Did anyone get a load of the video that came out of Liberia last week of President Bush dancing with the locals during his Africa visit? W. was flat busting a move. A white bread move, true, but a move nonetheless. Kind of a cross between the Hully-Gully and the Funky Chicken. Crowd loved him. When he took off his coat they went wild. I don’t care what the man’s approval rating is, he’s still one of my faves.

Big recall of 143 million pounds of tainted California beef put a scare into a lot of meat eaters this past week, including your humble narrator. Fortunately about a third of the bad beef went to school lunch programs, so I think those of us who have already graduated or dropped out of school dodged a bullet on that one. But hey, all kidding aside, we really should be more vigilant in protecting our country’s most precious commodity. And, of course, by “our country’s most precious commodity” I mean “cheeseburgers.”

And I Quote: “For the first time in my adult life, I am proud of my country.” ~ Michelle Obama, who would have us accept her as our country’s first lady

And FYI ~ Michelle made that quote on more than one occasion, so the pundits should stop trying to spin it … she said what she said and I believe her. Although, I gotta say, if it came right down to it, I’d much rather have Michelle as a first lady than Bubba as a first laddie.

Last week, the New York Times, exhibiting everything that’s wrong with journalism today, ran an unsubstantiated, front-page story suggesting that John McCain had an affair with a Washington lobbyist. The story was an obvious and inept hatchet job designed to smear a man through lies and innuendo. My question to the NYT is, “Hey, who do you think you are? The Cleveland Daily Banner?”

Education Corner: The fava bean comes from the fava plant, which Wikipedia describes as “rigid and erect with stout stems.” Goes well with human brains and most body parts. You can understand why it is the bean of choice for cannibals and sexual deviants.

We interrupt this column to bring you the obligatory “Bashing Hillary” bit …

Say kids … ever wonder where the contribution dollars you give Hillary’s campaign are really going? Well, close to $100,000 of them went for party platters and food items as she geared up for the Iowa caucuses. No, I didn’t say a hundred bucks, check out the zeroes … I said a hundred thousand. Lessee … she dropped 25 grand at the Bellagio in Vegas and five grand at the Four Seasons. That’s understandable, I guess … you know, you got to tip the bellhops and all. Her top consultants got somewhere in the neighborhood of five million bucks in January alone. Hold it … did I say five mill in one month? My Lord, I did, didn’t I. Okay, $5 million to her top kicks. Mark Penn’s firm (Penn is her chief strategist and pollster) pulled in $3.8 million for fees and expenses in January; but all told, Penn’s firm has billed her for more than $10 million. Ad man Howard Wolfson pulled in close to $267,000 in January (his total bill is $730,000-plus). Mandy Grunwald’s firm (Grunwald is a longtime media strategist for Hillary and Bubba) has received $2.3 million in fees and expenses, and is still waiting for Hillary to cough up a balance of $240,000. There’s more, of course, but that’s where some of your hard-earned money went. Good thing your donations are tax-deductible, huh? Not sure yet how much of them millions ended up in Billary’s off-shore accounts, but who cares anyway … they’re the Clintons and we love ‘em, am I right?

I’ll answer that question: No, we don’t. Not even the libs love them anymore. Clinton fatigue is epidemic. One thing you gotta say for Hillary, though … chiding and shrieking one moment, weepy and conciliatory the next. She wants change? I think she’s going through the change. Bubba, take your wife … please

We now return you to our regularly scheduled column, still in progress …

… So the guy goes, “No, you idiot ~ I said ping pong balls!” Hahahahahahah. Yeah, that one always makes me laugh. Little blue, I guess, but s’funny stuff. I like that edgy humor.

Let me ask you … is your pet suicidal? If so, how do you know? Did you find your cat sitting behind the wheel of your car with all the windows rolled up sucking on a hose that’s attached to the exhaust pipe? Did your hamster scarf down an entire bottle of sleeping pills? Did your parakeet try to throw itself in front of an 18-wheeler? More and more, doctors are prescribing anti-depressants, including Prozac, to pets. And by “doctors,” I mean “veterinarians.” Last year, even giant drug pusher … er, I mean … pharmaceutical giant Eli Lilly introduced a chewable anti-depressants for dogs. Some of these drugs even come in “beef flavor.” I have to say … I tried some of those and they don’t taste like beef at all … they taste like cardboard (‘course, there’s nothing wrong with cardboard … everything on CiCi’s menu is made from it). Another government-sanctioned drug pusher … uh, there I go again … I mean, another pharmaceutical giant, Pfizer, has taken it to the next level and come up with a “diet” drug for dogs. I’ve tried that, too, and I must say, I can see a real difference in my thighs. Next up ~ botox for dogs who aren’t getting enough toxins in their Alpo.

