Man Has Mixed Feelings About $39 Flight

[MetroSheriff]

read "distance" as "distant"

It don't matter, hillbillies don't read too good, no how...

 

[FL000]

I was banned from flying into Tennessee because they accused me of trying to smuggle in a load of books. However, the ban was lifted and I was never prosecuted because they weren't able to find anyone who could prove that they were, in fact, books.

GO DAWGS!!!

 

[PassingThru]

Down in Tennessee

There's a saying down there in Tennessee in the Business world.

"We lose a little on every deal.....but we make it up in volumn."


--

 

[MetroSheriff]

I was banned from flying into Tennessee because they accused me of trying to smuggle in a load of books. However, the ban was lifted and I was never prosecuted because they weren't able to find anyone who could prove that they were, in fact, books.

GO DAWGS!!!

Good one!!!

 

[I.P. Freley]

"Yankee rag"??

Errrrrrrr... Yes, they are based in NYC. What y'all don't realize, I guess, is that for the majority of their existence they haven't been in NY. They were originally based, as I recall, in some college town in the midwest. Madison, Wisconsin, perhaps? Sounds right.

For those who took this article seriously... You might want to go look at the site to get a better idea of their brand of sarcasm and satire. I also heartily recommend the book "Our Dumb Century", which is simply one of the funniest things I have ever read.

 

[MSNFlier]

The Onion...

www.theonion.com

IMHO, an extraordinarily unique and fun satirical newsweekly. It started on the University of Wisconsin campus in about 1986 and was based here as they expanded to Milwaukee, Denver and then finally NYC. They moved their headquarters from Madison about a year or so ago to NYC and I think they have lost a bit of their "outsider" satirical bent. Still, I do look forward to seeing what they're up to and what the headlines are every week during the academic year and bi-weekly during the summer.

Their issue released about a week or so after the September 11 attacks was an absolute classic. Dark humor, but with a certain bent to it that allowed one to laugh for the first time since the attacks happened. In fact, there were a few news articles run in the Madison area around the time discussing how The Onion might deal with the issue. The headlining article is located at:

http://www.theonion.com/onion3734/hijackers_surprised.html

The Onion throws little things in articles like the "location byline (where the story originates)" and other quirky things which their more dedicated readers look for because it's always interesting, usually very clever, and thus funny.

Apparently, a Chinese newspaper picked up this article and ran it as a "true" story, not realizing that The Onion was a satirical paper. In the article, Congress threatens to leave the Capitol because it is "obsolete and inadequate" and relocate to either Memphis or Charlotte!!!!!!

http://www.theonion.com/onion3820/congress_threatens.html

The Onion is one of the top ten most visited sites on the web on a weekly basis. Maybe one should consider bookmarking it and having some great laughs!!!

Here's the headline and story from this week's Onion

REPORT: AL-QAEDA ALLEGEDLY ENGAGING IN TELEMARKETING

WASHINGTON, DC—In a chilling development, the CIA announced Monday that it has acquired a videotape showing suspected al-Qaeda operatives engaging in what appears to be telemarketing.

"This video, obtained from a credible third-party source, features grainy footage of a group of men strongly believed to be al-Qaeda members making phone solicitations for vacation-home rentals, long-distance phone service, magazine subscriptions, and a vast array of other products and services," CIA Director George Tenet said at a press conference. "Many of these calls have occurred, unthinkably, during the dinner hour."

Added Tenet: "We had known about al-Qaeda's practice of raising money through drug trafficking and money laundering, but it seems the full scope of their depravity had barely been imagined."

The video is not the only evidence of telemarketing activity within al-Qaeda. According to Tenet, CIA agents tracking the terrorist organization over the past 12 months made steady progress infiltrating its communications network, eventually gaining access to transmissions to and from al-Qaeda operatives. These transmissions included a number of telemarketing "cold calls" to randomly chosen U.S. citizens.

Last December, during a sweep of caves near the Afghan-Pakistani border, Maj. Gen. Dan K. McNeill, leader of U.S. forces in Afghanistan, unearthed further evidence corroborating the phone-solicitation theory. Inside one cave, McNeill and his troops found a bank of empty cubicles with individual phone lines, a bullhorn, and 10 desktop bells, commonly rung in the event of a "sale."

"I couldn't believe what I saw," said McNeill, who also discovered bomb-making instructions and detailed maps of U.S. landmarks in the cave. "On top of all the destruction these people had already unleashed, plans were underway to harass the American people with a merciless assault of offers for everything from discounts on home DSL lines to pre-approved, low-interest credit cards."

For all the evidence collected by the CIA, the "smoking gun" in the investigation may turn out to be an alleged Osama bin Laden motivational videotape, currently in the possession of CNN. The controversial tape, which has never aired on the cable network, is rumored to feature bin Laden urging his followers to think positive and believe in the quality of the product they are pitching, closing on the grim slogan "Smile And Dial."

Among the victims of al-Qaeda's telemarketing efforts is Coral Gables, FL, retiree Bernice Parks, who last Friday spent nearly 45 minutes trying to say no to a pushy aluminum-siding salesman who identified himself only as "Mohammed," only to give in and order full siding for her home. It is believed that the $3,000 charged to Parks' credit card—an amount she thought to be "a rock-bottom value, especially compared to what big companies like Sears charge"—was funneled through al-Qaeda's extensive siding cartel.

