merica breathed a collective, if bored, sigh of relief Wednesday when missing Utah teen-ager Elizabeth Smart was found alive and well after being abducted last June from her bedroom. Police are calling the recovery of the teen a rare happy outcome to a potential tragedy; critics, however, are calling the fairy-tale ending trite and manipulative.

The major breakthrough in the case came earlier this week after two separate witnesses contacted police with information that a suspect in the case had been spotted in Sandy, Utah. Police soon apprehended Brian David Mitchell, an unemployed shelterless self-proclaimed prophet with everlasting bedhead. Mitchell had previously worked as a handyman for the Smart family, under the bizarrely erotic pseudonym Emmanuel. Authorities were surprised to discover Elizabeth Smart in shoddy wig and sunglasses disguise with Mitchell at the time of arrest, as well as cartoon witch Broomhilda, whom police claimed was Mitchell's wife Wanda Barzee.

Law enforcement and child safety advocates are applauding the teen-ager's safe return, but the more thick-skinned media critics are less kind. The New York Times resident crime reviewer Durill Barry Fields even referred to the case's conclusion as "claptrap."

"This fascinating story of a family's struggle to cope with loss—and even more intriguing, the absence of closure—came tumbling to a lifeless deadweight resolution Wednesday," Fields wrote in the Times' weekend section. "The little girl returns home, unharmed, and everybody's happy—except those of us who watched this potentially disturbing and effective abduction story from day one. What a disappointment to spend nine months of considerable worry on a story whose ending would be rejected at Law & Order."

The duration of the kidnapping bothered other critics as well. The San Diego Review magazine's resident media sniper Hatley Wells took more issue with the time than the ending.

"It's completely difficult to make an original abduction these days. Personally I'm not a fan of the genre," wrote Hatley in Friday's edition. "While I appreciate what Mitchell tried to do with this kidnapping, any good criminal should recognize when their crime has worn out its welcome. Walking down the street in broad daylight alongside his victim, many will no doubt say he wanted to be caught—it would have been a much better idea to want to be caught about seven months ago, before this whole thing blew its suspense factor."

Even the usually easily-pleased media critics are reluctant to say much good about the crime. Early word has it that TV Guide is already leaking advanced press from next week's issue, where they "jeer" the kidnapping. Though they compliment the creative "prophet for the homeless" angle and Ms. Smart's "true-to-life" performance under pressure, they echo critics who slam the lackadaisical, violence-free capture of the terrorizing crazy abductors. The TV Guide review follows another Jeer to this year's ho-hum Survivor and precedes a Cheer to a "warm and dazzling" Will & Grace that tactfully addresses the subject of coming out at work.

exas, spawning ground to president George Bush, was thoroughly perturbed when the U.S. Supreme Court granted a last-minute stay of execution to Delma Banks Thursday. Banks, convicted of murder 23 years ago, was scheduled to become Texas' 300th execution since 1976, when the guy in charge of counting got confused and had to start over. All of this begs the question: How does a guy last on death row in Texas for 23 years?

Banks' request for a stay of execution was backed by three federal judges, and though the request was significant enough to give the Supreme Court pause, it does not automatically mean they have decided to hear the case. However, the action does guarantee that Banks' execution will be delayed long enough to miss the big-300 window. The lucky customer set to claim the record now is Keith Clay, a convicted murderer penned in for March 20, causing an unpleasant week-long pause in executions for death penalty fans.

The basis for Banks' appeal is poor legal representation and deceitful attempts by the prosecution to keep blacks off of the all-white jury. The case was already rejected by the Texas Supreme Court before the U.S. Court granted stay.

"Well, duh, he was poorly represented and the jury was selected to favor the victim," said Texas Supreme Court Justice Earl "Two Shoes" Miller. "This is Texas. You don't get to the big three-zero-zero by balancing things in the bad guy's interest. He done it, he know he done it, and now he got to fry for it. Yeah, I know we inject 'em now—don't get me started. I sure miss ol' Sparky. But if Banks didn't not want to be killed he shoulda driven the guy up to pussy Oklahoma or something."

Miller then struck a match off my face and asked if that made this reporter want to kill him. A lawyer issued by the state upon arrival of outsiders suggested it had the makings of entrapment.

