(continued)

In the Washington Post, Steven Mufson wrote that insurgents are pouring their profits into destroying the oil infrastructure, driving up prices and scaring off investors. Though Iraqi reserves are capable of producing up to six billion barrels of oil a day, Iraq struggles to reach a prewar output of 2.5 billion barrels per day. If Bush's goal for the war was to control plentiful oil supplies, Mufson said, he's failed miserably.

And on the News Hour, the indispensable Juan Cole identified oil as one of the main reasons for renewed violence in Basra: "There are several party militias that are fighting turf wars with one another, in addition to tribal mafias, that are seeking to control rights to gasoline and kerosene smuggling worth billions a year. And they're siphoning it off from the central government. They're basically stealing it from Mr. al-Maliki, and he wants them to stop."

Sinners: Graydon Carter and David Friend, for collaborating on a 10,427-word piece in the April Vanity Fair about Jack Worthington, "a respectable financier," who came to the magazine with the claim that John F. Kennedy was his father. Unfortunately, every piece of hard evidence Friend came up with contradicted that claim—but Graydon decided to print the endless article anyway. How come? "Because—Who knows? What if? Remember the 'Deep Throat' scoop?—it just might be true." Next time, spike it instead of giving it a cover line.

Winner: Mark Morford, for another enraged (and deadly accurate) column in the San Francisco Chronicle about our magnificent president: "[N]ow Bush is in his final year. This is both the good news, and also the very, very bad news. Because we are now in the death throes of the worst administration in modern history, entering the period of serious consequences, of economic collapse, environmental impact, record oil prices, international recoil, rashes, boils, inexplicable vomiting. Fun for the whole family."

Winner: David Wessel, for a brilliant page-one explainer on the meaning of the Fed's rescue efforts, beginning with the collapse of Bear Stearns. The bottom line: "The Government of Last Resort is working with the Lender of Last Resort to shore up the housing and credit markets to avoid Great Depression II," economist Ed Yardeni wrote to clients.

Sinners: Major donors to the Democratic party, who wrote to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, urging her to reconsider her position that superdelegates should follow the lead of elected delegates when they choose the Democratic nominee for president. It's still possible to make this nomination worth as much as Hubert Humphey's was in 1968. (Value then: Close to zero.) This could be one of them.

Winner: Arthur Laurents, for proving that even at 90, you're as young as you feel—by garnering the review of a lifetime for his direction of the new Gypsy with Patti LuPone.

Winner: The Onion, for finally discovering the real reason gays are not allowed to serve openly in the American military: "They're special, pure and rare, like a gleaming diamond, or a snow-white colt. We must protect them."

READ MORE
• Full Court Press: Charles Kaiser on Bush's War
• Full Court Press: From Howie Kurtz to Ashley Dupré, Charles Kaiser rounds up this week's media winners and sinners
• Today's Top Stories