I have been neglecting my duty to amuse. By way of atonement, here is the first installment in what should be a frequent, fun-filled feature intended to provoke smiles, if not guffaws.
1. Testifying at a House subcommittee on broadcast "indecency," Gail Berman, president of entertainment for the Fox network, said:
"We sincerely regret that a few incidents of inappropriate programming have overshadowed the good shows we proudly air on Fox each week."
(Good one, eh?)
2. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia doesn’t hunt only with VP Chaney. He pursued pheasants on a trip arranged by the dean of the University of Kansas School of Law weeks before hearing two cases in which the dean was a lead attorney. Here is Scalia’s defense:
"I do not think that spending time at a law school in which the counsel in pending cases was the dean could reasonably cause my impartiality to be questioned."
(Not bad.)
Here is a third statement I find unfunny but worthy of note.
In Kabul, Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld said, "I’ve not seen any indication that the Taliban pose any military threat to the security of Afghanistan."
On the outskirts of Kabul, meanwhile, five aid workers were killed in an attack "that resembled previous attacks attributed to the Taliban," said the Chicago Tribune.
Seven paragraphs further down, the reporter noted: "More than 500 people have been killed in a resurgence of violence linked to the Taliban movement since last summer."
(No comment.)