ASA scientists were stunned and slightly nauseous this week to find the face of US Senator Ted Kennedy unexpectedly present in the most recent feeds from their Spirit rover, one of NASA’s two remote-controlled toys currently canvassing the Martian surface. Once they’d recovered from the pain and confusion of seeing the senator’s visage cruelly larger-than-life on the big screen, however, speculation erupted among engineers as to what this means about the red planet’s mysterious history.

“This is huge,� explained mission commander Emeril Welch. “Bigger than Ted Kennedy even, if you can imagine that. This is incontrovertible evidence of life on Mars, and booze.�

Once only a controversial theory, this latest evidence all but proves that Mars once contained enough booze and loose women to support the Massachusetts senator. The news is sweet vindication for the few fringe scientists who have argued for years that the red planet once played host to representative democracy, and floozies.

“Ted Kennedy might have been able to get by on Mars without water, but no way is this a dry planet in the alcohol sense,� stated Welch. “We think it’s only a matter of time before one of the rovers uncovers evidence of shot glasses and used condoms.�

The discovery is a boon for scientists of all stripes, who had previously been embarrassingly excited about finding trace evidence of long-gone water inside rocks on the Martian surface. This latest finding confirms that Mars once contained not only various forms of water and club soda, but also a virtual minibar of alcoholic concoctions.

Preliminary drilling in Kennedy’s face has uncovered evidence of whiskey, vodka and scotch, with various crags in the face showing evidence of large quantities of rum once existing on the Martian surface. Such discoveries represent a quantum leap for NASA scientists, who have gone from scouring the Martian surface for faint evidence of microbes to speculating about the Martian bar scene in mere days.

How Kennedy got to Mars, or perhaps came to Earth from Mars, is another question entirely, and one scientists will explore after they’ve answered the burning question of whether or not a Martian could get drunk off the dust from Kennedy’s face. Conspiracy theories have already surfaced suggesting some kind of drunken shuttle mishap, covered up jointly by NASA and the Massachusetts senator. These theories have put a new spin on the original controversial “face� on Mars, first spotted by the Viking Orbiter 1 in 1976 and now thought to possibly be the visage of Kennedy’s female shuttle companion, presumably killed in the crash and later denied by the Kennedy family and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.

These latest discoveries have put on hold cash-strapped NASA’s plans to charge $5 a minute for web surfers to drive the Mars rover from their home computers, using keyboard commands or supported peripheral joysticks. This would seemingly put an end to heated online debate over whether the rover would accept quarters or would require special tokens. Early indications are that the online community is “pretty bummed� at the prospect of missing out on killer games of “Tank Battle� between the rovers Spirit and Opportunity.

n a setback for complete bitches everywhere, Martha Stewart was convicted of four criminal charges by a jury of twelve of her peers, only much poorer. A deleted phone message and testimony from a "friend" of Stewart put the nails in her defense's coffin and doomed the austere homemaker and queen bitch to almost certain prison time.

With no television cameras in the courtroom, the prosecution spent less time on their hair and suits and focused on building a concrete case against Stewart, who was found guilty for trading her shares of ImClone based on an improper stock tip and attempting to cover up evidence of the illegal action. Stewart's defense claimed the ImClone stock was sold because Stewart had meant to buy stock in the Raelian company that made the clone baby, but got the name wrong. The defense claimed Stewart believed ImClone, a pharmaceutical company working on a cure for cancer, was "sure as shit not going to show profit."

Though Stewart has yet to be sentenced, with the severity of the crime, a term in a minimum-security prison is most likely. Stock in her own company, Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia, dropped 25% in value when her conviction was made public. Stewart didn't do anything to help her sentencing hearing when she dumped all shares shortly before the announcement.

Stewart met the court proceedings with confidence, even showing up the first day of the trial with a $12,000 handbag in tow, prompting members of the jury to murmur, "Jesus, you believe this bitch?" As she was found guilty on all counts, courtroom witnesses described Stewart as "surprised, with an underlying current of bitchy just below the surface."

Since the end of the trial Stewart has professed her innocence and vowed to appeal the case until she is exonerated. She didn't stand on the steps of the courthouse frantically smacking her lawyers about the face and pushing them down the steps, hair frazzled and face manic like a comic Cruella DeVille, but wouldn't it have been great if she had?

Judge Miriam Cederbaum instructed the jury Stewart was subject to guilty or not guilty findings based only on the evidence, and not on the obscure "what a bitch" clause the prosecution proposed, which was originally founded to justify temporary insanity in spousal murder cases. The jury deliberated seven hours before returning, and according to juror Shelby Thucker, they were very conscious of the media attention their verdict would be given.

