I was watching the daytime gabfest "The View" today (shut up - I had to watch a segment for work). Basically, The View consists of four horrible shrews and one sweetie pie (the lovable Elisabeth Hasselbeck of Survivor and Puma design fame). Today all the four shrews wanted to discuss was the "bulge" on President Bush's back during the second debate. They speculated away about the President wearing a wire and Barbara Walters even hiked up her far-too-tight jacket to show her own microphone pack as evidence. How this is "evidence", I don't know. We've all watched enough reality television to know that people wear those packs in the small of their back, while President Bush's bulge was clearly on his upper back, between the shoulders.

As the four shrews loudly congratulated themselves on their liberal smarts, Hasselbeck was finally able to shout above their din. She quickly pointed out that A) the President was most likely wearing a bulletproof vest and B) that if he was wearing something else, why in the world would he hunch over and pull his arms in to make it obvious that something was there? Good points. I feel sorry that a classy, intelligent woman like Hasselbeck has to share a stage with those old hags.

I'm not sure how I feel about the fact that the White House doesn't respond to things like this. On one hand, I realize that they don't want to give any of these insane stories any credence. But, on the other hand, they must realize by now that the mainstream media will actively try to defeat the President and so they will do their utmost to keep these kinds of stories alive. As such, the old rules no longer apply. I know the White House would rather talk about the issues than above Karl Rove, but you can't always get what you want.