Sarah “Barracuda” Palin was a very competitive high school basketball player, and later a very competitive politician. She also competed in beauty pageants, and I doubt she sees any inconsistency. And I don’t think Palin minds one bit that some of her supporters think she’s hot, otherwise she could adopt a perfectly reasonable style of dressing that does less to highlight her sex appeal.

Similarly I seriously doubt Danica Patrick feels any loss of pride in her racing accomplishments when she celebrates her attractiveness, If Patrick throwing out some playfully suggestive line or showing some skin makes you respect her less, that’s your problem not hers. Or maybe you would respect her more if she’d done the Sports Illustrated shoot in a more modest bathing suit?

Now why would you go off on such a hateful bunch of trash talk about a nice Catholic girl like Danica (by conversion – though she never did a “Catholic schoolgirl” shoot that fixates you so), when you yourself know that you never bothered to to take a minute Googling to get half a clue about what you were talking about? Is spewing your trash talk so dear to you, that you don’t want to spoil your fun by checking the facts?

I have to wonder if any of the RS regulars are Indy Car fans, that nobody straightened you out before I got here. I’ve heard the NASCAR cliches, but come on is that the only racing?

Your assertion that Danica Patrick “can’t compete with the boys in a race car” is factually absolute BS, which you would know if you had taken a couple of minutes to check your “facts” – unless you’re going to use an absurd standard by which the vast majority of boys that Danica competes with in the Indy Racing League are even less able to “compete with the boys”.

Out of 20+ drivers who compete regularly in the Indy Racing League, Danica Patrick is currently 5th in the championship race (points from race finishes). Out of 6 races so far this season, she finished in the top 5 in four races, in the top 10 in five of the six races.

Danica Patrick competitive accomplishment is better than the vast majority of the “boys” in her races. What was your fixation that couldn’t take a few minutes to learn this simple fact, instead of spewing your “can’t comptete with the boys” nonsense?

In auto racing as in other sports, only a small fraction of the participants are “stars” (who win most of the races). Then there are a large proportion of “solid performers”, and behind them a large proportion struggling to stay in the game. By her performance Danica Patrick is not a star, but in the upper tier of the “solid performers” competing better than most of the “boys”.

You suggest that Danica Patrick has used her good looks to achive a position in auto racing not merited by her driving skills. Her performance on the track, better than most of the male drivers, shows she’s earned her position regardless of gender or attractiveness.

Actually it’s more like the opposite of your ignorant assumption. Sure Danica is hot, but not to the degree that would normally be required to be a Sports Illustrated swimsuit model. Rather than exploiting her looks for unfair advantage in racings as you suggest, what Patrick did was exploit her racing accomplishments to get to be a swimsuit model that she would otherwise be unqualified for by the normal requirements of attractiveness.

I asked what would compel you to spew such nonsense that Patrick “can’t compete with the boys in a race car” when it would have only taken a minute for you to see what nonsense it was. Maybe that was a rhetorical question, because I’m pretty sure it was a simple kind of inference for your mindset:

- Danica Patrick is hot (Well OK, maybe not necessarily bad)
- Danica enjoys being hot (Uh oh, getting dangerous)
- Danica uses her hotness to her advantage (Oh noooooooooooo!!!!!)
Ergo, Danica must be a worthless bimbo who “can’t compete with the boys”

Sure, Danica Patrick’s good looks work to her advantage getting hired to endorse motor oil and internet services. So what? Should she insist on taking lower endorsement fees than they’re offering her, because she doesn’t want to take advantage of her attractiveness?

While good looks help Patrick get endorsement deals, she wouldn’t be getting them if she “can’t compete with the boys in a race car”. In the same racing series, I’d say Milka Duno, the Renaissance chick from Venzuela, is a lot hotter than Danica, but she isn’t getting the endorsement contracts. That’s because Duno’s performance in Indy Racing hasn’t measured up to her past successes as a model (a role she earned strictly on her merits, without unfairly exploiting racing skills like Danica did), naval engineer, sports car racer, etc.

The phrase went something like this: Not all who consume porn become sexual criminals, but all sexual criminals consume porn.