Nearly all of the $3,000 became al-Qaeda profit after what Parks described as "worn, faded siding that seemed to have been removed from another house" was hastily installed by three Middle-Eastern-looking men in an unmarked van.

"These evil people are preying on bored receptionists, gullible housewives, and defenseless seniors like me," Parks said. "At home, at work... they simply do not care."

In spite of the mounting evidence, al-Qaeda leaders detained in Guantanamo Bay continue to deny that their group is involved in any over-the-phone solicitation.

"Al-Qaeda is willing to do many things to achieve its goals," said Tariq al-Salaam from his holding cell. "Disrupting people with intrusive, unwanted phone calls is not one of them."

Jerry Wiener, a Metairie, LA, 75-year-old who was recently scammed into buying a $4,200-a-month timeshare condominium in "Yumabad, Arizona," urged the U.S. to take action.

"If it was up to me, every last one of those animals would be drawn and quartered in the public square," Wiener said. "I thought these al-Qaeda guys were pretty bad before. But making pushy, aggressive sales pitches to random, innocent strangers who just want to eat their supper in peace? That's about as low as it gets."

 

[rightrudder]

I like this one:

WASHINGTON, DC—Vowing to "exact justice for the taking of innocent American lives," a determined and defiant President Bush deployed more than 14,000 ground troops to the West Nile Monday.


Above: Bush outlines the details of Operation Deep Desert Off! to reporters.
"My fellow Americans, an enemy from overseas has attacked us in our own land, waging biological warfare against us on our home soil," Bush said in a nationally televised speech from the Oval Office. "We must send a strong message to our enemies in the West Nile region that this virulent aggression against America will not go unpunished; it will not stand."

Bush's decision to deploy troops came on the heels of three more West Nile virus deaths over the weekend—one in Louisiana and two in Illinois—bringing the national death toll to 51.

"These cowards want to bring down our very way of life," Bush said. "They have sought to rob us of our ability to leave the house without repellent. But what they did not count on is the tremendous spirit and resolve of the American people. No one, be they man or mosquito, will dictate what we put or don't put on our skin for protection."

Armed with anti-mosquito munitions, American Special Forces made landfall at Damietta near the mouth of the Nile early Tuesday, and by dawn had erected U.S. Army netting over the city. Bush promised that the netting, expected to extend all the way to Khartoum by the end of the week, will eventually stretch nearly 1,000 miles to the Nile's source and "as far to the west as necessary."


"The United States will not stand idly by while people or insects who despise everything we stand for develop weapons of mass infection," Bush said. "The only way to fight a pestilence such as this is to attack it right where it breeds—in this case, the lands to the west of the Nile River."

Though not made public until Monday, Operation Deep Desert Off! began at approximately 3 p.m. EST Sunday when Air Force F-15 aircraft armed with mosquito-seeking Sidewinder missiles flew in support of F-18s deploying military-grade citronella napalm. By nightfall, special DEET-dispensing flamethrower tanks of the First Armored Infantry were scouting out possible base camps 100 miles west of the Nile.

Though details of the plan remain classified, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said the ultimate goal of Operation Deep Desert Off! is to "eradicate the deadly, virulent strain of anti-Americanism that has spread from the West Nile to our own shores."

"We have 14,000 fully armed and equipped American troops in the region right now who are prepared to take the fight to this foreign threat," Rumsfeld said. "I must stress that it will not be easy, as the war we wage is not against a traditional enemy. This enemy operates in secrecy, striking when and where we least expect. It is an enemy without borders. But I am nevertheless confident that the evildoers responsible for killing those 51 Americans and infecting hundreds more can be defeated by Christmas."


Above: U.S. soldiers board a troop-transport boat near the West Nile city of Alexandria.
Response to Bush's troop deployment has been mixed.

"This ridiculous show of force is patently not the way to fight the West Nile virus," said Dr. Arnold Bloch of the Centers For Disease Control. "Foreign military action will do nothing to halt the spread of this disease and does not help those currently infected with West Nile. Besides, Bush should have deployed those anti-mosquito jet fighters along the eastern seaboard and garrisoned the Mississippi River area last year, when there was still a chance to contain the disease's domestic spread."

"Only two years ago, Bush said he would try to control his retaliatory impulses," Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle (D-SD) said. "But in the past six months, he's invaded the West Nile, petitioned Congress for economic sanctions against Japan for the crop devastation wrought by the Japanese beetle, and threatened China with nuclear attack if its snakehead invasion was not halted. If he continues this hardline military stance on all overseas natural threats, he will badly damage his chances of ever solving future crises peacefully."

Undeterred, Bush maintains that the time to strike is now.

"We will hunt down and capture those who bring sickness and death to our shores," said Bush during a visit to the St. Louis home of Robyn Crist, 35, whose husband Dan was one of the first West Nile casualties. "Nothing can deter us from bringing down these bloodsucking anti-American parasites."

 

[FL000]

Their weekly "what do you think?" series is probably the funniest single recurring feature on the internet...besides the RJDC updates.

 

[Ty Webb]

This is too funny. I have a subscription to the Onion, and have been leaving my old issues laying around in our crew room and airplanes for quite a while. . . . with the address labels removed, of course.

After all, we wouldn't want to piss off the Talibaptists . . . . .

 

[SaabStory]

If you've never read the Onion..go do it!!

Two of my all time favorite headlines:
1) "This just in....All persons employed in the Pizza Industry, from production, delivery, to consumption: High".
2.) Exclusive....Stoner Architect designs "All Foyer House"

funny stuff