Bag’s Best of 2010 – Andrew Breitbart, a.k.a. Mr. Bubbles

Bryce Duffy for TIME

The phrase that hit me as soon as I saw this was: that stubborn bathtub ring!

This portrait of Andrew Breitbart, the crass, hateful and subversive trickster reveals just how ludicrous and ham-handed he is — the photo, attempting to parody soft and sensitive liberals, makes a mockery instead.

In light of the TIME article that accompanies the pic, or the May New Yorker profile (“Rage Machine”), the photo makes as much sense as if Tony Soprano tried to pull off this scene.  What’s offered up here, rather, is a churlish visual attack on liberals, particularly L.A.’s west side quiche eaters such as former mentor Arianna Huffington, that Breitbart grew up (and felt so inferior) around.

So here’s the sophomoric push back, like the hairy monster is some kind of metrosexual type, lounging in his tub actually filled with bubble bath (!), with a tower of fresh towels (spa, anyone?) and a glass of white wine in this modernist haven giving off the Zen/eco-vibe.

Though I have no idea what brand he does his damage with, by the way, I’d imagine the Mac (which, true to character, Breitbart threatens with a drenching) is part of the mockery, too, the destructive brute seeming much more like a PC man.

(caption: Andrew Breitbart at home in his bathroom in Los Angeles on March 15, 2010.)