Hey, kids! Want some fun activities for a rainy afternoon? Try this swell game:

Compare and contrast (in clear, idiomatic English) 1) the current Weekly Standard’s lover – sorry, cover – story and 2) Matt Taibbi’s snarky (if journalistically suspect) Rolling Stone feature about the GOP’s new It Girl, Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Founding Mother). 

It’s like they’re profiling two different people!

CO Starter Kit (pat. pending)

RS headline:

Michele Bachmann’s Holy War

WS headline:

Queen of the Tea Party

RS graphic:

WS graphic:

RS nut (so to speak) graf:

Close your eyes, take a deep breath, and, as you consider the career and future presidential prospects of an incredible American phenomenon named Michele Bachmann, do one more thing. Don’t laugh.

It may be the hardest thing you ever do, for Michele Bachmann is almost certainly the funniest thing that has ever happened to American presidential politics. Fans of obscure 1970s television may remember a short-lived children’s show called Far Out Space Nuts, in which a pair of dimwitted NASA repairmen, one of whom is played by Bob (Gilligan) Denver, accidentally send themselves into space by pressing “launch” instead of “lunch” inside a capsule they were fixing at Cape Canaveral. This plot device roughly approximates the political and cultural mechanism that is sending Michele Bachmann hurtling in the direction of the Oval Office.

WS nut graf:

 Bachmann is a far more serious candidate for the Republican nomination than her reputation would suggest. She’s a talented fundraiser who raised $13.5 million for her 2010 reelection campaign. She’s a television star who appropriately tailors her message to her audience. Her combativeness will delight conservatives eager to fight Barack Obama. Her movement credentials—she founded the House Tea Party Caucus—put her at the cutting edge of right-wing politics. And in a primary campaign where authenticity counts, no other candidate has Bachmann’s unique history: an Iowa native who put herself through law school, raised her five children and took in 23 foster children, and has never lost an election for state or federal office.

It’s all yours from there.