Last night, Willard Romney's tiny operators deftly manipulated the dials and levers that make him speak, allowing the simulacrum to deliver carefully calibrated utterances about his vapid plan to heal the economy, the failures of President Obama, his own dramatized personal history, and his standing as the "real" hope and change facing America.

And? So? Yes, he lied a couple of times. Yes, he was upstaged by the hologram of an elderly actor who once starred against a monkey (More about that later this morning). No, it's not clear if he's shown he's human enough for voters to decide they like him better than Sh-enator Obama (like John McCain used to say!).

Also, Americans like bellowing at empty chairs and invisible presidents. They didn't call him "Silent Cal" for nothing!

Next up for Willard Romney: Land speculation along the Gulf Coast.

The storm formerly known as Hurricane Isaac is finally done soaking and haunting the people of Louisiana and Mississippi.

The storm spared New Orleans but not the small, rural towns and swamp folk all around it. Now it's the suburbanites' turn to blame the levees. For working too well.

A major earthquake off the coast of the Philippines briefly triggered a tsunami warning. It's since been canceled.

The best way to ditch student loans in bankruptcy is to matter-of-factly explain to the judge that you're a bum. You've always been a bum. And you're always going to be a bum.

Unsurprisingly, the "legitimate rape" congressman, Todd Akin, is still polling well in his bid to represent Missouri in the U.S. Senate.

Harvard is investigating claims that more than 120 students in a class devoted to the study of Congress cheated on a final examination—the largest such display of mass academic dishonesty that anyone there can remember.

Apartheid remains the gift that keeps on giving. An old racist law means the government can charge a whole group of striking miners with murder—even though it was the cops who were seen on film gunning down 34 armed and angry miners in a recent clash.

NO ONE HEARD AT ALL. NOT EVEN THE CHAIR.