Very few people in the United States understand how the byzantine delegate party system works, and according to Politico, New Hampshire Republicans are hoping to use this fact to their advantage to freeze out Donald Trump.

For a few days each year, Texans of the furry persuasion head down to the Crowne Plaza North Dallas-Addison to let their fur flag fly at the annual Furry Fiesta fandom convention.

Last night, the Ronulans decided that they were gonna take their Paul and go home.

As if the hours of Republicans dancing broadcast on CSPAN yesterday wasn't steamy enough, here it is, edited down by Corey Ann Clark and set to "My Neck, My Back." "**WARNING YOUR HORNY LEVEL WILL SOON BE VERY HIGH**," Clark writes. "While I was watching the RNC yesterday, I noticed during the musical numbers some of the ladies of the party getting RED HOT. Luckiliy, I was able to obtain 45 minutes worth of this footage and crammed it into 3 minutes of lustful hounds twirling their fingers, even more raunchy, taking off their ten gallon hats." Current horney level: about to explode. [Corey Ann Clark, h/t Richard Gin]

Granted, this ckip of Late Night With Conan O'Brien star Triumph the Insult Comic Dog's trip to the Republican National Convention is a couple days late. But, hey, it just went up on Youtube yesterday. And besides, as NBC always says, if you haven't seen it yet, it's new to you! The Fox News/Ann Coulter strap-on joke alone is worth watching. Canine comedy after the jump.

So what if Hurricane Gustav displaces thousands, destroys their homes, and further devastates an already devastated region of these United States? Filmmaker Michael Moore sees a silver lining around the eerily quiet eye of the disastrous storm: It will screw-up the Republican National Convention. Already, John McCain is saying his party might have to postpone the Convention. And Moore couldn't be more tickled. He told MSNBC's Keith Olbermann, "I was just thinking, this Gustav is proof that there is a God in heaven. To just have it planned at the same time, that it would actually be on its way to New Orleans for Day One of the Republican convention, up in the Twin Cities, at the top of the Mississippi River."

With thousands of "Family Values"-type conservatives descending on St. Paul, Minnesota, for the Republican National convention, area locals-who are largely Democratic, progressive and, yes, gay-are being asked to do their best to make the visiting Right Wingers feel more at home in a series of fun commercials which urge, "The Republicans Are Coming... Make An Effort." One example after the jump.

The appearance of a giant pot-leaf poster and an "IMPEACH BUSH" skull behind Chris Matthews must have flustered him, given what he said next...

ATTENTION ALL MANHATTAN EMPLOYERS: As a service to you, in order to identify your honest employees from those longhaired liberals, The Village Voice has printed a list of every single person — that's 1,793 protesters — arrested during last week's Republican reign of terror. "The guest list at Pier 57" is even organized by date for your convenience! Now you can identify those who were truly calling in sick versus those who were locked up and trying to not drop the soap. Let the pink-slipping begin.
The Honor Roll [Village Voice]

We were rather thankful to have avoided any republican parties, an emotion further validated by another reader report. Last night's party at Gotham Hall lacked a single celeb-worthy soul, but now we know "it" boy Fabian Basabe is back in town. Thank God, now we can move on with our lives!

The post-RNC nuclear fallout continues and we just figured how TOTALLY liberal New York media is after this week. We've received reports of Fox News' mascot Bill O'Reilly discontent with New York magazine's special convention editor Maer Roshan over the images of Republicans as chosen by the magazine's art department. Apparently, some feel New York didn't use the most flattering pictures of GOPers in the magazine's special convention issue, and O'Reilly thinks it's another move on behalf of the liberal media to make Republicans look less than gorgeous. Yeah, like it's that hard to do.

After the Republican exodus has raised NYC's attractiveness quotient back to its original level, we're left with little more than memories of an inconvenient week. Thankfully, we still have some glossy mags to flip through for nostalgia's sake. New York magazine explores the coverage in some of the finer publications:

At the outset of this Week Of Hell, we totally intended to invade some convention soirees. But then we realized that Republicans are super boring, we had little chance of getting near the Bush twins, and Scrubs was premiering. Thankfully, the folks over at the Black Table did our job for us and crashed a right-wing fiesta. Seriously, they took one for the team:

BREAKING AS ALWAYS! We just returned from the floor of Madison Square Garden (no, seriously), where we witnessed hundreds of journalists sitting around and doing... nothing. But wait! President Bush enters for a soundcheck! People are politely applauding because he made it to the podium without tripping, perhaps. First Lady Laura looks glazed over in a red suit, Condeleezza Rice is wearing powder blue. Very Talbots. Dubya takes to the mic and says in his wittiest presidential voice, "Check, check. My fellow members of the press corps, there will be tax relief. Don't spend it all in one place." Everyone politely chuckles, soundcheck over. We run out of the convention in tears. Outside, we are assaulted by a sea of cowboy hats. Oh, the humanity!

We're all kind of down on the convention: the people aren't pretty, their clothes aren't that great, and no one is fucking in the streets. It's rather depressing, actually, and we can't wait for this giant political wind wagon to move along. One reader, however, notes that the RNC allows for some lovely people-watching:

When Vice-President Dick Cheney accepted his nomination last night, we more than disappointed; we totally expected him to step down out of shame for his personal style. New York magazine ran his ghastly image by surgeons, trainers, and stylists to see how he could be physically improved and, to no surprise, there's a lot of work to be done. Says a hairstylist from La Boite a Coupe salon:

· Stalkers of the First Daughters will love "Twinspotting," a play-by-play of Jenna and Barbara's movements throughout the convention. [Boston.com]
· Indulge your sick voyeuristic fantasies with a look inside the strange world of a Republican singles party. [Travis LaFrance]
· We're hearing rumors: "The password to get past the cops at the corner of 29th and 7th on the West side (where you either have to show credentials or say something important sounding) is 'Starbucks.'" That will, shockingly enough, get you into the Starbucks located in said area.
· Senator Orrin Hatch invades the kitchen at a PAC luncheon for no apparent reason. [Alice Ayers]
· A reader report from the front lines: "The streets are filled with annoying, american-is-god, badge-laden and way too much make-up individuals and *that's* just the 10,000 cops being paid way too much overtime to justify their storm-trooper attitude at every single person who tries to walk down the fucking block. The delegates are worse."

As we pointed out earlier, the media just isn't the media without some convention swag under its arm. Barneys Loft Spa has raised the bar with their special treatments for those overworked journos looking for a blow-out with their free beer:

EXCLUSIVE CONVENTION SCOOP! It's 11:45 and we've just returned from Nolita, where we spied a waifish woman entering Cafe Habana with a man whose hair reflected a suspicious amount of product usage. Nearby, there were people secretly buying some sort of foot coverings from Sigerson Morrison. And wait, what's this? Someone gave money for a bottle that looks eerily like Odwalla in the Prince Street Market. Will our city ever be the same after this crazy convention?! Check back for more breaking updates!

Gosh, we were totally wrong about the Republicans being sexually repressed. Just look at how open they are with their giant, compensatory dildos.
[Chicago Tribune slideshow (reg. req'd)]