Opponents of the death penalty say it is instances like this that makes the death penalty all the more reprehensible, the potential of a man who didn't get a fair trial being executed without receiving adequate representation; proponents of the death penalty say "Whoo-hoo!" really loudly and do the cabbage patch when the lights flicker outside the prison.

Since the death penalty's legalization by the Supreme Court in 1976, Texas has led the sport by a clear margin. The closest runner-up to the Lone Star state's 299 in executions is Virginia with 87. Texas has maintained a wide lead through careful maintenance of laws and tactics, including executing multiple prisoners during monthly "Two-Fer Tuesdays," counting random police shootings of suspects as "one-half" executions, and re-defining the term "murder" to include possible bodily harm inflicted on persons who may or may not be proven to exist. In some trials, evidence can be firmly announced to exist and yet never actually presented, a Texan tradition the president has made good recent use of.

Despite the bump in the road, Texans are confident the 300th execution is just around the corner, and heavy bets are on Keith Clay in a March 20th shut-out. Those wishing to attend the tailgating parties out front can find fliers with hand-drawn directions in most towns surrounding Huntsville Penitentiary.

It's about time someone came out and said it, good people, and I will be the first, if you ignore the looming headline: We've been too lenient on those Russians!

What inspires this angry anti-red rhetoric, you ask? Nothing, none of your business. It certainly wasn't related to my decision to remain just friends with Russian bride Molga. It's just time someone reminded the rest of the world Russia hasn't changed their ways at all since the fall of the Soviet Union.

In the 1950s Stalin convinced the world everyone in Russia was living a perfectly happy, Wizard of Oz-like life. At first I was skeptical; but after that minute, I decided it looked good enough to try. That was my first attempt to visit Russia, and though I shouted unsavory thing about the Department of Foreign Affairs at the time, I now realize they acted in my best interest. It's plain from all that footage that turned up after Stalin's death that everything is dreary and ugly over there—they don't even have color. All this talk of the red menace I didn't quite expect so much gray.

I'm not afraid to step on politically correct toes, even mash them until the nails flake off and become bloody and swollen and bruised. I'll come right out and say it: The Russians are weird. It should be obvious, people, they kept that nasty shellacked body of Lenin in the Moscow equivalent of the town strip mall for years. You'd think somebody would wonder what that curious smell is and bring up the suggestion of burying him, but no, not the Russians. And don't get me started on the way their awful cock rock bands completely ape everything off our awful cock rock bands. That bugs me to no end.

Then in the 1960s Kruschev goes on an on about how the Soviet Union will bury us. Fat chance, you can't even bury one crusty Russian cadaver, I don't see you digging 200+ million holes in the cold hard Siberian ground. They brag about sending the first man into space, but everybody knows they never got him back so it doesn't count. Then by the time the 1980s roll around they claim to have enough nuclear weapons to compete with us in a nuclear war, and now it's common knowledge they only had one jeri-rigged nuke put together with duct tape and Play-Doh. Yeah, that will help—we threw all that Star Wars money away on nothing.

If there's one thing that should be clear about the Russians by now, they can't tell the truth. They get a kick out of lying like I get a kick out of netted briefs—it's something they'll never admit to, but it thrills them like nothing else. Whether it's backtracking on a treaty with Hitler which he had good intentions of keeping or if it's an ex-KGB Russian mafia tough disguising himself as a woman on the internet to get a free plane ride over to the states courtesy of a short, handsome-challenged, sex-starved columnist. Hypothetically. What I'm saying is, don't trust 'em. Not now, not ever.

Incidentally, since I apparently have a few lines to spare to this column, I would like to make an announcement on behalf of Boguslaw Sadowski, the friendly cousin to fellow commune columnist Boris Utzov. He is seeking to start up a business involving the numbers and invites you to invest start-up capital, with extremely good odds you will receive a big, big return.

Boguslaw is quite a charming new foreign friend. In exchange for my recommendation to help him with his new business, he will help me find Camembert, who has recently turned up missing from our apartment. Boguslaw is nearly 100% sure Camembert will be in the same condition as when he disappeared.

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