• New controversial medical study ensures that cervical cancer will be the breast cancer of next week. One more’s a trendpiece! [New York Times]
• Members of Congress were very busy and shouty last night in trying to decide who they hated more: Obama or Geithner… [Washington Post]
• …while Catholic bishops easily picked Obama. [AP]
• Please do let the nebbishy hypochondriacs in your life know about the Vicks nasal spray recall. Or actually don’t. [CNN]
• Oprah the Human is self-canceling Oprah the Show in September 2011 so she can work on her own cable teevee station side-project. [WSJ]
• US citizens will probably not be allowed to visit Cuba again after all. By and large this should come as a huge relief to any Cuban familiar with American spring break cultural practices.. [The Hill]

Everyone very loudly but gently say “congratulations” to Sen. Robert Byrd, who became the longest-serving lawmaker in the history of Congress today. He’s like, “I look forward to serving you for the next 56 years and 320 days,” which is very gracious! Here’s this video of Robert Byrd playing the ancient instrument of “fiddle” back in the 1870s, when people would watch other people do “fiddle” on teevee for enjoyment. It’s like eight minutes long though, so just as with any old person thing, you can get away with turning it off after like 24 seconds and then saying that you love it. [HuffPost]

Oh, do watch this a few times. A reporter following Nancy Pelosi on Saturday night completely wrecked himself, and only one of his friends would help! WHAT A SCENE! [Fishbowl DC]

A top secret operative sends us this video of the line of folks looking to get into Longworth, which is super lengthy. Clearly the guards are ACORN thugs trying to slow down the security process, the bastards. But hey there’s another House office building right across the street, so they will just run back and forth between the two buildings all day trying to find the shortest lines, as one would do at the supermarket check-out. [YouTube]

• Someone accidentally left a document detailing ongoing Congressional ethics violations investigations on a public computer network. The Word paperclip would have advised against this. [Washington Post]
• The deposed president of Honduras has been temporarily undeposed by the de facto government. Legitimacy has been totally restored to government there, clearly. [New York Times]
• The Philadelphia-based (and Boston-based, for that matter) sports enthusiasts did not enjoy last night nearly as much as they did Wednesday night. [Philadelphia Inquirer]
• This Russian tycoon who was forbidden from visiting the US apparently came here twice last year as the personal secret guest of the FBI. [WSJ]
• A Coast Guard plane and a Marine helicopter crashed into each other off the coast of California this morning. Despite this being the exact fantasy of every toy-owning toddler, rescue authorities are concerned.  [AP]
• Rhymey former French president Jacques Chirac will be stand trial for corruption and defend some corrupt-seeming things he did while mayor of Paris. [Times Online]

Watch Republican Congressman Steve LaTourette toss off sassy bon mots interspersed with his A-game impressions of Fran Drescher as an infant. Congress has a two-drink minimum for a reason, people. [via The Awl]

Republican Arizona congressperson Jeff Flake spent the week on a desert island, literally, and someone asked him how this made him feel. Well, truth is, Jeff Flake hasn’t felt like a man since leavin’ the ranch. Nope, it’s impossible to feel like much of a man at all, with this fancy humans-only society-livin’. “I’ve felt like a pansy, I guess, and this made it feel like I was actually doing something again.” Like, he didn’t feel like such a queer again, on account of all the nature and shit. “Congressman Flake didn’t realize that that word can have a negative connotation. He simply meant ‘wimpy.’ He apologizes if anyone took offense to it,” said his spokesperson. Does this look like the face of a pansy to you?? [Ben Smith]

Poor Georgia Congressman and gubernatorial candidate Nathan Deal. He was trying in Congress this one time to make sure that all illegals either show their birth certificates or die, but then the “ghetto grandmothers” complained that they did not have their birth certificates handy. Oh, those old ladies in the ghetto! Deal has apologized, but had a very important serious point, okay? [YouTube, AJC]

• This new tax credit thing for businesses that make up new jobs is not entirely despised by everyone in Congress. Even Eric Cantor is like, whatever! [New York Times]
• But speaking of “entirely despised by everyone in Congress”: Obama’s Afghanistan strategy. [Washington Post]
• NASA has discovered an enormous invisible (?) ring around Saturn that’s the size of 1 billion Earths. Next step will be for them to make the case for why we need to blow it up. [CNN]
• The Taliban in Afghanistan say they have no interest in killing Westerners. Swear to god you guys! [Reuters]
• The Supreme Court will now decide whether YouTube videos of animal cruelty count as free speech or whether they should be banned forever. [WSJ]
• And two more Americas (+ 1 Israeli) won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry, for something about ribosomes, which sounds suspiciously like that thing the Medicine people did. [LA Times]

Who’s someone people like? The Sullenberger guy, Chesley B. Sully Sullenberger, who became famous for not crashing an airplane last summer or whenever it was. Anyway, coincidentally, you know who the Republicans decided would make a great new congressman from California? So reports The Hill, with signature Cheeky Juxtaposition: “Republicans hoped the hero who saved all 155 of his flight’s passengers and crew by landing in the Hudson could help them retake a seat that long had been in the GOP’s control.” MORE »

If there’s a single winner tonight, it’s the photo to your left. The fact that one can type “old-timey doctor” into something called “Google Images” and produce THIS… what a great country. No. What a great Internet. None of this is true. But we digress! Health care speech: Obama started a full 900 million seconds late, so let’s listen to the second and third paragraphs of his speech hmm? (Part I, Part II) MORE »