Britain's version of the welfare-to-work program is training one woman to be a Britney Spears impersonator. It would have been a more interesting story if it was a guy.

If Gore is practicing "fuzzy Washington math," what would Texas math be? In Bush's case, presumably how much to tip your hooker after you've snorted cocaine off her ass. And yes, that was the best I came up with. Can any of you do better?

One comment that rather describes Dubya, except for the first two adjectives: "He was competent, fluent, pleasant and funny, satisfying every doubt except the most troublesome: what is he for?" Actually written about William Hague at this week's Tory party congress. And Hague is nowhere near as purposeless as Dubya.

With all the preparation he must have put into the debate, he was still an idiot. He knew less about his own plans than Gore did, and it showed, he obviously didn't know that RU-486 has been available in other countries for years, unless that comment about making sure it was safe for American women implied that American uteruses (uteri?) are different than French and British uteruses, like Japanese snow. And he didn't know Russia's position on Yugoslavia. Wouldn't it behoove someone who wants to be president to read a newspaper every so often?

And so repetitive. Both of them seemed to think we needed to hear everything five times before it would sink in. Bush did the fuzzy math thing about four times, according to my fuzzy math, and the crack about how many IRS agents it would take to figure out Gore's tax plan twice. At least he kept the "Mediscare" crack down to one usage, but really.

And all that makeup, on both of them. When Jim Lehrer is the most life-like person in the room, you know you're in trouble.