And on the human front, U.S. law professor Lawrence Gostin told the international Oxford Health Alliance Summit that obesity is a greater threat to the world today than terrorism. He said world governments were placing too much emphasis on fighting terrorism and not enough on healthy diets. That may be true, but I gotta tell you … those weren’t fat people that knocked down the Trade Towers and it ain’t fat people blowing up in the middle of crowded streets over in Israel and Iraq. Until I see with my own eyes some fat guy exploding from eating too many chicken wings and wiping out an entire city block, I think we should just keep letting China sew our clothes in larger and larger sizes.

Speaking of which … I’m about ready for another cheeseburger.

by The Texas Trouble Maker

First time my phone rang after I posted the story about The Fricasseed Pheasant, it was a call from someone who told me outright that my pheasant adventure was the most stupid thing I could have done. I could not agree with the female who called, because she has never been to Korea, never had to go without fresh meat for 11 months, has never been in the United States Military, and, since she admitted she was born and raised in Bradley County, is automatically disqualified to tell any other person anything about being stupid. Ignorant maybe, but, not stupid.

Being a polite person, I did attempt to get the caller off the subject of the pheasant by telling her about another adventure I had. That one had to do with the environment, also in Korea.

You don’t believe that there were environmental concerns as far back as 1953 Korea? Shame on you. Of course there were environmental concerns back then – it had to do with all the contaminated clutter that was scattered all over the old battle sites. Things like unexploded bombs, rockets, mortar shells, grenades, mines, demolitions, outdated ammunition, pyrotechnics, contaminated fuel, used oil and lubricants, industrial chemicals, CBR agents, and, the worst, old C Rations.

I knew when I mentioned C Rations that there would be a flock of ignorant civilians who would demand an explanation. How can old food be dangerous? In the case of some of the C Rations, especially the breakfast meals, not only were old, stale and putrid meals poisonous, the fresh ones were too. Just eat some of that stuff and you will understand. Blue eggs and green bacon bits have never been my favorite – fresh or not.

Anyway, as far as the rations went, after the war, when things started settling down, the quartermasters went through their supply dumps and found that they had maybe 3 and a half jillion cases of outdated rations – some having been manufactured back in the 1940s. It was time to get rid of the stuff.

Getting rid of a couple million cans of C Rations can be a chore. You can not just dump the stuff in a landfill because someone will come along and dig the stuff up, hoping to find something eatable. Also, since some of the cans contain things like cigarettes, chewing gum, rock candy, condiments, coffee and tea, which all last forever, the cans are opened and the items collected for utilization or trade on the local black market. So, each can has to be punctured, the contents poured out to be burned or buried with a lime covering.

My radio relay site did not have more than a hundred cases of the old rations so it was easy to load them in a truck and haul them back to the marine quartermaster at K6 airbase for disposal. Naturally, the Gunny Sergeant running the supply dump refused to accept any trash from the Air Force. He also refused to accept any of our outdated ammunition and explosives. But, he did tell me to destroy the stuff and bury the debris on my own mountaintop and not bother him with work.

I didn’t want to clutter up my resort atop the mountain, so asked where else I might dump my junk. The Gunny told me that the army might take it, back in the mountains, where they had an ordnance disposal site. It sounded good to me so we drove to the dump site.

The site was a canyon – one that was about two hundred yards wide and ran a twisty half mile back into a mountain. Both sides of the road was packed high as a forklift could reach, with crates and crates of bad stuff. Aircraft bombs, artillery shells, demolitions, land mines, you name it, it was there in haphazard heaps and piles. And, for a case of Carling’s Black Label beer, an army sergeant allowed us to dump our load. Then we got the hell out of there because some of the crates were smoking.

Two days later, I was sitting atop Paris Radio Relay site, when off to the northwest, one of those mushroom shaped clouds suddenly went upwards out of a clummer of mountains. It was that dump we had visited to get rid of our junk. I recorded the event on 8 mm movie film because I had never seen a big explosion before. Especially the long, white trails of willy pete that arched from the valley into the heavens and then landed two miles away. The cloud and streams of scattering ordnance were almost as impressive as the sonic boom and ground tremors that radiated over the countryside.

