Congress Freezes US Assets

(Washington) In an eleventh hour decision of major proportions for our stumblebum economy, the United States Congress today passed legislation that effectively freezes the assets of its own government. Passing swiftly through the GOP-controlled House, the bizarre bill landed in the Democrat-controlled Senate and, after an hour of heated discussion was approved by an undisclosed margin.

President Obama, who has surpassed his quota of vetoes for the month, is expected to sign the bill into law from the Democrat-controlled Oval Office this morning.

The Republicans, firmly against the bill in the beginning (since it was first sponsored by a Democrat) backed off after it became clear that the private sector would assume a larger roll and in no way be directly effected by the freeze. Democrats assured themselves that even though they would not raise taxes they would continue to mouth concern for the needy, throw money at issues and brace for blowback.

Both sides concluded that the action would save billions in gov’ment expenditures.

“If these brahmans really wanted to save money they would suspend their paychecks, their premium health insurance and their lifelong pensions,” said Rosey Rosebud, a representative from Harlem. “Most are by nature already beyond wealthy when they first run for office and get richer as Mandarin opportunities blossom in the golden years.”

Rosebud simply frowned when asked about the influence of lobbyists and the cancelation of social programs inherent to the these procedures.

Now the combined Congress must vote on an sticky amendment that would ban lobbyists from Washington altogether.

“It’s really a sham,” squawked one lobbyist, his oily pockets full of gifts for cooperative lawmakers. “Don’t these people understand that we run things around here? They can’t simply dismiss us. It’s un-American!”

A nearby senator commented on the uproar asserting that when the end is near drastic steps were often necessary.

“We can’t just go on printing money while the middle class gets squeezed,” he said. The rich are still rich. The poor are still poor. The middle class works two jobs to maintain. The people have unmasked their leaders to find no one leading.”

Although the gov’ment has frozen assets belonging to such distinct entities as Iran, Pete Rose and the Ku Klux Klan, it had never seized its own. The icy funds, initially generated by the IRS and National Park fees, will be stored below zero in an undisclosed location near Cheyenne Mountain in Colorado.

“Even if the assets are frozen they must be protected in the event of a nuclear strike,” said the senator, “far out of reach of the drunken sailor spending. If our government was forced to operate and execute like small business it would have been bankrupt in 1783, a year after it opened.”

Despite the icy solution some in the Congress plan to stay open until petty cash runs out. Most agree that a solution is not on the horizon and that freezing assets does little more than slow down the inevitable shift in policy making and expenditures.

“All of the filibusters and back slapping haven’t worked,” flinched the source. “We can’t wait for the American people to get off their asses and demand fiscal responsibility on the part of their elected officials. The government apple is rotten to the core.”

Democrats here expressed hope that the action would project the Republicans as the bad guys in the 2014 elections while Republicans were confident that the freeze would reflect poorly on the White House and the Democrats. – Kashmir Horseshoe

Anarchists Overrun Antarctica

(Montevideo UR) A contingent of loosely knit anarchists have landed on the beaches in Wilkins Sound in an apparent attempt to reclaim the island continent from the penguins who have called the place home since before recorded history.

According to spy networks the anarchists hope to set up a utopian society there.

Our besieged bureau in Puerto Montt, Chile reports that at least 15 separate groups of debunkers, each with their own craft and dogma, arrived on the icy beaches within moments of each other. None had even a semblance of a uniform or even the same flag. All stood around in the surf ignoring any military precision exhibited by the others. Then, like a flock of songbirds without orders they moved toward the known inland penguin stronghold at the foot of Mt. Siple.

“We have no intention of disrupting penguin life here,” said one unidentified anarchist. We just want to be left alone by the rest of the world. If we cannot flourish here we are indeed doomed.”

Many controlled, though heated, disagreements emerged as to the proper course of action.  Chronic direction as to the exact location of the stronghold further disrupted the forward motion of the invaders. This confusion was highlighted by a loud disturbance when three anarchists fell hundreds of feet into a crevice created by ice and winds of at least 150 miles per hour. At least three one-person search parties met the same fate before the afternoon drew to a close.

By nightfall the entire landing party was forced to huddle together amid dwarf Orwellian pines to keep from freezing since no one had organized a firewood unit and no blankets were included in the haphazard survival list that was never completed.

