In his inimitable way, Jon Stewart cut this week to the heart of the debate in the Obama administration over whether to prosecute U.S. officials guilty of violating U.S. and international law forbidding torture.  --  "This is our conundrum," Stewart said, after invoking the post-WWII Japanese war crimes trials) conducted by the United States government in 1946-1951 that led to 920 executions from among the more than 5,700 individuals indicted.[1]  --  "Do we prosecute government officials for sanctioning the techniques our enemies had once used on us that we deemed brutally immoral, or acknowledge the breaking of laws but give our officials a temporary insanity defense for what were probably good faith attempts to protect a scared-***less population — and while we're at it, belatedly apologize to the Japanese guys that we killed."  --  "Is there an E-card for that, by the way?  Actually, I think there is.  It's a cat in a cowboy hat dancing very slowly. . . ."

In case you missed the news:  One of the ways schools around the country are dealing with their budgetary problems is to cut the past tense from language programs.  --  "[A] number of lawmakers, such as Utah Sen. Orrin Hatch, have welcomed the cuts as proof that the American school system is taking a more forward-thinking approach to education," the *Onion* reported.[1] ...

In a satire published Thursday on the Information Clearinghous web site, Jerry Ghinelli described an Israeli military operation dubbed "Friendly Enemy," in which "hundreds of Israeli F-16 fighter jets streaked across the Atlantic in precise formation and fired surgical air strikes at alleged terrorist strongholds in densely populated Muslim communities all along the northeast corridor of the United States."[1]  --  "President Bush and President-elect Obama both appealed for restraint, but stated emphatically, 'Israel has the right to defend itself,'" and Congress voted a resolution of support, with only Sen. Russ Feingold voting against the resolution....

A short story in dialogue by Terry Bisson entitled "They're Made Out of Meat" was nominated for a Nebula Award after it was published in 1991 and later reprinted in the "Readings" section of Harper's.  --  Intellectually, the target of the piece has been dubbed "carbon chauvinism."  --  The piece has been adapted for the stage, and in 2006 the film adaptation posted below won the Grand Prize at the 2006 Seattle Science Fiction Museum film festival.[1]  --  The text of the original story can be read here....

On Nov. 12, 2008, at a celebration held at London's New Wimbledon Theatre two days before Prince Charles's 60th birthday, Robin Williams delivered a nine-minute monologue on the 2008 presidential election and the end of President George W. Bush's administration.[1]  --  The appearance, in a show entitled "We Are Most Amused" that also featured John Cleese and Rowan Atkinson (Mr. Bean), was Williams's first stand-up stage appearance in Great Britain in 25 years.  --  Robin Williams is now 57 years old.  --  "Charles was just three when his mother became Queen, making him, as her eldest son, heir to the throne," Reuters reported on his birthday.[2]  --  "The Queen, now 82, is the oldest reigning monarch in the history of the nation and is still in good health.  Her mother lived to be 101."  --  A YouGov poll "found 42 percent of people [in the U.K.] were in favor of him succeeding the Queen, compared to 35 percent who thought the throne should skip a generation to Prince William, Charles's elder son.  --  When the same question was asked in 2005, only 31 percent backed Charles, while 42 percent preferred William, whose mother was the late Princess Diana." ...

This video, which is entitled "Les Misbarack," was produced more than two months ago and has remarkable production values.[1]  --  Andrew Sullivan commented:  "Whatever happens, the McCain campaign could never pull this off.  Patience, steel... triumph."  --  While it has been viewed more than a million times, it has never been more timely than on Nov. 3, 2008, as the most remarkable, the most disciplined, the most focused, the most historic, and — one more day may show — the most successful presidential campaign in modern American history draws to a close.  --  BACKGROUND:  For more on the original song ("One Day More") from the 1980 musical, see here....

For five minutes Gov. Sarah Palin thought she was talking to President Nicolas Sarkozy on Saturday as a Montreal comedian Marc-Antoine Audette pretended he was the French head of state.  --  "Audette, posing as Sarkozy, speaks in an exaggerated French accent and drops ample hints that the conversation is a joke.  But Palin seemingly does not pick up on them," AP reported Saturday.[1]  --  The entire conversation, in which Audette's voice sounds nothing like Sarkozy's, can be heard on YouTube.[2] ...

