Bad Santa

Red Dirt's daughter, take heart: Apparently, there are lots of kiddies out there who are leery of fat old men who urge children to hop up on their lap. Check out this Scared of Santa picture gallery.

And while we're on the topic of freaky Father Christmases ...

I've said it before and I'll say it again ... Michelle Malkin might be a hottie in the (admittedly not-so-sexy) world of ultra-right wing punditry, but she is one crazy-assed wacko. Talk about humorless. Among the latest targets of her fury is Robert Smigel's recent "Blue Christmas" cartoon (aired on the Dec. 18 "Saturday Night Live") that satirizes the old Rankin/Bass Christmas specials while skewering the current political and cultural divide in our country.

The cartoon in question (available for viewing here) ridicules the stereotypes of Red Staters -- not Red Staters themselves -- by giving us a strident, left-wing Santa who refuses to bring Yuletide gifts this year to those inbred imbecile children of Red State America.

Evidently, Michelle takes the cartoon at face value. "In addition to cruelly mocking Rush Limbaugh," she writes," the cartoon ... shows Santa and Rudolph skipping over the Red States (referred to on a map as Dumbf*ckistan), commiserating at a Chinese restaurant with Al Franken, Natalie Merchant, Moby, and Margaret Cho, and then taunting a little girl as a religious bigot for believing in God. There's the liberal holiday spirit for you. Pathetic losers."

Memo to Malkin: Look up meaning of "irony."