My dad sent me a clip from the August 13 New York Times, with two passages circled. It’s a review of some guy named Brian Dykstra’s off Broadway show “Bryan Dykstra: Cornered and Alone.” The first circled part is the opening paragraph (I’m typing it out so typos are mine):

“Here’s how Brian Dykstra describes George W. Bush: ‘My A.D.D.-suffering, dyslexic, drunk-driving Bush Klan president with a 13-minute attention span, leaky brain pan” – we pause here to omit a deprecating anatomical reference – the “I.Q. of a cracked blue soap dish, the verbal skills of a glue-sniffing gerbil with social-anxiety disorder”with “that severely self-medicated wife (and who can blame her?)”

The second circled part is this sentence which appears in the second-to-last paragraph after a long not very interesting discussion about how Republicans might want to skip some shows while visiting the city during the GOP convention:

“The only problem with Mr. Dykstra’s show is that it doesn’t start until a half-hour after he has taken the stage….[Italics mine]

Can anyone imagine a review of a one-man show full of such facile bile aimed at Bill Clinton A) being reviewed by the Times? B) Being criticized solely for taking too long to get going?