I still can’t make up my mind about which incident was the most stupid – my walk through a mine field or my drive into a canyon packed tight with touchy explosives. I guess it had to be the trip to the canyon because not only was that place crammed with demolitions, it was plumb contaminated with C Rations.

by The Texas Trouble Maker

An Error Has Occurred! Sorry Texas Trouble Maker, you are banned from using this forum!
Banned: Send comments to BradleyNewsAdmin@gmail.com

Boy, was I surprised to read those words when I attempted to access the Forum of the Bradley Weekly, Friday evening. Banned! No reason, no explanation, nothing – other than I had been banned from using the forum. Couldn’t even get onto the forum to see if maybe there was something posted about the ban.

It is not as if I have never been banned from anything before – golly, everyone has been banned from something or another during their lives. I think the first time I was banned from a place was when I was in first grade and learned that boys were banned from using the girls’ restroom. Understandable, and I had no problem with it.

In Junior High school, I was banned from the girls’ locker room at the gym. Again, I understood.

Over the years, I have been banned from shooting certain people, from traveling to Russia while I was a member of the United States Air Force, and from going to Cuba after I retired from the Air Force. For a while, I was also banned from going to China, Libya and San Francisco but I always understood, because reasons were explained to me.

Not in the case of being banned from the forum of the Bradley Weekly however, because someone over there just went and banned me and will not tell me why. I just keep getting the same message and no one at the weekly will answer queries sent to their e-mail address. They do not even explain if they are sorry because I can no longer enter, or, if they are saying that I am a sorry person. There is a difference you know.

Banned. No explanation. Not even a warning given to me, like they have done to other members. I do not even know if this is a 3-day ban like they have handed out to other members for irking Momma Shelton, or, is it a week, a month, or, permanently. I have been asking for a reason for four days, but no answer has flowed back to me as of now.

I can only speculate about the reason for the ban. It can not be because I have used bad language, because I have never done that, and would not. It can not be because I have personally attacked someone, because I have not done that either. There is one possible reason; however, but since it involves censorship and possibly violation of First Amendment rights, I hesitate to mention it.

Last Friday, I noticed that a member, who uses the moniker Cerebral Assassin, had altered one of my comments. It was a clever switch of words and I was about to complement him on the switcheroo when I suddenly realized that CA had displayed my altered comment as a ‘quote’! Yep, he pretended that he was quoting something that I had said, rather than his merely changing some words in the comment I had made. Well now! To be able to manipulate comments that have been made on a web page takes some computer savvy, and, I think, access to the software that runs the web page. In other words, CA goofed by making a mistake that indicates he is an insider at Bradley Weekly.

I did not mention the possibilities to anyone other than the Moderator for the Bradley Weekly web site and did so through the link that accompanies all comments that are posted on the forum. I did it because I wanted the moderator to understand that the integrity of the site might have been compromised – which could also mean that member info and addresses are being accessed by an unauthorized person. OR, the moderator is CA and is trying to hide his goof from the Administrator. Wouldn’t that cause a flap at BNW?

I also captured the sabotaged comment and the erroneous quote and reposted it as a quoted article with added comments from me. My purpose for doing that was to warn other members that something bad might be happening.

Well, after going off line, I returned later in the day to find that I had been banned. I am curious as to why. I have received some calls about the reason. One fellow tells me that I inadvertently exposed the fact that the folks at Bradley Weekly censor member comments – I do not believe that, because this is the first time I have heard anything like that. Then someone called to reveal that I had stepped on some collective toes in an earlier comment where I mentioned Melissa Snyder, who is apparently the local Police Chief’s wife – I don’t go for that story either because, until someone else mentioned that she penned articles under the name of Gizmogal on the web, I had not paid attention to what Melissa was writing for the paper, or doing in local politics. Then another explanation came along – this one I sort of believe.

My being banned might be due to a computer glitch (repeat, glitch), whereby the computer that identifies members authorized to enter the forum pages, has lost or altered my password. Maybe Susan Shelton, who goes by the moniker Admin, and owns the whole shebang over there, will massage her software and get it to work properly. And, quit telling me I am banned, banned, banned.

Dear HTC,

Please do not use my real name, I know to many people in this town. You are right on the money with the information about Melissa Snyder. She is one of the worst poeple morally I have ever known. It is about time someone exposed her. She tries to put on an act to make people think she is a kind person but she has one of the darkest hearts I have ever seen in a person. And I too have heard her say her real feelings about the HTC.

