This is a good one. Fox News is suing comedian Al Franken, charging he misappropriated the term "fair and balanced" in his forthcoming book. Right off, you have to say good for them, because if anyone knows about misappropriating that term, it's Fox.
Specifically, Fox News says Franken's upcoming book, "Lies, and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them: A Fair and Balanced Look at the Right," violates its trademark on the term "fair and balanced." Fox also calls Franken a "parasite," "shrill and unstable" and "increasingly unfunny," which sounds pretty fair and balanced to me.

Seriously, you have to say it's about time a major corporation stood up to satire. Everywhere you go, someone's ruining this nation with satire. Late night TV: satire. Comedy clubs: satire. Cable coverage of California's recall: satire.
Plus, you have to love Fox's honesty. "Franken is neither a journalist nor a television news personality," the network said in its court papers. Thank you. TV news personalities are separate from journalists. Good to see that in print.

Now you're probably saying, sure, this suit sounds legit, but what court will take it?

Well, good news. Fox filed in New York, where, remember, the courts let Spike Lee temporarily stop TNN from changing its name to Spike TV because everyone in America would think of him and mistake the cable channel for one of his movies such as, uh, let's see, well, one of his movies.

And, of course, columnists will say things such as Fox is arguing against free speech, that it's trying to stop criticism of its news coverage (while it criticizes other TV news coverage), that it's harassing someone who has a different political point of view and that it's attacking the very Constitution and Bill of Rights it so patriotically says it defends, blah blah blah. Columnists -- what do they know?

Anyway, this is TV. Since when does TV care about the Bill of Rights? I don't see the word "ratings" anywhere in the Bill of Rights.

Besides, this should be proof for Fox's critics that it's not all-conservative, all-the-time news. A conservative channel wouldn't file a lawsuit in this lawsuit-happy society. It wouldn't use government to squash an individual's rights, or try to weaken the Constitution. See, Fox uses big government. Good ol' liberal Fox.

There are, however, a couple of points that might dim some people's enthusiasm for the lawsuit. For one, Fox wants to block Franken's book because, Fox says, "He is not a well-respected voice," and, "He appears to be shrill and unstable."

Here's my concern: Without shrill, unstable, unrespected voices, who's going to write all the diet books in America?

And Fox said Franken is a "C-level" talking head whose "views lack any serious depth or insight," and while that may be fine, I worry that if the court says those things matter, Fox won't be able to send Geraldo Rivera to the next war.

Or maybe that's Fox's real plan. It has found a way to get out from under its contract with Rivera and, for playing along, Fox is tossing Franken a bone. Although Franken's book isn't due out until next month, it went from something like No. 489 in sales before the suit to, by Monday, No. 1 on Amazon.com's charts.

So it's all a plot. Pretty smart of me to see, don't you think? So smart, I'm going to appropriate the phrase "smart." Or maybe "smart ass." You decide. That's it. I'll report, you decide. No, wait, that's already taken.