre. RIP.

David Raposa: And now you know why Victor Martinez signed with Detroit.

David Roth: The walk-off head-bop one is great. The situation turns so quickly.

David Raposa: Please note that there are multiple sightings of that rarest of beasts: Having-Fun JD Drew.

David Roth: I assume that JD then drove 40 minutes into the suburbs, went to a giant and extravagantly air-conditioned mega-church, and repented.

David Raposa: At first, I thought you misspelled “hyperbaric chamber” as “mega-church.” But then I noticed that the UmpBump post links to an article about Drew’s faith. From JesusJournal.com.

David Roth: Good site name. I need to get into URL squatting. I remember a McSweeney’s list a long time ago that was a list of former MLB players whose names were still available as URLs. I remember BobbyGrich.com was on there. Now it’s owned by a Bobby G. Rich. TomCandiotti.biz is out there.

David Raposa: EsixSnead.com: still available. BillPulsipher.net and PaulWilson.org, however, redirect to Goatse.cx — how strange!

David Roth: I have an Esix Snead autograph rookie card at home that I lifted during my days at Topps.

David Raposa: Intrigue! I’ll put the over/under on number of laser grids you had to weave through at 4.

David Roth: I was a lot like Catherine Zeta-Jones Entrapment — like, more than usual — but my glasses kept falling off. And instead of Sean Connery watching leeringly, there were a bunch of broken Geronimo Berroa game-used bats leaning against a wall.

David Raposa: That sounds about as exciting as the “new” film Connery’s threatening to make. Here, have the interminably long trailer!

David Roth: The “About” section of this website is baffling. It’s all about the co-founders and, like, their hobbies. “Theresa, his wife, enjoys spicy food.” How is that relevant to your film? Also, the trailer looks like one of those The General insurance commercials.

David Raposa: I was gonna say that my friends made a claymation short back in 6th grade that had better production values.

David Roth: I also like that this trailer for kids includes a sentence that begins “Can this octogenarian…”

David Raposa: AND HIS BILLY GOAT.

David Roth: Do you think there are Florida Marlins articles that begin “Can this octogenarian and his billy goat(s)…” And then goes on to discuss Jack McKeon trying to motivate his team?

David Raposa: I guess you saw Old Man McKeon take Ricky Nolasco out back for a caning?

David Roth: There’s a thin line between being an old grump who probably shouldn’t have a job and just being a total asshole, isn’t there? I can barely see it sometimes it’s so thin.

David Raposa: It’s George-Lucas-neckbeard thin. Given the Marlins’ situation, though, I think Trader Jack’s earned himself a few faux-Ozzie outbursts. Also, if push comes to shove, he can just say he learned it from Earl Weaver YouTubes.

David Roth: I want endless .gifs of his pained waddle to the mound. The Metamucil commercial that is his face during games, the palpable, visible-in-a-thought-bubble-above-his-head wish to be napping in front of an episode of “In The Heat of the Night” on WGN. Being the saddest old person in Florida is quite an achievement, if you think about it.

David Raposa: True. And the Marlins clubhouse is a pluperfect mixture of justifiable and inexplicable disgruntlement. Meaning you have players getting dicked over by management, and players just being dicks. (Hello there, Han-Ram!)

David Roth: Hanley Ramirez should’ve just gotten fat. It’s the fastest way to show your disdain. Surely it’s easier than just doing everything 75% as quickly as you did it last year.

David Raposa: He’s still too young, though. He’s at that age where even the fattiest foods and liquors get metabolized all hummingbird-like.

David Roth: He could hire professionals. Who makes Adam Dunn his six-egg breakfast sandwiches?

David Raposa: “The ‘7’ in my 7 Layer Burrito refers to the number of tortillas I use.”

David Roth: There should be people who help guys get out of the league. Give them profane neck tats, five unhealthy meals a day, set them up with brand-ruining celebrity buddies.

David Raposa: Joe Francis could always use a secondary source of income.

David Roth: I don’t suppose that Francis and McKeon being in Miami at the same time ever led to… no, probably not.

David Raposa: That is a Penthouse Letter that writes itself.

David Roth co-writes the Wall Street Journal’s Daily Fix, contributes to the sports blog Can’t Stop the Bleeding and has his own little website. And he tweets!

David Raposa writes about music for Pitchfork and other places. He used to write about baseball for the blog formerly known as Yard Work. He occasionally blogs for himself, and he also tweets way too much.

Photo by Keith Allison.

ShowMeNonstop: You can click to skip random videos on search terms, but that’s all. Mmm hmm: TOM FORD! CATS FIGHTING! ROCKETS EXPLODING! [Via, via]

by Abe Sauer

On Monday at the CNN-Tea Party Republican presidential debate, Michele Bachmann pounced on the fact that Rick Perry signed an executive order in 2007 mandating all girls in his state be vaccinated against HPV. She was accusing the Texas governor of crony capitalism.

Bachmann had found the issue that would differentiate her from the man who stole her thunder. The Congresswoman spent the next few days slamming Perry and the HPV vaccine in interviews — and even in her fundraising email immediately following the debate’s conclusion. It’s a move that morphs a one-time sideshow amusement and general thorn in the side of Democrats (and thinking human beings) into a genuine public health threat.

