Every now and then, we try to watch the national news so we'll get the jokes on the Daily Show the next day. So, even though Comedy Central's fake news outlets are on break this week, we were watching the NewsHour with Jim Lehrer last night and turning away when the Saddam Hussein on the gallows footage was on (like a game of hangman, we keep expecting a half-completed word to appear under his feet, with the letters S, T, and E filled in) -- when what comes on for the second news segment of the show but a career biography of Nancy Pelosi!

Now, we usually pooh-pooh nationally-broadcast news segments about San Francisco as not sufficiently insidery for us -- but this one was pretty decent! Here's a partial list of the highlights:

--a bleeped-out clip of former SF Congressman Phil Burton at a rally (you can read his lips and see he's saying "bitch"), along with John Burton wearing an outfit that makes him look like he's in a prison jumpsuit;
--footage of a harried Barbara Taylor (now at KCBS and the City Desk Newshour) trying to keep peace at a 1987 Congressional candidate primary debate (with 13 candidates) as a former San Francisco supervisor says a younger (and still wide-eyed) Nancy Pelosi doesn't care about the poor;
--excellent 1980s hairstyles and typography, and Nancy Pelosi in huge shoulder pads;
--a decent breakdown of the difference between a San Francisco "liberal" and a San Francisco "progressive";
--Krissy Keefer in her dance studio, explaining why Nancy Pelosi does not in fact exemplify "San Francisco values";
--perennial voter information guide favorite, San Francisco Republican Mike DeNunzio; and
--a very plump former Supervisor Michael Yaki telling stories about Nancy Pelosi playing Jeopardy in the office.

Well worth watching! Click here and go to "streaming video."