Help! apt /dpkg very, very confused

["David A. Greene" <greened@eecs.umich.edu>]

Ugh.  I knew I shouldn't have done it.

I tried to install exult from unstable today, and along with it
dependecies on libc6 unstable, etc.

apt downloaded everything but when dpkg was unpacking libc6,
my machine locked up.  Ok, so that's one problem that needs
to be looked into.

I rebooted, fsck'd ok.  I have a bunch of .h.dpkg-tmp files
in /usr/include and GOK where else.

I try apt-get -f install and get this:

waller:~# apt-get -f install Reading Package Lists... Done Building 
Dependency Tree... Done Correcting dependencies...E: Internal Error in 
pkgMinimizeUpgrade E: Unable to minimize the upgrade set

I try apt-get dist-upgrade or anything else (install, etc.) and
get this:

waller:~# apt-get dist-upgrade
Reading Package Lists... Done
Building Dependency Tree... Done
You might want to run `apt-get -f install' to correct these.
Sorry, but the following packages have unmet dependencies:
  bsdmainutils: Depends: libncurses5 (>= 5.2.20010310-1) but 
5.2.20010318-2 is installed
  fdutils: Depends: makedev (>= 1.6-28) but 2.3.1-52 is installed
  libpng2-dev:  libtiff3g-dev: Depends: libtiff3g (= 3.5.5-3) but
                3.5.5-3 is installed
                 Conflicts: libtiff3-dev but it is not installable
  logrotate: Depends: libpopt0 (>= 1.6.2-1) but 1.6.2-5 is installed
             Depends: base-passwd (>= 2.0.3.4) but 3.2.1 is installed
  lynx: Depends: debconf
  netbase: Depends: netkit-inetd but 0.10-6 is installed
  ssh: Depends: libpam0g (>= 0.72-1) but 0.72-30 is installed
       Depends: libssl0.9.6 but 0.9.6a-3 is installed
       Depends: libwrap0 but 7.6-7 is installed
       Conflicts: ssh-nonfree but it is not installed
       Conflicts: rsh-client (< 0.16.1-1)
  tcl8.3-dev: Conflicts: tcl-dev
  tcpd: Conflicts: netbase (< 3.16-1) but 4.05 is installed
  timidity:  tk8.3-dev: Depends: tk8.3 (= 8.3.2-4) but 8.3.2-4 is
             installed
E: Unmet dependencies. Try using -f.

Now, I might be reading this wrong, but aren't most of these "conflicts"
actually just fine?  Some of them are really confusing (like netbase
and tcpd) and others are very strage (lynx->debconf and debconf is
installed already!).  I think my package list somehow got corrupted.
How do I fix this?  I suppose I can manually dpkg -i everything I
already have in my system but that is very time consuming.

Help!

                                       -Dave

--

"Some little people have music in them, but Fats, he was all music,
 and you know how big he was."  --  James P. Johnson