Part 10 (2/2)
”If I had to guess, by the end of next week every citizen of Iraq will be w.a.n.g chunging,” Mr. Rumsfeld said. ”But I've been wrong before.”
KIM'S BLOG When people ask me what's the best thing about North Korea being a closed society, it doesn't even take me a nanosecond to come up with an answer: ”We don't have any American sitcoms here.”
Oh, I know, it's an easy target. Everyone likes to complain about sitcoms, just the way some people like to b.i.t.c.h about a near-total absence of food. But even so, I see sitcoms for the scourge that they are because I see what the introduction of sitcoms has done to my neighbor, China.
People in the West don't know this, but China has gone absolutely sitcom-crazy since the introduction of them to the mainland back in the mid-1990s. I can't go to a nuclear summit there without President Hu Jintao saying ”Kiss my grits!” or something r.e.t.a.r.ded like that. Sometimes I'll say ”Dyn-o-mite” just to humor him, but my heart's not in it. Do you know whose face is on the paper money in China? If you guessed Mao, you're not even close-it's Scott Baio circa Charles in Charge.
My biggest fear, the one that keeps me up nights, is that American soldiers are going to pour over the demilitarized zone, seize all of North Korea's television transmitters and start broadcasting that show with Jim Belus.h.i.+ in it. I sleep with a gun by my pillow, and if that ever happens, yours truly is putting a bullet in his head.
RALPH NADER CONSIDERS WRECKING 2004 ELECTION.
But Prominent Crackpots Are Cool to Bid Activist Ralph Nader is considering wrecking the 2004 presidential election, carrying on an election-wrecking tradition he began in 2000, a.s.sociates of the spoiler said today.
Mr. Nader was huddling with prominent crackpots in Was.h.i.+ngton, D.C., today to determine whether he has enough support among wing-nuts and whack-jobs nationwide to mount an entirely meaningless campaign.
”If I wreck the 2004 election, I intend to wreck it in all fifty states,” Mr. Nader told reporters today. ”I have no intention of being merely a regional spoiler.”
Mr. Nader added: ”If you're going to screw up an election, screw it up big-time. My supporters expect nothing less from me.”
But across the country, significant numbers of crackpots who have supported Mr. Nader in the past appeared to be cool to his latest bid to wreck the 2004 election.
”If I'm going to waste my vote, I want to be sure I'm wasting it on the right banana-head,” said longtime crackpot Harlan Brill, who supported Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio) in this week's Delaware primary. ”It is time for Ralph Nader to step aside for a new generation of goofb.a.l.l.s.”
For his part, Mr. Nader said that he would ”listen to the voices of crackpots everywhere” before making a final decision to screw up the 2004 race.
If he decides not to run, Mr. Nader said, he will actively seek out people who are in the middle of The Da Vinci Code and wreck the ending for them.
”It won't be as satisfying as spoiling an entire election, but I think it will still be rewarding on some level,” Mr. Nader said.
Many prominent crackpots want Ralph Nader (above) to step aside for a new generation of egomaniacal goofb.a.l.l.s.
EXPERTS GIVE THUMBS-UP TO FIRST-COUSIN MARRIAGES; HILLBILLIES, BRITISH ROYAL FAMILY JUBILANT.
State of Kentucky Declares Official Day of Celebration One day after experts announced that marriages between first cousins were significantly less risky than had previously been thought, jubilant cousin-fanciers praised the findings as a major step forward for inbreeders everywhere.
Reaction to the news was especially joyous in the state of Kentucky, which will celebrate the findings with an official state holiday, tentatively called Kissin' Cousins Day.
Elsewhere, exuberant hillbillies relished what many of them saw as a vindication of their inbreeding lifestyle.
”I'm just relieved that I won't have to lie about meeting my wife in high school anymore,” said Dirk Wesson of Slug Hollow, West Virginia.
Amid the general euphoria, however, there was some carping in the hillbilly community that it took scientists so long to jump on the inbreeding bandwagon.
”We were ahead of the curve on this one,” said Clem McGillicutty, a noted hillbilly and prominent inbreeding advocate. ”Wonder how long it'll take those so-called 'experts' to recognize the health benefits of grain alcohol?”
Prince Charles (pictured) reacts to the news that first-cousin marriages carry few genetic risks.
On the other side of the Atlantic, a spokesman for the British royal family said that the Windsors were ”pinching themselves” about the inbreeding developments.
”It's jolly good news,” said Charles, the Prince of Wales. ”It certainly opens up a fellow's options a bit, dating-wise.”
Prince Charles has long been linked with British aristocrat Camilla Parker Bowles, but the new, bullish findings about inbreeding seemed to put a question mark over that relations.h.i.+p.
”All bets are off now,” said Prince Charles. ”I feel like a chap in a candy store.”
SEGWAY CREATOR INVENTS ”ROUND THINGY”
Amazing New Invention Shrouded in Secrecy Inventor Dean Kamen, who just six months ago created the Segway-a scooter unlike any scooter the world had ever seen-has done it again, this time inventing a ”round thingy” that will revolutionize transportation.
Sources close to Kamen say that the round thingy-so shrouded in secrecy that it is referred to in its patent filing only as ”the round thingy”-could be attached by means of an axle to other round thingies for use on cars, buses, trucks and other vehicles.
”When people see Dean's round thingy in action, it is absolutely going to rock their world,” one a.s.sociate of Mr. Kamen said.
Critics of Mr. Kamen, however, were more skeptical of the Kamen camp's claims for its amazing new round thingy.
”Dean Kamen isn't the only person in the world who's been trying to develop a round thingy,” said Dr. Louis Peverall of the Ma.s.sachusetts Inst.i.tute of Technology. ”The question is whether his round thingy will succeed where so many other round thingies have failed.”
Mr. Kamen, unfazed by the critics, is poised to unveil a series of other groundbreaking inventions in addition to his astonis.h.i.+ng round thingy.
His new inventions include a writing implement fabricated from a sharpened piece of graphite encased in wood; an amazing lighting device that consists of an electrified filament contained in an airtight gla.s.s bulb; and a hand-held, gear-driven kitchen tool for the ”beating” of eggs.
Segway creator Dean Kamen has been evasive on the subject of his latest invention, which he calls a ”round thingy.”
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