The brunt of Bachmann’s crony capitalism charge is that Governor Perry mandated the use of a drug by a pharmaceutical company — Merck — that had also donated to his campaign to the tune of $28,500.

Meanwhile, Bachman has taken somewhere north of $140,000 from pharmaceutical companies.

Those donors include Abbott Labs, Pfizer, GlaxoSmithKline, AstraZeneca, Novartis, Eli Lilly and Bayer. Yet, not a dollar of all that pharma money, from such a wide range of the world’s largest drugmakers, came from Merck. Might Bachmann be going after Merck on behalf of that company’s competitors who also happen to be Bachmann donors?

But really, if Bachmann is carrying water, it’s likely not for her pharmaceutical patrons, but her insurance ones. Over the years, Bachmann has taken in huge donations from the insurance industry, including big names such as Allstate, American Family, Aetna and AFLAC, as well as umbrella organizations like the National Association of Health Underwriters and the National Association of Mutual Insurance Companies. There are also several professional insurance association and agent PACs. In the 2009–10 cycle, “insurance” was the largest single industry donor to the Congresswoman. Of the 435 members of the House of Representatives, Bachmann ranked eighth in total fundraising receipts from insurers.

Now, if Bachmann likes a good follow-the-money insinuation, she might like the hypothetical that she is only going after Perry’s Gardasil decision because, as a covered treatment, such an order would cost insurers for every injection (a full vaccination requires three shots, and they cost about $120 each). Perry worked to secure about $40 million from the state to match about that same amount from the feds to cover the uninsured and those on state health assistance.

(A note on the subject of conflicts of interest: Quaint by comparison is that the Our Country Deserves Better PAC (better known as the Tea Party Express), the co-sponsors of the debate, donated to only one candidate on stage Monday night: Michele Bachmann. That this was not disclosed is, in this day and age, a minor point, but one that should be flung in with the rest of CNN’s reputation as its spirals around the toilet bowl.)

It would be a relief to nail Bachmann as a crony capitalist. But worse and far more likely is that she’s just a political opportunist who sees going after Gardasil as a fast-track to headlines about America’s virgin daughters threatened with the penetration of a forced injection — with her as a protector of those virgins.

After the debate, Bachmann told Anderson Cooper that immediately after the event she had been approached by a mother. Bachmann looked right into the camera and said, “She told me that her little daughter took that vaccine, that injection, and she suffered from mental retardation thereafter.”

If Bachmann did not just make that whole story up, then she repeated a lie that she didn’t care to elaborate upon. In the hours after her statement, health professionals and citizens alike voiced outrage at her unfounded claim. Two separate Minnesota heath researchers offered a combined $11,000 bounty on any proof of the connection.

But what about the opposition to the mandate voiced by the Texas Medical Association that so many keep mentioning? That was for tax purposes, not treatment ones, as doctors worried they would be forced to eat the costs of administration as a “pass-through” treatment where they could bill for the injection itself, but not the time spent giving it.

What would really take Bachmann’s claim to the next level would be a full-on slander lawsuit from Merck. Bachmann’s irresponsible, if not manufactured, claim that HPV vaccination creates “mental retardation” presents a genuine threat to Merck’s bottom line — and at least a few of the jobs of their 94,000 employees, their contribution to being an “engine of the economy.”

Merck’s statement on the issue, with the clinical title “Merck Statement on GARDASIL®,” was so sanitary it did not even mention Bachmann’s name. In the battle for news worthiness, Merck’s effort has all the pop of the brochure that your pharmacist staples to prescription bags at pick-up.

Asked for comment on the possibility of such an action, a spokesman for Merck referred me to the statement, saying only that right now Merck’s “priority is to make sure there is accurate information about Gardasil available to the public.”

Of course, the real losers here are women who will suffer horribly and die from cervical cancer.

A lesser loser, but a loser nonetheless, is Anita Perry, the wife Rick Perry threw under the bus during the debate when he spun his HPV vaccination mandate as “a mistake.” (Perry has called the mandate a mistake before, but never on quite such a national stage.)

Anita Perry has a BA and an MS in nursing. In addition to her personal medical experience, her father was a doctor. She has been a champion of women’s health. By accounts, she is the true driver behind the Gardasil mandate. For years as Texas’ First Lady, Perry has made cancer a particular focus, attending event after event for cancer research, awareness and fundraising.

During the passage of the vaccine bill, Anita Perry headed up a sexual assault organization, which may have pushed her further toward an understanding of the value of HPV immunity.

Emails from a FOIA request by Politico show that Rick Perry was hardly a factor in the vaccine bill and instead forwarded information to Anita, who responded by writing, “[Dallas Republican] Tammy Cotten Hartnett told me at lunch today that she would help you with some conservative groups.”

Putting a human face on Perry’s order was 31-year-old teacher Heather Burcham who, while dying of cervical cancer, lobbied heavily for the mandate and became a health advocacy partner of Perry’s in the run-up to 2007. Burcham said before her death, “I don’t want my life to have no purpose whatsoever, and if I can help spread the word about cervical cancer and the HPV vaccine, then I haven’t lived in vain.”

