Every Picture Tells A Story

by digby

Today I am breaking down the formidable Chinese Wall of the Hullabaloo Empire to editorially endorse my favorite advertiser, Michael Shaw at BagNewsNotes whose work this week is outstanding.

First,he has a take on Joe Lieberman that is both funny and inspired: Holy Joe as man-boy, which explains why he and Lil’ Junior get along so well. (It also explains his fear of sex.)

Without a better way of understanding such things, most people attribute the Lieberman – Bush attraction to a combination of political expedience and shared ideology. However, I think it’s more psychological than that.

When you look at relationships — be they marriages, or the working kind — you tend to find people with generally equivalent degrees of moral and emotional development. (To understand “delayed” moral development, you need only look at the way this country has been governed over the past five years. For example, you find a lot of black-and-white thinking, such as “good” versus “bad” and “us” versus “them”; a preoccupation with authority and obedience; and dramatic, self-centered acts mostly rationalized after the fact.)

Delayed moral advancement tends to go hand-in-hand with the lower rungs of emotional maturity. In kids trapped in adult bodies, you tend to see silliness substituting for wit; awkwardness in the place of poise; passion masquerading as love; aggression covering for strength; and rituals standing in for originality.

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When the Senator says he will run as an independent if he gets knocked off in the Democratic primary, he’s not making a thoughtful judgement, he’s throwing a hissy fit. When Lieberman cozies up to Bush and the two embrace in the Senate chamber, the best analogy is not two mature gay men so much as innocent and excited children recognizing a possible new playmate from the other side of town.

It’s important to click the link so you can see the hilarious visual analysis that accompanies the story.

BagNews also covers the Colbert Miracle from the prespective of duelling screenshots of The Man and the president at the dinner, dissects the Flight 93 trailer, finds the poetry in the rally for Darfur and takes us back to New Orleans with more pictures from the great photographer Alan Chin.

And, by the way, BagNews is also up for best Political Blog in the Webby Awards, which is quite the honor. You can register to vote, here, if you haven’t already. The balloting closes on Friday night. Bagnews is one of the most original blogs out there. His analysis of politics and culture through pictures is incredibly valuable in a culture where “politics is TV with the sound turned off.” Michael has also been a great friend of the left blogosphere, (this blog in particular) buying ads since the dawn of our little venture always creating innovative and interesting visuals for any blogs that feature them. If you have a chance today to go over and vote for BagNews, it would be a nice affirmation of great blogging by a great guy.

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