A few random links for you, in a big rash of posts -- this is the first of three.

• Joining a fan club, with my friends... Jellyfish are an amazing band, and I love them. Everybody should listen to them.
• Amy points out that there's nothing un-American about the abuse at Abu Ghraib. In fact, the US does it all the time, in US prisons, to US prisoners, in the USA.
• John Stewart gave a commencement address at his alma mater. Very funny, and very clever. And somewhat insulting to the university, but so what?
• Smart Mobs looks interesting.
• Kerry leads Bush in the latest poll, even with Nader in the equation.
• Supergirl has come to Smallville! And she's got some fantastic powers. If there were a god, it would have been Sarah Michelle Gellar. (Or, possibly, Sarah Jessica Parker. A chain-smoking, neurotic thirtysomething Supergirl would have been hilarious.) This blonde chick is interestingly sinister, but not really cutting it as a long-term supergirl.

  I'm liking the whole way Smallville is heading. It's getting all dark, and proper big-scale conflict instead of freak-of-the-week. Once Lex and Clark starts fighting it's gonna rock.