OMAIG
Rachel reported that 73 AIG employees got a million dollars or more in bonuses for tanking the company and threatening to drive the world economy down to the point where Yap Islanders are the only people left on Earth who still have a viable currency.

Senator Ron Wyden dropped in to mention that he and Olympia Snowe had added a bailout clause that would have stopped these bonuses, but it mysteriously disappeared. I can’t believe he wasn’t wearing a sign that said “I TOLD YOU SO.”

There was a lot of talk about taxing ‘retention bonuses,’ but I’m not sure I believe that will work for more than one tax year. Won’t everyone just change the name so they start receiving “enhanced-incentive gold stars” or “liquid asset attaboys”?

Talk Me Down
While we certainly have been doing some senseless spending on maintaining Cold War nuclear weapons, it’s one of about three things that hadn’t been threatening to actually bankrupt us lately.

Say goodbye to that! Russia is in talks to put long-range Russian bombers in Cuba and Venezuela, and they’re talking about building up their nuclear arsenal. Because that worked so well the last time. How many cinematic alien invasions will it take to make us realize that we all need to work together?

Rachel welcomed former Senator Chuck Hagel to talk about this exciting new game of Whole World roulette, and fortunately he seemed to be way more into understanding the way our nations intertwine than bear-in-the-woods chest thumping.

Hagel also showed an admirable disgust for choosing party loyalty over doing what you believe is best for the country and said, “There’s no room for that kind of silliness.” STOP MAKING ME LOVE YOU, CHUCK HAGEL.

Ms. Information
Ms. Information is always one of my favorite segments. Tuesday’s was no exception but for one horrific flaw: Ms. Maddow, please don’t ever again make my brain process the phrase “Cheney doodle.”

Now that you can’t banish that phrase from your mind either, I’ll tell you that the head of the White House Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships met with an exciting group of far-right Christian visionaries that we might as well call The Coalition of People Who Make My Normal Christian Friends Cringe and Hide Under the Dinner Table.

Rachel also noted that Sacha Baron Cohen’s Bruno character puts the moves on Ron Paul in his upcoming movie. Which officially moves the film up in my ranks from “I don’t care if it’s just like ‘Borat’” to “How many tickets am I allowed to buy and when?”

The Dark Side
I hope that last story built up enough of a whimsy cushion around your psyche, because it’s time for news about CIA prisons. The Red Cross, who the U.S. agreed should be the monitor of such things, has released a report saying that we tortured prisoners at secret “Black Site” prisons.

Mark Danner, author of “Torture and Truth” stopped by to make your shame and rage circuits fight for supremacy.

Danner mentioned that in one of the high-level White House MEETINGS about torturing people, Ashcroft said “History will not judge us kindly.” How do you have that thought and not have a follow-up thought on maybe knocking off the waterboarding people until they vomit?

Please watch the clip. I promise that things get fun again for the Cocktail Moment.

This Way Out?
Dr. David Kilcullen, military strategist, author of “The Accidental Guerilla,” and general Aussie bad-ass, came by to talk about the real cost of victory in Afghanistan. He made an interesting distinction between knowing how to do things and knowing whether to do them, then suggested that the real way to go is to “take non-military steps to deal with local grievances.”

He emphasized making social repairs on a small scale and carefully using local standards as a guideline.

Cultural anthropologists, did you hear that?! NOW IS YOUR TIME! Look up from your field notes and see your introverted, bespectacled Bat Signal in the sky! Stop throwing grad school parties organized around hilarious joke themes that only twelve other people understand and GET IN THERE!

Cocktail Moment
The Obamas have continued the hideous Chicago tradition of dumping green dye into any fluid within arm’s reach on St. Patrick’s Day. I’m not just talking about turning the river into a ribbon of vomit; I had a nasty flashback to my bartending days, when I was forced to add cheap green food coloring to cheap beer all night long.

Master mixologist Dale DeGroff cheered me back up and sent Rachel straight over the moon by showing up to make some spectacularly beautiful Irish coffees.

You are about to see Ms. Maddow in full-blown cocktail bliss. Enjoy.

Happy St. Patrick’s Day Recovery Day to us all.