Tomorrow any survivors plan to take the day off and return to the task at hand later in the week.

– Zorro DesPlants

Ash Tray Surplus Undressed

(Paradox, CO) The abundance of unused ash trays currently serving as memory knick-knacks will be decreased significantly thanks to several suggested recycle programs adopted at the highest levels today. The ash trays, once a major component of the smoking culture, are no longer in demand with the demise of puffing and diminished tobacco use.

Suggestion #1: Get the government involved. Persons anxious to rid themselves of these items are instructed to send them to the thousands of tobacco lobbyists currently working in the nation’s capital. Maybe they can give them as gifts to the Congress.

Suggestion #2: Take action yourself. Many of the ash trays are plastic which make for easy recycling, whereas glass and metal cinder keepers present a more serious problem due to the length of decomposition. Antique and classic ashtrays, as well as spittoons and earthenware creations often fetch a high price and can be sold to collectors.

“We are happy that so many have given up smoking,” said one health official whose expertise appears essential to the cleanup. “We all remember the smells associated with dirty ash trays. Some day our descendants will perceive these objects as disgusting and negative yet historically important mementos, and may store everything from keys to candy to safety pins in them.”

Up till now authorities had been concerned that the ash trays might fall into the hands of terrorists or used by marijuana smokers.

Anyone bogged down by the presence of these soot and ember depositories can now recycle safely and easily. It’s the patriotic thing to do,” said the source. – Ripple Van Winkle

Cruel and Unusual Punishment

Not a lot of ‘em in Stringtown much cared for Ma MacElliot or any from her whole pestering clan for that matter. They found the old lady (Ma) to be abrasive, petty, callous, loud and whiny. They didn’t like her because her dogs were mean and her sons were meaner. They didn’t like her because she constantly spit tobacco juice, often on their shiny shoes, nice green lawns and acutely swept Stringtown sidewalks.

And personal hygiene may have just as well been a French greeting. Rashes found a warm welcome in her every crevice, while matching socks would have been a coordinated victory. She broke wind at the most erratic times and in the most inappropriate places. She never washed her hair and her Rambler Ambassador smelled of rotten eggs and sour milk.

She wore a stained Bronco jersey, with some player’s name faded on the back. Ma’s mere presence at the grocery, a stroll through the second-hand store or a prowl at the dump she could anger and embarrass large swaths of humanity.

Nora Goode explained that resentment hatched because Ma had once been a blue blood and, like the other MacElliots had fallen on cumulative faces and now were just as broke as everyone else on the south side of the unraveling town’s bucolic social networks. They were has-beens and in less than two generations had fallen from Brahmans to bums.

Ma cursed as a mouse shot across the floor. She wished she had kept one of the feral cats that used to inhabit the place. She had exiled them, meows and all, to the barn where they now set up house, ignoring the purge of the rodent proletariat at the old home doublewide.

“Bet there’s no mice prancing around inside that barn,” she groaned. “They’re all over here.”

When Ma got her fifth DUI George W. was still President. Now it was her sixth arrest on drinking and driving. She had been coming back (doing the speed limit with at least one headlight on) from a tractor pull in Utah when a cow elk jumped onto the highway in San Miguel Canyon and collided with her pickup. During the ensuing investigation it became apparent that Ma had been sipping. Her low profile/high alcohol level was easily enough to win her a spot at the Montrose jail for the night.

“I only had a six-pack. That’s what I get for doing the damn speed limit,” said Ma. “If I’d have been speeding I’d never have hit that elk. Oh well, jail won’t be so bad. At least I’ve earned a few months away from my worthless relatives.”

Then she said, “It’s a conspiracy. The cops are hiding out and waiting for me! When I still had money it was different, more formal…all the lawyers and bail, the plea bargains and alcohol classes,” she sighed. “But now they tell me I’m some kind of indeegent, which means they can’t squeeze no more dollars outa this one!”

“Six offences I see,” said the judge and no sense of remorse…that’ll be 120 days or 160 days in lieu of fine.”

“King of the Blues”

Interview Part IV

“The Swan Song”

Sunny: Like I said, I am the king of the blues.

Horseshoe: Your roots reach deep into the Mississippi Delta, into the South Chicago scene, into Motown. That’s quite diverse.

Sunny: Yeah, man. I’m the king of the blues, baby, the king of the blues.

