First of all, Mr. Heyward, I want to thank you from the bottom of my heart for gracing us with your presence here in Congress today. I realize your schedule would be busy under normal circumstances, being the CEO of a huge, awesome oil company and all. But I can't imagine what it must be like for you now as the media relentlessly hammers you day in and day out. So again, thank you so much for taking the time to answer our piddling little questions today.

Second, I want to apologize for the president's actions. He has absolutely no right to demand that you clean up this mess. After all the fine, thankless work you do day in and day out, you do not deserve to be bullied by someone who was only technically elected leader of the free world.

Believe me, Mr. Hayward, if it was up to me, it would be the American people who would repay BP. After all, American waters destroyed your gorgeous oil rig. And American seagulls and cranes are now polluting your precious crude with their dirty feathers. If I had my way, all these large bodies of water and sea creatures would be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.

Mr. Hayward, I sit here in utter admiration of you. You carry a burden none of us can possibly understand. Not since Job has a man endured such unwarranted persecution. You are a tower of strength, a shining beacon, and a wondrous example of what the human spirit can withstand. I can honestly say I've never met any man who could measure up to you, and I doubt I ever will.

Mr. Hayward, I want to kiss you. Gentle pecks at first, then deep, probing kisses that seem to last forever. I've never felt this way before, about anyone, and I am not afraid. The heart wants what it wants, and it is no liar.

Mr. Hayward, I want you to know that you can have your way with me, in the manner of your choosing. Whatever you ask for, it shall be yours. I am your slave. If you wanted to urinate directly into my mouth, I would gladly open it to receive your pee. If you wanted to defecate onto my chest, I'd remove my shirt immediately.

I would do all of this and more. I want you to understand that. That's how strong my love is.

I know that my fellow Republicans will pressure me to retract my apology, and I will do so because I've always been a good soldier. That is my earthly duty. But my heavenly duty is to love you.

Mr. Hayward, I see you rising to leave. I beg of you, do not despair. You must endure, for all of us. STAY ALIVE! NO MATTER WHAT OCCURS, I WILL FIND YOU!

A tweet from someone (can't recall who; forgive me, it's been a jerk of week for me) led me to a post at Mark Evanier's* Web site (News from ME) with some amazing video.

* In case you're unfamiliar with Mr. Evanier, he's a scribe for many cartoons and comic books over the years--most notably (for me) Groo the Wanderer, a grossly overlooked work of supreme silliness.

I'm totally just echoing what Mr. Evanier wrote on his site, but if I can expose a few dozen more people to these videos, it's worth it. And I'm also gonna go ahead and totally tell you what happens in these videos, but I promise these spoilers won't make it any less awesome.

The post in question has a clip from the classic Late Night with David Letterman (from 1984, according to its YouTube page), with Dave interviewing pre-Carson Tonight Show host Jack Paar. Jack takes Dave on an impromptu tour (one Dave was not briefed on before the show, apparently) backstage at the Late Night studio, which belonged to the Tonight Show during Paar's reign. Jack points out a few notable spots, including his old office, which had been filled with junk since he left.

The tour ends in a dressing room, where Paar opens up an innocuous looking utility door to reveal a tangle of old pipes. But not just any pipes. What sense would that make? C'mon, use your head.

No, these pipes were decorated by Jim Henson.



It seems Paar had The Muppets as guests on The Jack Paar Program (the talk show he hosted when he was allowed back on TV) in 1964. It was one of their first national TV appearances. Grateful for the opportunity, Henson expressed his thanks in graffiti form. And even though paint is not a medium you associate with Jim Henson, you can totally see his hand in this work.

Amazingly, it was there 20 years later when Paar sprung it on Dave Letterman. Even more amazing, the artwork is still there today. In fact, NBC has now decided to make it part of their studio tour. Here, in a segment from The Today Show, the exhibit is unveiled by Jimmy Fallon and Frank Oz, puppeteer behind Bert, Fozzie Bear, and many other beloved Muppets.

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

If you don't think this is one of the coolest things ever, this is where we part ways, sir.

