I don't know what other cities it runs in but out here, you can't turn on the TV without seeing a commercial for Sit 'n Sleep, a business that sells beds and other furnishings. In every one of their ads, you hear their slogan: "Sit 'n Sleep will beat anyone's advertised price or your mattress is free!"

Today, my friend Michele Hart stopped in and she pointed out something that hadn't occurred to me the eighty-seven million times I've heard that sales pitch. It's that it doesn't make sense. They would never give a mattress away free.

Think of it this way: Sit 'n Sleep is selling the Sealy Posturpedic for $1700. You find an ad someplace that offers the same mattress for $1680. You bring that ad into Sit 'n Sleep and show it to them. Which of these two things do you think would happen?

1. They sell you the Sealy Posturpedic for $1679.
2. They say they can't afford to sell you the Sealy Posturpedic for $1679 so they give it to you free.

Their pledge is not worthless. It is a way of saying they'll beat anyone's advertised price and I assume that's so. It just didn't dawn on me until Michele mentioned it that it couldn't possibly result in any free mattresses. And boy, do I feel dumb for not picking up on that before. I wonder how many people do.

Medical reporter Charles Ornstein writes about the agonies and indecisions surrounding his mother's end-of-life-care and passing. In my own case, I was quite prepared to make the critical decision and indeed, was standing by and thinking it was imminent on several occasions. And the reason I was prepared was that my mother had explicitly told me, over and over, that she didn't want to be kept alive on a technicality. One way she said it was, "If all I'm able to do is breathe, I don't want to be breathing."

That helped me know what to do. So did a conversation I stumbled into one day with my own doctor, a very wise man and not just about things of a medical nature. He said, approximately…

I've seen it time and again. The patient's case is hopeless. They have zero chance of living anything other than a life in a nursing home strapped to a machine, barely or wholly unaware of where they are. They've made it very clear that they don't want to be kept "alive" that way and all the proper forms have been signed that give the Loved One the power to say, "Discontinue treatment."

But the Loved One doesn't do that. They think they're overriding the patient's wishes out of love for them but actually they're putting their own wishes ahead of the patient's. They're afraid that they won't be able to live with the decision or that others will criticize them for killing their mother or father. If they stand to inherit a lot of money, they worry that the police will start investigating. Often, they're emotionally unable to deal with the medical realities and they insist, "No, no, I have a hunch" or sometimes it's a message from God or a belief that ending a life, even the kind of life the patient didn't want, is murder. There are also some people who just plain have trouble making any kind of important decision in their lives and this one seems too important for them to make.

So they ignore the realities and the patient's wishes and they tell themselves they're doing so "for them." But they're actually doing it for themselves.

Mr. Ornstein's article has a lot to do with the costs of keeping people arguably alive past the point of hopelessness…and that is a concern. My father, when he had his penultimate heart attack, was worried sick (let's say "worried sicker") about what taking care of him would do to his wife, personally and financially. He'd had to witness what happened with a pair of neighbors who I think I've written about here at some point. They were as nice and ideal a couple as you could ever find but when the man went utterly senile, taking care of him pretty much wiped out the family savings and the physical labor and exertion pretty much killed his beloved spouse. My father thought, as did we all: What a horrifying thing to do to the person you love most in the world…to essentially make them destroy their life taking care of you when you oughta be dead. I will always believe my father to some extent willed himself to die rather than do the same thing to my mother.

He was not so much worried about the cost of hospitalization. He had great insurance…a plan so good you couldn't get it today. He just thought what a pain it would be to take care of him when he couldn't take care of himself, and how expensive it would be to hire caregivers, remodel the house to accommodate his new needs, etc. I don't think he could possibly have gotten any better if he'd felt it was at the expense of his wife's health and monetary security.

Some of you may remember the Terri Schiavo matter of not long ago. A lot of those who thought the most important issue in the nation was to keep that woman alive — even ignoring others in similar or more "saveable" conditions — would like to forget it. What struck me at the time was how little the controversy had to do with Ms. Schiavo; how she'd merely become a prop in whatever remained of her alleged life. It was all about what was good for those around her, either in terms of their own lives or in how they could use her to demagogue some issue.

