Aubrey's Blue Athletic Outfit

Aubrey is previously here.

She takes good care of her body. Very fit looking.

Michelle Obama at Slave Auction

There's no other way for me to conceptualize this other than the kind of physical examination of black chattel by white traders at a slave auction: Erin Aubry Kaplan's discussion of Michelle Obama's bottom represents one of the lowest, most explicitly race-conscious - and hence racist - essays imaginable.

The piece, "First Lady Got Back," is written from the perspective of one black woman admiring another, but for the life of me I can't fathom the rationale for publishing an essay like this at a major journal at time when the country is supposed to be transcending. There is no decency here, and no class. This part is especially revealing in its degradation of Mrs. Obama:

From the ocean of nastiness and confusion that defined this campaign from the beginning, Michelle rose up like Venus on the waves, keeping her coif above water and cruising the coattails of history to present us with a brand-new beauty norm before we knew it was even happening.

Actually, it took me and a lot of other similarly configured black women by surprise. So anxious and indignant were we about Michelle getting attacked for saying anything about America that conservatives could turn into mud, we hardly looked south of her neck. I noted her business suits and the fact she hardly ever wore pants (unlike Hillary). As I gradually relaxed, as Michelle strode onto more stages and people started focusing on her clothes and presence instead of her patriotism, it dawned on me -- good God, she has a butt! "Obama’s baby (mama) got back," wrote one feminist blogger. "OMG, her butt is humongous!" went a typical comment on one African-American online forum, and while it isn't humongous, per se, it is a solid, round, black, class-A boo-tay. Try as Michelle might to cover it with those Mamie Eisenhower skirts and sheath dresses meant to reassure mainstream voters, the butt would not be denied.

As America fretted about Obama's exoticism and he sought to calm the waters with speeches about unity and common experience, Michelle's body was sending a different message: To hell with biracialism! Compromise, bipartisanship? Don't think so. Here was one clear signifier of blackness that couldn't be tamed, muted or otherwise made invisible. It emerged right before our eyes, in the midst of our growing uncertainty about everything, and we were too bogged down in the daily campaign madness to notice. The one clear predictor of success that the pundits, despite all their fancy maps, charts and holograms, missed completely? Michelle's butt.

Lord knows, it's time the butt got some respect. Ever since slavery, it's been both vilified and fetishized as the most singular of all black female features, more unsettling than dark skin and full lips, the thing that marked black women as uncouth and not quite ready for civilization (of course, it also made them mighty attractive to white men, which further stoked fears of miscegenation that lay at the heart of legal and social segregation). In modern times, the butt has demarcated class and stature among black society itself. Emphasizing it or not separates dignified black women from ho's, party girls from professionals, hip-hop from serious. (Black women are not the only ones with protruding behinds, by the way, but they're certainly considered its source. How many gluteally endowed nonblack women have been derided for having a black ass? Well, Hillary, for one.)

Erin Aubry Kaplan is a columnist for the Los Angeles Times who happens to be black. If a white conservative columnist published this at, say, the Wall Street Journal or the Weekly Standard, the Democratic-left would be up in arms with yet another cry of racism!

My first thought when getting to the section about Mrs. Obama's "solid, round, black, class-A boo-tay" was thinking that here's what the slave traders would be saying, back in 1830, if the president-elect's wife was stripped naked and slathered in oil, tied to a post up on a "stage" while an auctioneer made the case for a strong "field nigger" with "solid hindquarters" and sharp muscle tone conducive to long, stooped hours picking cotton, with the added bonus of a "near-burble" skin to withstand the searing midday sun.

Anyone who's read classic novels like Jubilee or Uncle Tom's Cabin has some recollection of the dehumanizing nature of the chattel slave markets.

Erin Aubrey Kaplan should know better.

Captain Ed's got more.

Butthole Bangers on Parade: In-Your-Face Homosexuals Defile Tournament of Roses

I don't think Robin Abcarian gets it --- and that's pretty surprising, considering how well the Duck Dynasty deal turned out for the GLAAD ayatollahs.