• There are many rumors about the origins of the vuvuzela. Some say it was the result of a CIA psy-ops experiment that tried to find the perfect frequency that would drive men mad. Others say it was spawned from a horn that fell off Satan himself. Still others say that the instrument was invented and popularized by Kenny G. All of these rumors are correct.
• Though it is associated with South African soccer, the vuvuzela originated in South America and is named for the Argentinian pop star of the same name, best known for her 1973 hit,  "Mis oídos están sangrando (para ti)."
• A vuvuzela can register sounds up to 127 decibels. The only louder man-made sound is a detonated nuclear bomb hooked up to a vuvuzela.
  
• Scientists are hard at work developing an even louder vuvuzela for the 2014 World Cup, the Vuvuzela Centipede, which will consist of three vuvuzelas surgically attached to one another.
• Many critics feel the vuvuzela is distracting and not befitting "the beautiful game" and its grand traditions, such as hooliganism, bloody, deadly riots, and fascist salutes.
  

Within the last few weeks, as World Cup fever has gripped (most of) the globe, I've seen numerous wags on the internet tweet/facebook/smoke signal about how they would never watch soccer in a million years. Especially here in America, where soccer is still seen as something decadent, European, and vaguely effeminate, kinda like...the rest of Europe, I guess. Never mind that the World Cup is literally the most watched thing on the planet. You and your small circle of friends don't care about it, and it is therefore not worth your time.

I can't stand this Me-Centric attitude that celebrates ignorance. When people say things like this, they are declaring their pride in how much they don't know. I despise when people declare I'VE NEVER WATCHED/LISTENED TO/READ [BLANK] with pride, as if they've passed some endurance test the rest of us poor slobs failed. "It took all my strength, but I never watched a single episode of Lost. You poor saps will never know what you didn't miss!"

I've always felt that there is nothing to be gained from not knowing something, because everything is an experience, whether it's listening to a symphony or watching American Idol. And yes, Idol sucks hard, but I know it sucks hard because I've actually watched it a few times.

When you say I WILL NEVER WATCH/LISTEN TO/READ [BLANK], you are saying I AM WILLFULLY CLOSING OFF MY MIND TO CERTAIN THINGS I SUSPECT I WON'T LIKE. And that is fine, if that is what you choose to do with your brain. Just don't act like this decision makes you more evolved than everyone else. And certainly don't act like you can comment on the qualities of something you've already chosen to ignore.

Under my benevolent despotism, if you choose to not see/listen to/read something, all you should be allowed to say about it is. "I haven't seen/listened to/read that. It doesn't look like something I'd be into." And that's it.

Those who violate this rule shall be locked in a solid white room with no windows for a full week, where they will be able to enjoy the stimulation-free nothingness that they seem to crave so much.

I have spoken.

Nike and CBS have filed a class action lawsuit against USC's football program, seeking damages for loss of income.

"The impending NCAA sanctions against USC football, which include a two-year ban from postseason play, will reduce the program's visibility, and thus have a severe impact on the plaintiff's bottom line," the lawsuit states. "When the school violated the spirit of the NCAA's commitment to amateur athletics, they should have considered how that act would impact the millions of dollars we have invested in their program."

Pete Carroll, former USC football coach, contested the lawsuit's implication. "The USC I know would never commit recruiting violations or pay our players in any way," Carroll said, "because nothing is more important to us than our corporate partnerships."

The NCAA has yet to comment on the lawsuit. "Our rules committee will review this case as soon as possible," the league said through a spokesman. "Right now, we are preoccupied with completely destroying some conferences."

Stephen Strasburg's major league debut was everything (almost) everyone hoped it would be. I'll admit there was a part of me that wanted Strasburg to, if not fail, then perform in a middling fashion. There was no way (I thought) the hype could possibly match the reality. But it did, and then some. After seeing how lights out he was, and ignoring the fact that the Mets will have to face this guy a couple of times a season for at least the next few years, I had to admit he was something awesome to behold.

