I have been informed that my Warty Live CD issue is the result of some strange filesystem overlay module that had been developed for knoppix/morphix. I have also been informed that the Hoary Live CD does this in a more sane and normal manner. Or, to quote jdub:
“broken non-lkml-happy kernel module fucks with normal software, film at 11”
Still, it takes something pretty special to break rewinddir().