In early April, dozens of national GOP poohbahs came to New Orleans for the Southern Republican Leadership Conference (SLRC), a bellwether event for the 2012 presidential election. The big star at the SLRC, though, was former Alaska Gov. and current Fox News analyst Sarah Palin, whose minions placed little gifts on the seat of every attendee: a shrink-wrapped chunk of caribou jerky, with a jaunty note attached: “An Alaskan Snack from SarahPAC!”. At a convention where most of the swag ran toward cheapie ballpoint pens, Palin’s cari-boudin made an impression.

The jerky showed up again last week in SarahPAC’s quarterly finance report submitted to the Federal Elections Commission (FEC), which had a $3,800 line item for “gift bag items” from Indian Valley Meats, located in the small town of Indian, Alaska (“where the mighty Chugach mountains meet Cook Inlet”). The other mail-order cured meats from Indian Valley could almost be described as Northern Exposure meets Cajun cuisine: teriyaki jerky with Arctic ox, salmon jerky, and hot and spicy summer sausage with reindeer.

Sarah Palin signs autographs at April’s Southern Republican Leadership Conference in New Orleans. Photo by Cheryl Gerber.

According to the FEC filing, SarahPAC raised more than $850,000 in contributions and spent most of it on typical campaign expenses, including airfare, mailings and donations to other political candidates (Nevada senatorial candidate and Tea Party favorite Sharron Angle — a sort of Palin manque — received $2,500). As for how Palin spent her dough in New Orleans, there was a $1,500 expense for “Dinner/Meeting” at Mother’s Restaurant on April 8, and two separate filings for unspecified “Meals” at the Windsor Court Hotel on April 8 and April 12, totaling $162.49, and “Business Center, Printer Rental, Printing” at the Windsor Court totaled $259.

Though Palin was famous on her book tour for signing her biography at populist spots like Costco and Sam’s Club, she didn’t go the Motel 6 route while in New Orleans, but stayed at the Windsor Court, one of the city’s poshest hotels. One night’s lodging there on April 12 came to $205.57.

All told, SarahPAC contributed more than $2,100 to the New Orleans economy — and that’s not counting the caribou jerky.

Harvey Pekar, the cartoonist behind American Splendor, died this morning at his Cleveland home at the age of 70. Memories of Pekar are already flooding the Web, along with official obits (The New York Times, The Washington Post).

In the early 2000s, Pekar was coaxed into being a sometimes-Gambit contributor by former editor Michael Tisserand, who was a huge fan of the man and his work. In 2003, Tisserand even wrote his own American Splendor-type comic about his interactions with Pekar and had it illustrated by Rhett Thiel.

Today, in honor of Harvey Pekar, we’re running that comic again (download the whole thing here), and presenting Michael Tisserand’s remembrance of his cantankerous friend:

Lonnie Johnson, Fats Domino, Dennis McGee, Clifton Chenier, Kid Ory. Thanks to Harvey Pekar, these aren’t just Louisiana music legends. They were comic heroes in the pages of Gambit Weekly.

Pekar is known to most people for his American Splendor comic book, his memorable appearances with David Letterman, and the acclaimed movie American Splendor, in which he appeared as himself. For a few years in the early 2000s, he also became an occasional Gambit contributor. His masterful portraits of local musicians managed to convey essential biographical information, Pekar’s own opinions, and a dash of wry wit in just a few words and images. It was a great honor to work with him.

Shortly after Katrina, I wrote in an essay that I returned to my Gambit office shortly after the waters went down and salvaged my Harvey Pekar bobblehead, a gift from arts editor David Lee Simmons. The essay was picked up by the alt weekly in Harvey’s home town of Cleveland, and the next day I received an email from Joyce Brabner, Pekar’s wife. “Interesting priorities,” she wrote. “Until reading this I believed that I would be the only one thinking to grab and save Harvey Pekar in the event of a catastrophe.”

That was the last contact I had with either Harvey or Joyce … almost. A couple years back, Harvey was appearing in Chicago to promote a comics anthology that he had edited. I was living there at the time and when we met up, I was feeling pretty forlorn about missing New Orleans and the chain of events that had brought me north. Harvey certainly recognized self-pity when he saw it. “You’re writing and your wife’s got a good job,” he said. “What have you got to complain about?”

