I appreciate that these awards are about a most sincere sarcasm but even in this negative context the awarding of an accolade feels highly inappropriate relative to the gravity of events that both the winners and nominees have wrought upon our country. Maybe I am taking this too seriously but I find it impossible to find even the slightest shred of humor in how demonstrably the Bush administration has harmed this nation. It is a sad commentary that we've been compelled for reasons of nothing less that the most fundamental moral and ethical corruption of our most sacred institutions, to displace justice with humor. I just cannot laugh.

A laugh a minute! Finally, a New Years Day event we can all look forward to.

Maybe you should actually organize an event, broadcast this one, too, it would be a lot of fun to watch...

And you certainly need to come up with more categories, such as "most hilarious serial buffoon", which would surely have included George Allen, Larry Craig (Craig gets the Most Versatile Buffoon award, surely) Rick "puppy love" Santorum,

...and the winner of the serial buffoon award is none other than Deadeye Dick Cheney, from shooting his pal in the jugular vein, to lurking in the bushes as Bush misspoke, to conjuring up new-age mushroom clouds, to fomenting typical Bush-era diplomacy with Iran, he's been the star of stars.

George Bush chiming in here!  (Had to take over the troll patrol to do it!  hey, what is a troll?  and what's with that "seek wisdom" down below this white space here?)

Well, I like the limelight!  So I'm glad to accept the award.  I never read the papers.  And the internets.. who needs em?  But I like awards.  I'm having so much fun being president.  Still hoping to be dictator. 

Off to do some biking.  Thanks again.  tpm... what does that mean?

Seek Wisdom

I'm a big fan, but this was distinguished by things not associated with TPM.

It was heavy-handed, predictable, unfunny, and annoying. The categories were not particularly reflective of the entrants, the entrants drop-kicked road kill. It was humor of a level the conservatives tried with their lame, pathetic, and derivative attempt at The Daily Show on Faux. Further, the build ups overshadowed the finale. And were funnier. Really, I'm not hungover.

And Gonzales gets skunked? Come on.

darkcloud@darkendeavors.com

Per Wholly Rogue E, my "'I don't agree it's inappropriate to call attention to official conduct' doesn't actually make sense, or not in any 'standard English' sense ... Can you explain or clarify what you tried to tell us? What is it that you don't agree with?" You see, a previous commentator dumped on Josh for being just jocular. I was disagreeing and supporting the outing of official (mis)conduct, although evidently in an old fogey way of my own. 

John 

http://www.haberarts.com/

First things first - I like the idea of the Golden Dukes, I like the irreverance, and good job getting such a distinguished panel of judges. The choice of John Dean was particularly apt.

Perhaps the issue here, assuming the Golden Dukes are not going to be a one-hit wonder, is that the winners this year have set the benchmark against which future awards will be decided. And I can't help but feel Alberto Gonzales is to the Golden Dukes what The Shawshank Redemption was to the Oscars.

I guess I can understand the choice of George Bush and Bradley Schlozman for their respective awards where Gonzales must have been a strong contender, but I must disagree with your judges on the choice of Sara Taylor for Best Testimonial Trainwreck. That award had to be Gonzales', and here's my reasoning.

1. Sara Taylor is a junior GOP loyalist in training, someone out of her depth and frankly some sort of competent testimony would seem beyond her experience and/or capability. (Lurita Doan is the same class of nominee, so too Monica Goodling)

Gonzales, in contrast, was the Attorney-General. You expect, at the very least, something a little polished from a person in his position. You certainly do not expect, for example, to see his chief of staff flatly contradict him.

2. Sara Taylor's testimony did not lead to a perjury investigation. Different story with Gonzales.

3. Gonzales' press conferences provided information that conflicted with with what he had testified, or would testify in future.

4. Gonzales achieved an improbable bipartisan consensus that he was unfit for his job. He managed to draw criticism even from staunch GOP loyalists such as Jeff Sessions and Tom Coburn.

One argument in favor of Sara Taylor over Gonzales is that Gonzales' testimony was more successful in protecting the higher-ups. But I think this obfuscates a key point; that both their testimonies removed all doubt about the politicization of federal government (and thus allowed George Bush to claim his Golden Duke).

And here's the thing, in years ahead, most of us will forget the Sara Taylor testimony. It will fade into the morass of corruption and ineptitude of the Bush era exemplified by all the other lower level GP operatives. But we won't forget Gonzales, because he was the Attorney-General.

It's like The Shawshank Redemption, which pretty much every fan of the film knows did not win any Oscars. Do you remember which films beat it out? Pulp Fiction and Forrest Gump, mainly the latter. But you know the academy missed a great opportunity to recognize a timeless film, and I reckon the Golden Duke elites missed a similar opportunity with Gonzales.

Compared with previous AG's defense of executive malfeasance of yesteryear, Gonzales' perfomance was masterfully appalling. Sheer perfection in terms of its mendacity, deception, incompetence, feebleness, corruption, cronyism, and (attempted) chutzpah. Whilst we might see Sara Taylor's like again, I cannot imagine any AG would demean himself and the office quite as thoroughly as Gonzales.

Sara Taylor is Forrest Gump, a likeable film but with a rather glaring lack of depth or subtlety. Gonzales is Shawshank, a production blanketed by every layer of filmic greatness. Just disappointed the judges didn't see it that way...

I must defend the judges' choice of Sara Taylor, the quintessential emblem of Republicans of our era. Hertzberg said it perfectly: "But what singles her out as deserving the Dukie is her belief that she had taken 'an oath to the President.' This sums up much of what is wrong with the Bush Administration, from its cult-of-personality code of allegiance to the Leader to its ignorant disregard of the Constitution."

That said, the Fredo idea is brilliant. The Dukies' own answer to the Oscars' Irving Thalberg award, in memory of a guy so incompetent, unethical, and just plain weaselly that he defied pigeonholing into any single Dukie category.