In the following video, Jon Stewart tackles the question of abstinence-only sex education (with all of the appropriate sarcasm) and the fact that it has proven ineffective in reducing teen pregnancies and the transmission of STD's.

He first offers us a look at some of the techniques used and some of the arguments being offered by those opposed to comprehensive sex education. You're bound to love the dirty toothbrush example as well as the "god stick and shame cave" analogy that Stewart attributes to the likes of Senator Brownback. It's a good thing we've advanced from more primitive deterrent strategies and adopted these advanced measures of preventing children from exploring their sexuality.

He closes the segment with a pubic service announcement promoting dry humping as a reasonable alternative to getting 'dirty'. Stewart tells teens that dry humping is safe...it avoids the need for those disgusting condoms...and it allows you to still get into heaven.

In the following video, The Onion reports that the vast majority of praise (compliments) is not sincere and is actually offered with sarcasm.

It reminded me of a Seinfeld episode titled The Good Samaritan. In the episode, George jumps the gun on acknowledging the sneeze of a woman in the presence of her husband. The husband is angered because George didn't allow enough time for the husband to issue the first "God bless you".

As the show progresses, the Seinfeld crew continues to debate George's alleged faux pas. During the discussion, Jerry decides that telling someone "God bless you" after they sneeze isn't really all that meaningful. Instead, Jerry suggests it would make people feel better if we said, "You're so good looking".

Since virtually everything on Seinfeld had to do with sarcasm, it seemed to perfectly complement the tongue-in-cheek satire offered by The Onion. With that said, next time you hear someone sneeze, give Jerry's suggestion a go and see if you get a thank you or a glare that tells you your smart ass sarcasm isn't appreciated.

A sad day indeed. This Friday was the end of the season for HBO's Real Time With Bill Maher. What will I do with my Friday nights now? Well I guess The Daily Show and The Colbert Report provide a safety net for those in need of irreverence...but it's still difficult to see Bill Maher drop off the scene for a few months. OK, enough with the lamentations...it's time for this weeks New Rules.

Bill starts out with a swipe at the high price of gas...call it the nine tenths rule. He then argues that psychedelic screen savers are a gateway drug...which may explain his reference to all things prickly.

Maher shifts to the upcoming wedding of Jenna Bush to remind our president that he's not losing a daughter...just a war. He knocks the obsession with cosmetic surgery and the need to bring our children to work, and he suggests those who think that Obama is a Muslim might want to be sure they haven't married their cousin.

Maher takes a jab at liberals and their oil burning and bumper sticker laden vans. He then closes with a segment on the lingering Democratic nomination in which he points out that the obsession with everything Jeremiah Wright may be Hillary Clinton's secret weapon...though I doubt the Reverend will provide the Clinton campaign with the offense Maher suggests will be needed to put her over the top.

Drinking stories are clearly a part of our culture...especially on college campuses. In the following spoof, The Onion provides the "research" on the most popular phrases 18-24 year olds use to describe their state of drunkenness to their roommates from a weekend of partying.

Ironically, little has changed over the years with regards to getting trashed. When we're young, the goal is to be the most outrageous drunk...the one everyone talks about the next morning. Wearing that badge becomes the objective. Then as we get older, the goal seems to shift to being able to drink the most without showing any tell-tale signs of impairment.

On the one hand, the unedited is celebrated...on the other, masking one's actual status becomes preferential. Perhaps it's all a result of societal expectations. We're willing to allow youthful indiscretion until the point at which we require adult inhibition. Makes one wonder if either approach makes any sense. I find that realization to be a downer..but then again, we're talking about drinking, eh?

This week Bill Maher argues that mailing our tax returns shouldn't require a stamp, that the airlines provide such dismal service that they ought to start loading us in the cargo hold, and that the Pope ought to wear a slip under his holy garments...especially in light of the church's long history of cover ups. Maher then blasts Blockbuster's plan to takeover Circuit City...calling it an effort to create the worst retail experience in America.

He closes with an excellent observation on the latest Barack Obama bitter-gate brouhaha. Maher isn't buying into the manufactured maelstrom when he seeks to understand how in the hell one defines an elitist in America. He then insists that those who think Obama is an elitist need to reconsider what lies behind the candidacy of John McCain and the presidency of George W. Bush. Instead, Maher suggests it is he who should be bitter at the fact that "shitkickers voted twice for a retarded guy they wanted to have a beer with".

We've all heard the expression, "Her floor was so clean, you could eat off of it". In the following video, Mo Rocca wants to know how many people would actually give it a go. OK, he doesn't ask them if they would sit down and have their meal served on the floor...but he does explore people's views on the infamous five second rule.

I suspect the number of people who will eat something they've dropped on the floor is higher than one would imagine. I could be wrong, but I'd bet the number of individuals who throw away absolutely everything that falls on the floor isn't all that large.

