Meet David Horsey, Pulitzer-Prize-Winning Cartoonist

David Horsey won two Pulitzers, in 1999 and 2002, for his political cartoons for the now-defunct Seattle Post-Intelligencer. Now the P-I's successor, seattlepi.com, has given him a blog. Needless to say, it won't be winning any Pulitzers.

(BTW, the title of this post, "The skinny on beauty queens," refers to the fact that Horsey prefers his beauty queens with "a healthy bit of meat on their bones.")

The saving grace of Barbie is that she could never open her mouth and say something that would reveal the empty space in her little plastic head.

Hmmm, I always thought the saving grace of Barbie was that you could pop her little plastic head off, make her little plastic boyfriend wear girl clothes, and put her little plastic body in the microwave. But maybe Horsey didn't play with his Barbies the way I did.

Moving on:

Lately, real life Barbies

Wait a minute. "Real life Barbies"? I'm no fan of beauty contests, but I do think their contestants are, you know, human.

Lately, real life Barbies have been making news for opening their mouths and letting their deepest thoughts spill out. Last year, a Miss Teenage USA contestant gained instant Youtube notoriety with a rambling, utterly nonsensical monologue about world affairs that made Sarah Palin look like a genius in comparison. More recently, at the climax of the Miss USA pageant, Miss California was asked to share her opinion about gay marriage and, when she expressed the view that marital bliss is intended for Kens and Barbies, not Kens and Kens, she was pilloried.

... Personally, I'm not especially upset when a beauty queen expresses an opinion with which I may not agree. Thank the Lord for the First Amendment. And, like every other smarty-pants cultural elitist in the country, I am hugely entertained when one of them proves incapable of expressing any coherent opinion whatsoever.

On the one hand: Human Barbies shouldn't open their silly little mouths--they're in a beauty contest, not the National Merit Finals! On the other hand, isn't it hilarious when beauty queens try to think because good-looking women are so stupid!

Unfortunately, Horsey's utter lack of a coherent point, unlike making Ken play dress-up, isn't "hugely entertaining." However, it certainly proves that he's "incapable of expressing any coherent opinion whatsoever." Maybe cartoonists, like beauty queens, ought to keep their mouths shut and do what they're good at.

Via my friend Stephanie, who notes, "Men compete in stupid, degrading contests, too. I'd say professional footballers aren't exactly the brightest bulbs in the bunch, but you don't see David Horsey gleefully cheering at their stupidity."