Nexus of the universe?

Because of its mysterious symptoms and the fact some people don't believe it really exists, I like to think of Lyme Disease as the conspiracy theory of bacterial infections.

Because of all the gleeful speculation on nefarious plots he elicits from the black helicopter crowd whose ranks he has personally increased by many fold, I like to think of George W. Bush as the conspiracy theory of presidents.

So what happens when the conspiracy theory of presidents is infected with the conspiracy theory of bacterial infections? And what happens if that president has been allegedly hiding the alleged disease -- which allegedly causes cognitive defects -- from the public for at least a year?

I don't know, but I can't wait to find out what Cheney had to do with it.

Paris Hilton finds her match

Since I like to be clever, and since Scooter Libby was sentenced to prison on almost the same day as Paris Hilton began serving her jail term, I tried to my darnedest to think of a witty blog post connecting the two. Unfortunately, besides the goofy first names and the sex with Dick Cheney, the two don't share a whole lot in common.

Frustrated, I abandoned the project. Then, as I was reading an article about how the Feds have taken over the Michael Vick dog-fighting probe, it dawned on me. I was trying to pair Paris with the wrong legally challenged news maker. Because, when you get down to it, Paris Hilton and Michael Vick are practically the same person. You don't believe me? Consider this:

Social disease Although up to 20 percent of Americans have Herpes Simplex 2 you can't usually tell by looking at them. Unless they look like Michael Vick or Paris Hilton. Who have both pulled off the neat rare trick of inadvertently revealing their positive herpes status to the public. Paris by not paying the rent on a storage locker that housed, among other things, her medical records, and Vick through his hilarious Ron Mexico ordeal.

Animal cruelty Regardless of what the Feds find, if you don't think Vick is or has ever been involved in the vicious blood sport of dog fighting, well . . . I have a 5'11 running quarterback from Virginia Tech for you to take with your first pick in the NFL draft. Paris's dog cruelty is more subtle. But would you want to spend your life crammed in a tiny purse, only to be left defenseless and unfed when your mistress goes off to perform sex acts on Persian club owners and the relatives of Greek shipping magnates?

Extreme forgetfulness during travel Paris got herself into this whole mess by forgetting she didn't have a license to drive a car. Vick, no stranger to the absent mind, once forgot the water bottle he was illegally taking onto an airplane also had a secret compartment to illegally put weed in. Luckily, Vick also forgot to put his weed in the secret compartment.

Siblings Paris and Micheal each have a much less famous -- but still a little bit famous -- younger sibling who tries to follow in their footsteps. That would be Nicky and Marcus.

Sex with Cheney They don't call him Dick for nothing. What did you think goes on in an undisclosed location anyway?

Controversial gestures of obscenity with animal names When Vick wants to grab a large crowd's attention he raises his hand and flips the bird. Paris opens her legs and flashes the kitty .

Under qualification Look, I don't want to say Paris and Vick don't have talents -- Paris would be great in a hotel room full of 15 year old boys and Vick would be the finest smear the queer (are we still calling it that?) practitioner the grassy area between the basketball courts and jungle gym has ever seen. But, let's face it, based on their skill sets Vick has no business playing quarterback in the NFL and Paris has no business walking upright.

These similarities need to be noted and considered if and when Vick is sentenced for his crimes against caninity. Obviously, like his twin Paris, Vick would find prison drafty and suicidally depressing. So they might as well send him directly to house arrest. Only the house would be the one Vick owned in Virginia, but likes to deny ever being to. And the confinement would be restricted to the room were they found the doggy tread mills, the breeding rape stand and the blood on the walls and the carpet.

To spice things up there would have to be a bunch of hungry pit bulls let down there too. And Dick Cheney, smirking by the rape stand.

Cheney loses the Mormons, birds

With college admissions becoming more and more of a high priced arms race every year, the quality of the commencement speaker has never been more important.

If a university gets a good one -- especially if he says something clever or newsworthy -- the school gets free advertising in papers all over the country. Get a bad one and the students and alum start feeling grumpy and insecure about their place in the college landscape.

Traditionally, high-ranking politicians have been at the top of the list of "gets." Not so much these days, as the Bush administration isn't very popular with the collegiate set.

Still, the administration wisely decided Vice President Dick Cheney needed a little spring exercise and dispatched his commencement wisdom out to Brigham Young University and The United States Military Academy.

They should have just stuck to West Point, as it seems Cheney's impending visit to Provo has sparked the rare Mormon protest -- careful Cougars, it's a slippery slope, next thing you know there will be a Starbucks in the main quad.

Adding to Cheney's tough week, this morning a jihadi bird tried to take out Air Force II.

Silly bird. Silly Mormons. Do they honestly think they can do what scandal upon scandal and coronary incident upon coronary incident couldn't? Who's living in the bubble of delusion now?

Death Watch: Dick Cheney

Ann Coulter and Bill Maher were once a couple. Last week they engaged in the kind of public one-upmanship that former lovers often do. Coulter started it by "outrageously" questioning Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards's vagina-preferring bona fides, while Maher followed by "shockingly" wishing (or, he says, not quite wishing) Dick Cheney dead.

Maher's comments were bookended by the Taliban's attempt on Cheney's life during the Vice President's trip to Afghanistan and Cheney's latest cardiovascular incident this morning.

Dick Cheney first entered into the death watch cross hairs in 1978 when he suffered his maiden heart attack at age 37. Ever the political animal, Cheney's next three heart attacks came during the election years of 1984, 1988 and 2000.

2000 was also the year Cheney ascended to the second highest office in the land. While he has been technically heart attack-free since, here is a quick rundown of some of the words that appear in Cheney's Vice Presidential medical dossier:

Coronary balloon angioplasty, Hotler monitor, asymptomatic ectopy, implantable cardioverter-defibrillator, atherosclertotic disease, endo-vascular procedure, and popliteal artery aneurysms.

As a certified death watcher I can -- in the most apolitical, actuarial terms -- declare Dick Cheney should be dead.

And that's not even considering Cheney's propensity towards sloppy gun play and the international terrorists and domestic message board commentators who have expressed extreme prejudice towards the VP's breathing habit.

So why, this death watcher asks, does Cheney still remain among the upright? The only conclusion I can reach is spite.

Dips in Cheney's approval rating actually trigger a hormonal reaction that results in his chunky blood dissipating. And whenever he is attacked by a polemic screed -- by a prominent figure like Maher, or that ever-so-well-adjusted man named "anonymous" -- an unique type of adrenaline boost permits Cheney's hybrid heart to steady in its push to power its plasma discharge through arteries caked thin with cholesterol, nicotine and the bone marrow of children. At the rate things are going Cheney will outlive us all.

Following this theme of spite, I also suspect, in a non-certified capacity, Coulter's comments will act to delay Edwards's own "shocking" announcement for at least a couple years.

Putin zings Cheney

President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday called Vice President Dick Cheney's criticism of Russia "an unsuccessful hunting shot."

Now, now Vladie, you wouldn't like it if Dick brought up your little kitten friend, would you?