Is Britney Spears pregnant again?

Hey, you there. Why so blue? Bummed that our unseemly national fertility cult, the Celebri-baby Boom, might be coming to an end? Sad that the stork has dropped one bundle at Thetan Place and is heading inexorably Namibia-ward?

Well, fret no longer. If certain sources are to be believed, there’s another bun in the oven, another insta-famous tot on the conveyor belt, another ominous tabloid drama gestating: Britney Spears is pregnant again. Reportedly. (Don’t you love the word “reportedly”? Like the word “pregnant,” it’s full of hope and dread in equal measure.)

Yes, the paint is barely dry on Sean Preston, and here’s another Federline-sired fetus taking up residence in downtown Spears. It’s dawning on you, isn’t it? This is going to be a very large family, a regular Waltons Mountain of Spearspawn. We must prepare for the impact of the Spears generation on Social Security, tax revenue, and the job market. More to the point, we must prepare for the impact on music. A Spears family of this size and reach will inevitably result in many, many terrible albums. We lived through the Wilson Phillips crisis, but this, I guarantee, will be much worse.

Now I realize, many of you hate the whole Celebrity Pregnancy subset of entertainment reporting. What can I say? I don’t disagree. I’m just in it for the frightening sculptures it seems to inspire. But here’s who I want to hear from: someone defending the cultural merit of stork watches, famous fetuses, the whole three trimesters. Explain this phenomenon to me, and I promise, I’ll never write another one of these items again.*

*unless the editors threaten to cut my daily ration of meat and Tales of the Gold Monkey DVDs [EDITOR’S NOTE: WE TOTALLY WILL, SCOTT.]