Who is Tyler Perry?

Okay, I know who he is. He’s marginally talented and apparently arrogant enough to think he’s such a success that he can put his name in the title of nearly every project he comes up with, unlike…well, pretty much everybody else. (Except Sid Meier.) He’s a guy whose highest rating over at Rotten Tomatoes is merely 53%. (Could change since it’s for his latest flick.)

By the way, this is the real Tyler Perry. And sir, until you come up with something 10% as brilliant as Walk this Way, Back in the Saddle, or Draw the Line, take their name out of your mouth.

Congratulations Governor Palin

Hey, I guess I’m pretty smart after all.

Barack Obama is a snot-nosed lawyer punk

“John McCain likes to say that he’ll follow bin Laden to the Gates of Hell – but he won’t even go to the cave where he lives.”

That has to be one of the most slimy things ever said in politics. First, if Obama wants to get autobiographies out and start comparing cajones with John McCain, he’s going to come out severely wanting. Second, last time I read the Constitution it didn’t say anything about senators from Arizona having the power to send troops anywhere, but Obama’s the scholar in that area, not me.

Also, lest we forget, while McCain himself might not get bin Laden, maybe someday his son will. But McCain’s too classy to talk about that.

Too bad there’s not more of that going around.

I don’t get Will Leitch

Well, I just read that Will Leitch is quitting his baby at Deadspin.

And for what? A contributing editor’s position at New York magazine.

I can’t say I understand that guy. Don’t get me wrong–I absolutely have nothing bad to say about Will Leitch whatsoever. I’m hardly a frequent blogger and even less important than I am frequent.  That said, Deadspin opened my eyes to the blogosphere. Along with Bill Simmons (and Glenn Reynolds), he opened my eyes to the fact that regular people frequently have something to say that’s more insightful than anything the intelligentsia would ever come up with. Not only that, he was gracious enough to link here twice–once for my piece on John Bunting and the other on Lance Armstrong. Both of those posts were the kind of information I wanted to know but the mainstream media never added up, so I did it and Will gave me an audience by linking to it on Deadspin. Power to the people!

So what does he do? He leaves his new media empire, chief of the most important sports blog gateway around, for an old media publication named after the world’s most over-exposed town. I don’t get it. (Maybe it’s the money.)

Earlier this year I read Will’s book Life as a Loser. It’s a compendium of essays he wrote pre-Deadspin. It’s okay, hampered by the fact that his life hasn’t been all that crazy and that he’s just not as good at that type of thing as Chuck Klosterman. (Then again, Klosterman is the king.) But what struck me from reading that book is that Leitch is a huge movie buff, a devotee of Woody Allen, and given a choice would probably like to live life as a movie critic. I thought that was shocking–a midwestern, straight, sports nut who gets shaky knees over Woody Allen? Plus, that kind of thing never seems to invade Leitch’s writing. With Bill Simmons, he reviews movies all the time and it’s obvious that, given the chance, he’d love to take his hand at writing comedy in Hollywood. But until I read Leitch’s memoir I’d have never guessed that. How do you reconcile the guy who edits Deadspin with a guy who wets his shorts over Annie Hall?

I don’t know, and I don’t know any other sports fans who dig Woody Allen. Maybe that’s part of the special mix that makes Will Leitch special.

I wish him well and his voice will be missed. And if he doesn’t name Kige Ramsey the new editor he doesn’t have a hair on his ass.