What the hell happened to Mr. Barry Obama? Back in Denver, up on the stage, he was on fire like a messiah. Now he’s washed out, wan, tired — he looks like he needs Geritol. The guy starts talking these days and your eyes just glaze over. For God’s sake, man. Say something short. Something punchy. Stop rambling and doing that fake smile where you try to pretend you’re not angry. Thomas Friedman captures it well in hiscolumn today. Money quote: “In recent weeks, I feel as though [Obama] has lost that gut connection.” That’s putting it mildly. The other night I watched Obama being interviewed by Keith Olbermann and I wanted to weep. Then I started getting that sick feeling in my stomach — the one where you start to realize how good the Democrats are at losing elections. As much as I dislike the Clintstones, I have to admit that Hillary and Bill would not be letting themselves get bitch-slapped around by the Repubes the way Obama is.

South Korean intelligence reports that ODL (Original Dear Leader) has suffered a stroke. North Korea denies this, saying there’s “no problem,” and that ODL missed a parade because he got stuck in traffic, not because of any health problems. Pressed by an AP reporter, the spokesbot added, “The health of Kim Jong Il is a personal issue.” When asked what that statement meant, spokesbot simply repeated the sentence. Three times. I must say, I don’t necessarily agree with all of Kim Jong Il’s policies, but on this one I’m siding with him. What right do we have to wonder about his health? It’s none of our business, right? Sometimes the press just makes me sick. And yeah, I can see from the photo that he’s lost a little weight and he’s being held up by strings, but I don’t think you can leap to any conclusions based on that.

But Dear Leader remains alive and well (see photo above). Oh, and they’ve got some upgraded iPods and a new version of iTunes. Seriously? That’s it? I’m still trying to figure out why they held an actual event today instead of just putting out a press release. As a fellow filthy hack commented to me after the big show, “Can you imagine if Sony did this?” Nevertheless, there was much cheering and shouting and clapping and whooping, even though much of it came from Apple employees who had been instructed to remove their green event T-shirts so they’d look like regular members of the public. I’m not making that up. Friends, it’s true — Apple brings along its own employees and has them cheer like mad for their own products.

Afterward I wondered if the entire purpose of the event was simply to have a reason to put Dear Leader out in public. Thing is, Dear Leader, while definitely still alive, nonetheless looks frail. We saw him afterward, being escorted away by the very dangerous looking Katie Cotton, who has this very intense smile that seems to say, Don’t even think about trying to get close to us, punk, or I will friggin bite your nuts off. It’s hard to describe this but there’s something not quite right about the way Dear Leader walks. I thought maybe I was imagining this but another hack said he thought the same thing.

But Dear Leader is making an effort to let everyone know that he’s doing just fine, thank you. So, um, all right. Game on, people.

Windows Mobile: “The perfect blend of power, capability and instability.” So says this guy. And yes, it’s at the bottom of a post where he says he likes my Google Android item. But still. Much love, dude.

Great comic strip here designed to keep the kids off the Linux. See here.

I’m not making this up. See here. The churro is a phallus. The leather is a hint at S&M. The two dudes leaving the mall together — you get the idea.

You know what? I’m starting to admire Dvorak. Yes, he’s totally out of his mind. Yes, he wear Depends. But he always manages to come up with something that will drive traffic. The guy’s a survivor.

Namaste, Old Man. I bow to the place where your creepy dreams about Bill Gates become one with the public’s imagination.

Free fake new iPod to anyone who can Photoshop an image of Dvorak as a leather boy. With or without a churro.

Matt Asay picks up on the griping here with a piece titled “Disservice to partners may bite Apple.” Apparently MacUser has been tracking this too, with an article explaining that “Apple has installed a proprietary authentication chip in their portables that makes it impossible for 3rd party companies to create iPod/iPhone compatible accessories without signing an often times costly agreement with Apple.” (MacUser cites this article from Popular Mechanics.) MacWorld, meanwhile, tracks the dissatisfaction among iPhone app developers here.

Hear me now and believe me later, people. There is a lot of grumbling in Happy Happy Apple Land these days. It’s not just about MobileMe and the so-called “3G” iPhone. And it’s no longer just music companies complaining about working with Apple.

Britain’s Independent takes a swing here. Short version: Google has become the kind of uber-power it used to rebel against. “Don’t be evil” is bullshit. Street View lets people see inside your house. Be afraid!

Funny thing is that the problem with Google has been apparent all along, or at least since its stock offering, which was set up so that insiders got special super-duper shares which let them control the company even after selling shares to the public. In other words, Give us your money and shut the hell up. We’re not making this rule because we’re evil. We’re making this rule because we’re so much smarter than you, and you’ll just screw things up if you start trying to tell us what to do, and it’s actually in your own best interest to let us use your money without answering to you. Seriously. It is.

That alone was enough for me. Not because I thought they were lying — because I thought they were sincere. Oh, and there’s also the “Don’t be evil” thing. Are there really people whose little internal alarms don’t go off when they hear something like that?

See here. No killer app. No consumer focus. And it’s open source rather than having a vertical stack like BlackBerry and iPhone. In other words, it’s the desktop Linux of mobile phones — a solution in search of a problem that doesn’t exist. Or, to put it another way, Android was indeed created to help solve a problem, but it’s not a problem that customers have, it’s a problem that Google has. Same for Chrome, when you think about it. Google is all about solving the world’s most difficult problems — specifically, those problems that prevent Google from owning every last piece of the world.