I can't stop ..... defining irony

Time for a new segment... as some of you may remember I hate Nic Cage, so naturally Con Air is a repeated object of my venom. Sadly, one part of that movie has worked its way into my subconscious... when the loony played by Steve Buscemi says in reference to the song Sweet Home Alabama, "Define irony: Bunch of idiots dancing on a plane to a song made famous by a band that died in a plane crash." There are all kinds of little ironies and hypocrisies in the daily news cycle, so with apologies to Alannis Morrisette, here are a few from the past week or so:

Ted Kennedy, a man who worked his entire political career to pass universal health care causes universal health care to fail by dying.

Random suit in MA, gets elected primarily by running against the Senate Health Care Bill, a plan nearly identical to the one he voted for three years prior, except that it contains the one aspect he hates about his own state's plan, cost controls.

Stephon Marbury, the epitome of a shoot-first pass-never point guard, is going to play pro basketball in communist China

Paul Shirley, a "not a has-been, but a never-was" basketball player, gets fired from his writing gig at espn.com for writing this ridiculously stupid piece on Haiti.  - Oh wait, that's not irony at all, just sweet sweet justice in one of its many forms.

Sarah Palin is attacking NOW, an organization devoted to empowering women, for criticizing a pro-life Super Bowl ad by saying the pro-life message is feminist, despite it involving a bunch of old white men telling females what they can and can't do.

Bristol Palin, a woman famous for having pre-marital sex and one who likely would not have been pregnant had she used contraceptives, is now staying in the limelight by speaking across the country in favor of abstinence-only sex education.

This segues nicely into another first: the first I can't stop within a can't stop post. I can't stop wondering .... if a girl or guy who is saving her(him)self for marriage gets married and then subsequently divorced, do they go back to a celibate lifestyle, or has Pandora's box (vulgar pun? intended) been opened and there's no going back? In theory, I think the answer is that they go back, since isn't the whole basis for the idea that sex should be saved for those with whom you want to procreate? However, I think certain practical realities (read: needs) might get in the way of that, once the genie is out of the bottle. After an extended discussion, Mike and I decided that it was latter (see, eg. Jessica Simpson) but we're curious as to others thoughts/second-hand knowledge on the topic.