Feel free to share your own rules, regulations, and rituals with regard to eating off the floor. Unfortunately, when I saw this video, all I could think of was David Hasselhoff lying drunk on the floor and eating a burger. That's enough to make anyone reconsider the five second rule.

Bill Maher walked a fine line tonight...and he may have even crossed it a couple times...so much so that Jason Alexander tells him (while holding two fingers close together), "You've got to be just this far from madness at all times".

Regardless, tonight's New Rules was one of the best Maher has delivered since the end of the writer's strike. He starts off with the obvious...you can't protect the Olympic torch (or much of anything for that matter) with security forces on roller blades. He follows that with a comment on astrology and boring children's birthday parties...neither of which drew much laughter.

Next he nails a segment on Virgin Airlines' new ad campaign which touts a woman blow drying her hair at her seat. Maher laments the decision to turn already dismal flights into flying locker rooms and he finishes by sarcastically suggesting he'll now have time to shave his balls.

In a segment worthy of the title of his prior show, Politically Incorrect, he criticizes the Aetna Insurance decision to appoint Magic Johnson as their spokesperson. Amidst moans from the audience, Maher essentially states that he refuses to take health tips "from an HIV positive fat man" (ouch!).

As if that weren't enough, he pivots to offer a lengthy and scathing indictment of the Pope and the Catholic Church. While referring to the raid on the Texas polygamist sect, Maher sets the table for the evisceration of the Catholic Church when he tells us that the combination of a secretive compound, religion, and weirdos in pioneer outfits is bound to result in children being molested. He closes by drawing an insightful analogy between the bail out of Bear Stearns and the free pass given to the leadership of the Catholic Church.

While I've only included a clip of the New Rules segment, the entire show was noteworthy. If you have the time, head over to YouTube and have a look.

Should we laugh at the fact that The Daily Show provides a more accurate version of the facts that underly the news than does Fox News? Here's your chance to decide by watching John Oliver's documentary on the two faces of Fox News.

Funny as it is to watch this piece in which the many Fox News correspondents spin an issue one way if it favors the GOP and another should it cast a positive light on the Democrats, it provides a frightening commentary on the degree to which Fox News is neither fair or balanced.

It really is amazing to see the blatant partisanship that has come to typify much of what is disseminated by Fox. It is even more amazing that they are able to attract the formidable audience they do.

I'm reminded of my one of my favorite quotations. Horace Mann once stated, "We go by the major vote, and if the majority are insane, the sane must go to the hospital". As it now stands, I'm currently scheduling my exploratory visits. If Fox News wins over many more viewers, I'll soon be seated at the admissions desk.

Did you ever wonder what happens to your vision when you've had a few too many cocktails? The following visual is from an ad campaign aimed at drunken drivers and it simulates the effects of being intoxicated. The ad format has been used in prior campaigns but I thought it was rather effective in pointing out the risks of drinking and driving. Regardless, I simply like visual images that mess with our brains.

On a lighter note, I find it amusing to compare today's attitudes on drinking with the one's that existed when I was in high school. At the time, one of my teachers was known for his many oddball comments. One of my favorites related to his take on drinking and driving. With his signature deadpan delivery, he would tell us the following, "If you're going to drink and drive, make sure you have a car." Today, I suspect such a comment might land a teacher in hot water. So much for the good old days.

By the way, to get the full effect of the visual, click on the following thumbnail image and it will open a full sized one.

In these political times, every day brings a new endorsement. In the following video clip, Lewis Black gives us the skinny on the value of celebrity endorsements. Once Black finishes skewering the merit of endorsements from the likes of Kal Penn, Dick Van Patten, Heidi Montag, Rosie O'Donnell, Tom Cruise, and Donald Trump, he moves on to the creme de la creme...Oprah Winfrey. Black shows us a few Oprah clips to make his point that Oprah's exuberance for Obama may not be all that...well...exuberant.

I think the truth of the matter is that celebrity endorsements do very little to influence politics and more likely serve to influence the appeal of the celebrity making the endorsement. Then again, given the propensity of politicians to mouth the lines of their handlers, who better to judge actors than fellow actors, eh?

Who would have ever thought that Jimmy Kimmel could be a Richard Simmons' protege? In the following video, Richard does his best to save Jimmy from the ravages of a life of leisure...and poor hygiene. Try as he might, Richard can't seem to get Jimmy to shed his bad habits...or his extra pounds.

In the end, Jimmy can't change his ways and his fancy pants makeover is a total failure. Turns out Jimmy would rather remain "a piece of s@#%". Richard, on the other hand, will be forced to kick his way out of another celebrity's closet while waving his magic wand. And so goes the work of a fitness fairy...not that there's anything wrong with that.

