2008: The Year in Stupidity
POLITICS
White House? You Mean That Place on Maple and Elm?
Do you remember what happened November 4, 2008? Took out the trash. Walked the dog. Voted for the 44th president of the United States. That last one was pretty big news to a lot of people, but not to the publisher of the Sapulpa (Oklahoma) Daily Herald. His paper made no mention of the election in its November 5 edition, other than to note that John McCain won the county. His rationale? The paper is focused on local news, he said.
Of his readers and the elections? “I’m sure they watched it on TV.”
Obama Leads Bin Laden in Brazil
How do you give yourself a leg up in Brazilian politics? Change your name to Barack Obama. Six candidates in Brazil’s local elections have done just that. But office seekers haven’t stopped at Obama. Two hundred have renamed themselves after Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, which just happens to be the name of the immensely popular president of Brazil. Other people looking for the public’s votes include a Bill Clinton, a Jorge Bushi, and one Chico Bin Laden.
What We Need Is a Cover-Up
The Max Planck Institute, a German scientific think tank, needed something visually striking to grace the cover of its special report on China. So it borrowed characters from a work of Chinese literature. The tome in question, it turns out, was a flyer for a Macau strip club advertising “young housewives having figures that will turn you on.”
Max Planck’s wasn’t the only publication suffering a cover malfunction. The July 21 edition of the New Hampshire Valley News featured a rare typo: It forgot how to spell its name. In large, bold letters, the masthead screamed “Valley News.”
The Sapulpa Daily Herald of Oklahoma made no mention of the election in its November 5th edition
THE NEWS
Gardner Caught!
Matthew Gardner was detained for questioning at Seattle’s Sea-Tac Airport by Transportation Security Administration (TSA) officers who recognized his name from the no-fly list. A little background: Matthew Gardner is five years old; the Matthew Gardner the TSA is looking for is considerably older. Young Gardner’s mother, Nadia, said that at one point, as she hugged him, an officer admonished her, “Ma’am, you cannot touch him. He has not been searched, and he is still considered a security risk.” Then Nadia was searched to make sure that Matthew had not passed her any contraband.
A Virtual Crime Spree
Maple Island was rocked by news that one of its citizens had been murdered by his estranged wife. The fact that Maple Island exists only online, as part of the virtual role-playing game MapleStory, doesn’t make the news any less shocking. When her virtual husband had their virtual marriage annulled, the devastated woman, who lives in Japan, used the password of the real-life man who controlled her online ex to kill off his online persona (got that?).
“I was suddenly divorced,” said the woman, who was arrested on suspicion of illegally accessing a computer and manipulating electronic data. “That made me so angry.”
Court: Toilet Had It Coming
SCRANTON—It’s official! You can now legally curse your overflowing toilet in this Pennsylvania city. The city paid a woman $19,000 to settle her claim after she was charged with disorderly conduct for yelling at the offending commode. Dawn Herb was facing up to 90 days in jail after her neighbor, an off-duty cop, heard her tirade through an open window. A local court ruled in Herb’s favor, finding that arguing with one’s bathroom fixture is constitutionally protected.
WORLD AT A GLANCE
Missing: One Scared Only Child
When a Cambodian couple got divorced, they split everything fifty-fifty: furniture, possessions, even the house, which the husband took a saw to and literally cut in half. Neighbors told China Daily that it was the most cost-efficient way for the couple to avoid each other.
Hospital Announces New Promotion to Attract Patients
A German woman got more than she bargained for when she checked into a hospital to have wrinkles removed from her body after losing 224 pounds. The 33-year-old woke up from surgery to find that doctors had put silicone implants into her breasts, enlarging them from a C cup to a D. The hospital says it was done to ensure proper blood circulation. Nevertheless, the woman wants them out.
Your Voice Is Divine
Nepal has a new “Living Goddess.” The six-year-old was chosen by the government after it was determined that she possessed the 32 characteristics necessary for the honor, including “eyelashes like a cow’s” and a “voice as soft and clear as a duck’s.”