I suppose I was fortunate that I didn't have to make The Ultimate Decision, though I came close and was quite prepared. I'd decided that it was too simple to just say, "It's not about me. It's about what she wants." It wasn't even, "It's not about me. It's about what she wants, assuming I'm satisfied she would still want it when she's unable to rescind that wish." It was, I came to believe, at least a little about me in that what she least wanted (and would have hated more than anything) was to be a crippling burden on my life. She had reached the stage where she didn't want to live and felt that having birthed and reared me, she was now a destructive presence in my life and ashamed to be that. I have the feeling that when she realized she was dying, among her last thoughts was, "Good. Now, Mark won't have to tell them to turn off the machines." That's a great mother for you.

Let's go back a few years and catch one of the oddest magic acts…Tom Mullica, who did bizarre things with cigarettes. I don't think anyone's doing this kind of thing today and with good reason. Audiences wouldn't tolerate being in the same room with all that smoke.

Tom is still around and still performing…but not this kind of thing. Some years ago, he abandoned cigarettes and began starring in a tribute act for his late friend, Red Skelton. He plays Branson much of the year and tours when he's not in Branson. Word of mouth and the clips I've seen suggest he does a very fine show and I hope to see it some day.

Here's his cigarette routine. Before you decide you'd like to do something like this, you should know something. Tom is now (happily) back at work after spending some time fighting leukemia and seeing it go into remission. They say that smoking cigarettes can raise your risk of getting this disease by 30% or more. I wonder what the odds are when you smoke them twelve at a time…

To follow up on this earlier posting…

I accepted an offer yesterday to sell the house I grew up in. I lived there from age 2 until about 23 and it's one of only four homes I've ever had. The first was before I was two and I have no memories of that dwelling. The one before the home I'm currently in was an apartment on Croft Avenue here in Los Angeles. I was living there when I started working for Sid and Marty Krofft and that occasionally caused confusion. Once, for instance, I had a friend who was either going to meet me at home or at the office and he phoned and left a voicemail that said, "I'll meet you at Croft [or maybe Krofft] at 2 PM." Uhh…

There was another odd coincidence to that apartment. They've since moved it elsewhere in town but Dark Horse Comics used to have a small office in a building at Croft Ave. and 3rd Street — and publisher Mike Richardson had a view out his window of my old apartment. That was the apartment in which Sergio Aragonés and I began doing Groo the Wanderer, which is now published by Dark Horse.

Anyway, the house I grew up in — the one my father bought for a bit over $17,000 in 1953, the one my mother lived in until she passed away last October — will belong to strangers following a 45-day escrow. In that span, I need to get out the last items that I want, distribute furnishings to friends who may want them, clean the place out and have it fumigated and retrofitted. There's a very old O'Keefe and Merritt stove in the kitchen and I'm told that if I find the right expert, he'll come in, pay me a few thousand bucks for it, then restore it and sell it for five times what he pays me. I need to find that expert. There's also a rug in the living room that my mother used to tell me was very valuable and that when I inherited the house and sold it, I should get someone in who'd pay me properly for it. We'll see if she was right.

And then I have this other goal: I want to see if I can get Time-Warner to stop sending me bills for the disconnected cable TV service there before escrow closes. Wish me luck.

Every realtor I spoke to about selling the house asked me if I had any emotional attachment to it. Nope. None. I had plenty to the lady who lived there but without her, it's just a house I happen to own. Sure, there are lots of happy memories but I can still have those without owning a house I don't need.

It sold quickly. The realtor predicted a five-day sale and it took a bit longer than that…but I was in no hurry so it's fine. I thought the buyers, whoever they might be, would either tear it down or build it way up but the high bidders say neither. They intend to move in, fix only what needs to be fixed right away, and live there. I hope they're even half as happy in it as my family was.

There's a PBS special called An Evening with Jerry Lewis that's debuting this weekend — tonight, in some towns. It was taped last November at the Orleans Hotel in Vegas and it's supposed to be Jerry singing and telling stories and mostly doing a Q-and-A with the audience. I am told that Jer loves the Q-and-A segments more than anything he does professionally and that he would not do a show without an extended one.

I've seen a few of them, live and on video, and they're…odd. He seems to like playing the non-nutty professor…likes to hold court on lofty topics. If someone asks him if he and Dean liked to hang out, he turns it into a five minute discourse on trust and caring and the bond of two men, and much of what he says is incoherent and rambling. Sometimes, he doesn't even wander away from the topic. He just starts a mile away from it and keeps going in all directions. I assume the PBS special will be edited judiciously to make it appear as if he is actually addressing the questions that are asked.