"We were all extra careful to argue both sides of the case, to make sure our decision wasn't based on anything but evidence," said Thucker, via phone interview. "The men in the jury were quick to call her a bitch, while most of the women found her to be a very successful self-made woman. Finally, we came to the conclusion we were both right. I know lots of people consider powerful women to be bitches, and that's not fair. But Martha Stewart… don't you get the feeling she could be penniless and still be the world's biggest, poorest bitch?"

Clearly, Stewart could be idolized by young upwardly-mobile women everywhere for her shrew business sense and formidable demeanor. For those who find bitchiness a virtue, she was a true beacon in the business world. Even her ethical behavior in making more money and protecting her interests can be respected by aspiring self-made women. However, she got caught, which should be enough to lose all of our respect.

Stewart would not return calls placed to her attorneys by the commune—the bitch.

You've probably heard a lot of talk lately about how I "caused" the recent commune server crash by trying to hook up the giant electric Tyrannosaurus Rex I bought off eBay from those disgruntled Universal Studios chumps to the commune power grid. No doubt these accusations stem from the fact that I once traded the original www.thecommune.com domain name to a couple of burnouts at a Phish show for a bag of mushrooms. Once guilty, twice shit as the saying goes.

But before you get your tits in a twist deciding I'm guilty before innocent and all that, pigeonholing Omar Bricks as a fan of jam bands, let it be known I didn't know we were going to the concert. I thought we were just going over to Danny's house to hang out, and the next thing I know we're all at the arena. And once you're at the place you pretty much have to roll with shit and go to the concert, unless you want to hang out with all the guys selling patchwork pants and homemade burritos in the parking lot for three hours. All things considered, that was about on an even suck level with actually going to the concert, but I figured at least they don't let dogs inside. The last thing I need is some guy's stoned golden retriever staring me down all night and giving me the creeps. Truth be told, I've never been real good at going long periods of time without blinking.

So we get our asses inside, and the suck is already in full swing because Johnshark made us late haggling over the price of a hemp candle he thought we could smoke in the bathroom once we got inside. I make a beeline for the beer tent, naturally, but when I turn around, Johnshark and Danny are just gone. Turns out the guys I was walking next to on the way to the beer tent were just these two bizarro alternate-universe Johnshark and Dannys, two guys who kind of looked like them through the dry ice and other assorted smokes, but in reality they didn't know a Johnshark from a Assshark.

Now I'm rolling solo through jam band hell, stuck listening to the five-hour version of "Wolfman's Brother" without conversational distraction or Danny inevitably getting naked and trying to crowd surf. So out of desperation I strike up a conversation with the only two hippie dipshits I can find who aren't clog dancing, and before I'm sure what's what I've sold them the commune's domain name for a ziplock bag full of hopefully-psychedelic mushrooms. Judge if you must, but it was so loud in there, I don't think you would've done any better.

The way I figured it, nobody can really "own" a name, that's just some legal bullshit mumbo jumbo, so it was like I was getting the shrooms basically for free. I remember something about the Indians using the same argument after they traded away New York for a pooka necklace and things seem to have worked out okay for them. Not so for Omar Bricks, however. There must be some kind of special Indians-only law on that one, like how they can legally snort heroin or give peyote to little kids because hey fuck you, I'm an Indian. And there's some kind of Indian-giving clause to that where they can scotch a deal because the great sky spirit says land belongs to all God's creatures, something all Shirley McLaine like that.

Whatever the actual law is, turns out it doesn't mean shit if you're no part Indian, and that means I got screwed on the whole thecommune.com domain deal. Not that the mushrooms were bad, they were alright, but I got sick on my landlady's dog later that night, and the eviction crew didn't give two shits about what the great sky spirit had to say about Omar Bricks having all his shit thrown out on the lawn at four in the morning.

Thankfully in the end nobody was hurt. Except Raoul Dunkin, who Red Bagel hit with a portable toilet after he got the news, but whatever. I don't know if he thought the domain debacle was Dunkin's fault, or if Bagel just hit him with that chemical toilet because he didn't like him. Either is entirely plausible. But life went on at communeonline.com, and we were all a little bit wiser about Indian laws after that day.

As for who blew up communeonline.com, beats the shit out of me. But if you ask me, Raoul Dunkin has been wearing a snazzy new hat that I find pretty suspicious. Draw your own convictions from that, Sherlock. Bricks out.

º Last Column: Cell Out
º more columns