This week Naomi Klein appeared on "The Colbert Report" to talk about The Shock Doctrine.[1]  --  Klein and Colbert engaged in light-hearted banter about torture, war, natural disaster, economic crises, corruption, and the prison-industrial complex.  --  A brief, humorless account of The Shock Doctrine follows.[2] ...

Saying "I can't see it, touch it, or feel it, but I can sell it, so I'm going to palm it off to the highest bidder," a 24-year-old New Zealand man is auctioning a framed deed of "soul ownership" on the web site TradeMe, the Associated Press reported Wednesday.[1]  --  Walter Scott said his soul "is 'a merry old soul' rather than a 'funk soul brother' but that he would 'would like to think there is a bit of funk in there somewhere.'"  --  "In 2001, 20-year-old U.S. university student Adam Burtle tried unsuccessfully to sell his soul on auction Web site eBay.  --  Bidding had reached $400 before the auction was pulled from the site, with the company ruling something tangible needed to swap hands." ...

The theme of this humorous 30-second MoveOn TV spot, scheduled for broadcast this week in Phoenix and nationally on CNN, is that George W. Bush and John McCain “are cousins, identical cousins.”[1]  --  It’s based on the theme song of the 1963-1966 American sitcom “The Patty Duke Show.”  --  Thanks to Roy Sutherland for sending this, who writes: “In times like these, humor is the best weapon.”  --  For more on this spot, see pieces in the Boston Globe and USA Today....

"Experts agree that Clinton stands a good and improving chance of pulling out a victory in the end, given her momentum, determination, and appeal to dumb people," David Swanson of After Downing Street wrote Wednesday.[1]  --  "Like soccer moms and Jews for Buchanan before them, dumb people are shaking up this election and coming into their own as an identity group with ever rising 'self-pride.'  The group intentionally avoids the term 'self-esteem' as being too difficult to spell." ...

This 30-second short won the "funniest ad" category in MoveOn's "Obama in 30 Seconds" contest....

Historian Robert McElvaine reported on April Fools' Day that the percentage of historians who rate George W. Bush as the worst U.S. president ever in an informal poll has soared in the past four years from 12% to 61%, with 98% of them agreeing that his presidency has been "a failure."[1]  --  “No individual president can compare to the second Bush,” said one historian.  --  “Glib, contemptuous, ignorant, incurious, a dupe of anyone who humors his deluded belief in his heroic self, he has bankrupted the country with his disastrous war and his tax breaks for the rich, trampled on the Bill of Rights, appointed foxes in every henhouse, compounded the terrorist threat, turned a blind eye to torture and corruption and a looming ecological disaster, and squandered the rest of the world’s goodwill.  In short, no other president’s faults have had so deleterious an effect on not only the country but the world at large.”  --  McElvaine concurred in the consensus, notint that "Mr. Bush inherited a sizable budget surplus and a thriving economy.  By pushing through huge tax cuts for the rich while increasing federal spending at a rapid rate, Bush transformed the surplus into a massive deficit.  The tax cuts and other policies accelerated the concentration of wealth and income among the very richest Americans.  These policies combined with unwavering opposition to necessary government regulations have produced the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression.  Then there is the incredible shrinking dollar, the appointment of incompetent cronies, the totally inexcusable failure to react properly to the disaster of Hurricane Katrina, the blatant disregard for the Constitution — and on and on." ...

On Saturday, UFPPC's Xeno Campanoli offered a modest proposal:  "We here in Tacoma, and by extension throughout the country, could sponsor Brother Military Bases of troops from other countries we are now occupying here in our own midst, in our own neighborhoods, perhaps quartered in our own homes, just like those we bring to those places around the world which provide resources for our troops of the 'more than 737 military bases spread around the world' [historian Chalmers Johnson's figure] that we sponsor for them."[1] ...