(photo by VictoryNH)

I was trying to decide what to talk about today that hadn’t already been done, and done better, by somebody else.

I could bring to your attention a horrifying story from Salon about the CIA’s illegally torturing and jailing an innocent man for nearly two years — a story that America’s mainstream press could have covered themselves, but won’t touch.

I could mention this excellent E&P article from last year on how the sporting press for years largely looked the other way with regard to steroid use right up until the Balco scandal made that impossible to continue. (Hmmmm — American media ignores a key story that’s right under their noses. Pattern?) Even now, the coverage is focusing on a few players, and not on the whole enterprise of baseball that encourages juicing — including the owners and the players’ union.

I could talk about how Steve King (R-Dumbass) thinks so highly of his objectively pro-Christmas bill that he forgot to vote for it. Seriously: Scroll down to the Iowa delegation and see for yourself. (H/t to the Wege.)

I could talk about how, contrary to Sheryl Gay Stolberg’s musings (sent to me by Dakine01 via e-mail), Bush isn’t "hurt" by his own acting out the part of the Governor’s wife in The Caucasian Chalk Circle, willing to rip the country (and even his own party) in two just to get his own way. He doesn’t care — he’s not running for re-election anyway.

I could even talk about the horror that is Mike Huckabee.

But I think I’d rather talk about the wonders of no-knead bread. How ’bout you? (Though if you pass on each of the above stories to your kith and kin, it would be a kindness.)