Why the District Attorney decided not to take Wes Snyder and John Daily to court is beyond me. Just as Melissa is a dishonest liar her husband is a dishonest liar too. He either tells a lie or he dances around the truth. And John Daily does, too. That is just what the District Attorney said they did. They will attack the Sheriff Gobble with full vengence and the Mayor Gary Davis and the County Commissioners will help them, but when the spotlight is on them everyone says let’s forget about it and move forward.

I will tell you that I knew Lee Reese and Rory Reese and they were not nearly as bad as the Chief of Police and his wife that we have now. I could tell you some things I know about them that would make you understand better what I want to say, but I am always afraid I will give myself away if I say to much and I am concerned what might happen. Melissa uses the Bradley News forum to hurt people. Yes she uses many different names on the forum and yes one of them is Gizmogal. People do not realize how hateful the Snyders are. They will destroy you if they can. In the newspaper it mentioned Wes Snyder’s hot temper. That is so true. He is a hot tempered man and she is a mean tempered woman. It seems like Cerebral Assassin is playing both sides of the fence, I don’t know. But he is right when he exposed little Miss Pancake Face. When she falls she will fall hard.

I miss the HTC forums and you are needed in this city. I do not have any money to help you out. I wish I did. When you had the discussion forums you had so much information that people needed to know. I know people misused those forums but you always tried to keep them straight. I did not always agree with you and sometimes I even got mad but I can not deny that you did good in this city.

Name withheld at my request

The above comment, and all “Ear To The Ground” articles are submitted by our readers and in no way reflect the views opinions or flavor preferences of HTC.

I‘ve always believed Cleveland had two of the worst newspapers in the country, and the Mondo Times Worldwide Media Guide has finally borne that out. Mondo Times ~ “covering 17,645 media outlets in 211 countries” ~ lists both theCleveland Daily Banner and the Bradley Weekly in their Top 20 Worst Newspapers. The Banner comes in at 18, and the Weekly at 13. Although I would have thought those scores would be lower. Hard to imagine 17 newspapers worst than the Banner. Or 12 worst than the Weekly. We truly live in a glum age. Anyway, I just stumbled across Mondo Times by accident, but it made me feel so validated I had to share it with you. ‘Course they also rated The People News as one of the country’s best monthly papers, so even though Mondo is brilliant in their assessment of the Bumble and the Weakly, they are retarded in their assessment of The People News.

Speaking of The People News, I recently learned they used to call themselves simply The People. I guess they added “News” to the title to make us think they were a newspaper. You know, like the Bradley Weekly did when they started calling themselves Bradley News?

And they say I spin. Ssh’yeah, riiiight.

I also felt validated, by the way, when “Cerebral Assassin” outed Melissa Snyder’s “Gizmogal.” Melissa and them scoffed when I wrote back in December, that “what will come out eventually will come out.” Cerebral proved my point. You know what? I don’t care what you think you got, one day a hard wind’s gonna blow it all away. Huh, Wes?

And in a related story, the Cleveland Rotary Club presented Judge John Hagler with a Paul Harris Fellow. The award is pretty much given to any Rotarian who gives $1,000 to the Rotary Foundation. In honor of the occasion, the judge had a few close friends for dinner. Along with fava beans a nice Chianti.

In that same grisly vein, while celebrating Ashura, Shiite Islam’s holiest day, Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah reminisced fondly about some dead Israeli soldiers they scavenged off a battle field and kept as trophies, saying, “We have the heads, the hands, the feet and even a nearly intact cadaver from the head down to the pelvis.” My friend, if that don’t creep you out, your creeper’s broke. Makes all them deer heads on Uncle Joe-Bob’s wall seem downright bucolic, don’t it?

Anyway, if that’s how they celebrate a holy day over in Islamville, I hate to think what they do on Halloween.

And I Quote: “I just thought you guys might like to know that gizmogal on the Weekly’sforums is none other than Melissa Snyder. Word amongst the ranks is that she even made her husband call the Sheriff to get you guys in trouble. She and hubby are also the ones behind the suspicious witness reports and handling of the CiCi thing. Watch your backs.” ~Cerebral Assassin, posting at hometowncleveland.com, February 18, 2008 @ 8:48 p.m.

But you know, really, the amazing thing to me about all this is … I’m almost 600 words into this column and I ain’t said one thing about Billary Clinton. I guess that 12-step thing is working after all (he said just before he fell off the wagon) …

If Billary would kill to get in the White House, wouldn’t it also kill to get back in? Discuss.