Of course, some people pointed out that Strasburg's start came against the lowly Pirates (like this jerk did). But with some time to think about my dumb tweet, I've changed my mind and would like to echo the sentiments expressed by Walkoff Walk. The Pirates are still a major league team. They have some decent hitters, like Andrew McCutchen, Delwyn Young, and, okay, why not, Lastings Milledge. Even the worst teams in baseball do not strike out 14 times in one game very often. Any time a pitcher racks up that many Ks, no matter who the opponent is, it's amazing. Especially when he fans the last seven batters to face him and is still throwing 99 mph as he does it.

Almost as impressive as the 14 strikeouts: Strasburg did not walk a single batter. I bet you'd have to look long and hard to find the last time a pitcher made his first major league start and didn't issue a single free pass. And if you did find such a start, it was probably because that rookie gave up seven straight hits and was yanked before recording an out.

I also heard/read some people mocking Nats fans for never showing up to games before now, and leaving when Strasburg left the game. That last act is, admittedly, a little shabby. But up to this point, you can't say the Nationals had much to cheer for, save Ryan Zimmerman and the occasional anomalous hot streak. I don't blame people from staying away from the ballpark. Going to games is expensive. If you're going to invest that amount of money and time, the on-field product better be worth it, and up to this point, it hasn't been.

It reminds me of 2008, when the Rays made the playoffs and lots of fans (particularly of the Red Sox stripe) mocked the folkways of a fanbase that had no experience with packed stadiums and postseason baseball. Such criticism is totally unfair, because all fandom starts somewhere. Just because the Sox had almost a century's head start to build its mythos doesn't make their fandom any more evolved or righteous.

In 1905, some handlebar-mustachioed gentleman decided to take in the Boston nine and see what all the fuss was about; now 100 years later, his descendents are Sox fans. If this person had grown up in Tampa Bay, he wouldn't have had an opportunity to see a major league baseball team in his hometown for 90 years. Whose fault would that be? Nobody's.

I'm sure there's kids in Florida who got hooked on baseball for the first time because of the excitement of that first postseason in Tampa. Now they're fans for life, and they'll pass that passion along to their kids. Likewise, people from DC who had only a middling interest in the Nationals could get caught along the tide of Strasburg-mania, and in the process, become real fans. And the people who've been "real fans" all along get to look down their noses at the newcomers and boast that they liked the Nats before it was cool. Win-win!

My only objection, and it has little to do with the second coming of Koufax himself: I've heard more than one person say that Strasburg's debut was a great tonic for "long suffering" Nats fans. Here I must raise a hand and object. The Nationals have only been around for six seasons. They have not existed for a sufficient amount of time to have a long suffering fanbase. For that, look at the team from Pittsburgh they just defeated. Or Indians fans. Or Royals fans.

Better yet, look to the dispossessed Expos fans, who were left without a team when the now-Nationals left Montreal. There's no better definition of a long-suffering fanbase than one whose team split town and ain't never coming back. Particularly since Expos fans must have seen the execution coming from miles away, as MLB did everything in its power to drain the Expos of what little life they had. They moved "home" games to Puerto Rico. They let Jeff Loria run the team into the ground. And they took over the franchise but didn't allow it to improve in any way.

Just consider that, Nats fans. Your team may have been a doormat up until this point, but least it still exists.

I have now almost totally weaned myself off of listening to WFAN (apart from Mets games). It was hard at first, because I grew up in a house where this station was on all the time. The sounds of sports radio, however dumb, are like audio comfort food to me. But I've come to realize it's more like audio Cheetos--it provides no nutrition and leaves behind a sticky, powdery mess.

However, I will occasionally tune in after a good series for the Mets. I like to soak up some good vibes and listen to those sad sacks who bitch and moan no matter what the team does. I did this yesterday and also heard the late morning/early afternoon hosts Joe Benigno and Evan Roberts interview Bill Madden, Latino-phobic Daily News scribe and George Steinbrenner biographer.