I started to answer him, but then stopped. What did I expect? A soft shoulder from the man who made timeless art out of a decades-long drudge job as a hospital file clerk? When Pekar scoffed, it was like being serenaded by a master soloist. As he explained in the film American Splendor: “If you’re the kind of person looking for romance or escapism or some fantasy figure to save the day, guess what? You’ve got the wrong movie.”

The queen of new burlesque, Dita Von Teese has always worked controversy in her favor, making a name for herself as a dancer, fetish model and spouse of Marilyn Manson. She’s attained enough celebrity cachet to perform ever more infrequently while focusing more on endorsements — for Wonderbra, lingerie lines and now a high profile promotion with Cointreau, which is sponsoring two shows (9 p.m. Mon.-Tue., July 19-20; House of Blues) at the opening of Tales of the Cocktail.

Gambit: You say you don’t draw a distinction between burlesque and stripping, but you’re the queen of burlesque. What’s essential for an act to be considered burlesque?

Dita: For me, and according to factual history, American burlesque queens always incorporated a striptease and a degree of nudity. It upsets me that with the commercialization of burlesque, the strip is being removed. Burlesque never was just about retro dancing girls, or just about the “tease” or seduction. It was about a reveal, and always, always, always incorporated striptease. The greatest star of all, Gypsy Rose Lee, who went on to make films, write books and become a part of mainstream Hollywood took her clothes off to music onstage, and it sickens me to see modern Hollywood trying to rewrite history and make striptease a bad word, all the while using the term burlesque.

It’s my personal mission to explain to people what burlesque was, and to remind people that striptease, when done properly, can be beautiful, creative and legitimately entertaining. Those of us that know and understand the true history of burlesque know that the art is in performing something as risque as a strip, yet somehow maintaining elegance and sophistication. Perhaps that is too much for some people to grasp, or too much trouble to go to in order to achieve this effect — so they just take away the strip, maybe add some feathers and sequins, and talk about how “classy” they are compared to strippers. A great burlesque act is more than merely striptease, but it’s also much more than merely corsets, feathers and red lipstick, and there is no need to explain to people how “classy” you are because you don’t strip. My intention is to be true to the history of burlesque in America, and to honor the legends of burlesque that came way before me by keeping the striptease in burlesque.

Continued after the jump…

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Dita Von Teese is the queen of new burlesque, a former fetish model, former spouse of Marilyn Manson and a representative for Cointreau, which is sponsoring two nights of performances (9 p.m. Monday-Tuesday, June 19-20 at the House of Blues) at Tales of the Cocktail. Dita is expected to do the Opium Den act previewed above (as well as the cocktail glass act after the jump, which is harder to see given all the Cointreau promotional shots.) Dita’s act has become so lavish with sets, costumes and effects that she doesn’t perform very often. The spectacle requires a Las Vegas style treatment and venue — and a sponsor with deep pockets. Dita has performed in New Orleans a couple of times since headlining the Tease-O-Rama burlesque festival nearly 10 years ago. She did a show with the now defunct Shim Sham Revue. Here she is working with Bustout Burlesque but is bringing several performers from Los Angeles (they appear in the video after the jump). She now splits time between Los Angeles and Paris and spends more time promoting lines of lingerie and and liquor than performing. She has a book of beauty tips slated to come out later this year.

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Every media outlet has its own niche when it comes to the BP oil disaster. The Wall Street Journal, not surprisingly, is concentrating on the ups and downs (mostly downs) of BP stock prices. Mother Jones is muckraking (literally) from an environmentalist perspective. Even The Huffington Post is doing its own thing, which involves one of Arianna’s celebrity friends penning a new-age, pop-psych essay called Drawing Blessings From the Gulf Oil Spill. (”To best serve the Gulf of Mexico, ourselves and our world, I encourage focusing and having faith in the power of divine love. By focusing on bringing greater good into manifestation, there can be a returning to the natural order that thrives and creates bounty.”)

With everyone getting into the act, it’s no surprise that the National Enquirer is muscling in on the action with a story headlined OILY BP BOSS BUSTS UP NUPS!:

BP boss CARL HENRIC-SVANBERG isn’t just being blamed for the massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, he’s the accused villain behind the breakup of a Massachusetts couple’s 18-year marriage! …

What’s more, just days after BP’s Deepwater Horizon oil rig exploded on April 20 - leaving 11 dead and millions of gallons of oil spewing into the gulf - the lovebirds vacationed in Phuket, Thailand on his luxury yacht!

Wow. Can’t wait to see how the Weekly World News is going to cover this … but I bet it’ll involve space aliens and Bat Boy.