And I Quote: “All the rules (regarding delegates and superdelegates) will be going out the window.” ~ a senior Clinton official, laying it on the line as to what the Clintons will do if they don’t go into the convention with a clear lead

The election’s gonna be a train wreck, though. You got the Democrats devouring their own tail, and you got the Republicans … well, devouring their own tail.

But let’s give George W. credit ~ he’s still the man. This week he put Africa on notice that they’re going to have to start showing a little initiative if they want them many billions of U.S. taxpayer dollars to keep flowing their way. He told them America was an investor, not a donor. What’s that old saying? “Give a man a fish and you feed him for a meal. Teach him to fish and he feeds himself for a life time.” In the case of Africa it’s “Thank you for teaching me to fish. Please bait my hook again.” Cradle of civilization indeed. If they ain’t figured things out by now, they ain’t going to.

But poor ol’ George’s approval rating’s been dropping like a hot rock. It’s getting so low, pretty soon I don’t think they’ll be able to measure it with numbers anymore. They’ll have to use a letter or something. A symbol. His approval rating will be P … or semi-colon. Yes? No? But the crazy thing is, Congress’ approval rate is even lower than Bush. They’ve gone past numbers and letters and their approval rating is, like, a mineral, like zinc or tiptopite. Approval rating of a milk jug. Of one of those barbed wire heart tattoos. Bear with me here, I’m trying my best to squeeze a punch line out of this thing. I don’t know. I thought there was a pretty good joke in there somewhere, but if there was, I can’t find it now.

You know what? Go bait your own hook.

Cooperative efforts between U.S. and Italian authorities netted close to 100 Mafia capodecinas and wiseguys from the Gambino crime family last week. John “The Teflon Don” Gotti was the Gambino Godfather back in the day before Salvatore “Sammy The Bull” Gravano rolled on him for immunity and Gotti lived out his last days in a federal jug in Marion, Illinois. Sammy the Bull was a hitman for the family who turned state’s evidence and escaped into witness protection. But you can’t escape your nature, huh Salvatore? Guy got busted in his new life dealing ecstacy and ended up doing a 19-year jolt in the Arizona State pen. He’s there even as we speak.

But you gotta love those nutty Cosa Nostra types, with the colorful nicknames and the penchant for whacking. Some of the ones who were nabbed in the crime clean up include: Thomas “Tommy Sneakers” Cacciopoli, Joseph “Joe Rackets” Casiere, Domenico “The Greaseball”Cefalu, Joseph “Joe Marco Polo” Chirico, Joseph “Miserable” Corozzo, Nicholas “Little Nicky” Corozzo, Anthony “Cheeks” Licata, James “Treetop” Outerie, John “Johnny Red Rose” Pisano, Richard “Fat Ritchie” Ranieri, Angelo “Little Ang” Ruggiero, Michael “Mike the Electrician” Uricuoli … and, well, it just goes on and on.

Anyway, this is J. Michael “Mikey the Leaker Leonard coming at’cha with this week’s column, y’know what I’m sayin’? First though, wanna give a shout-out to all the pisanos in my decina, especially Nicky “Axo the Axe” Vicino and Perk “Hittin’ Your Eye Like A Big CiCi’s Pie” Evans. Now back up outta my face so I can get on with this column before you find yourself chained to a car bumper at the bottom of Lake Ocoee, y’unnerstan’ what I’m say’? You don’t want none’a this, you freakin’ babbo, you come in here, disrespect me in front of my compare? Keep smiling, you cafone, see if you still think it’ funny after my borgata comes heavy in here and jams you up, you jamook, you facia bruta.

Man … I’ve turned into Joe Pecsi all of a sudden. I mean, Joe “Li’l Mo Fo” Pesci.

Look, I’ve always considered myself a reasonably conversant guy when it comes to politics, but … superdelegates? The heck is all that? What happened to going into a voting booth and casting a vote? We already know the popular vote doesn’t really count for anything, but who’s actually electing the presidents these days ~ “the people” or some partisan political machine? Superdelgates? Are we now the nation of Clinton and Bush, or will anybody else ever again be allowed to occupy the White House?

And I Quote: “Mrs Clinton still has the edge among super-delegates, not least because Bill Clinton is calling in all the favors he has done them over the past 16 years.” ~ TimesOnLine

Actually, I think only Democrats ~ the entitlement party ~ have superdelegates. Just another way to control the proles while making them think they matter? The Clintons contend (by the way, media pundits … they are the “Clint‘ens, not the “Clinttons“), the Clint’ens contend that superdelegates should support the candidate they want to support … not the candidate “the people” want. That, in itself, should throw up all kind of red flags regarding superdelegates. What’s next? Humonousdelegates? Omniscientdelegates? Dictatordelegates? How about we crank this whole neo-election process down a notch or two, you know? Get back to the way things were before there was such a thing as a Clinton.

