DanMargarita.com

I honestly haven’t watched MTV much, at least not since they stopped playing “M” on their channel, so I didn’t see the infamous incident where Kanye West jumped on stage during the MTV Video Award show and took the microphone from winner Taylor Swift and announced that singer Beyonce had “one of the greatest videos of all time.”

Ah, if only Kanye had run onto the field to take the ball out of the N.Y. Jets quarterback’s hands and declared that Tom Brady was one of the greatest QB’s of all time, but I digress.

Not having seen it live, I was puzzled by all of the buzz on Facebook not long after the incident took place.

“Kanye’s an ass,” seemed to be the consensus.

Well, yeah, we knew that (and the president later confirmed it). Still, with the amount of discussion on FB, I knew something was up and soon learned of the classless man’s classless act.

It’s not the first time he’s done these publicity-seeking hijinks, but it backfired wildly and West was forced to humble himself on Jay Leno’s new show, apologizing profusely. It could’ve been worse; he could’ve been torn to shreds by the ladies of The View.

That’s the entertainment world, however and there are worse places he could’ve been a jackass, historically speaking. It’s a good thing he wasn’t at Gettysburg while President Lincoln was saying, “Four score and seven years ago…” to step in front of Lincoln to announce, “Great speech, Mr. President but Frederick Douglass had one of the greatest speeches of all time!”

Going further back it would’ve been rough to see him interrupt Thomas Jefferson as he read the Declaration of Independence.

“We the people…”

Although, I suppose Jefferson would’ve asked Kanye if he had any good looking sisters he could “date.”

Worse, Kanye could’ve been at the Last Supper, saying “Great speech, Jesus, but Aristotle had one of the greatest speeches of all time!”

The fact that Kanye West has declared himself the voice of his generation should’ve given us an idea that that his MTV antics shouldn’t have come as a big surprise. To paraphrase the old saying about “class,” if you have to announce that you’re the voice of a generation, you’re probably not. That’s for others to decide and declare and most people, like Bob Dylan, tend to reject that notion and the burden it carries.

Rudeness by a spotlight-hogging celebrity is one thing, but when it comes from a member of congress, it’s another matter.

This brings us to South Carolina representative Joe Wilson, who now famously yelled, “You lie!” at President Obama during his speech to a joint session of congress recently.

Before getting to the substance of it, I have to note that before this, if you mentioned the name Joe Wilson, I would’ve thought you were either talking about Valerie Plame’s husband, or Dennis the Menace’s grouchy neighbor.

Considering that H.R. 3200, Section 246 is titled “No Federal payment for undocumented aliens,” it would seem to disprove Wilson’s claim. Of course if Wilson had been watching Fox News, he might honestly believe it. Fox is not known for their accuracy in reporting, especially when a Republican politician gets involved a sex scandal. A number of times they’ve identified GOP pols with a “D” next to their names, with regard to Gov. Mark Sanford and Rep. Mark Foley.

In no one’s recollection has a member of congress yelled out or called the president a liar during a speech. Normally, even when members of congress criticize each other, it is done with at least an appearance of civility, and in the third person.

“If my liberal friend would kindly remove his head from his rectum…”

How can we expect celebrities to be polite if we can’t even get our elected leaders to be polite?

Anyway, I’d better end this before Kanye comes in and interrupts me. I just hope he's not nearby if and when I have a honeymoon.