Make your own Kerry Plaque courtesy of Wizbang and Pete Holiday.

The Blogsphere imploded today on the news that Alphablogger Glenn (Instapundit) Reynolds had been placed in a rehab center at an undisclosed location for emergency Blog Detox.

After forcing Reynolds to post a final, unalarming message on his site at InstaPundit.Com, stating blandly "OFF ON A FAMILY EASTER TRIP: I expect blogging to be limited at best," he was immediately bundled into an unassuming SUV to be transported to The Langley Center for Recovering Blogaholics somewhere in Virginia.

But Reynolds, it seems, was able to break away from his guards en route and find his way to a public internet connection at a local airport for "Just one more post, honest."

Due to an alarming intelligence failure, the agents in charge had forgotten to take away Reynolds' digital camera which held, not the cows or the local landscapes (the posting of which gave the family their first cause for alarm earlier this month), but what Reynold's later called, "My puddytat, which I tot I taw."

An alert Washington Post reporter, drunk and in recovery from writing sixteen Condi Rice profiles in one day (each of which included no less than three quotes from two 911 widows and Katie Couric,) recognized Reynolds as he was being dragged out of the terminal and stuffed back in the SUV. When last seen, Reynolds had his head out of the window screaming, "I just wanted to fill an important hole in the blogosphere! I had five minutes left on my Starbucks card!"

Indeed.

The result is seen here as the Post's editors, lusting for a chance to put newspapers back on top of the media pyramid, flooded the Blogzone with top assets, assigning such noted scribes as James Olsen and Lois Lane and Al Franken to cover the story.

A QuickTime video monologue @ small world.

How do your get an American General to say "Vietnam? If you're a Reuters' stringer you just throw your poetic license at him.

Q: Luke Baker from Reuters again. General, I wonder if you could give us sort of an estimate of how long you're planning or you expect fighting to go on in Fallujah or Ramadi to bring a -- to pacify those towns, as you put it? And also, your reaction to suggestions that the experiences your forces are going through now in Iraq have shadows of Vietnam?

GEN. SANCHEZ: Shadows of Vietnam -- I don't -- I don't see any shadows of Vietnam here in Iraq. It's two totally different battlefields, and I wouldn't even begin to characterize this as a Vietnam for the American forces.

From today's DoD News: Coalition Provisional Authority Briefing 4/08/2004

Plus a weekend in Vegas with JayLo.
The Mrs. here doesn't have to know.

Ah, the shameful art of diplomacy begins before the dead are even buried.

MADRID (Reuters) - The United States and Britain bargained with Spain's new prime minister Wednesday over his pledge to pull Spanish troops out of Iraq, hoping to salvage a faltering alliance.

Secretary of State Colin Powell and British Prime Minister Tony Blair were in Madrid with other world leaders and royalty to mourn the 190 victims of the Madrid train bomb attacks which triggered a voter revolt that brought Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero to power.
-- Reuters.com

When you're laid out by a Cruise Ship cold, there's not a lot you can do that's productive. Take me. Feeling low-grade on just about every level. So I decided to put in a shift at the ACME License Plate Maker.

Here's my output. I'm sure you can craft a few of your own. (Acme, by the way, is owned and operated by Jef Poskanzer, unix wizard and professional curmudgeon. Somebody either buy this man a beer, get him a date, or pop his PayPal button. His needs are infinite.)

Take a listen to: radio vox populi: live from the commons

Radio Vox Populi is a realization of the people's voice, taking the content of the weblogs and broadcasting it back to the world. As weblog authors update their sites their writing is collected, synthesized into speech, and streamed to listeners as an Internet radio station. Live from the commons 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.

That is -- if you fancy hearing a loquacious Stephen Hawking read blogs.

As of this writing, there are 599 blogs waiting to speak.

Get in line.