And I Quote: “You know, none of us can predict the future …” ~ Hillary, responding to a Politico.com questioner last week who wanted some reassurance that if Hillary were in the White House, there would be “no new business or personal scandal involving Bill Clinton.”

Actually, Hillary, I think it’s safe to say we can predict the future when it comes to Bubba. Namely, he will always be the same lying, self-serving, dishonest, money-grubbing, scandal-ridden skirt-chaser he’s always been. That ain’t gonna change. Death, taxes and Bubba, yes?

And if Obama actually wins the White House, will he then be the second black president?

Awww, who cares? The whole thing makes my brain hurt. Let’s talk about Brittany and Paris and Heath Ledger.

On second thought, let’s not.

And I Quote: “My, I felt this thrill going up my leg. I mean, I don’t have that too often.” ~ Chris Matthews, host of MSNBC’s Hardball, giving what he described as an “objective assessment” of an Obama speech

But what’d'ya expect? Journalists stopped being fair and objective when Huntley and Brinkley retired. Anyway, I doubt o’ Hillary’s got the juice to send a thrill up anybody’s leg anymore. Assuming, of course, that she ever possessed that ability. Sure, she makes my skin crawl, but crawling skin ain’t the same thing as a thrill up my leg.

And I Quote: “I’m tested, I’m ready, let’s make it happen!” ~ Hillary in Texas this week, trying her best to get a thrill going up somebody’s leg

But you gotta love the way the left-leaning media has turned their back on Hillary. It’s really going to be a bloodbath when Obama faces off against McCain. Gonna be so biased, slanted, hostile and downright evil it might even sink to the level of the Banner and Weekly. What? No, you’re right … even them cafones in cable news can’t sink that low.

Fuggedaboudit.

by Kenneth Balog

Hey, fellow husbands! Have your wives ever bugged you about running the family vehicle out of gasoline? Mine does, constantly and frequently each time I get behind the wheel of a motorized vehicle.

“Don’t run out of gas. Never let the tank go below the halfway mark. Do you have enough gas? Stop at the station before we go shopping because I don’t want to run out of gas.”

I mean, it is not as if I have EVER run out of gasoline. I admit that I have allowed the dial to touch the quarter-full mark, and twice, get to the one-eighth mark, but never close to the empty mark The vehicles we have had over the years; 16 automobiles, 2 trucks, 3 motor homes, 3 boats and even a puddle jumper airplane, especially the airplane, have never run out of fuel.

Well, there was that one time the Mercury engine blew a head because it had ingested some mud, and we had to row the tri-hull home, but that should not count, because the tanks had plenty of fuel in them.

I have no idea why she starts yapping about gasoline as soon as we get in our current SUV. She was the person who insisted that we needed a SUV because it was easy to get in and out of. And, over the years, I learned that it did not matter what type vehicle we used, she would mention the gasoline quantity.

Finally, today, after a trip to the nearby Wal-Mart, Walgreen and Cooke’s Store, I had heard enough about the “don’t run out of gas” thing. Pinned her down real good with “When did I EVER run out of gasoline?”

Of course she brought up the boat incident, along with 27,222 times she thought we were ABOUT to run out of gas, but couldn’t come up with a single time we did fuel-starve an engine. And, of course, she went through the warning a mechanic once gave her about running the diesel CAT engine in one of the motor homes out of fuel. She remembered every word about it: “Run out of fuel and you will need a mechanic to get all the lines pressurized, rid of air bubbles, the injectors cleared, the fuel heated, etc, etc.” It did no good to remind her that I had installed an atomic powered siren to warn us when the 150-gallon diesel tank got below half full. It didn’t do me a bit of good to tell her the diesel engine did not run on gasoline, so it was unnecessary to pump some in the tank. Back when we had the motor home, it didn’t do me much good to tell her that we didn’t even have gasoline in the thing. Made no never mind – ‘don’t run out of gas.” And then, her second most commonly used warning: “If we run out of gas you will have to push this thing with your big Yankee nose!”

I do not think I am being overly critical about this hang-up of hers, even though it has been going on 56 years. Yep, 56 years this coming August. Started before we married, when I thought she might enjoy what happens when a fellow runs out of gas with a girlfriend in the car. OMG; maybe that is the reason behind her everlasting warnings.

