Big Bird gave money to hookers through ACORN. Oscar the Grouch had an abortion. These fucking puppets hate America, say conservatives. You know who doesn't hate America? Sarah Palin. And she has a conspiracy theory of her own to add.

When Henry Kissinger won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1973, off the back of wars in Vietnam and Cambodia, Tom Lehrer called it the "moment that satire died." Someone please revive it, because we need to kill it again. Conservatives are upset about a two-year-old Sesame Street skit in which a news organisation called Pox News is lampooned (slightly - this is fucking Sesame Street) and referred to as trashy.

Posters on Big Hollywood, a blog from Breitbart, were outraged. "PBS - a network partially funded with my tax dollars - has the right to tell my kids that their parents watch "trashy" news?" said someone called Stage Right, according to the Daily News. "The message is clear, I can't even sit my kids in front of Sesame Street without having to worry about the Left attempting to undermine my authority." Yes. Crystal clear. You've really read those tea leaves, Nostradamus.

Talking of people who can see which way the wind is blowing - in Russia as well as Alaska - Sarah Palin is back and giving speeches. In which she apparently uses the words awesome and bogus hundreds of times. Maybe she watched Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure before going on stage. Anyway, her addition to this week's conspiracies features the decision to move 'In God We Trust' from the center of coins to the edge. "Who calls a shot like that?" she asked audience members, rhetorically one would assume unless she was addressing the US Mint. "Who makes a decision like that?" She added: "It's a disturbing trend." Finally, a financial crisis she's qualified to comment on.