By Steve Fey

There have been a lot of odd developments in the news lately. For instance, this stuff:

The re-enactment of the Michael Jackson trial on E! Entertainment News is proving once and for all that there are things considerably weirder and scarier than Michael Jackson. Namely, E! Entertainment News re-enacting the Michael Jackson trial.

Anti-immigration sentiment has reached new highs, what with the passing of strict new laws eliminating many benefits for illegal immigrants in several states. Spokespersons for several bands of American Indians have been quoted as saying: "Wish we’d thought of that!"

The hyperbole by young Hollywood starlets about their emotional lives has been amply illustrated by the many disastrous occasions in the past six months when the earth truly did move.

Hybrid cars are all the rage. Owners say that the machines use very little fuel yet still perform very well under heavy traffic and freeway conditions. That’s all very well, but what if two of them get together and form a back-cross? You know, when two hybrids breed and their original forms return, only worse? Imagine a Model T with a twenty-four volt electric motor and you’ll see what I mean.

A crisis in Social Security resulted when it was discovered that there were now more people voicing opinions about social security which they pulled from their ears than there were workers earning taxable income.

A recently published article informed us all that the reason Microsoft products are attacked by viruses so often is because there are so many more Microsoft products in use than any other brand of computer software. This was the result of a forty-year longitudinal study involving thousands of graduate students.

In health news it was reported that Vioxx and similar drugs can kill you. But not as fast as the symptoms they’re designed to treat, so it’s okay to use them, just not to kill yourself. Also, not all fat is bad. Transfats are bad. A transfat is a really big public bus, I think. If you see one, don’t eat it. Regular fat is actually good for you, they say. In a related development, it was reported that the primary cause of death among both men and women is being born in the first place.

Martha Stewart got out of stir the other day. On the occasion of her first day of work in over five months, she told her employees that she was (I’m going to have to paraphrase here) amazed at the amount of misery in the world. Is it a coincidence that Martha rhymes with Siddhartha? I think not. The Eightfold Way: It’s a Good Thing. (Maybe it’s nine-fold now, including the Way of Right Decoration.)

And finally the Oscars came out last week, and many people are asking why, once again, Martin Scorsese didn’t win for Best Director. Well, I’ll tell you, I’ve seen both The Aviator and Million Dollar Baby and the reason is because Martin Scorsese didn’t do half as good a job of directing as did Clint Eastwood.* Why in heck did you suppose Martin Scorsese didn’t win? Everyone knows that the Academy Awards are always given out in an impartial and unbiased manner, right?

That’s all for now. Tune in next week when we discuss everything that needs to be done to make the world into a perfect place. Test to follow.

*Mr. Eastwood’s job was as fine a one as I’ve seen since One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. (That movie won Best Director, too.) Not that The Aviator isn’t a fine film, because it is, but as I said, the reason Scorsese didn’t get it is that he wasn’t the best director. Sorry, fans.