Originally aired July 30, 1999
Written by Steven Stoliar
Directed by David R. Eagle
On a world where tabloid journalism has replaced real news, a photo suggests that Maggie is having an affair with the President, whose advisers decide to use it to distract the public's attention from a war with Switzerland.
Tropes present in the episode:
- Alternate History: Major newspapers such as The Los Angeles Herald are essentially gossip rags whereas only underground newspapers cover more weighty issues. The US is at war with Switzerland as a major Swiss banking scandal caused a worldwide economic recession. There are also reports of ethnic cleansing in the French-speaking parts of Switzerland, emulating the situation in Bosnia on Earth Prime.
- Fictional Counterpart:
- The Hawks Report refers to The Drudge Report, the first news outlet to break the Monica Lewinsky scandal which this episode parodies.
- Tony Jacobs of GNN interviews Maggie's double.
- No Celebrities Were Harmed: Jefferson Williams, as in William Jefferson Clinton. Making it even more obvious, President Williams, like Clinton, was first elected in 1992.
- One Drink Will Kill the Baby: Averted. Maggie's heavily pregnant double is smoking a cigarette with one hand and drinking a beer with the other.
