It's going to be a short one today, folks. Since Congress is on yet another one of its week-long vacations, politically it has been a pretty slow week. Even the mainstream media is left fanning the flames of the airport security foofaroo in a desperate attempt to fill their allotted timeslots, in the absence of any real news out of Washington. Well, actually, even if there were such news coming out of Washington, the media would likely still be distracted by the shiniest object in their (quite limited) ability to perceive these things.

But, media-bashing aside, all we've got for you today is a series of unconnected musings, which of course leads us to the altar at which Herb Caen worshipped: Three-Dot Journalism. So without further ado (and with lots of ellipses... of course), we bring you the following random thoughts...

...While watching The Chris Matthews Show this weekend, I had to jot down a word apparently coined on the spur of the moment. Seeing as how this is only a three-dot item, I am feeling too lazy to search out the transcript of the show, so you'll have to look it up yourself to see which inside-the-Beltway pundit came up with this bon mot, sorry.

While discussing certain folks in politics, a word mashup occurred between "celebrity" and "politician" -- giving us "celebritition." To use it in a sentence, "Arnold Schwarzenegger, and other celebrititions of his ilk..." I didn't jot down in my note exactly who was being referenced, either, but a guess that the person so referenced rhymes with "para-salin'" ("When vacationin' in Hawai'i, we got to do some parasalin' near the beach") would probably be the correct one.

Celebritition is an interesting term for an interesting phenomenon I've written about before -- celebrities from the entertainment, sports, or other high-profile worlds who decide late in life to tackle a second career as a politician. I first wrote about this over four years ago, which ended with the then-almost-comedic wish that the rumors were true and Al Franken was going to run for the U.S. Senate.

But, although I initially responded favorably to the "celebritition" as a term, now I am not so sure. Upon reflection, it's not very self-referential. It almost demands to be spoken rather than written, so the proper inflection may be placed, to warn the listener: "Hey, Bozo, new term ahead!" And if used casually in a sentence without much surrounding context, I am not at all sure that it would be obvious that it referred to a celebrity politician and not some sort of action one would go through on the road to celebrity (as in: "Movie Of The Week: The Celebritition Of Miley Cyrus"). The political world's version of "Disney-fication" (Disnification?), in other words.

Perhaps "pol-ebrity" would be better? I'm just saying...

... Speaking of introducing newly-coined phrases to the political world, I was both enthused and disappointed by this week's episode of The Simpsons, I have to say. Because while Bart Simpson did indeed utter the phrase "moose poop," he did so in the literal, secondary meaning of the term -- as I define it, of course.

I defined this particular term two years ago, during the campaign. Here's the reference:

moose poop (n.) -- (1) Synonym for "bullshit," esp. when used to describe falsehoods coming out of Sarah Palin's mouth, or indeed any Republican in the 2008 election. (2) Genteel term for the scat or feces of alces alces (North American moose). See also: moose shit. Usage: (1) I see Sarah Palin's spouting the same old moose poop. (2) Watch your step, there's some moose poop on the trail here.

This, of course, was in response to a still image taken from the "Let's get to know Sarah Palin" video from the Republican Party. This image has not been altered in any way:

Ever since, of course, I have become a tireless advocate for the term, encouraging its use by everyone everywhere, for the betterment of mankind. Ahem. So it was indeed thrilling to hear it from the lips of that arbiter of popular culture, Bartholomew J. Simpson, but disappointing that he was merely identifying strange piles of matter on a forest floor, and not using it in its deeper, less shoe-scraping meaning.

Oh, well, you can't have everything, I suppose. Progress is indeed progress...

... I have to say, I'm not flying anywhere this week, so I have the luxury of watching "National Opt-Out Day" from the sidelines, as it were. Which leaves me free to point something out without making any sort of political statement (which I believe I already took care of yesterday, in high satiric form).

Protest groups seem to always fall into a gigantic trap of their own making. They believe that annoying the heck out of a large segment of the public is going to somehow further their cause. I remember the first time I noticed this was when the first Gulf War was declared, and I watched (I had a somewhat unique viewpoint that day) protestors from Berkeley march onto Interstate 80, stop all traffic, and then march across the Bay Bridge (which carries something like 600,000 vehicles per day into San Francisco). I couldn't help but think, "Boy, they're not really convincing anybody of anything, but they sure are pissing a lot of people off!"

So we'll see what happens tomorrow. The tactic is supposed to be for those annoyed at getting groped to demand to be groped, in the hopes that this brings the security checkpoints to a virtual standstill. What this means is that a lot of folks behind them in the lines may miss their flights home to Grandma for Thanksgiving. Which (picture me scratching head) is supposed to prove... what, exactly?

While these internet-fueled protest campaigns most often fizzle out when it comes down to actual results, in this particular case, the media is not only already along for the ride, but they really really want some video of checkpoint gridlock to show everyone tomorrow night. So who knows how it will actually turn out, and who knows how the media will portray it turning out? Two entirely separate questions, those...

... Seeing as how I seem to be on a somewhat cartooney theme today, I close by saying something that will warm the hearts of the creators of South Park (who famously spent an entire episode decrying the fact that every storyline in existence had already been done before, captured in the refrain: "The Simpsons already did it!"). In this case -- even in an article which has previously referenced said Simpsons -- I have to give credit where credit is due. On the subject of the pain of flying these days, South Park already did it.

In an episode titled "The Entity," Mr. Garrison gets so annoyed at his treatment by both airport security and the airline personnel themselves that he swears he's going to create an alternate method of transportation to take the airlines down. This aired around the time of the hype surrounding the launch of the Segway, I should mention.

I won't go into the rest of the plot much, due to its offensive nature (par for the South Park course, really), except to say that what Garrison comes up with (the "IT") would be extremely uncomfortable to actually operate, if IT actually existed. When these features are explained, "Bill Gates" responds: "But the way it works... do you think people will go through that to travel?" to which "Steve Forbes" replies: "Hey, it still beats what you go through at airports."

So if you have had a tough time traveling this holiday season, I strongly recommend you find a copy of "The Entity" episode of South Park, to view when you get to your destination. I actually did have to look this transcript up, so if downloading a video is impossible on your grandparents' steam-powered computer, then you can at least read it (if you've got a twisted sense of humor, I should at least warn)....

-- Chris Weigant

Follow Chris on Twitter: @ChrisWeigant