All Entries Tagged With: "Silverton"
Satirists Bring Suit
The International Union of Satirists and Gag Writers (AIUSG) has filed suit against Donald Trump. Calling the actions of his administration “unfair competition” they also named several top ranking administration officials in the action.
They say the President’s statements reflect strong irony and plenty of ridicule while outlandish remarks put him in a class by himself, shutting the door on light-hearted exaggeration attempts or any valid expose on anything political.
“Obama was fun to tease. He had a sense of well-advised comedic response,” said the suit. “Even George W. Bush could deliver a joke. Trump is the joke.
“We hope to bring the whole sideshow down before it destroys the nation,” said one petitioner. “Trump’s erratic behavior is in no way pointed, clever or constructive humor.”
In a prepared statement union leaders said It is currently impossible to make fun of someone who is such a mess. There is no inherent humor whatsoever unless one lowers himself to doting, laughable news coverage the mainstream media has produced since January.
A growing number of satirists and even some fledgling comedians are beside themselves and gasping for air. Several have reportedly jumped from bridges and balconies. Others have even began hurling themselves into the path of slow creeping (albeit non-existent) Republican legislation as a bloody protest.
Economists predict that as many as 3500 satirists could lose their jobs as a result of the humor quagmire.
“And that’s just in the immediate ranks,” said a Harvard professor. “One must consider the reverberations. All of the satellite industries connected to satire are at risk as well as the support services and fanned out personnel. This kind of laughter has been part of the editorial landscape since Jamestown. It’s healthy as long as it does not cross over to meanness.”
Trump supporters, if they read this at all, will write it off to fake news and liberal propaganda landing everyone right smack into the cycle of frustration and outright despair over the state of leadership in this country.
“He even lied about his golf handicap,” said one sardonic source who said she cannot keep up with the President in the field of the absurd.
“I’m out of energy,” she wailed. “It looks like my future in journalism will be eternally linked to covering town council meetings and writing obituaries.”
– Uncle Pahgre
Scribe Tied to North Korean PR Firm
Self-Indictment? An example of Toole’s dirty work, penned for Kim-Jong-il during his tenure in Pyongyang.
(Colona) Peninsular Journalist Melvin Toole has been linked to a rogue public relations firm that once represented named Kim Jong-il, the father of Kim Jong-un.
Asian experts, who have been observing Kim Jong-un with a new degree of intensity since the crisis over nuclear weapons went into overdrive last year, agree that the North Korean leader is easily as dangerous as anyone in the current White House.
“We have been mining Kim’s vast experiences with everyday reality to come up with a working personality sketch that might further predict erratic behavior in Pyongyang,” said one political source in Japan. “Kim is what we like to call turnip cart nuts in diplomatic terms which does not disqualify him from elected or inherited power.”
Whether Toole was complacent in sharing sensitive information with North Korea or simply a stooge of his own delusions will be determined in the Hague next week.
Meanwhile Chinese Prez Xi Jinping appears to be positioning himself from potential blowback from the slogan scandal. Like many in the Trump Whitehouse, Jinping has never filed for status as the agent of a foreign power registered as a foreign agent.
Aides to the Chinese leader say he didn’t feel the need to fill out more paperwork at a time when nuclear warfare was on the table.
Toole, clearly responsible for such slogans as We may eat gras for dinner but we’ve got nukes! and Dear Leader – The only god you’ll ever need did not return our tweets this morning.
In the A bomb of our own campaign his halting hand is evident if not in the headlines then in the stuttering body copy. The mindless pentameter is unmistakably his as are the all too common sickly sweet melodies.
“His touch seems apparent,” said former copy writer and critic, Tommy Middlefinger, who adds that a favorite, He’s not just a man in an oversized suit coat, never made it to Korean TV but was a hit on commercial radio in China.
Toole expands on the rough slogans to further explain that Eating grass makes you strong (a play off a Wheaties ad) and the popular ballad: On a Clear Day We Can Reach San Francisco.
One release attempts to place Dear Leader in a better light. I am not going to eat this entire cow and this rack of lamb, these eight lobsters and this pork roast because I love my people.
Internationally the situation remains tense with propaganda replacing logic and threats dominating diplomacy.
North Korean copywriters have rarely had the opportunity to write much in the United States because the gifted ones have been shot by Kim Jong-un, Chairman of the Worker’s Party of Korea. Others have been shunned by the American mainstream due to the sordid case history of one Kim Kimo-Baby, a defector who arrived in the US just prior to the Korean War.
Kimo-Baby has since been indicted for selling classified ads to Joe Stalin in 1952 and arranging for the same Soviet dictator to have his mustache cleaned at a Bay Ridge (New York) dry cleaner shortly before his death in 1953.
Kim, allegedly the first Korean to it 65 homers in a season, is currently serving a life sentence for bilateral espionage (and failure to run out a fly ball) somewhere in New Jersey.
“Toole deserves the garrote for his insolence and grave noncompliance ,” said one prosecutor, “but he his well-carved talents will no doubt endure. He will probably end up writing ads for the insurance or pharmaceutical industry.”
Rumors that Kim Jong-on had suggested a diplomatic swap involving Toole for a minor league prospect in the Korean Maritime League were angrily shouted down in the House last night before bed.
– Fred Zeppelin
“Religion is excellent stuff for keeping the common people quiet.”