Town Seeks New Sign Maker
Days after posting a bilingual traffic sign in Swansea, Wales, officials were alerted to a problem. The English half was fine, but the Welsh, which had been e-mailed to the translator and returned minutes later, read, when translated back into English, “I am not in the office. Send any work to be translated.”
Iran, Then I Ate
Had Iran only served an appetizer, it might now own the record for the world’s largest sandwich ever. The 1,500-meter-long hero was stuffed with chicken and ostrich meat. But before it was measured, people began thinking, Mmmm, ostrich … Soon the hungry crowd dug into the sandwich and gobbled up the evidence, leaving only crumbs to submit to Guinness World Records.
ARTS & LEISURE
Visit Exotic Toxicland!
Looking for an adventure holiday but find swimming with sharks so yesterday’s vacation? Then why not consider sunny Chernobyl? Twenty-two years after a nuclear reactor blew its top and rained radiation throughout the area, the region just outsidethe exclusion zone is a popular recreational destination. Rather than 12-headed bass, you’ll find grand lodges and great hunting. Visitors scoff at the high radiation levels found in local game. “It’s more contaminated in Kiev,” one angler told Canada’s Globe and Mail.
Art World Admits: It Really Doesn’t Matter
For nine years, the Tate Modern in London displayed two paintings by abstract artist Mark Rothko. Just howabstract they were became apparent when someone noticed the location of the signature on the back of the paintings and realized that they had been hung vertically instead of horizontally.
SPORTS
… And a Mitt to Be Named Later
The Calgary Vipers, a minor-league baseball team, offered to trade a pitcher to the Laredo Broncos for a power hitter. The deal was set until the Broncos hitter refused to go. No problem, said Calgary, we have other needs. And so Vipers pitcher John Odom was traded to Laredo for ten baseball bats.
Heterosexual Favored
The American Family Association believes that the word gay has been tainted. So for its website, onenewsnow.com, its software automatically changed the word to homosexual. That proved a little tricky during the Olympics whenever sprinter Tyson Gay was mentioned. An Associated Press article read this way on the OneNewsNow site: “Tyson Homosexual was a blur in blue …”
CITY DESK
Police Blotter
- After stealing surveillance cameras from a Garden Grove, California, business, Howard Shanholtzer ditched the white Mitsubishi pickup truck cops knew he drove and stole another vehicle. “Unfortunately for him,” said Detective Paul Danielson, “the car he stole was also a white Mitsubishi pickup truck.” Shanholtzer was quickly arrested.
- Police pulled over a Corpus Christi, Texas, man for failing to signal a turn. Cops became suspicious that something more was up when, they say, the driver blurted out, “It’s not my truck,” followed by, “If you find something, it’s not mine.” And, “If there is anything in that black bag, it’s not mine.” There was something in that black bag, say officers—crack cocaine. And no, they did not believe him.
- While searching for murder suspect Sterling F. Wolfname, cops in Billings, Montana, ran into someone at a shelter who matched his description. When they asked him if he was Wolfname, the man said he wasn’t. The officers concluded he was fibbing when they spotted this tattoo on his head: Wolfname.
- Fort Worth, Texas, police arrested Charles Ray Fuller for trying to cash a check made out for $360 billion. Fuller claimed his girlfriend’s mother gave him the money to start a record business. The woman denied being that dumb.
BUSINESS ROUNDUP
New Bailouts Coming
- To drum up business, a Roswell, New Mexico, car dealership hired a direct marketing firm to mail out 50,000 scratch-off tickets with one grand prize of $1,000. The dealership got the publicity it craved when a typo resulted in 50,000 $1,000-grand-prize winners instead.
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A German man put his luxurious 20-foot yacht up for sale on an online auction site, hoping to get at least $18,500 for it. He made one minor mistake: He forgot to set a minimum bid. In the end, the yacht was sold for $34.65.
3 bedroom house for sale:
New gas furnace, new wiring and new water heater won’t last long!Help wanted: Boiler operator. Previous clinical experience with gynecology patients required.
Found: Keys at the Diversion Dam rest stop with fob that says “Keys I Haven’t Lost Yet.”
