__
                    __ _ / _|_ __ ___
           _____   / _` | |_| '_ ` _ \   _____
          |_____| | (_| |  _| | | | | | |_____|
                   \__,_|_| |_| |_| |_|
                   Another Foggy Moment

 These are the continuing adventures of a typical resident
 of the self-proclaimed center of the Pugetopolis universe -
 Seattle. Most are true stories but some are made of whole-
 cloth. I ain't the Mayor, the Governor or a Big Shot. Just
 another Working Stiff with a Bad Attitude.

    ------------------------------------------------
    WARNING: This is not a Child-Proof Neighborhood.
    If you're a kid - scram!, beat it! you little
    punk before your Old Lady catches you and calls
    the cops. They'll throw you in the Big House in
    Walla Walla and won't let you out until you're
    89 years old. There. Don't say I didn't warn you.
    -------------------------------------------------

                          - 130 -

 "We will have to repent in this generation, not merely for the
  hateful words and actions of the bad people, but for the
  appalling silence of the good people."

               - Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. -
                  martyr to Christian Love

 On Burns Day, Friday the 25th, Scots the world over will once
 again solemnly assemble to pay their respects to the greatest 
 poet of all time - Rant'n Robbie Burns. If they have any class
 at all, they'll have a fiddler or three who can help them 
 promenade to the "March of the Clans", "Saint Andrew's Cross",
 "Shufflin' Samuel" and the like. And with a little luck, the
 pipers will all have to work that night.

 After the formalities are dispensed with, they will then proceed 
 to get properly Pissed, making whiskey toasts to everyone alive
 and dead while stuffing their gobs with haggis. The humble haggis 
 is one of those ancient culinary delights like lutefisk that is 
 only a delight to the nationality that invented it. It is a section 
 of sheep's gut stuffed with a boiled mixture of oatmeal and the 
 vicera of the sheep that donated the gut, all heavily spiced. Yum 
 yum! It looks like a fat, bloated sausage and gives off an aroma 
 reminiscent of week-old summer roadkill.

 Robert Burns was a poet of the People - the Common Man and Woman.
 That's not just a turn of phrase, he was indeed an anti-monarchist
 rabble rouser and a strong advocate for women's rights. The Kirks 
 and Lords of his day made him pay dearly for his attitude with a 
 never ending campaign to blacklist his poems and condemn him to 
 a life of poverty. They are now long forgotten while Robbie and 
 his poesy remain with us. We traditionally sing his "Auld Lang 
 Syne" at midnight every New Years. God-fearing Christian that he
 was, he wasn't a monkish man. He had a deep appreciation for whiskey 
 and the delicate turn of a feminine ankle. As he was so fond of 
 saying, "A man's a man for a' that."

		Is there for honest poverty
		  That hangs his head, an' a' that?
		The coward slave, we pass him by -
		  We dare be poor for a' that!
		For a' that, an' a' that,
		  Our toils obscure, an' a' that,
		The rank is but the guinea's stamp,
		  The man's the gowd for a' that.

                You see yon birkie ca'd 'a lord?
		  Wha struts, an' stares, an' a' that?
		Tho' hundreds worship at his word,
		  He's but a cuif for a' that.
		For a' that, an' a' that,
		  His ribband, star and' a' that,
		The man o' independent mind,
		  He looks an' laughs at a' that.

		Then let us pray that come it may
		  (As come it will for a' that)
		That Sense and Worth o'er a' the earth
		  Shall bear the gree an' a' that!
		For a' that, an' a' that,
		  It's comin yet for a' that,
		That man to man the world o'er
		  Shall brithers be for a' that.

                               *

 [The following is the transcript of an interview with President 
 George W. Bush done by Geraldo Rivera in the wake of the now 
 infamous Jihad Pretzel Attack. It was surreptitiously snuck
 to me by someone who shall remain anonymous. For unexplained 
 reasons, the networks chose not to air it.]

 GERALDO: George! May I call you "George" Mr. President? That's
          okay, I'm going to anyways. Please! Show me how you
          eat pretzels. What's your technique? How do you go 
          about it?
 DUHBYA:  Weeelll Dooogggies! If that don't beat all! I was 
          hope'n those Talibanitos shot you dead in Afghanistan, 
          you squirrel-brained rascal. Sure! What the hell, 
          I'll show you my pretzel eat'n style if you like. 
          It's not like the Leader of the Free World has anything 
          better to do with his time, now is it?

