2007’s last bird-flip to the human race

HDNet will re-air Dan Rather’s interview with Benazir Bhutto, the first woman to lead a Muslim nation and who was considered Pakistan’s best hope for real democracy and, as a result, was assassinated Thursday in Pakistan. You can catch it at crappy hours: today at 3 p.m. and Saturday and Sunday at 6 a.m. (West coast times).

Rather interviewed Bhutto in August as she was preparing to return to Pakistan. (When she arrived in Pakistan in October, she narrowly escaped another attempt on her life that killed 130 people. She had a bulls-eye on her back like few people.) Her murder is bad news for America, worse, of course, for Pakistan; not since Ahmad Shah Massoud was killed by al-Qaeda in Afghanistan in 2001 (his murder was plotted in tandem to the attacks of Sept. 11) has such an esteemed and avowed enemy of Islamic extremism been assassinated.

For those who can handle the brutal realities of Earth circa 2007, here’s a devastating series of photographs of the assassination aftermath that the mainstream media has thoughtfully prevented you from seeing, lest it not settle well alongside your figgy pudding. Because it all sucks right now and until someone realizes that, it will continue to suck. Just sayin'.

For the rest of us, here’s a silly gross-out holiday yarn from New Zealand.