It just might be this U.S. satellite thing. If you missed this wonderful story, the U.S. government announced that it would have to shoot a spy satellite down because it contained noxious fumes or something. If it was allowed to crash, someone might fall ill, oh my.

A lot of journalists and foreign governments, including Beijing, enjoyed this one for its absurdity while decrying the whole U.S. military intimidation side of this. On its face, the explanation given by the Pentagon is rather entertaining in its silliness, but I find the whole thing kind of sad.

I miss the Cold War, when the U.S./USSR actually tried to lie with some flair, coming up with elaborate explanations for things. Hell, the U.S. government has continued to let a lot of old UFO sightings go unexplained because they want to keep 50-year-old Cold War-era flight tests secret. Now that's taking the business of lying very seriously indeed.

Toxic gases on a satellite? Someone working in the Pentagon propaganda office should be fired for that. There are a lot of disgruntled writers in Hollywood and New York these days – why can't the U.S. government hire a decent one?