He is beloved and honored these days — less, I suspect, for anything he's done than for what he is: A survivor and a relic of another time. I don't think people love him for his movies or TV shows so much as they love him for just being Jerry Lewis all these years and not dying or going away on us as so many of his contemporaries have. When he does go away, it'll be sad…because he'll be taking an entire era of show business with him when he goes.

Here's a little preview of the special in which, as you can see, he does the Typewriter Routine for about the three hundred thousandth time…

As Joe Brancatelli informs us, all those points you've accumulated in your hotel loyalty program may be worth a lot less soon than you thought.

Ezra Klein on why Obama can't make a deal with the Republicans. Long story short: They don't care what he offers unless it's unconditional surrender. That's no way to make a deal, especially when you just lost a big election and your demands don't even reflect the majority of your own party rank 'n' file.

The Hollywood Reporter is once more telling us that NBC is planning to forcibly retire Jay Leno from The Tonight Show and rotate Jimmy Fallon into that slot as soon as next summer. We went through this a few months ago with many a media expert saying Jay's departure was a Done Deal; that there was no way the network would extend him again. Then they extended him again.

It kinda fascinates me how often everyone has been wrong about this guy. In Bill Carter's book on the Jay/Conan debacle, he quotes Lorne Michaels as saying "Fortunes have been lost underestimating Jay Leno." I can't think of anyone who so consistently defies predictions of impending demise. He more or less became Johnny Carson's Guest Host as a second choice. Most at NBC then wanted Garry Shandling to replace Joan Rivers in that capacity but Garry was too busy so at first, it was Garry and Jay switching off and the sense was that Shandling was the new Guest Host and Leno was kind of the Guest Host's Guest Host. Then Shandling withdrew and industry pundits doubted Jay could hold down the fort.

He did just fine. Then when Johnny left, they said he couldn't hold Carson's audience. He did. Then when Letterman came on against him, they said Jay would be replaced. He wasn't. Then they said okay, so he's finishing a respectable second…but he'll never beat Dave in total viewers. He did. Then they said he'd never best Dave in the 18-49 age bracket. He did. Then they said it wouldn't last. It did. Then they said Jay was just being buoyed by strong programming at 10 PM and would never hold his lead once those shows died out. Then they did and he stayed on top…and so on and so on. There's something about this guy that turns everyone who forecasts his collapse into Dick "Obama has zero chance of getting re-elected" Morris.

People in this business get fired all the time because they aren't in First Place. Only with Leno do his bosses say, "He's in First Place. Let's get rid of him." He was in First Place when there was a move inside NBC to dump him and install Letterman in that job. Dave didn't accept or they would have. Jay was in First Place when they actually did dump him and put Conan O'Brien there. That didn't work out so now Jay's back and he's in First Place…and they're reportedly talking about firing him yet again.

Don't tell me it's because his show sucks. First of all, I don't think it does. I think he's phoning it in…but I find the current Letterman less watchable and the two Jimmies unwatchable. And secondly, even if it does, when has that ever been a consideration in cancelling a network television show? Do we think one single person in the television industry believes Dancing With the Stars is a quality program? Or the current Saturday Night Live? It's almost a running gag in television that the folks running any network don't watch their biggest hit and don't understand why anyone does.

Now admittedly, Leno is only in First Place by a hair or two lately. He's a bit ahead in Total Viewers and holding his own against Jimmy Kimmel in the 18-49 bracket. In the latter category, he's again topping all expectations though, also admittedly, he has a lot more viewers at the 49 end of that demographic than around the 18. It would not be unscientific to presume he will start losing in that capacity before long…except for the fact that for something like two decades now, every single prediction that Leno's Tonight Show numbers would plunge has been dead wrong.

They always underestimate this man. You know the one time they didn't? When they thought he could establish a franchise at 10 PM every weeknight. And even that got the numbers they expected but so damaged the affiliates' 11 PM local news programs that NBC had to yank it. So they stuck him back in at 11:30 and again, wizened heads said that while he'd do better than Conan did there, he could never get to First Place there again…and now there he is in First Place with NBC saying, "Let's get rid of him." I don't know if they will or even if Fallon would really be the replacement…but someone's suggesting it again. Yeah, it doesn't make sense but it didn't make sense the last time they did it, either.

I don't really care that much about Leno's show. I just like something about a guy who so consistently gets written-off and then proves the prognosticators wrong. Eventually, predictions of his permanent departure will come true. Maybe that time is at hand, in part because NBC will make it be at hand. All I know is that whenever he goes off and stays off, all those who've been wrong over and over for two decades about Jay Leno will say, "See? I told you he wouldn't last."