          First off, you need proper equipment. Get yourself
          a bag of pretzels like these here, and then you get
          yourself oh...say...about 10 or 12 6-pack of Lone 
          Star beer, like I got in the icebox over there.
          Got that sucker locked and loaded for the Super Bowl
          so keep your gol dang hands off'n it!
 GERALDO: Ah...George...I thought you were a teatotaler! You
          said you went clean and sober. What's with the beer?
 DUHBYA:  Now hold on just a gol darn minute boy. Everybody
          knows beer ain't booze if'n you eat pretzels or some
          other snack with it. Then it's just lubricant. What
          are you an Idgit or someth'n? Next thing you'll be
          tell'n me blow jobs is sex. 
 GERALDO: Uh...okay...I never thought of it like that, but you
          do have a good point. I can't believe how stupid I
          am sometimes. Forgive me.
 DUHBYA:  Whatever. Just shut up and listen. I ain't gonna say
          this twice.

          Alrighty...You got your pretzels, you got your beer
          and now you commence to chow'n down like this here:
          First you take a pretzel and eat it. Then you grab
          a 6-pack and you drink it. Then you get another 
          pretzel and eat it. Then you get another 6-pack and
          drink it. You just keep a-go'n that-a way until you
          fall down drunk flat on your face and wake up on the
          carpet stare'n up at your dog's balls. Simple as 
          that. And if you're a Big Shot like me, just have the 
          Spinmeister Brothers mop up any collateral damage.
          Verstehen?
 GERALDO: Hmmmmm...yes...I think I understand everything now.
          Thanks George. Mind if I have a pretzel?
 DUHBYA:  Touch that bag and I'll have the Secret Service
          chop off both your hands. Now get the hell outta here.
          And, God Bless you boy. I'll be look'n for you in
          church on Sunday.

           Sic 'em boys! 
           [The sounds of growling/snapping dogs and a man 
           screaming for help alternately in Spanish and English.]
....................................................................

                THE BLACK PLEDGE OF ALLIGIENCE

       I pledge allegience to the red, black and green,
         Our flag, the symbol of our eternal struggle, 
                and to the land we must obtain.
     One nation of Black people, with one God for us all.
        Totally united in the struggle for Black Love, 
            Black Freedom and Black determination.

                          - Anon -

.....................................................................

                    THE BOOTLEGGER'S SON

 If you use the 520 Evergreen Floating Bridge with any regularity
 you may have noticed that plaque on it that says it's really
 the Albert Rosellini Bridge. I've heard it called many things 
 over the years, most of which are unfit to mention in mixed
 company, but never the Rosellini Bridge. You may have briefly 
 thought to yourself during an idle moment of gridlock, "I wonder 
 who that freeloading old geezer was?" Hardly any way to refer to
 perhaps the greatest Governor we've ever had. Far as I know, Al's
 still chasing ambulances in Seattle and throwing his two-bits in
 on local issues. He's got to be pushing 92 by now. He's probably 
 the only guy in town who gets to occasionally drive across a 
 bridge that's named after him. I'm sure there are days when he 
 wishes they had named a mountain after him instead.

 Al Rosellini done alright for a poor Italian kid from Tacoma.
 His Old Man, originally from Tuscany in the Old Country, became
 a Big Shot in the liquor business in Tacoma until Prohibition
 came along and put him outta business. So Joe relocated to 
 "Garlic Gulch" in Seattle's Rainier Valley to be close to the 
 Paisanos. It was the Italian part of Seattle at the time. And 
 let's just say that Italians, fond as they are of making their 
 own wine, were no big fans of Prohibition. Definitely the sort 
 of neighborhood that would appreciate, welcome and sympathize 
 with an out-of-work liquor-salesman who had good connections.

 Being a sensative young lad, Al was shocked a short while later
 when the Cops busted Papa Joe for smuggling booze. But he seems
 to have made a significant observation from that experience.
 One that was to have an impact on his future. He noticed that
 lawyers make Cops very nervous. With no more than a few words 
 a lawyer is capable of magically loosening the most secure 
 cold-steel shackles and opening the doors of the most heavily 
 fortified prison. Now that's power! He must have decided then 
 and there that he was going to be a lawyer when he grew up. 
 He'd show 'em a thing or two and they'd be a helluva lot more 
 careful mess'n with his Old Man.

