According to a recent survey, the BBC reports, the good news is that the United States is pretty much the only nation whose politicians don’t believe that humans create global-climate change — or at least give it a rather good kickoff.

The bad news is — well — the United States is pretty much the only nation whose politicians don’t believe that humans create global-climate change — or at least give it a rather good kickoff.

On the other hand, we Americans had some rather good kickoffs on Thanksgiving Day.

Hope you had a happy Thanksgiving.

Or as some of us say, though not enough of us, happy truly bad day for the native peoples of the Americas. Ranks right up there with Oct. 12.

In other good news, such as it may be, Pakistan is apparently rethinking its censorship of text messages — its list of banned terms had included "glazed doughnut."

Yes, I know. Who would have thought you could stun a doughnut enough so that it became glazed? (When I think about "glazed," which is not all that often, I think of ex-Hawkeye QB Jake Christensen and his poetry. You, too, huh?)

(Freshmen, note the spelling of "doughnut": Dunkin’ Donuts should not be your mentor in the use of the English language. For one thing, the second word in that company’s name could be taken as the imperative, and dangerous things can happen when imaginative minds wander in the direction of the imperative.

(Beau, you say, that can’t be the imperative; it’s misspelled. The word is already misspelled, I reply gently. By the way, how did you manage to break in to my column?)

Another term that fell victim to Pakistani text-messaging censorship was "athlete’s foot" — rather odd for a country that loves soccer, which, of course, is played with the feet. As opposed to American football, which is played almost entirely with the hands, except for those few who do, indeed (as well as in thought), employ their feet. The kickers are generally regarded with semi-benign amusement — if not outright disdain — by their teammates. Listen to former Oakland Raider Pro-Bowler Lincoln Kennedy on Fox Sports Radio sometime.

There were other words on the Pakistani list, of course — you know, the words that we all know but don’t normally put in this newspaper because we don’t want to offend the tender sensibilities of Natalie Ginty. Lord knows, we wouldn’t want her to go through the agony of another fainting spell.

In yet more good news, a major climate-change skeptic, Richard Muller of Cal-Berkeley, in a study partly funded by the Koch brothers (famous financial backers of things right wing, including the Tea Party) now says he believes man-made changes do indeed contribute to global climate change.

That’s nearly on par with the pope coming out in favor of abortion.

Well, OK, that’s probably hyperbole. But if you can’t have hyperbole, you’re left with mere bole, which is kind of like cold porridge.

(Yes, I know — "bole" means either the trunk of a tree or a reddish-brown fine clay, depending upon which definition you stumble upon first. You nitpickers take all the fun out of life, if that’s what this is.)

Speaking of hyperbole, there was Michele Bachmann last week, demonstrating that she’s never met a hyperbole she couldn’t jump through.

In the GOP presidential-nomination debate last week (it wouldn’t be a real week without a Republican debate, apparently), Bachmann announced that President Obama "has essentially handed over our interrogation of terrorists to the ACLU."

Who knew? And here I thought Obama was blowing them up with drones. Misled by the liberal-media conspiracy again, I guess. (Well, I do live on a grassy knoll. Hmm.)

That was the same debate in which Mitt Romney announced his first name was Mitt.

Which is fine and dandy, except that his first name is Willard.

Speaking of climate change.