Bill Clinton did not invite me to the famous Harlem blog party that got all the attention last week. And I retaliated by not blogging about it! Nyaah Nyaah!

But there's been a huge amount of attention focused primarily on the breasts of one particular blogger, Jessica something or other.

I carefully examined the picture, and yes, Jessica has breasts. Whether she was "showing them to her advantage" depends, I guess on whether there was any advantage to showing them, or whether an advantage was given in return.

I'd hate to say "tit for tat," because I'm sure someother blogger probably said it by now, and I might be accused of not giving credit to whoever it is by using Technorati to find out whether I'm permitted to say what someone else has most likely said. Such a burdensome process is so unfair that I just won't say it! No tit for tat here!

Now that that's out of the way, I'm worried about whether the breast issue, if laid bare, might actually be a smokescreen for something else. The issue might not be sexism, but racism:

What does it mean though that there are 20 bloggers invited to this lunch and not one is black or latino? What does it mean for this group of bloggers to be patting themselves on the backs for being with Clinton when they are all in Harlem and not one of them is a person of color? What does it mean for these people to be there and have not one of them raise this issue in their blogs?

I try to make up for what I lack, though, not that Bill would care (Ann Coulter's protestations to the contrary notwithstanding).

The thing is, Bubba (aka Bill) did invite Atrios (aka Duncan), and the latter doesn't seem terribly grateful. In fact, unless I am missing something in the comments, he hasn't discussed his own presence at the event at all; instead he seems to think that the fact that Dr. Helen Smith (Glenn Reynolds wife) has breasts is more important than meeting the president of the United States (to say nothing of what Dr. Helen said.) True, Atrios has posted a picture of Dr. Helen in a damningly sexy T-shirt, which reveals that yes, she too has breasts.

I'm shocked. Shocked I tell you!

Considering the nastiness of posts like the one Atrios linked, it would seem to be self evident that all women with breasts are guilty of "hypocrisy" for suggesting that Bill Clinton likes breasts or that women might want to show theirs off to him. Does that mean only men can complain about breasts of Clinton? Nah, that can't be it either.

At the risk of sounding like a horrid sexist, I'll stick my neck out here and say that I don't think breasts are so much the issue as the propriety of certain attire. Pandagon makes much of the burkha analogy, but I don't think that's apropos. If I may put aside the groper issue for a moment and switch to another area of the body, does anyone remember the controversy over the girls who wore flipflips to meet President Bush? I think a good case can be made that wearing flipflops to meet a president is analogous to wearing a tight-fitting T-shirt. It can be seen as disrespectful to the office -- even the former office.

Let's look at the picture:

Notice that the woman who has drawn all the criticism is not the only woman in the picture. I'm probably a bit old-fashioned where it comes to attire but if I'd been invited I'd have definitely worn a suit. [Right! I'm about as old fashioned as Glenn Reynolds and Markos Moulitsas Zuniga.]

I notice only a few of the men are wearing suits. For his part, Bill Clinton is, which means that he wasn't considering this a casual, shirtsleeves, wear-a-T-shirt, barbecue type of event. It's a professional lunch at a professional location, with a former two-term President of the United States who is still actively involved in politics. Like him or not, that's what he is. To not wear a suit to that is just violative of the most basic protocol. If you ask me, a higher percentage of the men in that picture are worse dressers than are the women.

I can't see their feet, though, so I don't know whether they are wearing flipflops. If they are, I'd feel about the same way I do about the tight fitting shirt. As to Dr. Helen's hypocrisy, show me a picture of her meeting any president in a tight-fitting T-shirt and I'll concede the point.

This all strikes me as very odd, and I'm now even more mystified over why Atrios has gone out of his way to focus his attack Glenn and Helen as "wankers."

From reading the posts in the Atrios archives for the period before and after the luncheon, you wouldn't know he was even there. Might it be that he really didn't want to be there? If you look really hard at the above picture, you can see a small portion of his head (the only hidden head in the bunch):

I mean, what is this? A game of peekaboo?

Sheesh.

I can't even tell what Atrios was wearing. For all I know he was wearing a suit.

Maybe even a double, um, breasted one.

Forgive me, but I don't get the hidden head.

(I hate it when I can't figure anything out.)