Horseshoe: Our sources tell us that you’ve released over 50 records and CDs since the Forties.

Sunny: I’m the king of the blues.

Horseshoe: You’ve been pickin and singin for over 70 years. Sooner or later you’re gonna drop dead. How do you feel about the hereafter?

Sunny: I am the king of the blues.

Horseshoe: After reviewing several of your songs it appears that you concentrate on simple, repetitious themes that could become annoying after a while.

Sunny: I am the king of the blues.

Horseshoe: We see that you travel with a complete orchestra. Are all these members really necessary or do you just like to be extravagant?

Sunny: I am the king of the blues.

Horseshoe: There are plenty of musicians, such as Muddy Waters, B.B. King, John Hurt, John Lee Hooker and others who might claim to be the king of the blues.

Sunny: But I am the king of the blues, baby.

Horseshoe: According to your agent you received that boom box as a gift from Yassar Arafat after a performance in Palestine.

Sunny: I am the king of the blues.

Horseshoe: It’s really loud. Can you turn it down so we can talk some more?

Sunny: I am the king of the blues.

Horseshoe: He also told us you were the tenth of eleven kids born to sharecroppers around the turn-of-the-century. How old are you anyway?

Sunny: I am the king of the blues.

Horseshoe: You don’t look that old.

Sunny: I am the king of the blues.

Horseshoe: One would think that all the drinking and partying would take its toll on a fellow your age.

Sunny: I am the king of the blues.

Horseshoe: The liner notes on your King of the Blues album say you’ve been married eight times and have fathered more than 40 children.

Sunny: I am the king of the blues.

Horseshoe: What did you and all of those wives find to talk about.

Sunny: Ain’t you been listenin’? I am the king of the blues.

Horseshoe: Read any good books lately?

Sunny: I am the king of the blues.

Horseshoe: Here, eat these guitar strings.

Sunny: I am the king of the blues.

Horseshoe: Nice day. You think it’ll rain this afternoon?

Sunny: It’s possible.

THE NINE LEAST INFLUENTIAL PEOPLE OF THE LAST MILLENNIUM

By Ken Currie

Special from our archives 1999

As a handful of calendar-clutching fanatics proclaim that our beloved Millennium is drawing to a close, second-rate journalists are scrambling to write pieces scrutinizing the last 1000 years with every possible angle. Now I am fond of this particular Millennium, having spent most of my adult life in it, but if it must be scrapped in favor of a newer, bigger one I hereby promise that I will not stand in the way. As others list and write about the great events and people of the past 1000 years, I too have compiled a list…not of important people, nor of lesser known greats. My list does not contain the forgotten or the obscure, but is rather a roster of complete nobodies. Here then is my contribution to posterity…last and least influential.

Alfredo Veducino (1102-1168)

Alfredo served as a monk in Spain. He maintained strict silence for fifty-five years although he never really took an official vow to that affect. The monastery where Alfredo lived was one where fellow monks unearthed and translated what was believed to be the grocery list of the prophet Isaiah. In later years the entire ordeal was downplayed when a senior monk pointed out that chicken chow mein was not available during that primitive Biblical period. This discovery and the subsequent dismissal of the said document shook the religious world of the time. Luckily for Alfredo he had had nothing to do with the research from the onset. He was bust keeping silent adhering to his daily regiment of sleeping until 3:45 in the afternoon and spending the remainder of the day engaging in what fellow monks called esucha de conejos or listening to rabbits.

Stefanos Meridan (1460-?)

Born the son of a destitute Portuguese eel trapper, spent his early years living on the beach with his father. His mother, a stout woman, would not allow either of them in the house do reportedly to the presence of an icky eel slime aroma. At age 11 a desperate Stefanos stowed away on a large merchant ship. After three days it became apparent that the ship had been abandoned. On the fourth day he returned home, cold and hungry, only to be locked out of the house by his mother who complained of a musty shipwreck stench that mysteriously followed the lad about. Later, as an adult, he claimed to have discovered a swift ocean-going route between Portugal and Spain. He set sail, bankrolled by the Italian court, centered in the city state of Sinatra, and three years later was swept ashore along the rocky coast of Scotland. He quickly claimed the land for the queen of Portugal and renamed in Stefanoland, after himself. Almost twenty minutes later red-headed Picts in plaid skirts made him sail away by hurling jagged rocks at his head. He was never seen again. Some one hundred years later a rough map surfaced at some insignificant Renaissance yard sale in a familiar writing style common to Stefanos. The map featured England and Ireland carefully drawn to scale, but named Meridanland and Stef’s Isle.