Here's her piece, "Relax. Rose Parade gay marriage float is not the apocalypse":

Breaking: Sky still intact after gay wedding on Rose Parade float. Mazel Tov to the grooms! pic.twitter.com/ueUdY4vVRu
— Robin Abcarian (@robinabcarian) January 1, 2014

A commenter named Angela Wingenroth, who identified herself as a stay-at-home mother, vowed not to allow her daughters to watch the parade:

"We don't care what the states say about it -- God is clear that this isn't right and I will NOT have this SHOVED DOWN MY CHILDREN’S THROATS!! The intolerance is theirs. They will not accept peoples' objections to their lifestyle -- you HAVE to accept that it's not just ok, but GOOD or you're a bigot! If they want to get ‘married,’ that's their choice, but my kids don't need to see it.”

Putting aside the twisted logic of accusing someone of intolerance because they are intolerant of your intolerance, I think I can put Wingenroth’s fears to rest.

As it turns out, the gay marriage float, sponsored by the AIDS Healthcare Foundation is not a “featured float” with microphones. Most people who see it in person will only hear the Indigo Girls song “Power of Two” emanating from its speakers.

As for the actual wedding ceremony? It will be on camera for just 15 seconds, when the float passes in front of the KTLA-TV cameras, at precisely 9:44:50 a.m. Pacific time.

At that moment, Aubrey Loots, 42, and Danny Leclair, 45, who own a chain of Los Angeles hair salons, will be joined in holy matrimony by the Rev. Alfreda “Freda” Lanoix. A lesbian couple, Sharon Raphael and Mina Meyer, who have been together for 42 years and married in California in 2008, will serve as witnesses.

In other words, Ms. Wingenroth, blink and you and your daughters will miss the wedding.

Again, Duck Dynasty shows it's not "twisted logic." Millions of Americans are tired of in-your-face homosexuality. And they're tired of being harassed as "bigots" if they dare express their disagreement with such objectively depraved behavior.

And notice something else here: The Los Angeles Times makes sure to announce how the homosexual wedding went off without a hitch, with a photo of the lucky homos getting married, "Same-sex wedding occurs without incident on Rose Parade float." But the truly big story is how many leftist protesters were arrested while demonstrating against Sea World's parade float. Twitchy has that, "PETA protests Sea World float at Rose Bowl Parade; 17 arrested." I guess that doesn't fit with the left's "radical right-wing" narrative, or something. Pathetic.

PETA tweets fotos of arrest after protesting SeaWorld RoseParade float http://t.co/zdktSoL01w @sarahbatcha #blackfish pic.twitter.com/mPIooJkE4K
— OrcaSOS (@OrcaSOS) January 1, 2014

Aubrey

On  Twitter:

Aubrey Again

On Twitter.

And previously here.

Smokin' Sunday #Rule5

Last week's entry is here, "Sunday #Rule5."

Starting things off this week is Pirate's Cove, "Sorta Blogless Sunday Pinup," and "If All You See……is a horrible smartphone sucking up vampire energy, you might just be Warmist."

More at Randy’s Roundtable, "Thursday Nite Tart - Pamela David."

Soylent has the "Brunch Buffet" (I think).

Plus, some luscious stuff at Odie's, "It's a Sign ~OR~ Rule 5 Woodsterman Style."

Subject to Change has "Humpday" --- and it's hot!

At Postal Dogs, "Natalie Gulbis is hanging in there."

Also at Good Stuff's, "Danielle Colby Cushman."

From Blackmailers Don't Shoot, "Pretty Girls on a Thursday, Aubrey Plaza Edition."

And at Camp of the Saints, "Rule 5 Saturday: Zoe Alexandra."

Also Daley Gator, "DaleyGator DaleyBabes: Audia Tulloch."

More at Knuckledraggin', "Mid-morning hottie."

And In a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World has the "Friday Pinups."

Plus, from Drunken Stepfather, "Steplinks of the Day."

At 90 Miles From Tyranny, "Morning Mistress," and "Hot Pick of the Late Night."