 Years later, despite the disadvantages of his lowly immigrant
 origins, his father's unorthodox approach to making a living 
 and a paucity of household cash in the midst of a depression, 
 Al wiggled into U Dub and made true on that dream. First he got 
 a B.A. to enhance his finer sensibilities, then he got a Law 
 Degree to enhance his ability to eat and pay his bills. Now 
 that he had beat the odds and bettered himself, he was prepared 
 to begin his ascent of the American Dream.

 While in Law School, he caught the eye of such notorious local
 N'er-Do-Wells as rabblerousing lawyer Harry Shefelman (future 
 two time president of the Municipal League and principal in the 
 now tony lawfirm of Foster, Pepper & Shefelman), the writer Prof. 
 Angelo Pelligrini (a former Communist who taught philosophy at
 U Dub and whose father was also from Tuscany) and the head of the 
 state Democratic Party whose last name was Rosellini though  
 he was no relation. These were intelligent, compassionate men of 
 ideas who offered this lowly immigrant son of a bootlegger an 
 amiable, convivial mileu in which to stage his ascent. 
 
 Al hung out his shingle in 1933 as the Great Depression raged.
 His first customer was a black guy he KOed back in his amateur 
 boxing days. Having possibly made a few bucks in side-bets off 
 that fight, he was thus in a position to consider his bill as
 pre-paid in a sense. But it's always a questionable practice 
 to hire a lawyer who has recently knocked you on your butt. It's 
 not likely he'll bother with a collection agency if you don't 
 pay up. He'll be confident he can settle the matter with you
 personally. While Al did lose that case he impressed the heck 
 out of everybody with his passionate rhetoric and exuberant 
 hand-waving. They could see he was a boy who was going places.

 Next thing you know, Seattle beverage and hospitality honchos 
 hired him to go after King County over its post-prohibition 
 "Blue Laws" which were cutting into their business. Rather 
 than try to get them struck down, he cleverly went in the 
 other direction - insisting that they apply to ALL forms of 
 public relaxation, not just those of his clients. The county 
 didn't expect that and was forced to quickly yank its "Blue 
 Laws" or face the wrath of the Chamber of Commerce and Rotary 
 Club. The State Liquor Control Board meanwhile, madly scrambled 
 to restore legal order admidst this temporary chaos and anarchy. 
 Al Rosellini - First Blood. He whooped 'em good. His name quickly 
 became legend amongst the restauranteurs and bar-keeps of King 
 County. He's been their staunch defender and honored guest ever 
 since.

 Having achieved some measure of local notariety and a bit of 
 a name for himself Al next set his sights on politics. Many 
 fine, educated liberal gentlemen of the time considered it 
 their civic duty to do so. Especially those like Al, who were
 eager to implement the many social lessons gained from the 
 Great Depression. 

 Casting a jaundiced eye about the land, he concluded that the 
 people of Seattle's 33rd State Senate District would be most 
 likely to appreciate his many talents and provide a reliable 
 base from which to operate. The seat there was occupied by a 
 scoundrel named "Tiger Tim" Murphy. Apparently many boxers of 
 the era commonly retired to the State House to snooze away their 
 Golden Years, no doubt thinking their prior experience might 
 occasionally come in handy to knock some sense into an obstinate 
 foe. Al gave it his best shot, and though only a rank beginner 
 at the trade, he came within an 80-vote whisker of winning Mr. 
 Tiger's seat. Impressive for sure, but no banana.

 The Mileu took notice of his effort and saw great potential
 in him. Future U.S. Senator "Maggie" Magnuson, King County's 
 young and up-and-coming Prosecutor at the time, kindly picked 
 him up, dusted him off and offered him a job as a Deputy 
 Prosecutor afterwards. It was understood that Al's sights were
 set on politics, not the civil service, and he would bolt at
 the first reasonable opportunity. A couple of years later, 
 "Tiger Tim" obligingly Kicked The Bucket and Al easily defeated  
 his appointed successor next time around. He was to eventualy 
 hold that seat for 18 consecutive years, giving it up only 
 when he moved into the Governor's Mansion.