Ahhhh … Mardi Gras … fat Tuesday … bare breasts, cheap glass beads and the sweet smell of magnolias and vomit. What a great tradition. And best of all, this week Mayor Ray Nagin’s Chocolate City celebrated its 21st murder of the year. And we’re barely into February. Hey Ray ~ maybe Hurricane Katrina was God’s way of telling us to give that toilet bowl of a city back to the swamp.

And speaking of our slow-witted but affable neighbors to the south, the Mississippi legislature has introduced House Bill 282, which would make it illegal for restaurants to serve food to fat people. Hey, here’s an idea, guys … how about making it illegal to give water to wet people, or to give shoes to people with feet.

The Archbishop of Canterbury jumped the shark this week when he insisted that the United Kingdom’s adoption of Islamic Sharia law was inevitable. He said citizens need to “face up to the fact” that Muslims don’t give two hoots in hell about the natural laws of the land in England. Kind of like the illegals here in America. Or the pot smokers in California. So enjoy the cop-out, Archbishop of Canterbury. When the Islamos come for your head for not practicing their Sharia law, hope there’ll still be somebody left on the island with the brass to help you out.

On the other hand, I could be completely wrong. Maybe what we need is a bit more oppression to go with the cultural imperialism. Gimme that old time theocracy. You know, maybe human rights are overrated. And, after all, separating a person’s head from their body by sawing through their neck bone with a machete does sound like a pretty good deterrent for any female in a family restaurant who is considering maybe sitting at a table with a male.

Anyway, it won’t matter in the long run. And by “in the long run,” I mean in three years. That’s when they say Iran will have The Bomb. And as we all know, when Iran gets The Bomb a hard rain’s gonna fall.

And in that vein, al Qaida market-tested the next generation of suicide bombers over in Iraq last week when they strapped remote-controlled explosives to two mentally challenged women and sent them off into the crowds of Baghdad. The women were detonated and close to 80 people were killed. “This is such a step forward for jihad,” gushed one Islamic murder guy with an unpronounceable name. “We killed a delicious number of innocent people and got rid of two retards at the same time. The fact that the two retards were women is just icing on the cake. Allah akbar!”

Speaking of woman I would personally like to see explode …

And I Quote: “(I have) been working to bring positive change to people’s lives for 35 years.” ~ Billary Clinton

Here’s a positive change Hillary wants to bring to your life ~ you don’t man up and buy yourself some health insurance of your own free will, she will garnish your wages and buy it for you. Next up, look for her plan to have your children raised by a village. And by “village,” I mean the U.S. government.

At a McCain Q&A last year in South Carolina, a questioner referred to Hillary as a “bit*h.” CNN and MSNBC made a point of loudly and publically criticizing McCain for not calling the questioner to task for insulting Hill. Last week in St. Louis at a Hillary Q&A, a questioner referred to McCain as a “bas*ard.” And I’m yet to hear ‘ary peep out of anybody. I’m just saying.

And what on earth is the big boggle from conservatives over John McCain? Rush Limbaugh has been tearing McCain apart, the Conservative Political Action Conference booed him, and Uber-con Ann Coulter even said she would vote for Hillary (!!!!!) if McCain gets the nomination (I wanted to add some more exclamation points in that last parenthetical, but no amount of punctuation can adequately convey my bewilderment). Annie, my dear Annie ~ all of you ~ have you lost your minds? How can Hillary possibly be better than McCain? On what planet, in what alternate reality, what dimension, what scenario, in what bad dream could Hillary be better? And please sign your letters.

And by the way, Ann ~ a little FYI … the starved super model look ain’t really working for you anymore. Yes, there was a time when the irreverent wit, the long blond hair, the short dresses, the long lovely legs and the super conservative sensibility all added up to a striking package. But Ann, that was years ago. We have to accept the aging process and go with it. Nobody gets younger over the years, yes? I know it’s hard to accept, but it’s impossible to fight, so rethink yourself for everyone’s sake. And for the love of Goober … Hillary??!! (again with the punctuation).

Actually, what I wanted to say about McCain … the guy is actually kind of amazing. Sure he can sometimes be an ornery old cuss, but he’s got a hot wife that’s like 20 years younger than him. That’s got to count for something, huh?

