Take a look at last night’s box score and tell me that you still think LeBron is the best guard in the NBA, the heir-apparent to Jordan’s throne. Miami won Game 5 with only three players in double-figures. Wade went over 40 for the second time in the Finals. And he went 21 of 25 from the line, including clutch shots to tie and go ahead at the end of OT.

The Bron-Bron hype machine may never relent. Nike and ESPN may continue to shove him down our throats and proclaim him the Chosen One.

But if I was starting a franchise, I’d take Wade ahead of LeBron, no questions asked.

The new cast is here. Refugees from CSI: Miami and Conviction. One of them is a chick replacing Dennis Farina (although the story amusingly refers to him as “Dennis Fontana”).

I have no problem with a female detective, but if they wanted to go that route, why not have S. Epatha’s character busted down to detective for some sort of insubordination and pair her with Jesse Martin? They have a great, semi-adversarial dynamic already.

Galley Friend D.D. sends us this amazing link to a detailed, careful, and very scary examination of the government and culture of Starfleet and the United Federation of Planets. (If that gets you hot, there’s also this appendix about “The Impact of Marxism on the Federation Council.”)

I’m not qualified to discourse on these essays in any substantive way. And I’m okay with that. But I am enough of a geek to appreciate paragraphs like this:

The majority of the evidence points to the Federation Council as the supreme authority of the United Federation. The Council appears to combine executive, judicial, administrative, and legislative authority in one body, in a fashion superficially similar to the supreme power of the Romulan Senate. In 2268, the Federation Council convened on Babel to discuss the admission of the Coridan planets to the United Federation in “Journey to Babel” (Paramount, 1967); this matter demonstrates both diplomatic and legislative powers, as the Coridan planets were independent states, and the matter ipso facto is a question of interstellar relations, as well as a question of internal law, regarding as it does the territory and jurisdiction of the United Federation. In 2285, the Federation Council sat in judgment of then-Rear Admiral James T. Kirk, former Chief of Starfleet Operations, on charge of nine violations of Starfleet Regulations, and ordered his permanent reduction in grade to captain, as seen in Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home; this is interesting in that it combined functions that normally belong to a judicial apparatus (a court martial) and to an executive apparatus (the demotion of a commissioned officer). In 2370, the Federation Council legislatively set a speed limit of Warp Five for all vessels in the United Federation, as seen in “Forces of Nature” (Paramount, 1993). In 2372, the Federation Council voted to condemn the Klingon invasion of the Cardassian Union (a diplomatic act), and further voted to provide foreign aid in the form of twelve industrial replicators to ameliorate the damage to Cardassian industry, in “The Way of the Warrior” (Paramount, 1995) and “For the Cause”(Paramount, 1996); it passed Special Order 66715 in 2374 authorizing Starfleet to “neutralize security threats to Deep Space 9 by any means necessary” in “Inquisition” (Paramount, 1998); during the Dominion War, the Federation Council voted in 2375 to withhold the cure to the morphogenic plague from the Founders in “The Dogs of War” (Paramount, 1999) and shortly thereafter approved a Starfleet operation to harvest metaphasic particles from an obscure world in the Briar Patch, in Star Trek: Insurrection (Paramount, 1998).

I don’t quite know whether or not to believe this story, but it’s on the internet, so it’s probably true. It seems that Dustin Diamond now lives in Wisconsin. And the bank’s about to foreclose on his house. So he’s selling T-shirts to pay off the mortgage.

Is this weirder than the Wil Wheaton site?

ILM is shutting down their physical effects unit, meaning that the triumph of CGI is nearly complete.

It’s sad not because CGI isn’t great, but because there is still a place for models and miniatures–see the amazing work with Minas Morgul and Orthanc in the LoTR series.

If you can’t get enough Greg Gutfeld at the Huffington Post, or you just want better abs, check out The Daily Gut.

Double Bonus: Don’t miss The Adventures of Keira Knightley’s Jaw.

Bad enough that Paul McCartney’s divorce from Heather Mills has led to a nasty custody battle over daughter Beatrice. But now, a German book entitled Die Freuden der Liebe has resurfaced, supposedly with nude pictures of the former Mrs. McCartney, who claims, according to the Daily Mail, that the book was “an educational lovers’ guide.” Peter Wilson, who also posed for the book, told the Daily Mail, however, that the photo-shoot was “cheap, titillating and sleazy,” and included “simulating sex, rubbing baby oil and whipped cream on each other, and acting out scenes with sex toys.”

Like Ms. Mills said, it’s educational!

On top of all this, cruder allegations have sprung, such as Mills having been a prostitute when she was in her 20s. Clients supposedly include a Saudi prince and Adnan Khashoggi. Petrina Montrose, a former call girl, claims she and Mills both spent time with the prince. From the Daily Mail:

“The prince was tall and greasy and I wanted to leave but I knew that to get my money I’d have to have sex with anyone in the room who picked me. Still, Heather was bubbling over with enthusiasm.”

“Instead she started parading naked around the room, trying to impress the prince even more.”

Sir Paul says he feels horrible about the “witch-hunt” directed at his ex-wife. On the other hand, I bet this helps his side of the custody battle.

For whatever reason, Jack Black doesn’t do it for me. He hasn’t made me laugh since his brilliant turn in Bob Roberts. But lots of people seem to love him, which is the only explanation for why a movie executive would greenlight a project like Nacho Libre.

In Nacho Libre news there’s this tidbit about Danny Elfman taking his credit off of the project. It’s a reasonably rare occurence–particularly for someone of Elfman’s stature.