Jessica Simpson at New York Fashion Week

Question: Who was Michael Kors' inspiration when he loaned Jessica Simpson this dress? Omar the tent maker.

Jessica Simpson and Nina Garcia at Project Runway Season 8 Finale

Oh, Michael, how could you do this to the poor girl!

What a fashion disaster! The Daily Mail was kind and called her frumpy. Which makes one ask, what was Lifetime thinking in bringing her on as a guest judge? I'm one of the skeptics, but I guess I'll wait and see how well she does. She may surprise us yet. Here is the Fug Girls' take on the Project Runway 8 finale in New York Fashion. Y'all can just google Tom and Lorenzo.

Zipper-dee-doo-dah and Hallelujah! Or the Revival of Project Runway

Project Runway is back! The gods have accepted my offerings of clothes from the 80s in exchange for a return of the PR of old ... and, praise and hallelujah, they have listened! Forget good clothes. Forget great design. It was the bitchiness I was craving and that had been sorely missing ...

Let's face it, the last two episodes of Project Runway Season 8 had nothing to do with the dresses. My assessment of the two collections and altered bridesmaids dresses can be summed up with simple phrases: Butt ugly. Pedestrian. WTF!? Seen that/done that. Grandmother's closet. Anemic. Trash/no class. And zipper-dee-doo-dah!

My discards from my 1980s closet

I suspect that even Lerners and J.C. Penny would balk at hanging most of these outfits on their discount racks.

I have been a devoted fan for all eight of Project Runway seasons, and in the first two years of this blog's existence behaved like a Bravo groupie. Then, like the Mets leaving New York, and the Colts bolting from Baltimore, Heidi took her show to Lifetime.

LIFETIME!? Isn't that the channel where actresses whose careers have tanked, or never took off, make movies for stay-at-home moms and blue-haired old ladies? My PR loyalty was sorely tested.

These past two PR seasons I've merely schlepped along, watching the show from the corner of my eye while performing tasks around the house, like cleaning toilets. It's a sad indictment when Models of the Runway provided more excitement than the Main Event.

Season 8 contestants haven't displayed anywhere near the level of creativity that past PR designers have shown (ENOUGH with the zippers already!), yet my interest in this show has suddenly been rejuvenated. Why is that?

Wendy Pepper's designs proved that good taste is not necessarily entertaining

Perhaps the writers, editors and directors suddenly SAW the LIGHT. With blinding clarity someone must have realized that viewers are not as much drawn to the clothes or designs, as to the personalities of the designers.

We will tune in to watch no-name and struggling designers if we are presented with color, drama, conflict, clashing personalities, bitchery, back-stabbing, and two-faced cussedness. Vanilla boring clothes are fine. So is a lack of talent. Just as long as sparks fly. How else can we explain Wendy Pepper's wild popularity as the premier PR bitch against whom all other PR bitches are still compared?

Watching PR last season was like counting drips from a faucet. There's no drama or tension when designers like and respect each other. Last week we watched the judges toy with the losing team like a cat with five mouses - each one playfully reminding them that someone had to leave. Oh, the back stabbing! The bitchery. The absolute delight Heidi took in forcing the team to choose one of their own kind for slaughter. Then good old Gretched stepped up to the plate and delivered. BIG TIME. Fashionistas across the land raised their martinis in awe.

United we stand. A Gift from the Gods moment.

This season, Lifetime was offered GIFTS FROM THE GODS in the forms of Gretched, Ivy, Casanova, Mondo, Peach, April, Valerie, and Michael C. What a motley and entertaining crew!

Let's look into the personality disorders of the major players a little more closely, shall we?

Gretched (I know, I know - Gretchen)

Motto: A force to be reckoned with.
Talent-o-meter: Creative, can style and sew. Makes the same well-sewn outfits over and over.
Scale of Self-delusion: Off the charts. Confuses bossiness and pre-emptive interference with being helpful.
Personality quirk: Suffers from a superiority complex. Addicted to tall Piperlime boots.
Gift from the Gods rating: Five platinum bars.


Casanova

Motto: I dunno what happen wit my taste!
Talent-o-meter: Breathtaking sewing skills; can create complicated, well-constructed gowns in no time. Taste level is wobbly. Some outfits are awesome, others laughably bad.
Scale of Self-delusion: Moving towards the center. He is listening closely to Tim and it shows.
Personality quirk: Unafraid to showcase his nipples and pointy-toed shoes.
Gift from the Gods rating: Five gold bars.

Ivy

Motto: Execute it beautifully.
Talent-o-meter: Her insipid, anemic, and uninspired designs resemble the outfits she wears. Can execute and sew.
Scale of Self-delusion: Off the charts. Regards herself as a top notch designer, but has received absolutely no confirmation from the judges to back up her claim.
Personality quirk: Gretched's mini me, and irritating, like a gnat.
Gift from the Gods rating: Five gold bars


Michael C.

Motto: I'm gonna win (and show up you bitches)
Talent-o-meter: Designs but can't sew. Mostly talented at hiding his true personality from the viewing audience. (See Peach's exit interview with Tom and Lorenzo)
Scale of self-delusion: Off the charts. Actually thinks his Carmen Miranda dresses are fashion.
Personality quirk: His naked ambition and false “poor me” stance irritated the bejeesuz out of the other designers, turning them into a pack of raving, clawing wolves.
Gift from the Gods rating: Five platinum bars

Let's not forget Valerie's cray-cray comments and rubber-faced expressions, April's cool, bitchy assessments of the competition, and Mondo's bouffant hair and quirky talent.

