@Google News: I Have Just One Question

--Who the flaming, frying, flying, fiddle-eye ₤µ©λ is Natasha Richardson?

Okay, she falled down go boom, bumped her head. I sympathize. But she seems to have taken over Google news, and I'm sorry, no actress deserves the attention she's getting. I mean, she fell on the friggin' bunny hill. Me, I'd be plurry embarrassed about that.

It looks as though she has a concussion. Big whoop--we're wetting our collective pants about this why?

Yesterday I saw a story entitled "Head injuries can turn deadly" or some such godawful drivel. Naturally the first ten words contained the name "Richardson" twice.

Forgive me if I think there's more important $#17 going on. As far as I know, there were at least three possible concussions in the NHL last night, and none of them are even in hospital.

And look at the stuff that gets shoved down the page because of it:

As cuts to our science programs and the marginalization of science continue under the Conservative "Feel-better-through-ignorance" program, Canada's science minister gives a firm, clear, answer to the question "Do you believe in evolution?"

That firm clear answer, however, is "I refuse to answer questions about my religion."

The problem isn't Goodyear's religion. The problem is that the Conservative Party of Canada neither likes nor understands science or scientists. And that's why, in the digital age, Canadians are cutting down trees and digging big ₤µ©λing holes in order to sell their country by the ounce, barrel, and board-foot to nations that'll sell it back to them as plastic, integrated circuits, and futons.

Evolution only has to do with religion if you're one of a particularly blockheaded and narrow-minded selection of Christian sects. I mean, even the Pope believes that evolution is the working meachanism by which his hairy thunderer keeps the biological world on its toes.

A science minister should have a stock pat answer for that question and be able to give it on cue as easily as Pavlov's dogs answered their bell. To fail to do so suggests either cluelessness unbecoming a government hack--I mean minister--or religious rigidity unbecoming anyone in charge of science.

Speaking of the Pope: He just gets better and better. He's defended the excommunication of people who helped secure a d&c for a nine-year old rape victim. He has allowed people who to this day believe the Holocaust is a hoax to wrap themselves in the authority of the Catholic Church--to speak with spiritual authority on major issues.

And this week, pushed to the mid-page by Natasha whosit's boo-boo, the Pope said that condoms aren't the solution to AIDS in Africa (a reasonable sentiment, and one I agree with [the two are not always the same]).

However, the Pope added the secret ingredient "radioactive stupid" to his stance when he said condoms may make the AIDS epidemic in Africa worse.

And it's amazing, with a few well-chosen words the Pope manages to go from a straightforward, well-understood, meaningful position, to a bucketload of stupidinium.

I mean, does he really believe that the few miserable and precious inches of ground we have gained in the struggle to keep this disease from killing half a continent are all due to husbands keeping their peckers in their pants, wives keeping their skirts down, and prayer? Honestly?

Meanwhile, Washington DC struggles with its own AIDS epidemic. Newsworthy, were it not for the eagerness with which we're apparently pursuing Mme Richardson. And I'll lay a pint to a prawn that she'll be "looking pale and tired, but happy" as she thanks "all her supporters and well-wishers" as she leaves the hospital. Unlike, say, any number of Washington AIDS patients.

Meanwhile:

Up to 1,000 Gambian villagers have been abducted by "witch doctors" to secret detention centres and forced to drink potions, a human rights group says. [...] The London-based rights group said the witch hunters, said to be from neighbouring Guinea, were invited into Gambia after the death of the president's aunt earlier this year was blamed on witchcraft.

Kate Allen, Amnesty's UK director, said hundreds of Gambians have fled to neighbouring Senegal for safety after seeing their villages attacked.

Somewhere out there, the African Union is presumably warming up the Pope-signal.

But hey, husband Liam Neeson has apparently flown to Natasha's side, so as day three of the Natasha Richardson Concussion Watch draws to a lunchtime, stand by for more agonizing detail.

But first a word from our sponsor!

*Sober second thought (AKA ass-covering). Perhaps I've misread this and Miss Richardson's injury is more than a common or garden-variety concussion. I still don't feel that the story deserves more column inches than real, important $#17 that's going down, right now, in the world.