WEAR BLACK, BRING FLOWERS

Etiquette expert Elizabeth Post died on Saturday. She was 89.

She was the granddaughter-in-law of the legendary Emily Post, but Elizabeth was an expert in her own right. Besides revising Emily's book five times, she wrote several books of her own and had a Good Housekeeping column for 35 years.

Condolences can be sent to the Emily Post Institute in Burlington, Vermont. Notes should be hand-written; pre-printed condolence cards are never acceptable.

IS GOD ON YOUR BUMPER?

A recent poll reveals most Oklahomans believe in God.

But only 61 of them want to say so on their license plate.

State law says at least 100 have to order the new "In God We Trust" specialty plates for them to go into production.

So Tulsan Gus Oliver bought 40 of the plates. He has only two vehicles. But he has ensured that God will be trusted on back bumpers across Oklahoma.

QUOTATIONS FROM THE CELEBRITY FRINGE

"My motivation is gone, because [Obama] will punish me if I'm successful. That's how you start communism, is just take -- Cuba. Obama wants to be Castro."

-- Victoria Jackson, formerly of Saturday Night Live.


"The American People are witnessing the greatest lie that is cleverly orchestrated by President Obama and his whole administration. President Obama feeds people poison, giving them the idea that they are entitled to take from the wealthier who have lived and worked in a democracy that understands that capitalism is the only truth that keeps a nation healthy ... [Obama uses] a socialistic, Marxist teaching, and with it, he rapes this nation..."

-- John Voight, actor.


"Homey made this bed, now he has got to lay in it. Barack Obama is the greatest gangster to ever come out of Chicago. He's a cultural terrorist."

-- Stephen Baldwin, actor.


"Seventy-five-thousand people at an outdoor sports palace, well, that's something the Fuehrer would have done."

-- Ben Stein on Barack Obama.


"Obama--he's a piece of shit and I told him to suck on my machine gun."

-- Ted Nugent, singer.


"Mr. President, as more and more people realize that you are refusing to release your original birth certificate, further questions will fuel the fires of debate or at least hinder the embers from ever being snuffed out. Questions such as, 'Does it really contain the Hawaiian physician's name?' 'Does it disclose something other than his birthplace that he wishes others not to see?'"

-- Chuck Norris, actor.


(The Huffington Post)

I FEEL THE EARTH MOVE, PART TWO

Now that a Muslim cleric has settled the issue of what causes earthquakes (promiscuous women), it's time to look at what caused the Icelandic volcano.

It's the gays and the pagans.

The Association of Orthodox Experts, a Russian Christian group, says the eruption is a manifestation of God's anger.

The group issued a statement saying, “Is not Europe increasingly departing from its Christian heritage? Does it not see that the eruption of the Icelandic volcano, and the appearance of its paralysing ash clouds, is a stern warning from God against their ‘advanced’ society?”

Iceland "has recently become a center of European neo-paganism of Aryan occult kind, which has Nazi character"

(The Association of European Traditional Religions, which is uniting with the World Pagan Association and the International Pagan Alliance, has its headquarters in Iceland.)

“A sizable number of members of the European Parliament proposed that all states represented on the Council of Europe should have mandatory classes in schools to teach about the sexual behaviour of homosexuals. Has formerly-Christian Europe forgotten the Scriptures, and, accordingly, the fate of Sodom and Gomorrah?”

At least they're not blaming it on the Jews.

WHAT WOULD MUHAMMAD EAT?

"Darwinist faggots who are as despicable as the rest, walking around eating your Trisciuts."

-- Younus Abdullah Mohammed, of the group Revolution Muslim, describing Americans.


"I don't think we have any comment on that. Triscuits are a very popular cracker. We have a broad variety of people who love them these days. Everyone loves Triscuits, and we hope that everyone enjoys them."

-- Basil Maglaris, a spokesperson for Kraft Foods, the company that makes Triscuits

QUOTATIONS FROM THE LUNATIC FRINGE

"What gives the Commerce Department the right to ask me how often I flush my toilet? Or about going to work? I'm not filling out this form. I dare them to try and come throw me in jail. I dare them to. Pull out my wife's shotgun and see how that little ACS twerp likes being scared at the door."

-- CNN's Erick Erickson. (Note: There are no questions concerning toilets, or flushing, on the 2010 census form.)


"Those crazies in Montana who say, 'We're going to kill ATF agents because the U.N.'s going to take over' -- well, they're beginning to have a case."

-- Dick Morris on Fox.

"I guess that would mean if you really had affection for your horse, I guess you could marry your horse."

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-- Former Congressman and current Senate candidate J. D. Hayworth on gay marriage.

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"The drivers of cars with illegals in it are intentionally causing accidents on the freeway."

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-- U.S. Senator John McCain.

QUOTATIONS OF THE DAY

"A 'movement' that encompasses gun nuts, tax protesters, devotees of the gold standard, Sarah Palin, insurance company lobbyists, 'constitutionalists' who have not read the Constitution, Medicare recipients who oppose government-run health-care, crazy 'birthers' who claim President Obama was born in another country, a contingent of outright racists (come on, people, let's be real) and a bunch of fat-cat professional politicians pretending to be 'outsiders' is not a coherent intellectual or political force."

-- Eugene Robinson, syndicated columnist, on the tea party movement.


"I've been trying to understand the Tea Party Movement. Sounds like a lot of angry people who want to get the government out of their lives and cut both taxes and the deficit. There's nothing wrong with that -- although one does wonder where they were during the Bush years."

-- Thomas L. Friedman, New York Times columnist.

I FEEL THE EARTH MOVE

Iran is one of the most earthquake prone countries in the world. So what's causing all these quakes?