With such over the top players on this year's PR stage, how can viewers not be mesmerized? I do hope that next year, Lifetime won't toss out great designers in favor of the "characters", but that they'll find a nice balance of both, the way Bravo did.

I admit being turned off for a while by what I perceived to be bullying and a ganging up on Michael C, until Peach, that lovely, likable designer for the country club set, revealed the following delicious tidbit in her interview with Tom and Lorenzo:

“Michael Costello … wants his own reality show and he’s creating this character that you see. There were two sides of Michael Costello and one of them did not have the nicest language; not just curse words, subject matter too. I don’t know how to put it, but he is not the victim that they’re painting him to be.”

Apparently A.J. agreed, tweeting that Michael C. was acting for the cameras. If this is so, then the little crying jag we were treated to was all for show. Way to go, Michael! The editors must have been whooping for joy!

I hope Lifetime gives Michael C. the reality show he so craves. Perhaps they could title it A Douchebag Designs Duds for Divas, in which he creates outfits for Brigitte Nielsen, Bristol Palin, Octomom, Kate Gosslin, Wendy Pepper, Jan Brewer, Ann Coulter, Michelle Duggar, Sharron Angle, and Heidi Montag, just to name a few.

As for next week's show, I am already salivating in anticipation. Aren't you?

Biased News: Hounding a Good Woman

The following extensive quote comes from an interview that Joe Strupp from Media Matters conducted with Shirley Sherrod, the victim of Breitbart, Fox, and racism. Breitbart is a right wing, self-styled journalist. Fox claims it disseminates unbiased news. These liars in righ-wing clothing swooped their collective strength down on an ordinary hard-working African American woman, destroying her reputation for no reason other than self-aggrandisement. Shame on both and a pox on both their so-called news houses:

Here is a portion of the text of the interview by Joe Strupp and in Shirley's own words::

"But the clear damage to Sherrod comes from Breitbart, who posted the tape without context, and Fox, which ran with the story and did not seek to confirm it.

"The news media should tell it like it is and not the way they want it to be," she said.

Sherrod said Breitbart never contacted her before posting the video clip to ask about it.

"I never heard that name until a few minutes ago," she said Tuesday night about Breitbart. "He never contacted me. I think they intended it to be what it ended up being, a racist thing that could unite even more the racist people out there who follow them."

She also said Fox News never checked the facts with her before posting a story and the video clip.

"Not before they reported it," she said of Fox's negligence. "They have called me today and initially I had said yes (to an interview), but I thought about it and I did not think they intended to be fair in their reporting. They are going to say what they want to say regardless of what I say."

She said Fox showed no professionalism in continuing to bother her for an interview, but failing to correct their coverage.

"I think they should but they won't. They intended exactly what they did. They were looking for the result they got yesterday," she said of Fox. "I am just a pawn. I was just here. They are after a bigger thing, they would love to take us back to where we were many years ago. Back to where black people were looking down, not looking white folks in the face, not being able to compete for a job out there and not be a whole person."

Still, Fox continued to push for an interview with her, Sherrod said.

"It was unbelievable. I am refusing to be on there. They have been calling me and calling me. I have refused to do an interview because they are biased," she explained. "I don't think Fox News does it fairly. It is worse so now. I have sat and listened to the way they cover the news even before this administration and I saw what was going on."

Sherrod said this situation has worsened her view of racism in media coverage.

"I think it is race. You think we have come a long way in terms of race relations in this country, but we keep going backwards," she said. "We have become more racist. This was their doing, Breitbart put that together misrepresenting what I was saying and Fox carried it."

Sherrod said she has gotten no future job offers and believes this will scar her reputation forever, even if all the facts come out.

"There will be people who always think of this," she said. "I can see in the future whatever I do, this story will be recounted, no matter what. This will be brought up. People will constantly be trying to point out negative things."

Have other job offers come up? "No, no one. People are afraid of me now, I guess, with all of this. That is the other fallout from this. Anyone would be afraid of me, maybe I am a troublemaker, a racist."

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack said he is reviewing the matter, hinting that Sherrod could possibly get her job back.

Asked if she would return if asked, she said: "I think I would have to go back for a short time, even if I did not stay for a long haul. I would need to prove a point, that I can be bigger than them. I was doing a lot of good things. People had access to that office that never did before. I had reached out to the poorest counties."

As we know, she was offered a job. Like her, I do believe that her reputation has been forever damaged. What strikes me most in this controversy is the number of people who still think that her firing was reasonable and that she is a racist. She owned up to a mistake made years ago, but many think that she still thinks along those veins. Reading the comments on this Hot Air post gave me the willies. Why are these people so vitriolic against someone they have never met? Is common sense debate no longer possible in our country?

To make matters worse, after the farmer and his wife in question were interviewed by CNN, Breitbart's primary reaction on another show was to ask, "How do they know this is really the farmer's wife?" Nice, Breitbart. Really classy.