As we all well now know, Oscar night 2013 will be remembered as that time Seth MacFarlane made joshing reference to Quvenzhané Wallis as an imminent object of George Clooney's sexual attentions, and then the Onion drastically upped the ante by calling her "kind of a cunt." (They later deleted and apologized for it.) The backlash to both outbursts was swift and loud, followed inevitably by the "Can't you take a joke?" backlash to the backlash.

One of the most agonizing side effects of a controversial comedy routine – generally a crude one that involves violence, tragedy, or is at the expense a minority group  -- is the scramble to explain why some things are funny and some are not. And explaining a joke is only slightly more magic-defusing than watching how sausage is made. Comedy is alchemy. The minute we say, "That's not funny because…" we risk the approbation of those who'd call us humorless scolds, uptight and fussy party poopers.

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"There is no appointment viewing anymore," Stone said. "In our first season, you had to show up on Wednesday nights at 10 p.m. on the comedy channel to catch the show. Now, I don't even know where or how people watch our show. We sort of don't really care about ratings. It's more important to come up with work that will add to the library in a way that we're proud of and will make people want to catch the show wherever they want to."

The first episode of the 17th season airs Sept. 25.

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Sure, Saddam Hussein got to play a role in Trey Parker and Matt Stone's 1999 opus "South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut." But it was Mr. Jong Il who really stole the show in Parker and Stone's subsequent puppet masterpiece "Team America: World Police." Kim's not just a homicidal maniac in a big house -- he's a guy who really, really loves to put on a big show. He's also a man who can't quite pronounce "inevitable," who struggles with the isolation of success, and who, it turns out, is actually a bug from outer space. Now that's a villain!

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Of course they have competition. There's "The Daily Show," for sure, though I'd argue that Jon Stewart's version is as much a news program as a comedy series. But for audacity, visual flair, musical chops, verbal invention and gut-busting silliness, not to mention consistency of vision over time, I think the "South Park" boys trump all comers -- including the creators of "The Simpsons," a landmark show that started to flag halfway into its endless run, and Seth MacFarlane of "Family Guy," whose show has its moments but has never quite risen to the heights of conceptually driven insanity that Parker and Stone reach so often.  At their best, I'd put Parker and Stone up there with "Monty Python's Flying Circus," "SCTV," Ernie Kovacs, the Marx Brothers, George Carlin and W.C. Fields, all of whom skated along the edge of the surreal and willfully outrageous, doing pirouettes and blowing raspberries at anyone who tried, like yours truly, to call them great and significant.

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 Last night, "South Park" gave Perry a long-awaited noogie when he showed up to accept at the school's comedy awards show. (Called "The Kathy Griffin Awards" -- how I wish those really existed.)

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"The Book of Mormon" nabbed a leading 14 Tony Award nominations Tuesday morning, earning the profane musical nods for best musical, best book of a musical, best original score, two leading actor spots and two featured actor nominations.

The musical, about two Mormon missionaries who find more than they bargained for in Africa, was written by Trey Parker and Matt Stone, the creators of "South Park," and Robert Lopez, co-creator of the Tony Award-winning musical "Avenue Q." The trio teamed up with Casey Nicholaw, who co-directed with Parker and choreographed.

It has received 12 Drama Desk Award nominations, six Outer Critics Circle Award nominations and a Fred & Adele Astaire Award nomination, which recognizes excellence in dance. The musical is also grossing more than $1 million a week and is selling out -- the place "Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark" was supposed to be before its implosion.

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1. "Family Guy": While American audiences found dread in bin Laden's cryptic video messages, Seth MacFarlane found gag reel opportunity. The show's famous FCC-baiting episode "PTV" depicted the terrorist in Afghanistan cracking up during a taping of his own terrifying video message. Botching the pronunciation of "Ramadan," the cartoon bin Laden breaks character to say, "Did I just say Radaman? What is that? Yeah, maybe Dennis Radaman is going to punish you with his crazy hair." Bin Laden made several appearances on "Family Guy" throughout the years, though many never made it to the screen.

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Oh yes, welcome to the month that was "That's My Bush."

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Twenty-year-old Zachary Chesser of Oakton, Va., was scheduled to make an initial appearance Thursday in U.S. District Court in Alexandria.

FBI agents say Chesser twice tried to travel to Somalia to join al-Shabab as a fighter. An FBI affidavit says he was stopped once by his mother-in-law and the second time was told he was on the no-fly list.

Chesser is charged with providing material support to a terrorist group. He is not charged for an online posting in April that said the creators of the animated TV series "South Park" risked death by mocking the Prophet Muhammad.

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A corpulent child wearing a Savile Row business suit and a red, white and blue ascot climbs onto the stage. He is wearing a shiny American flag pin on his lapel. He steps on a milk carton to stand behind the dais and assumes control of the meeting by slamming his gavel.

