*Remember the huff over Monica Hesse‘s piece on Brian Brown? The one from August 28, in which she describes the NOM executive director as “pleasantly, ruthlessly sane”? Nearly two weeks later, this thing still has legs. About this time last week, Rebecca Armendariz of the Washington Blade denounced Hesse’s story as a dangerous “puff piece.” Now, on WorldMagBlog—the online arm of (yes) the evangelical rag World—Les Sillars claims the controversy as evidence of liberal bias. Media Matters, on the other hand, says the Post‘s ombud response “illustrates fundamental flaw in ‘liberal bias’ claims.” (Hey, guys, it’s like a goddamn Rorschach test up in here!) The Awl weighed in from 20,000 feet with a post on Hesse’s status as a “failed lesbian.” And the better angels of our nature wept. [Seriously, though, I’ll leave the final word here to Wemple—or to our very own Hess!—but having read the piece, I’d call it a.) misplaced aggression and b.) self-defeating to accuse the woman of “journalistic vandalism,” or what have you. Hesse tried for a human(e) feature on an easy-to-revile fellow (with whom many of us disagree), and her conceit backfired. Doesn’t make her a monster.]

*NEOLOGISM FAIL: NBC Washington (see above) gets trigger twigger happy with some regrettable twucked-up wordplay after oh God I can’t go on like this:

You know how we know it’s a modern kinda world? ‘Cause everything starts with a Tw- these days. Sorry, did we say “everything”? We meant “tweverything.”

Thanks, Twitter!

So it should come as no big shock that a mid-year D.C. Twestival is coming to the third floor of the newly launched MidTown Loft….

If this sort of badinage appeals to you, hit up the Loft (1219 Connecticut Ave. NW) tomorrow from 7-11 p.m.

*FILE UNDER “SWEET WEB GADGET OF THE MOMENT”: Slate‘s new “News Dots” feature, a visualizer of major news stories and the interrelation between them, launched yesterday as part of the Web pub’s “Slatest” aggregation thing. And it’s pretty neat! See how Obama is the sun ’round which all stories turn?

*TONIGHT IN CITY LIGHTS: The Cult at the 9:30 Club. Fischer sez:

In the current age of album-centered nostalgia tours, it’s no surprise that the chameleonic five-piece is exhuming its 1985 breakthrough Love, which took from the best of that decade’s left-of-the-dial music—postpunk, goth, neopsychedelia—and made it muscular and accessible.