Ping Hi Pong (1225-1324)

As a philosopher in China, Ping taught meditation to children six- years-old and younger. He is credited with two metaphysical sayings. One was “The man who can boil a rooster’s egg will accomplish an impossible task” and the other, “To hear a beautiful woman sing, now that’s really something.” To this day no one has proven Ping wrong on either saying. As Ping neared his one hundredth birthday, an acolyte asked him for the secret of longevity. He smiled, settled back into his easy chair and said “To live a hundred years one must…” and before he could finish the sentence, he dropped dead.

Ivan Ivanivan (1850-1923)

As a distant cousin of Czar Nicholas, Ivan was extened privileges not often enjoyed by young men of his time. He got two extra potatoes per month and a full equestrian scholarship to Kiev Community College. While at school he penned Czar Wars…The Empire Strikes Us. This was considered controversial by the three people who actually read it (oddly enough they made up the majority of literate people in Russia at the time). He also wrote a collection of poems which the same three people began to read but found to be too controversial to complete. Ivan was traded to a Siberian minor league franchise for a warped landscape rake and lived in that barren place for his last 60 years because, as he put it: “In Siberia nobody expects you to grow a garden.”

Dr. Lisa Blackhart (1801-1888)

As the first female doctor in Boston to refuse to touch newborn infants, Lisa was encouraged by her brahman family to hit the Oregon Trail. After two difficult months in the saddle she decided to turn around and try heading West. She settled for a time in Kansas City doing odd jobs like radical amputation and liver transplants. Soon she became shocked by the illiteracy rate among two-year-olds. Determined to start a school to cure these social ills, she found her dislike of children to be a formidable obstacle. She moved on to Denver but found young children there to be equally annoying. She finally landed in Sacramento where she began a medical practice again. However, after only two months as a frontier doctor, she initiated a stern policy of refusing to see anyone who was sick or injured. With no patients to treat and no children to teach Dr Blackhart described her golden years as “the most fulfilling of my career.”

Wolfgang Jack VonStein (1679-1735)

As a boy in Hungary, Wolfgang (a long shot to make anyone’s list) longed to play the piano. Sadly, his parents could not afford to purchase such an expensive instrument but they did provide him with two chicken bones which he carried with him at all times. All over the village Wolfgang could be heard tapping the bones together to create increasingly complex rhythms. After a chance meeting with John Sebastian Bach at a local cafe the maestro offered to tutor the prospect free of charge. Once, at Bach’s home, the great musician demanded that Wolfgang rinse the chicken grease from his fingers before touching the piano. An enraged Wolfgang stormed out of the house never to return. In the years that followed he composed several symphonies to be performed entirely on poultry bones. Today a noted virtuoso, Rupkin Mensonich, performs VonStein’s work outside a sushi bar in Prague free every other Thursday unless it rains or something. Mensonich is number seven on our list.

Marcia Kreep (1821-1891)

Born in Vancouver on the wrong side of town, Marcia perspired to be an inventor. Among her drawings are elaborate schematics for what she called her “clock dismantler” and her similarly designed “pocket watch smasher”. Her early inventions were not well received and she found herself embracing poverty. Plus she was quite poor. This never changed. Other designs by Kreep were the “mechanized digital book dropper” the “self-sinking ponga boat” and one curious concept entitled simply “the thing that doesn’t work right”.

Jeff Singlehair (1946- )

A Flint, Michigan native, the idealistic Singlehair rejected his father’s offer to join him as a partner in an environmental engineering firm. Jeff said: “You engineers are wrecking the world with all that train smoke and other ungroovy stuff, um, man!” Jeff then joined the hippie movement but became disillusioned when, at age 20, all of his hair fell out. He attended a small Everly Brothers concert at Windsock, N.C. in the summer of 1969 mistakenly thinking (to this day) that he had been a part of the largest, most famous rock and roll event of his generation. Jeff currently lives in Chevy Chase in a Chevy van and makes candles for aromatherapy workshops around Southwestern Colorado.

Watch for our Nine Billion Most Average People of the Last Millennium in next month’s special insert and see if your name is mentioned!