More from Proof Positive, "Best of the Web* Linkaround."

Still more from Dana Pico, "Rule 5 Blogging: Even neutral Sweden has an Army!"

See also Bro My God, "Reminder: Girls Are Beautiful." (Via Linkiest.)

See also the Hostages, "Big Boob Friday."

A View from the Beach has, "Striped Bass Fishing With a Girl on Lake Lanier."

EBL has, "Cowboys vs. Giants."

Plus, here's a special appearance by Marooned in Marin, "Mark Levin: This Nation Is In Grave Danger (Nuclear Option)."

BONUS: At the Other McCain, "FMJRA 2.0: Cathedral Oceans."

Drop your links in the comments of I've missed your Rule 5.

Until then...

Aubrey

 A lovely Only Fans star, on Twitter.

Gov. Jerry Brown Looks at Reshaping California's Higher Education

I wrote on this previously, "Governor Brown Seeks Dramatic Community College Makeover."

And now at the New York Times, "In California, Son Gets Chance to Restore Luster to a Legacy":

LOS ANGELES — During a 1960s renaissance, California’s public university system came to be seen as a model for the rest of the country and an economic engine for the state. Seven new campuses opened, statewide enrollment doubled, and state spending on higher education more than doubled. The man widely credited with the ascendance was Gov. Edmund G. Brown, known as Pat.

Decades of state budget cuts have chipped away at California’s community colleges, California State University and the University of California, once the state’s brightest beacons of pride. But now Pat Brown’s son, Gov. Jerry Brown, seems determined to restore some of the luster to the institution that remains a key part of his father’s legacy.

Last year, he told voters that a tax increase was the only way to avoid more years of drastic cuts. Now, with the tax increase approved and universities anticipating more money from the state for the first time in years, the second Governor Brown is a man eager to take an active role in shaping the University of California and California State University systems.

Governor Brown holds a position on the board of trustees for both Cal State and UC. Since November, he has attended every meeting of both boards, asking about everything from dormitories to private donations and federal student loans. He is twisting arms on issues he has long held dear, like slashing executive pay and increasing teaching requirements for professors — ideas that have long been met with considerable resistance from academia. But Mr. Brown, himself a graduate of University of California, Berkeley, has never been a man to shrink from a debate.

“The language we use when talking about the university must be honest and clear,” he said in a recent interview. “Words like ‘quality’ have no apparent meaning that is obvious. These are internally defined to meet institutional needs rather than societal objectives.”

California’s public colleges — so central to the state’s identity that their independence is enshrined in its Constitution — have long been seen as gateways to the middle class. Mr. Brown said his mother had attended the schools “basically free.” Over the last five years tuition at UC and Cal State schools has shot up, though the colleges remain some of the less costly in the country.

Governors and legislatures are trying to exert more influence on state colleges, often trying to prod the schools to save money, matters that some say are “arguably best left to the academic institution,” said John Aubrey Douglass, a senior research fellow of public policy and higher education at Berkeley. So far, Mr. Brown has not taken such an aggressive approach, but half of the $250 million increase for the university systems is contingent on a tuition freeze.

“He’s creating stability, but basically he’s looking at cost containment with an eye on the public constituency,” Mr. Douglass said. “But the system has been through a very long period of disinvestment, and this may meet an immediate political need, but it is not what is going to help in the long term.”

I think he could do more for education --- and for the state as a whole --- by expanding economic growth and opportunity. It would take pressure off the higher education system, for one thing. As it is now the colleges and universities are expected to be saviors for all manner of societal failure, especially crime, poverty and social breakdown. A strong economy, through deregulation and business expansion, would help create a rising tide to lift all boats. I hope that doesn't get overlooked amid all the hoopla about increasing tax revenues. People need to learn the lessons of the past decade.

More at that top link, plus interesting photos.

And from some not unrelated thoughts, see Joel Kotkin, at the O.C. Register, "California Is Becoming Less Family-Friendly."

Serotonin Boost (Nah, Testosterone Boost)

From Ms. Aubrey, on Twitter: