The Academy Awards and politics have always gone together like pickles and chocolate (think Marlon Brando's bizarre refusal of his best actor Oscar in 1973 because he was upset about the treatment of American Indians, or Michael Moore's embarrassing 2003 acceptance speech), but the political undertones of last night's telecast made me wince more than usual. This time, the political cause du jour happened to be a very important issue -- global warming. But after seeing the glitterati's attempts at consciousness-raising, I begin to think that the best thing Hollywood could do for the environment would be to shut up about it already.

Climate change took center stage largely because Al Gore's documentary "An Inconvenient Truth" was nominated for two awards and won both. Gore himself mugged with Leonardo DiCaprio in a semi-amusing take on Gore's presidential ambitions, with the actor fawning over the former vice president because of his leadership in the global-warming debate. Singer Melissa Etheridge turned up the heat with her acceptance speech, a ramble on the need for self-sacrifice and action to save the planet. Yet urgent entreaties for self-sacrifice, when they come from super-wealthy celebrities who would not feel the impact of a carbon tax even if one were imposed, do not play well in Peoria. And while Etheridge, who is proudly gay, had every right to kiss her wife on the lips and thank her for her support during her speech, it's not the sort of thing that wins friends and influences people in Middle America. There are plenty of conservatives who are on the fence about global warming, but this kind of thing pushes them right off it and into the arms of Exxon-Mobil.

Gore's film is great, and probably deserved the Oscar. But when it comes to politics, most movie stars would do better to let the movies talk for them.

Well, unless they happen to be the governor of California...

While the state considers and considers whether to ban lead ammunition so that the California condor has a better chance of avoiding extinction, Tejon Ranch went ahead and did it. Sometimes things are really that simple.

Managers of the giant private hunting reserve said recent studies convinced them lead ammunition was the major contributor to lead poisoning of condors. Other types of ammunition are readily available and not all that expensive. So why not?

Ranch managers said a couple of years ago that they were willing to ban lead if the government did the same. Then they decided not to wait. It's a canny move, especially since the ranch wants to develop 5% of its land amid the Tehachapi Mountains, and faces fierce objections in part because of concerns over condors. Banning lead bullets--a more important step toward saving the endangered carrion eaters--takes some of the wind out of environmentalists' sails.

The timing is sweet because the state Fish and Game Commission is poised to consider its own regulations on lead bullets after years of foot-dragging. Tejon Ranch already has made the state look slow, and if the commission doesn't act, it now will look simply out of touch.

    Did you notice, in the Academy Awards montage of decades of Oscar-winning foreign films, that the Academy had to pander to the lowest priggish denominator, and the FCC, even for a flash of a moment?

    It wasn’t on the screen even long enough for me to recognize the film, but in the scene, the character was extending a middle finger -- and the Academy producers digitized the digit. They scrambled the image so you wouldn’t see the flip-off finger, even though anatomically that was the only finger it could be, and even though everyone who’s completed second grade has seen that gesture.

  Pitiful.

  I watched the Oscars in the company of a two-time Academy Award winner, the nephew of an Oscar winner, the son of a renowned British actor, and sundry creative folk, and amid all the joshing and droll commentary, everyone fell silent during the montage of Oscar-winning foreign films of the past.

    They were so stunning, so simple, so human and humane, that you couldn’t help thinking how many of the American-made ‘’best pictures’’ would fare in comparison. It isn’t about the quality of the acting, it’s about the scale and the message of the American winners: big-sweep blockbuster pictures about war and gore and crime, and the musicals and spectacles … and not very often thoughtful, intimate, complex films about the passions and joys and torments of ordinary life.

     Maybe it’s a case of huge Hollywood budgets fueling the drive to make huge motion pictures, and maybe it’s a function of a big industry in a big and important country making movies to match its brawn. But oh, ``La Strada,’’ ``Black Orpheus,’’ ``A Man and a Woman,’’ ``Closely Watched Trains,’’ ``Z’’ –  if there were an international trade deficit for brilliant, award-winning small films, Hollywood would be up to its neck in red ink of its own making, or unmaking. 

I had two reactions to the withdrawal of former Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack from the 2008 Democratic presidential race. The first was the conventional observation that the field has been depopulated of once and present governors (Mark Warner of Virginia and Evan Bayh of Indiana pulled out earlier), leaving only New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson able to play the “I’ve actually run something” card.

My second reaction to the Vilsack withdrawal was more parochial: There goes my hometown’s bid to elect a president! My former colleagues at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette had the same idea: The lead on their Vilsack story said: “Pittsburgh native Tom Vilsack's run for the Democratic nomination for president never got out of the starting block.”

I have written before about the endearing inferiority complex of people in my native city, who, like Canadians, are known for piping up to friends from more cosmopolitan places that this celebrity or that is one of us.  But Pittsburghers have been notably absent from even the most capacious lists of would-be presidents. The last Burgher whose name passed the lips of the Great Mentioner was the late Sen. John Heinz, who was killed in 1991 in a plane crash.

There were other might-have-beens. Sen. Orrin Hatch of Utah, a native Pittsburgher, briefly ran for the GOP nomination in 2000. Former Pennsylvania Govs. Dick Thornburgh (whose campaign slogan for Congress was "Thornburgh as in Pittsburgh") and Tom Ridge (a native of the Pittsburgh area who grew up in Erie) achieved national prominence as Cabinet members. But no one talks about them as potential presidents anymore.

With the precedent of Arnold Schwarzenegger in mind, perhaps Pittsburghers should coalesce behind a show-biz celebrity from the Burgh. But should it be Dennis Miller, Michael Keaton or Jeff Goldblum? I know: Charles Grodin in 2008!

Six months from now most of us won't remember whose names were in ''the envelope'' at the Academy Awards.

But the world will no doubt remember how the Academy told us all to pronounce the word ``Babel.''

Surely there's always an official Oscar pronunciation guide -- not all of those names come trippingly off the tongue. I expect there are a few in the Kodak Theatre who stumbled over ''Pan's Labyrinth'' the first time.

So which will the Oscars decree it to be: ``Bay-bel''? Or ``Bab-el.'' as in ''rabble''? Never mind the dictionary -- whatever Oscar dictates, the rest of us will obey. Or is that Obie?

Tamar Jacoby and Mark Krikorian finish up the immigration Dust-up with some educated guesses about what the coming political season will hold: ruthless crackdowns? craven cowardice? bold innovations? all of the above? Get the whole week's debate right here.

And reactions to this week's debate continue to trickle in. Kevin Johnson at ImmigrationProf Blog gives the debate some attention, and Brian Doherty at Reason gets a lively discussion going, featuring an appearance by the LoneWacko himself.

Reader Steven Marshall sends in some talking points of his own:

Having read the immigration debate between Tamar Jacoby and Mark Krikorian, I've concluded that both make some sound arguments and some that are just silly.  In the national debate, it seems that one side of the debate wants to make immigration reform punitive (like the idiot congressman who proposed that otherwise law-abiding people struggling for economic survival be made felons) and the other side wants a self-serving capitulation (amnesty).  The scourge of political correctness is also being wielded by the John Lennon crowd ("Imagine there's no countries...") as a cudgel in the debate.

Let's stop being hypocritical here.  "Immigration Reform" are code words for "Kick the Mexicans and Central Americans out."  I don't hear anyone wanting to build a fence along the Canadian border.  Would we even notice or care if 12 million Canadians with a language and culture virtually identical to ours were here?  I don't believe that Americans feel animosity toward Hispanics per se, just the imagined insistence that we adapt to their language and culture rather than them adapting to ours.  Frankly, if my family and I were in the hopeless economic position that the Mexicans are in, I'd sneak across the border, too.

Sorry for the headline ... but there's lots of great stuff out there today. For instance:

Sean Bonner uncorks part five of his fascinating five-part series on California gun-related legislation.

Roman Genn posts his news-caricatures of this week's Obamapalooza.

Nikki Finke reveals a bunch of Oscar spoilers.

Norman Lear bemoans the fact that national journalists are more interested in the Barack/Hillary "pissing" match than the health care crisis.

Halosheaven conducts a fine interview with excitable Angels broadcaster Rex Hudler.

Brian Doherty rediscovers that the term "dismal science," used to describe economics, was originally coined "because its arguments can be used against slavery."

Cory Doctorow writes about free fair-use legal representation for documentary filmmakers.

Eugene Volokh challenges the notion that Josh Wolf's half-year detention is part of a post-Sept. 11 erosion of freedom.

Kevin Drum gives Peter "Fighting Faith" Beinart a hi-five for re-examining his foreign policy worldview while changing his mind about the Iraq War.

Ken Layne recounts last night's O'Reilly Factor, in which Bill Maher's criticism of the president was explained away as a daddy complex.

Firedoglake continues its gavel-to-gavel blog coverage of the Libby trial.

LAist links to an interesting video presentation/adaptation of that New Yorker story on 24 you've heard so much about.

Speaking of video, L.A. Observed show us a militaristic Training Day video, allegedly from the L.A. Sheriff's department in July 2006.

Amy Alkon discovers stupid labeling tricks at Gelson's.

And Mickey Kaus keeps trying to fire bad teachers.

With all the hubbub about Hollywood's copyright battles with YouTube, it's easy to forget that there are entertainment companies out there that actually like the video-sharing site. One example is DMGI Inc. of Sacramento, an aggregator of independently produced music and video. Read about DMGI's reasons for cutting a deal with YouTube (and watch a funny video) at the Bit Player blog.

A man in a Wisconsin city hears a woman’s screams coming from the apartment downstairs –- the cries of a woman who, he thinks, is being raped.

He seizes the only weapon at hand -– a cavalry sword, a family heirloom -– and dashes gallantly off to the rescue.

But there was no damsel in distress. There was only a dame getting screwed for money on a porn video, making all the customary noises which had misled Our Hero.

Sure, James Van Iveren kicked in the door in his search for the wronged woman -– isn’t that what Samaritans do in the movies? –- and he smashed the doorjamb and the lock. And, he said afterwards, he felt ``stupid’’ about the whole thing.

I’m reading along, reading along, waiting for the story’s cozy finish, where the grateful mayor hands him the keys to the city of Oconomowoc, Wisconsin -- evidently named after an explosion in the Scrabble factory -- and I see he got arrested!?

The man who thought he was saving a woman from a fate worse than death should be feted with the Swashbuckler of the Year Award. He should be keynote speaker at the convention of Bodice Ripper and Romance Novelists. And instead he’s facing 33 months in the slammer?

Wrong, wrong, wrong. Harlequin romance publishers: step up to the plate. Pay for this man’s defense, pay his fines, pay to fix the door, and hire a lawyer to get the cops to give him back his sword. A couple of years ago a cable network staged a reality competition for the next Fabio to grace the cover of a Harlequin romance. Just put Van Iveren on a horse, hand him his family sword, and you’ve got it: ``Sir James of Waukesha to the Rescue.’’

After he’s finished serving his sentence cleaning up roadside trash on Interstate 94.