During this fortnight of my oblivion, the following earth-shaking events have captured the conscience of mankind.

Andrew Card resigned as White House Chief of Staff and was replaced by his Mini-Me in a typical Bush non-attempt to respond positively to advice.

Israel elected Ehud Olmert to make another attempt at peace and thereby brought down upon him the impending curse on Israeli peacemakers. Have you noticed that the moment an Israeli Prime Minister takes sincere, successful action toward peace, they are struck down by some otherworldly occurrence of fate? Rabin shakes hands on the White House lawn and is assassinated. Peres, the one Israeli leader who you can trust to always be fair loses his party. Barak jumps with gusto on the peace train and is hammered in the next election. Sharon puts behind him a lifetime of warmongering to hand over Gaza and now he's in a coma after a freak stroke. In case you didn't know, Ehud Olmert is starring in the new Superman movie coming out this May.

Everybody is still fumbling with Iran even as Bush fails again, this time with his team messing up on the Moussaoui case. This week in Salon, Sidney Blumenthal has a great article comparing Bush's and Hoover's similar responses to criticism. You see, until our friend George came along, Herbert Hoover was considered the biggest presidential foul-up in the past hundred years. You will notice that this sounds eerily familiar: in June 1930 he announced that, "The Depression is over," and then proceeded to veto public works and unemployment insurance. It says it all when the current American president is given the nod over Hoover's Depression denial as the most blind and rigid chief executive for a century.

Teri Hatcher is going out with Ryan Seacrest, not George Clooney as the tabloids at Oscartime supposed. You know you're on the B-list when you score a major actress and everybody thinks George did it.

Joey seems to have disappeared again after one new episode and Brad, Angelina, Jen, Nick and Jessica are, oh, who cares.

Coming up tomorrow, Sharon Stone returns as Catherine Tramell in a much-anticipated sequel that will either mark her comeback at 40-something or the formal end of her career.

In their final attempt to stave off eradication from the popular consciousness, the gay cowboys release their DVD next Tuesday, a month less a day after their party really ended.

Oil is up, CNN has upped their home page to 1024x768, and the pandemic hasn't struck yet.