KKKARTMAN: Order! Order! By the power vested in me. By myself and all freedom-loving, patriotic, deodorant-wearing, one-true-God-fearing citizens of East Park, I hereby declare moral outrage! Outrage, I say! Why, you ask? WHY?! Because the godless, liberal Benedict Arnolds at Comedy Central have prostrated to the altar of political correctness! They have succumbed to the demands of a legion of intolerant, extremist, Islamist, Muslim fundamentalists whose only logical response to a satirical cartoon lampooning their Prophet is violence, reactionary rhetoric and bad hygiene! Ha! This is what happens when you elect a Muslim president!

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The show, which has carpet-bombed every religious, political and, well, human group on the planet, made headlines last week when it satirically depicted the prophet Mohammed, whose image is verboten in the Muslim faith, by sticking him in a bear costume.

One thing about Islam: It isn't exactly known for its rollicking sense of humor about itself. Sure enough, in a post on Revolution Muslim's website last week, writer Abu Talhah Al-Amrikee published Parker and Stone's studio's address and warned that "what they are doing is stupid and they will probably wind up like [slain Dutch filmmaker] Theo Van Gogh for airing this show. This is not a threat, but a warning of the reality of what will likely happen to them." (The group, based in New York, has since taken down the site.)  

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Wednesday's episode of the animated series included the Prophet Muhammad as a character, despite a warning from a radical Muslim group that producers Trey Parker and Matt Stone could be killed.

The character's face was obscured by a black box because Muslims consider a physical representation of their prophet to be blasphemous.

A similar episode last week angered the New York group Revolution Muslim. It posted a warning on its website that Parker and Stone could face the same fate as a Dutch filmmaker who was killed after making a movie about a woman who rejected Muhammad's teachings.

Last week the character was hidden in a bear costume. When the costume was removed this week, Santa Claus appeared.

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"Yunus Muhammad" says in the interview that the Quran instructs Muslims to "terrorize the disbelievers." It does no such thing. The Quran instructs Muslims to live at peace with non-Muslims who are at peace with them.

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The website RevolutionMuslim.com has since been taken down, but a cached version shows the message to "South Park" creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone. The article's author, Abu Talhah Al-Amrikee of New York, said the men "outright insulted" the religious leader.

The posting showed a gruesome picture of Theo Van Gogh, a Dutch filmmaker who was shot and stabbed to death in an Amsterdam street in 2004 by a fanatic angered by his film about Muslim women. The film was written by a Muslim woman who rejected the Prophet Muhammad as a guide for today's morality.

"We have to warn Matt and Trey that what they are doing is stupid and they will probably wind up like Theo Van Gogh for airing this show," Al-Amrikee wrote. "This is not a threat, but a warning of the reality of what will likely happen to them."

The posting listed the addresses of Comedy Central's New York office and Parker and Stone's California production office. It also linked to a Huffington Post article that described a Colorado retreat owned by the two men.

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Instead, we carrot tops are experiencing a surprising surge of follicularly based vitriol of late – especially, and perhaps uncoincidentally, in a part of the world where they're plentiful.

Proving that the goodwill of the Ginger Spice era has long expired, The UK retail chain Tesco found itself red-faced this after launching a massive dud of a holiday card.  Depicting a red-haired child on St. Nick's lap, it reads, "Santa loves all kids. Even GINGER ones." The card enflamed the ire of Davinia Phillips, the British mother of three redheads, who took her case to the court of public opinion. Despite earning the nickname "ginger whinger" (okay, that's pretty funny), Tesco withdrew the cards. They did however helpfully explain that they were "intended to be humorous." 

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On last night’s perennially offensive, still shockingly funny "South Park," the boys fell under the spell of professional wrestling, with all “the cool costumes and jumping off ropes and stuff.”

Soon they were becoming WWE-style wrestling legends in their own little hamlet, right down to scripting “Your girlfriend is a whore” psychodramas to amp up the drama in the ring. But their greatest triumph was a rivalry between “Stan the Man” and “Juggernaut” for the affections of “Bad Irene” --  a bewigged, bikinied Cartman. And how did their wrestling love triangle play out? With “Bad Irene” in front of a slobbering crowd of fans, admitting to “Juggernaut” she “killed his child.” Why? Because “I’m not in love with you, I’m in love with abortion!” And then they started hitting each other with chairs.

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I remember when bottled water really started to take off, it worried me that water labels said things like "The Thirst Quencher!" or "Nature's Best Hydrator!" Now we know that our cultural downward slide is almost complete. Either the marketing departments have finally accepted the fact that they have to appeal to a country of Neanderthals, or the marketing departments themselves are staffed by half-wits and numbskulls and confused, slow children. "Hey, look, guys, let's not forget to remind people that there's no fat in water!" "Yes, because ... there's only water in water." "Right. In fact, maybe we should put 'Low sodium' and 'No sugar!' and 'Wheat-free' and 'Lactose-free' on there, too." "Definitely! Consumers need to understand that water is the most robust, scalable solution to the ongoing challenge of thirst."

Next, marketers will update that old cowboy song about cool, clear, free-range, cage-free, cruelty-free, noncomedogenic, allergen-free water, water, water!

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Here, see for yourself. Here's Tancredo's ad -- pay special attention to the narrator's voice about 10 seconds in, when he says, "There are consequences to open borders beyond the 20 million aliens who've come to take our jobs."

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