MORE ON THAT OBAMA PHOTO FLAP FROM ANN ALTHOUSE: “There’s so much talk about about the photo, and my post is drawing so much traffic from various blogs — the kind that try to disqualify me as drunk/stupid — that I have to conclude this criticism — it’s hardly even a criticism, more of an observation — really hurt. . . . In fact, the White House Flickr page — which I check almost daily — gets — I would say — an average of one new photo a day — maybe 2 — and the photos are clearly chosen to flatter President Obama. I have zero doubt that if there is a photo there, the White House believes it presents the President in an excellent light.”

What’s funny is that the pro-Obama blogosphere seems more anxious to protect Obama from a bad image than, you know, the people who are actually in charge of the images. Which was kinda the point of the whole “Bad Optics” discussion.

Plus this on the reaction: “It’s political gold against Sullivan. And I don’t just mean because he played the race card with so little provocation. It’s damaging to Sullivan because the way he arrived at the racial interpretation was entirely by searching around in his own brain. He thought and he thought — he puzzled — and then he realized what looked bad to ‘some people.’ Some people? But that was you seeing that, Andrew! What you see is what you see. How much alienation from one’s own thoughts there must be that you would expose your own racism like that!”

For me, on the other hand, a rather mild photo post has produced comments on how yummy and seductive I am. Win/win!