Bill is on a tear in this episode of New Rules. He begins with an assault on the TSA and their plans to make the screening process more comfortable - Maher just wants them to get him through the line well before his shoes are out of style. He takes a swipe at Bubba Clinton's extracurricular activities with an picture from the campaign trail - let's just say that Monica won't like the inference.

Next up, I'm with Bill when he says he's sick of Heidi and Spencer. When he asks, "Who are they and who cares", that pretty much sums up my sentiment. Maher then shifts to bowling and suggests Barack borrow a "ball" from uber alpha-male wannabe Ann Coulter. Oh, he also tells us Bush is quite the bowler...especially when it comes to preemptive strikes.

Maher closes by admonishing those Democrats who are whining that Hillary needs to drop out to save the party. Simply stated, he suggests Democrats take one of their children's chill pills and allow democracy to unfold. Instead of lamenting the close contest, Maher suggests Democrats "grow a pair" and cease with the pompous circle jerk alliances that have infected a number of well known web sites. After all, as Maher suggests, why all the fuss when everyone knows that elections in America are decided by the Supreme Court?

It's one thing to be uneducated; it's another to be stupid. If a new report on drop out rates in major U.S. metropolitan cities is to be believed, fewer Americans are educated. If the following video represents a cross section of the United States, far to many Americans are also stupid. Taken together, they paint a frightening picture. It's a mixture that may well explain our diminishing economic advantage and it may also signal our waning relevance on the world stage.

From The Washington Post:

WASHINGTON -- The Bush administration announced Tuesday it will require states to report high school graduation rates in a uniform way instead of using a variety of methods that critics say are often based on unreliable information.

Education Secretary Margaret Spellings announced the change at a news conference at which a report was released showing that 17 of the nation's 50 largest cities had high school graduation rates lower than 50 percent.

Nationally, about 70 percent of U.S. students graduate on time with a regular diploma and about 1.2 million students drop out annually.

"When more than 1 million students a year drop out of high school, it's more than a problem, it's a catastrophe," said former Secretary of State Colin Powell, founding chair of the alliance.

Now take a look at the following video. While this piece was a tongue-in-cheek presentation aired on Australian television, it is difficult to ignore the subtle threads of truth that underly the humor.

When I traveled around the world in late 2004 and early 2005, it became apparent that many foreigners were beginning to mistrust the American public. Generally speaking, the message I received was that the world could excuse the unfortunate election of George Bush in 2000...but his reelection in 2004 had set in motion doubts about the electorate's judgment. Further, the prior willingness to separate the unpopular actions of the U.S. government from the generally positive perceptions of the average American was beginning to erode.

At the same time, I sensed a forgiving tone predicated upon America's long history as a force for good in the world. Notwithstanding, it was apparent that granting the benefit of the doubt would eventually come to an end if our trajectory remained the same.

While the 2006 election may have been viewed as a step in the right direction, I think it's safe to surmise that little has happened since my travels to reassure the rest of the world that a sea change has occurred. The seeming ineffectiveness of the Democrats to reduce or remove our troops from Iraq couldn't have been encouraging.

The world may well view 2008 as our defining moment. Should the American voter install a president who "stays the course", I would anticipate a much stronger backlash and an accelerated erosion of credibility.

In the end, it becomes a question of the meaning of freedom. America has always been a beacon for independent thought and the champion of the oppressed. If our actions in November appear to be an affirmation of the status quo and an acquiescence to conformity, I suspect we will not only be seen as uneducated and stupid; we will soon be relabeled as representative of a mindset that chooses dictation over diplomacy and preemption over persuasion.

If that should transpire, the world may rightly conclude that fear has become the catalyst that will lead a once fearless people to further embrace the suspension of freedom. Hopefully, most Americans are smarter than that. Only time...and the ballot box...will tell.

With the Bush presidency coming to an end...with talk of a lame duck administration...and despite the negative reviews on George Bush's ambitious yet seemingly endless epic, The Iraq War...GWB Studios, in conjunction with GOP Tax Cut Productions, is moving forward with plans to release an astounding sequel that is destined to put an exclamation mark upon the 'Mission Accomplished' era.

From the director who brought us The Doubling Of Debt...get ready to witness the most startling event since the release of The Great Depression. Not since Alfred Hitchcock's The Birds, has America faced such an unfettered onslaught of "peckery". When the curtain falls on this startling production, you'll not only be missing the shirt off your back, your pocketbook will have been plucked cleaner than a spiral ham bone.

History is about to unfold...America is about to unravel...and George Bush is certain to have a legacy unlike any of his predecessors. My fellow Americans...prepare yourself for the premiere of R-E-C-E-S-S-I-O-N: The Ownership Society - You've Been Pwned.