As usual, Colin Powell is the first to say what other prominent Republicans are only thinking: The eloquent endorser of Barack Obama now warns that conservative media linchpin Rush Limbaugh is destroying the movement.

♦ The New York Times has endorsed Barack Obama, not surprisingly. [NYT]
♦ If Bravo loses Project Runway, there's always the copycat show Fashion House to fill the void. [NYP]
♦ Maer Roshan's Radar magazine has folded. [Gawker]
♦ OK! has a brand new editor, publisher and executive creative director. [NYP]

Hey, were you wondering who the worst political cartoonist in the United States is? We have an answer! It's California-based syndicated cartoonist Gordon Campbell, who took a break from his recent joke-free cartoons about how we are now a nation of communists because of the bailout bill to draw a very special cartoon in which he just colored noted traitor Benedict Arnold black and called him Colin Powell. That is the whole of this cartoon, a portrait of the man who betrayed George Washington and this young nation, in blackface, with white flags, and the utterly insane caption "Benedict Powell... Race Patriot." What does that mean? Let's allow Campbell to explain, in his own words:

General Colin Powell was a swell guy when he was commanding the first war in Iraq. And he was just super when, as Secretary of State for George W. Bush, he sold the second war in Iraq to the United Nations. But now that he's endorsed Barack Obama for President, Powell totally cannot be trusted—and he's black! So says crybaby bastard Rush Limbaugh, anyway. Limbaugh wrote in an email (Did they take away his radio show yet?), "Secretary Powell says his endorsement is not about race. OK, fine. I am now researching his past endorsements to see if I can find all the inexperienced, very liberal, white candidates he has endorsed. I'll let you know what I come up with." As for Powell's concern that a McCain presidency would result in two more conservative appointments to the Supreme Court, Limbaugh wrote: "I was also unaware of his dislike for John Roberts, Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, Anthony Kennedy and Antonin Scalia. I guess he also regrets Reagan and Bush making him a four-star [general] and secretary of state and appointing his son to head the FCC. Yes, let's hear it for transformational figures." [Politico]

Former Secretary of State under George W. Bush, Colin Powell, endorsed Barack Obama for President on Meet the Press this morning. Powell, a Republican and longtime friend of John McCain, said, "I think he is a transformational figure, he is a new generation coming onto the world stage, onto the American stage, and for that reason I'll be voting for Sen. Barack Obama... He's thinking that all villages have values, all towns have values, not just small towns have values." As for McCain and his supporters' straw-grasping, "terrorist" and "Muslim" talk, "I have been disappointed frankly in some of the approaches Senator McCain has taken recently... The party has moved even further to the right and Governor Palin has indicated a further rightward shift. I would have difficulty with two more conservative appointments to the Supreme Court, but that's what we'd be looking at in a McCain administration." Click through to watch the full endorsement. Click to view

Here's a photo from Vanity Fair's article about Oliver Stone's upcoming George Bush biopic W. that is, deliberately we assume, reminiscent of their own cover portrait of the actual war mongers. We have the real Colin Powell, Dick Cheney, and Dubya on the left and then Jeffrey Wright (Powell), Richard Dreyfuss (Cheney), and Josh Brolin (Dubs) on the right (along with fake Karl Rove and fake Paul Wolfowitz). The teaser trailer suggests that the impersonations (if that's what you want to call them), especially Brolin's, are spot-on and we think the likenesses are pretty uncanny, too. Anyone you would have cast differently?

Back in the day, confused Republicans used to like to pretend that careerist military hack Colin Powell would be the first Black President, because he is a Republican who is mostly well-liked. Powell never wanted the job, because he generally refuses to accept positions that force him to do anything other than follow orders (he is a very good soldier! cf. that fucking UN speech), and now he's a pariah for embarrassing the Republican Party in the UN speech and not being a very good Secretary of State. Now terrible hack Bill Kristol—who, as far as we can tell, has no professional or notable personal relationship with Powell—claims he knows for sure that Powell will endorse Barack Obama at the Democratic National Convention. What a scoop! You know, if it's true.