Chime out for ski days

Thanks to the reader who arrived yesterday via the key word "mischime". Yesterday's headline, "Candidates Mischime In" was a questionable choice by the always suspect crew at the NY Times headline squad, who use inconsistent capitalization as a torture technique. Remember, it was the candidates, not the headline writers, who could claim sleep deprivation as a justification for mischiming. "Candidates mischime in" runs a distant second to - "Candidates chime out" in the As Good As News poll of one. Chime in with a comment if you have an opinion. Comments will be accepted on Monday following a brief ski break.

Late Night Joke Tester?

With Nods to The Strike, Late-Night Hosts Return -"Eight weeks after their writers went on strike and plunged their shows into reruns, Jay Leno, David Letterman and Conan O’Brien returned to late-night television Wednesday with original shows in which both the Iowa caucuses and the new facial hair on two of the hosts loomed large. Mr. Letterman, who sported a thick beard as gray as Mr. O’Brien’s was red...Mr. Leno said that the union rules allowed him to write jokes for himself. “I write jokes and wake my wife up in the middle of the night and say, Honey, is this funny,” he told the audience."

I am clearly Late Night material, with a half red, half gray beard and the same joke testing technique as Leno. I ask my wife if a new bit is funny. She typically replies "No". Not satisfied, because I am always irrationally enamored of my own material, I press on. "Why not, be a little constructive, it's a funny idea, there must be some way to make it work..." After listening patiently for up to two seconds, my wife will explain calmly that my joke's not funny, "because it sucks" ..........
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Not Just Voter Fatigue: Candidates Mischime In - Covering sleep deprivation on the campaign trail, this piece features a quote from notorious night owl Bill Clinton, “You have no idea how many Republican and Democratic members of the House and Senate are chronically sleep deprived because of this system,” Mr. Clinton said in September on “The Daily Show.” “I know this is an unusual theory, but I do believe sleep deprivation has a lot to do with some of the edginess of Washington today.” While Bill looks on this as a problem, W reacts to the yawns of Congressional Democrats with a grin, "sleep deprivation is OK, but I would really like to see these windbags after a few hours of water boarding.".....
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States Hesitate To Lead Change On Executions - All 36 states that execute by lethal injection use a combination of 3 drugs, designed not just to kill, but to kill without any last minute writhing that might discomfit witnesses to the execution. The question of whether this 3 drug combination is cruel and unusual punishment is about to reach the Supreme Court. In the meantime all 36 states that use it have put death on hold, but none will shift to a different approach. Lawyers in the case now reaching the Supreme Court argue that injection of a single barbiturate , the method used when euthanizing animals, will kill quickly and with less chance of pain. This method was considered but never used by any state, partly because of that nagging writhing problem, partly because it just didn't sound right to execute your condemned like they were animals. As Good As News says, if you must execute - then appearances be damned. Treat the condemned more humanely in fact while getting the maximum deterrent effect from a good death rattle and a headline announcing Cop Killer Dies Like Dog.

Hospitals Slow in Heart Cases, Research Finds - Code Blue? Oh yeah- I heard that, but I'm on my break.

Appeasement? Not in W's Vocabulary, but see One Answer Only

W has befriended Vlad Putin and made nice to Kim Jong-Il in Dear Ilvis, but no one will ever confuse him with
24 Down - Churchill predecessor: chamberlain

The Franchised

Caucuses Give Iowa Influence, But Many Iowans Are Left Out -Tomorrow evening the thousands of Iowa voters who are not otherwise engaged will pick their candidates for President. The caucuses begin the Presidential selection process with a state that is already light on minorities and heavy on farmers, then exclude anyone who can't get out for a few hours on Thursday evening. The disenfranchised will include important groups, people in Thursday night bowling leagues, people who just spent their life savings on a baby sitter for New Year's Eve and can't afford to do it again for a caucus, people with work assignments that have taken them out of state (to Iraq, for example), people who work in the evenings, people who are still hung over from New Year's Eve, people who think Ugly Betty, Grey's Anatomy and the Orange Bowl are must see TV, people who can't bear to listen to any political discussion of duration exceeding one minute - really, it's amazing anyone shows up at all.

So, do we pity the poor, disenfranchised Iowans who will be otherwise engaged tomorrow night? Not for one second. A vote in a New Jersey Presidential primary is like a write-in for George Washington. You can pick the right guy, but the choice is already history. Iowans, those of you who are free tomorrow night, choose wisely. We are counting on you. Think of yourselves as the smart kid that gives his homework to the football team. We don't understand what you are doing and we don't really like you, but we know we can beat you up if things don't go well for us.

Successful Hollywood Producer Pioneers Shopdropping in One Answer Only

An oddball post obtusely captioned Wikipedia Anonymous connected plagiarist George Orwel (who could not spell the name he stole) and successful Hollywood producer Brian Grazer, Opie's partner, who pioneered an obscure variation on shopdropping. If you get bored with Orwel skip to the bottom for Grazer, a true oddball. Then

41 Across- What to do after completing this puzzle, with four straight lines: connectalltheos

Kid Sheleen's View

New Year's morning and As Good As News is reminded of a line from the comic Western, Cat Ballou. Cat (a young Jane Fonda) hires the grizzled gunfighter Kid Shelleen (Lee Marvin) to protect her father. Jackson Two-Bears (Tom Nardini as an educated Native American who helps Cat's father defend his ranch from the Wolf City Development Corporation ) encounters Kid stumbling groggily following a bout of hard drinking:

Jackson Two-Bears: Kid, Kid, what a time to fall off the wagon. Look at your eyes.
Kid Sheleen: What's wrong with my eyes?
Jackson Two-Bears: Well they're red, bloodshot.
Kid Sheleen: You ought to see 'em from my side.

One playoff game and one answer only

Happy New Year. As Good As News offered tourists some tips in It's Still Fun City, Dammit! but when it came to the Steelers, we fear we had our
17 Across - Daydreamer's state: headintheclouds
A win over the Pats, a relatively easy road to the Superbowl - just pipe dreams. We will take the playoffs one game at a time, starting with the Jags.