Actress Megan Hilty made her Broadway debut in Wicked playing Glinda, the role originated by Kristen Chenoweth. Ms. Hilty was much acclaimed for her work there, particularly in her rendering of the song, "Popular."

So here we are a few years later at "Defying Inequality," a benefit to amass funds to fight discrimination based on sexual orientation. Performing is the inestimable Jason Graae, a fine fellow with whom I have had the pleasure of working on a few occasions. Jason opts to serenade Megan Hilty with his rendition of "Popular" and — well, you'll see how it goes. Sorry about the shaky camera work but it's worth it…

John Cassidy on Bob Woodward.

Are you stopping into a Souplantation or Sweet Tomatoes this month to try the Classic Creamy Tomato Soup I like so much? Well, if you are, here's a coupon for 20% off your entire check…and it's good through the end of April. I don't see why you couldn't print it out again and again and keep going back.

Boy, do I like this one. I've seen a lot of great books lately reprinting classic comic books with reproduction worthy of the material…and not to belittle the desirability any others but IDW's "Artist's Edition" of MAD is the best one I've seen. Some of that, of course, is because the material itself is so wonderful — twenty whole stories and a number of covers and loose pages from the comic book issues of MAD, back when it was written and edited by Harvey Kurtzman and drawn by the likes of Wally Wood, Jack Davis and Will Elder. But a lot of the wonderfulness has to do with what IDW and editor Scott Dunbier have done with it.

The big thing they did right was to track down the original art itself and scan directly off it…so you see every erasure, every white-out, every stray pencil marking that didn't get erased. Then they printed the art the size it was drawn. Now, this has its drawbacks because the resultant book is roughly the size of Penn Jillette. It's 15½" by 22¼" and will fit on no shelf in your home or anyone else's. You can't hold the thing in your lap either. You need to open it flat on a table. I'll be storing mine in a wide art drawer I have. That is, when I'm not hauling it out to show everyone who comes by and doesn't have their own yet.

One thing that stands out is that not only does the reproduction live up to the work but the work lives up to the reproduction. Davis, Wood and the others drew this material for dime comics printed on crappy paper and they had no reasonable expectation that it would ever be reprinted once, let alone dozens and dozens of times, eventually full-size and crystal-clear. They could have put a lot less work into the pages and all would have looked fine in what they then thought would be the one and only printing.

They didn't. The panels are loaded with detail and nuance that wasn't visible the first time around — or the second or the third or the ninth. I know these stories real well and I'm seeing things in them I never saw before, not even in Russ Cochran's excellent hardcover reprints. You know how wonderful Wally Wood's art for MAD was? Well, it turns out, it was even better than we thought. Same with Davis, same with Elder, etc. (One minor quibble: John Severin is unrepresented. You may also regret that your particular favorite MAD story didn't make the cut…but there wasn't room for everything and not every story's original art could be located.)

I am similarly impressed with what Harvey Kurtzman did. Years ago, I had the chance to study the original artwork to Marvel's Not Brand Echh #1, which was more or less their attempt to do Kurtzman's MAD. Some very talented people worked on it including Stan Lee and Jack Kirby and even John Severin but the effort fell leagues short of Kurtzman & Company. Looking at the originals, you could see one reason why: Almost every panel had retouches and relettering and patches to indicate they passed it around the office and let everyone take a crack at adding silly signs and gags.

The pages of MAD in this volume show very few examples of relettering or pasteovers or of anyone going through the work after it was completed, trying to make it funnier. Kurtzman was notorious for fussing over pages and redoing his own roughs over and over, spending whole days on one page to make it 1% better. But the stories in IDW's splendid collection have sparse evidence of after-the-fact renovations. The pages really demonstrate that these guys knew what they were doing and did what they wanted to do. I never felt the sheer professionalism so strongly in any other book reprinting great comic art.

The book lists for $150 and it would be a bargain if you paid that. Right this moment, there's one dealer selling it via Amazon for $85.10 and I'll bet that price doesn't last long. I'll further bet that when this book is outta-print, you see copies going on eBay for $300 and up, maybe way up. If this material interests you in the slightest and you can find a place in your home for a copy, don't delay.

In case you can't tell, I kinda liked it.

Kevin Drum explains the Sequester in all its glory.