No, what I wanted to say about McCain is, the guy’s a serious war hero. He was a fighter pilot during Vietnam who got shot out of the sky in 1967. Broke an arm and both legs in the crash, then when the Cong caught him they shattered his shoulder with a rifle butt and stabbed him in the ankle and groin. Then they threw in him a POW camp, where he was routinely beaten and tortured (and we ain’t talking water boarding either). After about a year of this, the Vietnamese offered him his freedom (McCain’s dad was a big shot admiral and the enemy wanted to gain favor in Washington by releasing the admiral’s son). But … and this is a big but … but McCain refused to leave unless all the other POWs left with him! That, my friend, is brass. They threw him back in the tank where he stayed for another four years. Plus, they were ticked that he wouldn’t leave so they ratcheted up the beatings and the torture to teach him a lesson. Five-and-a-half years at the Hanoi Hilton under the most brutal of circumstances because he wouldn’t leave his comrades behind. That is character.

Here’s your choice ~ Hillary crying over herself, or McCain getting his head kicked in for over five years in a freaking Vietnamese POW camp for the sake of others? No contest. So enough already, you Reagan conservatives. Time to get over yourselves.

Oh, and speaking of Reagan conservatives … thanks George Bush for sending those tornadoes through Arkansas, Mississippi, Tennessee, Kentucky and Alabama. You killed 55 people, you know. Like you care. You and your precious global warming. We all know you don’t like black people, but what did Arkansas, Mississippi, Tennessee, Kentucky and Alabama ever do to you? You’ll pay, George Bush … you’ll pay!

by Kenneth Balog

Isn’t it odd how things seem to run in a series? Take for instance the recent spate of news about tapes. Once the lid slipped off the Hagler worm jar, the newspapers, TVs and courtrooms were flooded with tape talk. Many tapes! I find that interesting because it must mean that such occurrences cannot be mere coincidence.

How long has the tape thing been going on? Well, a few months at least – say maybe 15?

First, there was the missing tape at the jail – remember that? Someone erased a tape that might have had a taser torture session on it. Whatever happened to that case?

Second, wasn’t there a flap about how the city wanted to install traffic cameras that would tape drivers who ran red lights? Another thing that seems to have died away.

Third, the national media got all hot and bothered about some tapes the CIA made, then destroyed, about alleged torture of Islamo terrorists held in Cuba. Who knows what will come of that?

Fourth, the Hagler tape, which predates the Sheriff Gobble era, is now in the news, and according to some folks will be around for a couple of more years.

Fifth, there is some kind of tape floating around about how Chief Snyder supposedly lied in an interview with TBI about a Police Dept point system. Look for that case to go away without much fanfare.

Sixth, there is the tapeworm that a certain writer at Bradley News apparently has – otherwise how can she eat and write about all that queer food she and her daughter consume?

Seventh, there is the tape that my dietician wraps around my waist to determine if I have been sticking to a diet. I reckon that her tape is the most important.

Anyway, tapes are hot right now. Of course, they won’t be for very long. Mostly because things have gone digital and that means discs and memory cards are the going thing. Want to know what will replace the disc? It will be a wafer. Then a pinhead. Then a mote.

I can’t wait because I am getting sick of tapes.

Hometown,

I like the new direction you are taking. Are you ever going to bring back the discussion forum? I wasn’t going to get involved in this but I have been watching at the Bradley News forum and I am close to the people who work there. I won’t say anymore because I do not want them knowing who I am for obvious reasons. I know Melissa Snyder well and she is behind most of the nasty things that are being said about Sheriff Tim Gobble and the people at HTC. It looks like there are alot of people who don’t like Sheriff Gobble but she is behind most of it. I think Sheriff Gobble is a fine man and I have always thought the people at HTC are too.

I thought HTC might have been finished and I wasn’t even reading JM’s column that much anymore until recently. It is as if HTC has just woke up from a nap because you are doing good things again. I love the videos and I laughed my rearend off when you said you tricked the Bradley News into printing your column. They can’t get the best of you. I remember when your column was in the Bradley News and it is better now. You need to keep asking why isn’t the local media asking for the Judge Hagler tape. They are acting like you are the bad one for bringing it to light. They should be asking what is on that tape instead of criticizing the ones who reveal sick perverts. If Judge Hagler is connected to the murder of a priest he should be locked up until the police can learn what really happened. You should put the tape up at HTC and let us hear what is on it.

So, keep it up and watch your back because Melissa Snyder wants to put a knife in it. But don’t take it personal as she hates everyone but her own face which is said to exist somewhere under all that makeup.

The above comment, and all “Ear To The Ground” articles are submitted by our readers and in no way reflect the views opinions or flavor preferences of HTC.