Bad women.

Senior Muslim cleric Hojatoles Kazem Sedighi, Tehran's prayer leader, says "Many women who do not dress modestly lead young men astray, corrupt their chastity and spread adultery in society, which increases earthquakes."

At last, a solid scientific explanation.

Hey, would you check out the tectonic plates on that babe!

ARMED WHILE DRIVING

South Carolina is working on a law to allow drivers to keep a handgun under the car seat. The state already allows a gun in the glove box, console and trunk. But hey, you can never be too well armed while driving.

A HORSE OF COURSE

The carriage horses in New York's Central Park get more vacation time than I do.

By law, each horse must now get four weeks off a year. But I don't begrudge the horses their time off. Hell, we could all use more vacation. At least I don't have to work in the rain and shit in the street.

NO BAGGGAGE HERE

More and more airlines are charging extra to check baggage. Now at least one airline -- Spirit Airlines -- plans to charge extra for a carry-on bag. The fee:$45.

The best solution I can see it to fly naked. That way when you get where you're going you won't have to change clothes.

REVENGE OF THE SQUIRREL

An Oklahoma teen swerved his car to try to run over a squirrel that was trying to cross the highway in front of him.

He lost control, rolled the car, and was ejected and thrown 18 feet down the road. His injuries are serious.

The squirrel survived. Justice prevails.

QUOTATIONS FROM THE LUNATIC FRINGE

Voices from the tea party --

"I am the number one target for more than one more extremest group to defeat this November. We need to have your help for candidates like me. We need to you to take out some of these bad guys."

-- Republican Representative Michelle Bachman of Minnesota speaking to the tax day tea party at Freedom Plaza in Washington, D.C.

To what "extremest group" is she referring? Who are "these bad guys?" And what does she mean by "take out?"

"I'm a little apprehensive because of the left-wing nut jobs out there."

-- Ohio Valley Freedom Fighters Militia Colonel Kevin Terrell, leading a patrol of camo-suited thugs around Freedom Plaza in search of "liberal infiltrators."

QUOTATION OF THE DAY

"Is this what their 'change' is all about? I want to tell them, nah, we'll keep clinging to our Constitution and our guns and religion – and you can keep the change."

-- Former Alaska governor and 2008 Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin at today's Tea Party rally in Boston.

OK, the Constitution I get. Religion I get. But what's with the guns? And why is she clinging to them? Is someone trying to steal them? And what's she want to do with them? Shoot herself? Someone else? What's the deal?

BE AFRAID

This story reminds me of Iraq, where no self-respecting government ministry is without its own private army.

Now, the Oklahoma Legislature is thinking of setting up its own armed militia.

Republican State Senator Randy Brogdon of Owasso says a state militia is authorized under the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

He says the founding fathers "were not referring to a turkey shoot or a quail hunt. They really weren't even talking about us having the ability to protect ourselves against each other. The Second Amendment deals directly with the right of an individual to keep and bear arms to protect themselves from an overreaching federal government."

Brogdon, who later claimed he never used the word "militia," told the Associated Press (on tape), "Is a state militia a good idea? It probably is. Because it, again, it would just reinforce the attitude and the belief that you and I have the right to keep and bear arms and to provide and protect our families from an overreaching federal government. I think it's a great idea."

Brogdon is also running for governor. He says, "The primary job of the governor is to protect the state ... from the encroachment of the federal government."

Republican State Representative Charles Key of Oklahoma City is all for the idea. He says the legislation could be introduced next year.

Key has claimed in the past that the federal government had prior knowledge of the blowing-up of the Murrah building in Oklahoma City in 1991 as well as the World Trade Center in New York City in 1993, and in fact may have actually participated in the bombings.

Tea party leader Al Gerhart, who heads up the Oklahoma Constitutional Alliance, is a big force behind the Oklahoma Militia. He says, "Is it scary? You bet it is. But when do the states stop rolling over for the federal government?"

The last time an Oklahoman took armed military action against the federal government, it brought down a federal building and killed 168 Oklahomans.

Is it scary? You bet it is.

NO APRIL FOOL

Congressman Johnson ruined April Fool's Day for me.

It used to be my favorite day. Really, it's the ideal celebration for a secular humorist.

But what to do this year? Exploding dinner plates? Done that. Plastic cockroaches? Done that. Soliciting community volunteers to participate in a federal study by storing toxic waste in their basements? Done that. (On the air. Got in trouble for it, too.)

So I looked at this year's batch of April Fool's gags for inspiration. Google changing its name to Topeka? Boring. National Public Radio is promoting the sale of a 20 CD collection of their best corporate sponsorship announcements. I thought that was pretty funny.

Then there was Georgia Democratic Representative Hank Johnson, at a House Armed Services Committee meeting. He was questioning Admiral Robert Willard, head of the U.S. Pacific fleet. The Navy is planning to station thousands of additional U.S. Marines and their families on the Pacific island of Guam, an American territory.

After ponderously verifying that the island is some 20 miles long and only seven miles wide, the Congressman asked -- with a completely straight and as serious a tone as you can imagine --the killer question:

(Really, you've got to see this on You Tube. It's just not as funny in print.)

Representative Hank Johnson: "My, my fear is that ah, the whole island will become so overly populated that it would tip over, and ah, capsize."

And the admiral, to his credit, answered with a completely straight face: "We don’t anticipate that."

But the kicker is, THIS WAS NO APRIL FOOL'S JOKE! Although I just stumbled on this story today, the hearing was held last Friday.

So that's it. No April Fools pranks this year for me. I am completely demoralised. I give up, and defer to reality.