The Area-51 Mars Pictures

Like the magician who keeps your attention focused on his left hand while his right hand picks your pocket, the much ballyhooed Rover Mars Missions have kept the world’s attention focused on microscopic proof of water while low orbit satellites continue transmit the real Mars on classified wavelengths. As those who have been paying attention know, there are two levels of survey taking place at Mars now. One is centered on the Rovers and brings us Mars from about one foot above the surface. The other, more covert, mission involves a planet wide mapping survey from low orbit. While the signals from the first are in clear and easily obtainable, the latter's transmissions of a bird's-eye view of the planet are encrypted and sent back in burst transmissions in military wavelengths.

Intercepting, decoding and distributing signals that carry the real truth about Mars is the self-appointed task of ‘Dr. Benway’ (not his real name). Benway has long been a thorn in the side of the military command charged with security at Area-51, but his passion for secrecy and his technical mastery have kept various agencies from locating him over the past four years he has been active.

Distributed through moderated UseNet groups, Benway’s “interceptions” are infrequent but always earthshaking. The image below is the latest and comes with the notation that it was snagged from the Mars Orbiter data stream within the last week, “Pass 247 / South Polar Area.”

Lake Heinlein?

Rosie, Roseanne, Rodan: It's Just That Simple

In a moment of candor Professor Glenn Reynolds issues a retraction and confession at Instapundit.com:

EUGENE VOLOKH WRITES on animals, perversion, Jerry Falwell, and Rosie O'Donnell.

UPDATE: Sorry - confused Roseanne Barr and Rosie O'Donnell earlier

Little wonder and no shame to that as we learn at: "Cloning Experiments Gone A Wry [sic]

To nobody's surprise, least of all MoveOn and PETA, CBS blew off their pleas to be included in the today's Ad Superbowl that will be interrupted from time to time with something resembling a football game. The New York Times reported that, commenting on the decision:

Wes Boyd, a founder of MoveOn.org, told The Associated Press that he had no evidence that the ad was rejected because it was anti-Bush, he said, "I worry that it's about ideology."

Poor fretful man. Of course it is about the ideology. And controversial ideologies are clearly proscribed by CBS' long-standing policy. Bush is either very good or very bad, depending. Hence, controversy. But this move by MoveOn was never about actually getting the ad on the tube, it was a cynical effort to get the ad talked about when it DIDN'T get on the tube. Media is always happy to oblige since it clearly thinks that news = something that didn't happen.

In the same vein, the mouth-droolers at PETA pushed their little eating meat= impotence screed forward for the press pickup. They never believed they'd have to write a check. That way they could be outraged on the cheap;

A spokeswoman for PETA, Lisa Lange, told The Associated Press that CBS's policy was inconsistent, because she had seen ads condemning smoking and drunken driving on past Super Bowl telecasts.

Since Ms. Lange obviously suffers from the brain drain that occurs when empathy completely replaces sanity, let me help her out. Lisa, drunken driving is bad. No controversy there except perhaps in New Orleans. Smoking? Bad. Not a lot of disagreement there either. But even you have to know that the jury is still out on meat eating at every McDonalds in the land. Okay? Thanks. Now go cuddle a bunny to death.

CBS's Martin Franks is the only one in this story that's sane.

Antidrug abuse or antismoking ads, on the other hand, he said, do not wade into such controversial waters. "If you can find somebody responsible who is for drug abuse," Mr. Franks said, "or someone responsible who is for teenagers seeking to smoke, then it would be a credible rebuttal of our policy. I don't know anybody who does."

Asked about last year's drug policy advertisement that linked drug sales to international terrorism, Mr. Franks said, "Is it an absolutely perfect system? Absolutely not. On the other hand, the MoveOn.org ad wasn't even close. I didn't need to rewind that one in the VCR."

Perhaps MoveOn will attempt to hit up Franks for a $1.00 rewind fee when he ships the tape back.

