In the future, everyone is famous on 15 blogs.

After retiring early rather than lower a flag to honor former U.S. Sen. Jesse Helms, L.F. Eason III was the topic of the day in the blogosphere yesterday.

In its usual over-the-top style, D.C.-based political blog Wonkette called him a "brave American hero," while sister blog Gawker nominated him for "a hundred Nobel Peace Prizes" and asks, "Is anyone hiring experts in weights and measures?"

Idiosyncratic conservative Andrew Sullivan called his story a "profile in decency."

Durham author Haven Kimmel saluted him, noting "the list of people who stood up to (Helms), even in death, can add one more name, and I thank this man and I hold him and his family in the Light, for discerning what is true and acting on it to his own peril."

On the other side, a number of conservatives lambasted Eason's "sanctimonious arrogance" and said he "spit on (Helms') grave."

Former N&O columnist Dan Gearino slipped the shoe on the other foot, pondering liberals would be celebrating if a conservative made a similarly defiant gesture toward, say, Barack Obama.

In a snarky vein, Selma conservative Troy LaPlante wrote: "Good riddance. One less state employee on the payroll." And S.H. Long at Curmudgeonly & Skeptical went a step further: "Even in death Helms rids state of Commie b------s."

If Sheriff Taylor represents North Carolina's political hopes, then Lonesome Rhodes is its dark side.

In 1957, Andy Griffith played a role that serves as the flip side of the small-town sheriff in "The Andy Griffith Show" a few years later.

In famed director Elia Kazan's "A Face in the Crowd," Griffith starred as Larry "Lonesome" Rhodes, a cynical country singer who is catapulted to fame, but loses it all when he calls his audience "miserable slobs" before a microphone he didn't know was turned on.

The movie touched a nerve in political circles.

In 2000, Chicago Tribune columnist Bob Greene cited it after George W. Bush was caught calling a reporter a name on an open mic at a rally in Naperville.

This year, Washington, D.C., political Web site Wonkette regularly referred to former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards as "Lonesome Rhodes."

Other bloggers have called former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee by the name.