I have yet to read his Steinbrenner book, though I would like to. But if a subtitle like "The Last Lion of Baseball" didn't clue you into the book's tone, then this interview would have (you can hear the whole thing here). Like most folks who speak of Big Stein these days, Madden was effusive in his praise of the Yankees owner. He credits Steinbrenner with "making the Yankees a billion-dollar enterprise". Asked if he should be in the Hall of Fame, Madden responded, "if you tried to write a definitive history of baseball, I defy you to be able to do it without mentioning George Steinbrenner prominently throughout it."

You also can't write a history of the 2000's without mentioning George W. Bush prominently throughout it. That doesn't make him a great president. He had a lot of impact on the world, and most of it was negative. Prominence doesn't necessarily equal greatness, and it certainly doesn't necessarily equal goodness.

I know I've written about this before, but whenever confronted with this take on Steinbrenner, I feel like I have to raise my hand and provide a counter-argument. Because with each passing year, the idea of George Steinbrenner as a terrible owner seems to trickle down the memory hole.

And I know I've told this story before, too, but it also bears repeating because no one seems to remember this era anymore. The day Steinbrenner received his second "lifetime" suspension in 1990, I was at my grandparents house. I remember it distinctly because my uncle--an out-of-his-skull fanatical Yankees fan--was also there, and when the news came down, he literally leaped in the air, clapped his hand, and yelled with joy.

Because by that point, Yankee fans were in open revolt. The 1980s were an anxious, fallow period for the franchise. Despite spending top dollar on the best available free agents (surprise, surprise), the Yankees missed out on the playoffs for 13 straight seasons--a long drought for any team, let alone them.

Yes, I took a cheap shot at umpire Jim Joyce, whose blown call turned Amrando Galarraga's perfect game into a one-hitter. But that's because I'm a jerk who has no pity or shame. The real ire should be directed not at Joyce, but Bud Selig, which has idiotically resisted replay against all technological advances and common sense.

Jim Joyce is considered one of the better umpires in Major League Baseball. We have no reason to believe Joyce would have sabotaged a perfect game to drive an agenda or for personal gain. There was absolutely no incentive for him to blow the call, unless he is secretly the world's biggest masochist. After the game, he addressed the press (a pretty rare thing for any umpire to do under any circumstances) and sounded completely heartbroken about what had happened.

In other words, a top professional acting at in good faith and with the best of his abilities can still mess up very badly in a very big spot. And technology has advanced to the point where every single person watching the game immediately knows how badly he blew it. Which is why it makes less than zero sense to not have replay available in baseball.

In the absence of replay, everyone wonders how this injustice can be overturned while somehow retaining the game's "purity". Because going into a booth for one minute (which is how long it would have taken to overturn Joyce's call) ruins the game's magical mystical sepiatone Field of Dreams Wonderboy bullshit aura. By Bud Selig's logic, a seatbelt ruins the mystique of driving, even if you'll fly through the windshield without it.

What is truly "impure": Having instant replay to correct officiating mistakes, like every other sport does, or asking the commissioner to wave a magic wand and declare that Galarraga pitched a perfect game, as if the blown call never happened?

Here's how you institute replay:

1. Issue one challenge per team per game. When used, the challenge is expended regardless of whether the team "wins" the challenge or not.
2. Umpires have the right to refuse a challenge if it appears to be total BS. Otherwise, you'd have managers wasting them to allow a pitcher to warm up or just to be dicks.
3. Challenges can only be used for fair/foul and safe/out calls. No strike calling.

You can argue on the particulars, of course. But after last night, can you tell me that replay would be any worse than what we have now? Because what we have now is essentially crossing our fingers and hoping everything works out okay. Why not just ask Santa Claus for no umpiring mistakes next year? It makes about as much sense.

However, in the interest of fairness, I felt I should have an opinion from the other side of the fence. So I point you to this op-ed longtime contributor Skitch Hanson wrote during last year's playoffs, entitled "Making the Right Call on Wrong Calls". Enjoy!

"Welcome, O infamy! I go to encounter for the millionth time the reality of my experience and to forge in the smithy of my soul the final impetus for full replay."

