January 17, 2000 -

RECRIMINATING REAR-GUARDERY:

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Algore wants a gay-friendly military; there's foreign AIDS; Arkansas misses the First Hillbillies; and there's George the Killer.

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Those stories, and more. Now, the details...

SAN FRANCISCO -- Gay militarists are giddy over Algore's pledge to have a gay-friendly Joint Chiefs of Staff which will support homosexuals openly serving in the Armed Forces. "We believe the Vice President, when elected, will change `Don't Ask, Don't Tell' to `Kiss Me and I'll Tell you'," said Sycamore Swish, who believes he will be appointed chairman of the Joint Chiefs. Swish said his first priority as head of the military services will be the formation of the 1st Interior Decorating Division. "If America's enemies threaten, we will strike quickly to redecorate offenders in something really awful and ghastly and really, well, dreadful," Swish said, fingering a K-Mart circular threateningly.

NEW YORK -- Algore said he and the First Bacillus plan to spend $100 million to combat foreign AIDS, especially in sub-Saharan Africa. "I have always been against foreign AIDS. My Tennessee values, inculcated in a Washington hotel suite, have always led me to believe deeply that foreigners have no right to our AIDS and the Clinton/Gore administration is willing to spend what it takes to prove that," Algore alluded. Algore said he believes the Lord aids those who AIDS themselves.

LITTLE ROCK, Arkansas -- Seeking to nail down the title of Dimwit State of the New Millennium, Arkansans widely object to losing the First Fondler and Second Shredder to New York. "We want them to come back to Arkansas," said Knott Hedde, a longtime Clinton supporter. Hedde said Bill Clinton's hometown of Hope will be nothing once Clinton moves to New York. "Everyone talks about the Dope from Hope," Hedde said, "and it just isn't fair that Bill will leave us to become the Chappaqua Canoodler." Clinton tried to ease the pain. "The President probably will return to Arkansas occasionally to rape a campaign volunteer or participate in a shady land deal or two," a spokesthing said.

The Clintons said people from Arkansas will continue to play a big role in their lives. "We plan to bring an Arkansas consultant to Chappaqua for advice before we decide which porch at our mansion should host the washing machine," Mrs. Clinton said.

AUSTIN, Texas -- Need one reason to think kindly of George W. Bush? Well, how about 112 of them? In his first five years as governor of Texas, Bush presided over the executions of 111 men and one woman, the most of any governor since the Supreme Court's 1976 ruling allowed reinstatement of the death penalty.

NEW YORK -- Only one day after pimping for a pre-prepared Hillary Clinton on his late night talk show, host David Letterman had emergency heart-bypass surgery. Letterman proved he has a bleeding heart by hosting a totally scripted appearance with Mrs. Clinton in which she was given both the questions and answers to a supposed "pop quiz" to demonstrate her knowledge of New York State. Letterman's physicians said the heart surgery was a complete success and added that a precautionary brain scan showed nothing.

WASHINGTON -- The influenza epidemic has put the White House medical team on red alert. "You have no idea how tough it gets around here when the interns can't inhale," said Oral Saxxe, chief of Intern Scheduling for the Oral Office. In New York, Algore said respiratory problems among interns amounted to a threat to national security.

WASHINGTON -- The evil Supreme Court ruled that people who run like hell just because they see a police officer can legally be subjected to a stop-and-frisk search. "This is a deadly threat to physical fitness in many inner-city neighborhoods," said the Rev. Al Sharpton. Sharpton said racism is at the heart of the decision. "Often the only exercise people get is when they are reminded to perform their running and alley gymnastics by seeing The Man," Sharpton said.

NEW YORK -- The SCREAMER headline on the National Enquirer was about George W. Bush being "Smeared in Adultery Scandal." True to its journalistic ethics, the Enquirer reported the entire story of Bush's supposed tryst with a former Playboy bimbo, then added late on Page 2 that nothing about it was true at all. Gilda Radner, where are you?

LOS ANGELES -- Barbra Streisand lost a court attempt to have a photographer declared a stalker. BS sources said the millionaire airhead wanted a court order instructing the slutterbug to maintain a minimum distance of 100 yards from her nose and 75 yards from her body.

CHICAGO -- Some headlines are so stupid as to defy comment. This one, atop a UPI story about House Speaker Dennis Hastert, is among those: "Hastert calls for global world"

QUESTION FOR THE DAY: Given his continuing problems with telling the truth, would it be fair to characterize Algore as Bill Clinton without a sex drive?

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