The chancellor is guffawing so loudly his face is contorted.
Labour's rather contorted effort to gain political capital from the event, with their photos of dogs sniffing out Letwin, scored a measly 7%, with an (admittedly rather juvenile) picture of Hague cuddling an equally bald baby coming out on top with 40%.
Clegg's despicable move highlights how all three parties are twisting themselves into contorted knots, such is their desperation to look tough.
Pandering to the ultra-Orthodox is a sure sign, in the contorted codes of Israeli politics, of the bloody succession struggle now in prospect, as Mr Olmert is forced out.
Mr Obama has contorted his own policy to appease critics.
One of his earliest masterpieces, the life-size "Deposition of Christ" in Antwerp Cathedral, portrays the dead Jesus with a contorted, bloodless body modelled on a famous sculpture of Hercules in Rome.
So when a London teenager issues the conversational challenge "you chattin' me shit?" the grammar may seem contorted, and the usage may be unfamiliar, but you get the picture immediately.
The latest example of l'exception française is a contorted takeover battle involving two French drug firms.
"Unpacking My Library", which he began in 1990, shows a white-haired figure contorted, bent almost double, from the effort of concealing a book in his jacket.
At Jamestown, continuing research including the discovery several years ago of the foundation of James Fort has helped to explode the popular myth that the New World was tamed by Errol Flynn-like swashbucklers.The contorted skeletal remains recently unearthed suggest that corpses were hurriedly interred in shallow graves.
John Prescott, the deputy prime minister, recently told the Labour Party conference that "every time I see the Countryside Alliance and their contorted faces I redouble my determination to abolish fox-hunting".
