Hypocrisy, thy name is Simpson.

I'm sure you've all seen the photos of a slightly more robust Jessica Simpson. Frankly, I think a lot of what seems like weight gain was the effect of unflattering pants (not everyone is built to rock a high waist)--but that's beside the point. The fact is, she's still betterlooking than I and a good 90% of the world's population, with or without an extra five pounds.

My issue is with her nepotist sister, Ashlee.

Following the release of Jessica's photos, Ashlee posted a blog saying that "All women come in different shapes, sizes, and forms and just because you're a celebrity, there shouldn't be a different standard" and musing, "How can we expect teenage girls to love and respect themselves in an environment where we criticize a size 2 figure?" She also got really deep: "A week after the inauguration and with such a feeling of hope in the air for our country, I find it completely embarrassing and belittling to all women to read about a woman's weight or figure as a headline on Fox News."

Fair enough. I agree that Fox News has more pressing and pertinent things to run, like how our president's middle name is Hussein and that he's a Socialist.

But there are still three problems here, sweetheart. One, if you're going to embrace all sizes, at least be honest about them. Jessica Simpson is not a size 2. Neither was Jennifer Love Hewitt. I am not a size 2--I am lucky to squeeze my behind into a 6--but I don't lie about it to make myself feel better. I embrace my bodaciousness, and so do the creepy construction workers on West 57th.

Two, what the Hell does Obama have to do with this?

And three: You got a nose job. Pot, meet Kettle.


*By Jess, who craves peanut butter at a really inappropriate time.

I would like to publicly state...

For the past year, I have been planning my wedding detail by detail. And one of my favorite things is my bouquet, because how many brides do you see that walk down the aisle with black flowers?

Damn Ashlee Simpson gets knocked up and married three months before me and carries Black Magic Roses!!!!!

grrr.

just had to let that out.

* By Joelle, who will still have the coolest wedding.

Two patterns:

Blender tends to put women on their covers. I get it. After all, it's a sister mag to Maxim. But it's also a music magazine, so can someone please, for the life of me, explain why the Hades Tila Tequila is on the cover of the latest issue? I know she has that fauxmantic reality show, I know she released a few songs--but they were all shitty. If a music publication is to be taken seriously, why aren't they exposing serious musicians? There are plenty of beautiful femmes who can actually pen and carry a tune (Alanis, Mariah, even Natasha Bedingfield come to mind). Why waste our time on this lascivious leprechaun character?

When a lip synching performer's vocal track errs, they will do a jig. It wasn't just Ashlee Simpson. A singer in a live band at a wedding I went to this weekend did the same thing to a slightly higher-pitched cover of "No One" by Alicia Keys. Once she messed up her vocals, what did she and, subsequently, another male singer do? They did jigs. Is there a law somewhere requiring this?


*By Jess, who did a lot of nothing today.

All I want for Christmas (besides you, dear reader) is an end to shitty musical nepotism.

I'm not talking the father-son kind (because really, Bob Dylan's spawn did well with The Wallflowers, and Sean Lennon's new work is pretty damn good). I'm talking the sibling variety.

First we had Aaron Carter riding the coattails of his Backstreet Boy older brother, Nick. In an orange jumpsuit. And chains. On a trampoline. How utterly gangster, and I say that with an "er" instead of an "a" at the end deliberately.

Soon, we had the Duff sisters (Hilary, who hints occasionally that Aaron Carter actually inspired the hit "So Yesterday," despite her not really writing it), butchering my two favorite songs by two of my favorite bands of all time, The Go-Gos and Blondie. I feel that whoever allowed this to happen should be sent to Abu Ghraib. No paycheck is worth that humiliation. Oh, and speaking of "So Yesterday," I'd like to reiterate a lyric from that for you guys, only because I have to hear it at work every day: "If the light is off, then it isn't on." No shit, sister. The lightbulbs in your overpaid lyricist's heads must have been dimmed to the point of darkness to come up with such inane garbage.

Then we had the Simpson sisters trying to sing. As if Jessica weren't bad enough with her alternately wailing-whispering-hacking (I'm quite ashamed to have her as a namesake), we decided that we wanted more complete and total shit on radio, so we give her gravelly-"voiced" sister a record deal, and she winds up selling even more albums than Jessica ever did despite her ability to vocalize anything besides publicist-bullshit-diatribe (acid reflux my patootie) live being more than a little questionable.

And now, my friends?

Lindsay Lohan's little sister, Ali, is releasing a Christmas album.

If someone would give me a taser as a stocking stuffer, I'd put an end to this insanity.


*By Jess, who is happy that the Jets won today.