i experience a very distinct sadness for women and dignity in general each year the miss america pageant comes around.

apart from the obligatory requests for world peace, requirement for aggressive veneers and the apparent return of the bedazzled pantsuit, there's idea that we continually, as a society, just say, screw it- judging women by their looks is valid.

take, for example, the runner up, whose talent was ventriloyodeling. i am not kidding. a ventriloquist. who ventrilo-yodels. i couldn't make that up.

and the winner. oh, the winner. whose particularly insightful response to a question about national security boiled down do "the main focus of national security should be security."

no, i didn't watch the pageant. but people are talking about it and showing clips from it today. sadly, it continues to be as vapid and stereotypical as always.

thanks america.