– Napoleon Bonaparte
Second Homeless Jam Resorts
Crested Butte — Displaced Digest — May, 2017
They’re everywhere you look, hanging around the real estate offices, staring into shop windows, trying on ski boots, lingering over an overpriced slope lunch. That gaunt, disheveled gape, the eye avoidance maneuvers, the hapless slouched trot, when approached by their betters.
These are the Second Homeless, a growing population of Americans too proud to take assistance but too poor to buy a vacation home.
This is a problem that won’t just go away said a resort sociologist from Boulder who coined the phrase, Second Homeless, and hopes to make a killing on a soon-to-be-released book on the subject.
“The American Dream just got a wake-up call and there’s no free breakfast!” as Gloria De Quirke says in her first paragraph, “Soon there will be no discounted lunch either.”
Having only a small window to capitalize on their status these wanderers are highly visible from Killington to Squaw Valley. They are doddering from Michigan’s Upper Peninsula to the Florida Keys and to the Petrified Forest.
They eat well, send their offspring to public universities, buy a new car every four years and afford to buy organic at the local supermarket. Yet something is very wrong. The Arrival has escaped them. The final truth of purchase has eluded their desperate grasp. They have no second home in the mountains or at the beach.
Yet with the emergence of short-term vacation rentals there are few houses to rent for people who live in these regions. This phenomenon affects everyone from the woman who cuts your string beans to the man who delivers lard.
In a related piece Second Homeless persons have reportedly invaded the sets of several reality programs such as Dancing With Cigars, The Imbiber and The Missed Miss Universe Pageant (held in Medellin).
– Alonzo Pinke
“I drive around to make money so I can afford to keep driving around. “
– Melvin O’Toole from Breath of a Salesman, Testosterone Brothers, Boston.
Answers to Spring IQ Test
1. If you said “the wrong way around” was the only safe route to Point B, give yourself one point. If you said “Point B was not really worth the trip”, give yourself two points.
2. The correct answer was “a dog and two birds”. Other acceptable responses include: 1. Mount Whitney 2. rice curds all around 3. The Hangman of Babylon 4. [42] x pr@yx-[24] 5. May 4, 1691 6. sort of greenish or anything written in French. Give yourself 1 point.
3. Only if the electrician’s assistant leaves the building by the third floor west parking loft, north window and if he/she avoids every third step down the false fire escape on the way to the bottom can he expect to survive through the weekend. Worth 3 points.
4. The answer to this one is “the train arrives at 4:31 am. (Participants must show work on this one…although it doesn’t matter to whom one shows said labor.) Worth 2 points on Tuesdays.
5. Either the Crimean War or the Rose Bowl Parade. 1 point.
6. The correct response was 12 but if you submitted any number between 8 and 57 you are all right. (2 points). In fact, any number below 150 gains one point. OK with 150. We might accept any number except 666, which is the work of the devil, and 33, which is the work of an idiot. Bonus point for the trouble.
7. The problem with our society is ignorance and apathy. The proper response is “I don’t know”. If the tested added “and I don’t care” give yourself 4 points.
8. Follow your heart down the drain. 2 points.
9. The red star is under the third cup and the monkey has his hand on your wallet. Close one eye and share the bananas. 2 points. Note: Red stars may appear as black chickens or staple guns in Canada.
10. Trick question: Was Calvin Coolidge ever caught dressing up like a giraffe? One point.
SCORING: If you scored below zero you are a moron but one that can achieve success in mass merchandising. If you scored 1 – 3, you are of average intelligence, which can be quite frightening in the warm-blooded sector. If you scored 4 – 7, you are above average, which guarantees nothing. After all the average American can name all of the contestants on American Idol but cannot spell the name of the current president of Iran, Iraq, India, Pakistan or Yemen. If you scored higher than 10 you are a cheater and should seriously consider running for public office.
Toole Kicked Upstairs
(Washington) Longtime associate editor at the San Juan Horseshoe, Melvin “Breakfast Meat” Toole, was promoted Thursday although close friends say even he “can read between the lines” as to the paper’s intentions.
Toole himself had little coherent comment. He is supposedly overwhelmed with mindless and unnecessary administrative duties and cannot be contacted for comment.
“Getting kicked upstairs is better than downstairs,” laughed Toole, gesturing toward his groin area, as rabid supporters rallied in the streets below his once lavish, now all but abandoned balcony.
A former high wire legend, the scribe, who once toured with he famous Flying Farcheezies, has a chronic fear of heights, and did not appear on his familiar 14th story precipice. In a letter smuggled out of Horseshoe offices in a baby carriage Toole, 101, said the he sees his reassignment to a 16th story cubby hole as harsh and punitive.
“They are virtually trying to force my retirement but I still have a few good years left,” he whined. “Who will refill the water cooler and keep lead in the electric pencils when I am gone?” he lamented. “Who will call out for Chinese food and write irrelevant quotes on the bathroom walls? Who will decide which cartoons to watch on Saturday mornings?”
Refusing to be driven out of journalism but sitting glumly at his antique waterboard desk Toole said of his superiors: “First I got the cold shoulder then the lukewarm stares, then the pointy-boot.”
The restructuring comes at a difficult time for the newspaper which has just received news that it will be banned from reporting politics here until things warm up.
“That leaves dog shows and county fairs,” said one former proof-reader. “That’s not the stuff of greatness,” she said.
– Billy Mosca
Declan’s first baseball game!
Three generations of baseball fans: Kevin, Kyle and Declan Haley enjoyed a 23-5 route of the New York Mets by the Washngton Nationals on April 30