Within minutes after the news of Gary Coleman's death broke, the Intertubes rattled with one unfunny joke after another. It made me briefly happy that I've never become famous. Otherwise, random strangers might think that me dying at a criminally young age from head trauma was hilarious.

Of course, Gary Coleman wasn't a walking punchline simply because he was once famous. There's a lot of ex-stars who fit this bill--MC Hammer springs to mind. But the cruel, twisted anti-fame Coleman suffered from was a special kind, the kind that can only be inflicted on that most reviled form of ex-fame: child stardom. Not even debutards like Nicole Richie or the Kardashians--who have contributed not one single positive thing to this earth--are mocked the way that former child stars are once they hit puberty.

Child stars are chewed up and spit out on both ends--by a fickle public, and by weird, sociopathic stage parents who drive them to succeed long before they can make decisions for themselves. Thanks to decades of unsavory examples, people expect the worst of former child stars, and even if they never go down the primrose path, they will be hounded by paparazzi and curiosity seekers who can't believe that the Macauly Culkins of the world dared to grow up.

Coleman's living purgatory was exacerbated by a congenital kidney ailment that stunted his growth. At least some child stars have a theoretical chance to move beyond their past. Gary Coleman was forced to look like like a child long after anyone had any use for his schtick.

He also had the misfortune of acting on a show that had two of the more fantastic ex-child star meltdowns in history. Dana Plato left Diff'rent Strokes to rob video stores, act in porn, and OD on prescription painkillers. Todd Bridges became a drug addict and dealer with repeated run-ins with the law.

Gary Coleman got into some physical altercations with strangers, but much of that was provoked by people who wanted to fuck with him (granted, he also had some domestic disputes, and was charged as the aggressor in at least one of them). But his post-sitcom life was considered more sordid than sad because he caught the shrapnel of his ex-costars' explosions. Bridges and Plato blew up, and Coleman was collateral damage.

Anything bad that happened to him was labeled another sick chapter in the "hilariously" awful Diff'rent Strokes saga. Like how he had to sue his parents because they mismanaged his assets and left him broke. That horrible circumstance was put on the same level, in the public's mind, as Todd Bridges slinging crack, even though Bridges was a drug-dealing creep and Coleman was victimized by his mother and father.

Gary Coleman is one of the most egregious examples of what I call The Vanilla Ice Syndrome. Vanilla Ice's debut album sold 11 million copies, but almost overnight he turned into a pop culture whipping boy. The savageness directed at Vanilla Ice was in direct proportion to how honestly popular he once was. Once people decided they were done with him, and realized he kinda sucked, they had to mock him to compensate for once liking him.

The Vanilla Ice Syndrome is especially vicious when the ex-star in question was beloved by children and/or teenyboppers. At that stage, most kids don't really have much taste at all except liking what's popular. Violently rejecting something you liked when you were 12 is a way of showing you've grown up. In other words, I fear for Miley Cyrus' future.

In the late 70s/early 80s, Gary Coleman was one of the hugest stars in America. He was one of the most beloved and recognizable people in the country. Then, after eight seasons on the air, his act grew stale. But it wasn't good enough for people to just not watch Diff'rent Strokes anymore. They had to shit all over the guy because they once loved what he did. It was a product of the collective embarrassment over making someone famous for saying "watchu talkin bout Willis". He had to pay for the rest of us feeling so retroactively dumb.

So when he died, a lot of people couldn't resist the temptation to make lame cracks, most of them using that catchphrase. I know this is a hard concept to grasp in the Internet Age, but not everything is a springboard for your savage wit. It's okay to let something pass without making a snotty remark about it. It's okay to not spit out the absolute first thing that pops in your head when you hear about someone's death.

People made jokes after Dennis Hopper died, but at least Dennis Hopper lived a long life and was able to enjoy a second act of his career. Gary Coleman died at age 42, never got to live a non-shitty life after his heyday, and had troubles that were mostly not self-inflicted. No other details of his life make that even remotely funny. And if you think it is funny, pray no one's laughing if you get hit by a bus tomorrow.