-- From Ad Rejections by CBS Raise Policy Questions

Title, verbatim: Another Demonstration of the Cliff-Guibert Fire Horse Reel, Showing a Young Girl Coming from an Office, Detaching Hose, Running with It 60 Feet, and Playing a Stream, All Inside of 30 Seconds (1900)

From: Internet Movie Data Base

Hamlet - The Text Adventure

Your name is Hamlet. Until recently, your life has been great, because you're young, you're good looking, and your family is not only mega-rich, but royal. In fact, you're the Prince of Denmark. You grew up in a big palace in a little town called Elsinore, you were pampered, and you were happy.

But a few weeks ago, things started to go rather badly wrong.

Or... perhaps... not so good after all.

LE Cirque owner Sirio Maccioni doesn't forget an insult. Heading the restaurateur's list is former New York Times restaurant critic William Grimes, who trashed his sons' Osteria del Circo in January 2002. The one-star review described the rack of lamb as having "all the appeal of a gnarled tree stump" and the osso buco as "a slick, glutinous mass, with surprisingly untender meat concealed within." Interviewed yesterday by Women's Wear Daily on the 30th anniversary of Le Cirque, Maccioni hissed, "When a reviewer has an ugly wife, he can never be very good." Grimes told PAGE SIX's Ian Spiegelman, "It's a contemptible comment, regardless of who he was referring to. I thought he was a gentleman." Maccioni, presumably referring to Le Cirque, also complained: "The New York Times came in and took a star away, then the next year they gave it back." Grimes said he couldn't be the critic in question since, "I took the star away and it has not been given back." Nor could it be Grimes because, "Objectively, my wife is very attractive."

From: Page Six

"Hey, there's always room for "a slick, glutinous mass!"

[Warning: Suckupathon follows -- "More shots of fine food like this can be had by browsing Lileks' Gallery of Regrettable Food and you can even get his wonderful, life-enhancing and stunningly brilliant book of the same title right HERE. Buy one for yourself, one for the little lady, one for your master and one for your dame and ... hell, just buy a couple of cases of this mighty fine and tasty book and hand them out at random on the street."]

Don't you know you're supposed
to wash your hands before
returning to work?

When the camera showed you the hole cards, a new Grade C Celebrity Showcase was born.

Yes, for years, the only dependable place you could go to find celebrities nobody knew were still walking around was Hollywood Squares. But, after a few nanoseconds of looking at Whoopi Goldberg in the center you were compelled to click to something more edifying such as the latest Bowie knife being offered on QVC.

The downside of this was that you lost the ability to say: "Didn't they kill him off for good on Dukes of Hazzard in the late 70s?" or "Just how many facelifts does that make for Joan Rivers and do I have to start keeping score with my toes now?"

Fear not. Now Bravo has given you a new chance at tracking celebrity obscurity with Celebrity Poker Showdown!

Yes, this offering that lets you know who the losers are just before they lose, opens up whole new vistas of Celebrities that early in their career have sunk below sonar range.

Admitedly, Celebrity Poker scored in one of their early offerings by pitting the cast of The West Wing against each other, but since The West Wing is in heavy rotation on Bravo, we assume the President

Continued...

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• The Wizbang Kerry Sloganator
• Pundit's Last Post
• What Are Friendsters For?
• That Reuters Moment: "Shadows of Vietnam"
• Okay,okay, okay... make that two aircraft carriers, seven billion dollars. Deal?
• On the Prison Production Line
• If Blogs Have Not Already Made Your Head Explode...
• The Lakes of Mars
• Rosie? Roseanne?: Even Professors Get Confused
• No Bush at the Bowl
• Movies We Never Tire of Watching
• You Are In A Maze of Twisted Minds, All Alike
• New York City: "Hell with Good Restaurants"
• Celebrity Poker Showdown: Not Ready for Hollywood Squares
• Free Nostalgia for Nerds: The Perfect Holiday Gift
• We Are All Picasso Now
• "The Sleep of Reason Breeds Monsters."
• Doomsbury
• The Smoking Dopes of the Democratic Party
• "Now is the end, perish the world..."