The limp governor, who was tough enough to shoot a coyote but did not have the cojones to veto the bill repealing his HPV order, is now groveling in the face of outrage from mouth-breathing moralists. It’s a damn shame, because if Perry was genuinely the bold leader he’s been sold as, he would have just reissued his statements on the matter from 2007:

I have never seen so much misinformation spread about a vital public health issue: whether it is the effectiveness of the vaccine, the impact of the order on parents’ decision-making authority, or the impact this will have on the behavior of young women.

But the fact remains: my order always has been and always will be about protecting women’s health…. Those legislators who claim this is about their right to determine public policy have succeeded in overturning my order. But if they care about succeeding in stopping the spread of the second most deadly cancer among women, and not just asserting their power, then they will turn around and pass legislation to make access to the HPV vaccine as widely available as possible.

Instead, they have sent me a bill that will ensure three-quarters of our young women will be susceptible to a virus that not only kills hundreds each year, but causes great discomfort and harm to thousands more. Instead of vaccinating close to 95 percent of our young women, and virtually eliminating the spread of the most common STD in America, they have relegated the lives of our young women to social Darwinism, where only those who can afford it or those who know about the virtues of it will get access to the HPV vaccine.

In fact, this legislature has not only overturned an order that could save women’s lives, but they put rider language in the budget that prevents the state from funding vaccines for low-income women if it is mandated by the commission.

This is shameful.

Yes, yes it is. I wonder how Perry’s mother, currently suffering from cancer, feels about his change of heart?

There is some hope though that Bachmann and her paranoid anti-vaccine comrades are on their way to the dustbin of history.

A gynecologist I spoke with said that she is increasingly seeing young women just out of high school come into her office and voluntarily ask for the HPV vaccine. Better yet, the physician said that she often sees a noticeable friend effect, where after one women is inoculated, suddenly her circle of fiends all make similar appointments, mentioning that they heard through the first.

She adds, largely lost in the brouhaha, that Gardasil has been approved for boys.

The acceptance of HPV vaccination seems to be a trend across the immunization spectrum. The CDC’s 2010 National Immunization Survey found that 90% of American children aged 19- to 35-months are receiving recommended vaccines. It’s a note of good news, as the new data represent an increase after a number of years of falling rates — peaking in 2009. For example, the MMR vaccination rate rose to 91.5% from 90% in 2009.

And the better news is that America may not need a vaccination against Michele Bachmann, as she’s proving to be what doctors call “self-limiting.”

UPDATE 9/16 PM: This is how a once-promising campaign flames out, not in spectacular fashion with an orchestral showdown and a cloud of smoke, but with grainy cellphone video, musty fabric-covered wall dividers and a fern.

After a day spent reading her press — which included criticism from her own former campaign manager and current consultant, Ed Rollins — the campaign knew its goose was cooked. Late in the afternoon, Bachmann’s Youtube channel posted a video of Bachmann begging for her credibility, shot at the undisclosed location where she is being held hostage by public opinion.

Even her hair appears to have given up. Her last hope? “Perrycare.”

The email to supporters that mirrored the video statement was a mess, featuring grammatical errors and a complete abandonment of the “little girls” language in favor of “our young women.” What was more of a sign than anything though, for the first time in months of these emails, Bachmann did not directly ask for money.

So Bachmann’s campaign ends not with a whimper, but with a “Perrycare.”

Bachmann still plans to join the next debate on Sept, 22, which really will be something special.

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

“So if teens think as well as adults do and recognize risk just as well, why do they take more chances? Here, as elsewhere, the problem lies less in what teens lack compared with adults than in what they have more of. Teens take more risks not because they don’t understand the dangers but because they weigh risk versus reward differently: In situations where risk can get them something they want, they value the reward more heavily than adults do.”
 — This is a good read on how the teen brain works. God, you couldn’t pay me enough to be that age again. [Via]

by Awl Sponsors

This post is sponsored by NBC’s “The Playboy Club”.

Like him or not, you have to admit that Hugh Hefner has created an incredible empire. A huge part of it grew from the mystique of his upscale men’s clubs in the early 1960s. Being given a key to his club quickly became a status symbol — it meant you were somebody. Lucky for you, the new drama series, “The Playboy Club” on NBC, gives you the key to enter the decadent and dangerous world of this elite and exclusive Chicago club. As soon as the show starts, you’ll see that underneath all the glitz and glamour is a world of dark secrets and heated power struggles.

Eddie Cibrian stars as Nick Dalton, a powerful attorney with mob ties, and Amber Heard as the innocent Maureen, whose life changes forever on her first night on the job as a club Bunny. When Nick comes to her rescue to help her cover up her horrible secret, things get messy between him and Bunny Mother Carol-Lynne (played by Laura Benanti), who he happens to be dating.

At the very least, the show promises an inside look at the time and place that launched one of the most famous sex symbols in American culture — the Playboy Bunny. And, judging by the show’s official website, Hef approves.

“The Playboy Club” premieres Monday September 19 at 10/9c on NBC.

1876, huh? That is one antiquated gherkin!