Matt Taibbi as Jeremiah, with new Lamentations for the present moment: “America is dying. You could smell it at the Michael Jackson trial. Snapshot from the end of the case: It is early on a Tuesday morning on the last week of the proceedings. The verdict is days, perhaps hours, away. The courthouse compound is in an advanced zoolike state. The pro-Jackson crazies have descended en masse for the verdict, and they are fighting, in some cases with fists, to get places in front of the cameras. At the courthouse gates, a fat creep from Tennessee named BJ — journalists have dubbed him ‘Superfan’ — is pushing two Polish girls aside so that his weirdo buddies can dance, out of tune, to ‘Black or White,’ for the amusement of a row of mute European photographers. One of the shooters takes a place on the Tennessean’s ladder, which he stands on every morning to cheer for Michael. ‘Watch the fucking ladder!’ BJ shouts… This is a deathbed scene.”

What do the evangelical Promise Keepers (born yet again and coming to a city near you), Louis Farrakhan’s “Million Man March,” Boston’s recent Catholic Men’s Conference (at which Passion star Jim Cavaziel and a Bush officials discussed their headships), and the Jungian claptrap of Robert Bly’s early 90s “Iron John” movement have in common? Serious daddy issues. A fascinating Father’s Day report from Paul Zakrzewski.