Monday, October 13, 2008

A Special Announcement From Our Candidates



JOE: We interrupt this post to go live to Washington, D.C. for a special joint announcement from presidential candidates John McCain and Barack Obama...

(John McCain and Barack Obama appear side-by-side behind a podium on the steps of the capital building.)

JOHN: Greetings, my friends...

BARACK: What's up, America?

JOHN: Senator Obama and I come before you today in a display if bi-partisanship...

BARACK: John and I have spent the weekend in long talks about the state of our country...

JOHN: Our economy is in the crapper, my friends...

BARACK: Unemployment is at an all-time high...

JOHN: Our national debt is trillions of dollars and it keeps growing...

BARACK: Congress has been scrambling to turn things around and the best we can do is tell you not to panic...

JOHN: All the while crapping our own pants.

BARACK: The war in Iraq is out of control...

JOHN: Let's not go there. Let's just leave it at, we're at war.

BARACK: In two countries...

JOHN: And Iran's bucking for an ass-whoopin'.

BARACK: Global warming is an urgent threat that needs to be dealt with now.

JOHN: Dealing with healthcare is like trying to untangle billions of dollars from a ball of barbed wire...

BARACK: The number of illegal aliens coming in to our country is down...

JOHN: And we can't blame them. America just isn't all that pretty right now.

BARACK: With the country is such a downward spiral at the moment, whomever our next president is, will have his hand full.

JOHN: It will be a thankless job. Tough decisions will have to be made.

BARACK: We'll have to tighten our belts. Things will get worse before they get better.

JOHN: And in the process of getting worse, people will undoubtedly blame the new president for all their woes.

BARACK: Doesn't matter that we didn't cause the mess. One of us will be taking over the driver's seat on a bus that has already gone off a cliff.

JOHN:..or piloting a plane that's already been shot down. The next president will be treated like a Viet Cong's POW bitch for four years. No sleep, no rest, constant torturing from our national and international problems. Harassment from the middle class and opposition parties. No one will be happy.

BARACK: Basically, the next president is in for a Jimmy Carter of a time.

JOHN: Four years of trying to do the right thing while constantly being punched in the nut sack of democracy over and over and over...

BARACK: But we do think the next president, the one after the next one, will have a much better chance at being effective in office.

JOHN: It is with that in mind, my friends, that we regretfully announce that neither of us will continue our bid for president.

BARACK: We are both suspending our campaigns. And what does "suspending a campaign" mean, John.

JOHN (sheepishly): You actually stop campaigning and don't show up a dozen different places to tell people you are suspending your campaign.

BARACK: John and I are here to whole heartedly throw our support to the leading third party candidate. Ladies and gentlemen, your next president, Ralph Nader.

(Ralph Nader enters. John and Barack greet him smiles and pats on the back. Nader approaches the podium.)

NADER: Aw, crap.

CHEDDAR MOON


Another sold out show at Donny's last Saturday. The cast rocked. After opening night, most everyone went out to Old Town Ale House. There was a line to get in, so we went to McGinny's. Apparently, what we missed, was a lot of talk about Cheddar Moon and how much everyone enjoyed it. One of the actresses in another piece told me, with a slight edge, "Yah. My mother said it was her favorite."

The biggest and best surprise Saturday came when I found out after the show that Kate Powers was in the audience. Kate and I used to worked together at Jellyvision and she is a founding member of Teatro Bastardo (now Robot vs Dinosaur). Kate's one of those people who is abundantly talented, always the smartest person in the room, but also very humble and damn funny. I haven't seen her in years and always respect her opinion. She dug the show, which was great to hear.


THE BS NEWS QUIZ OF THE DAY

On Friday, I asked...

"The National Debt Clock in NYC has also been affected by the economy because it what?"


5% said "was sold to a foreign investor"
- No. But it was made in China.

5% said "was moved to make room for a billboard"
- Better to sell some Calvin Klein underwear than be reminded we've soiled our Fruit of the Looms.

No one said "was turned off to save energy"

90% got it right with "ran out of digits"

According to The Associated Press, the digital counter has been moving so much that it recently ran out of digits to display the ballooning figure: $10,150,603,734,720, or roughly $10.2 trillion, as of Saturday afternoon.

The clock was put up by the late real estate mogul Seymour Durst in 1989 when the U.S. government's debt was a mere $2.7 trillion, and was even turned off during the 1990s when the debt decreased.

It will be replaced in 2009 with a new clock, said Jordan Barowitz, a spokesman for the Durst Organization. The new clock will be able to track debt up to a quadrillion dollars, which is a '1' followed by 15 zeros.

China had a similar issue. In Hong Kong, they have a Surplus Abacus and ran out of beads.