 Al's life was turning into a Neil Diamond song. The humble 
 Italian Bootlegger's son was now a reputable State Senator.
 A lesser, self-serving man may have been inclined to bask 
 in the glow of his success and lord it over his 'inferiors'. 
 Not Al. This was no ego-trip. His new seat was a means to an
 end, not the end in itself. He had big plans for this little
 corner of America and he set about pursuing them.

 It was at this time that he adopted what came to be his political
 trademark: a red rose in his lapel. An elegantly flamboyant touch
 for a classy mug. Though with the McCarthy Era approaching, he may 
 have wished on occasion that he'd picked a different color.

 Being a pro-New Dealer and having many friends in progressive
 groups like the Washington Commonwealth Federation as well as
 hobnobbing with the likes of now-Congressman "Maggie" Magnuson,
 Al was clearly a broad-minded man. More a populist than a liberal
 or socialist, "social mobility" was Al's primary ideology. He
 was no rigid ideologue. Theory is fine for perspective, but when 
 you're in the trenches dealing with reality, knowing when to hold 
 'em and when to fold 'em, is the key to success. If you're too
 timid, you end up an ineffective nobody like Congressman McDermott.
 Too aggressive, you end up losing all your chips to one bad hand.
 He was flexible in that sense. But inflexible in his vision. 

 He saw government as a valuable tool for enabling people to 
 acquire the skills and means to improve their lot in life. 
 To better themselves and thereby, to raise the general mean 
 of society. Through education, training and help for those
 starting businesses, everyone prospered. But he also insisted 
 that those who, through circumstance, were unable to support 
 themselves - the physically and mentally limited, orphans, 
 the aged and even prisoners - had to be cared for. No doubt
 his father's experience made him sensitive to the plight of
 prisoners. Perhaps more than most he also knew the importance 
 of a 'level and fair playing field' for all. Reforms within 
 government could ensure one.

 These concepts did not sit well with more conservative element
 of his own party, let alone Republicans. The Big People they 
 cowtowed to, believed Little People should remain Little People. 
 And they paid good money to those pols to ensure the playing 
 field was heavily titled to their advantage. Indeed, they felt 
 that was The Natural Order of Things as ordained by our Divine 
 Creator. Heretics, schismatists and apostates like Al were
 anethma.
 
 By now it was the heyday of the Anticommunist Witchunters. The
 patriotic Red-baiters at the Seattle Times led the local mob,
 ferreting imaginary Bosheviks out from under every bed in town. 
 They slandered the name of many good people, casually destroying
 their lives and careers. That red rose in Al's lapel certainly
 looked vvveeerrrryyy suspicious to them. Some sort of secret
 signal to the comrades back in Moscow, no doubt. Al didn't 
 mind the red-baiting so much, but it sure pissed him off when 
 they used it to clobber his pet project: an attempt to create 
 a seperate juvenille justice system. Kids were thrown into adult 
 prisons at the time and he wanted to put a stop to the practice. 
 The anti-Red Yahoos and the boys at the Times City Desk didn't 
 care about juvenile delinquents. "Red Rose Al" was pushing the 
 reform, ipso fatso, it just HAD to be a Commie plot of some sort, 
 so they killed it. And thus the Times saved Seattle from wayward
 Bolshevik youths, allowing them to continue their 'education' at 
 the knee of seasoned, professional criminals. A mighty blow for 
 truth, justice and increased advertising revenues.
    
 By 1956, after 18 years in the State Senate and after having risen
 to the the etheral heights of the party hierarchy, Al stuck a wet 
 finger to the political winds and sensed a shift in the currents.
 He surmised that the time was ripe for him to be promoted to Governor. 
 There was one small hitch though - his party was royally pissed off 
 at him. During the heat of the previous gubnatorial race he had 
 characterized his own party's canidate, a man he didn't particularily 
 admire, as a 'lefty'. Who better than a man who had often been red-
 baited himself would better appreciate the effectiveness of that 
 particular slur. Though it was certainly an odd choice. What the 
 hell...nobody said he was an angel.

 The Republicans picked up Al's cue and went on to win. The Demos 
 made it clear to Al that his lack of solidarity would likely cost 
 him any chance of party money if he won the nomination. Whatever. 
 He figured he could handle it. And, much to everyone's surprise 
 except his own, he won the nomination and went on to win the 
 gubnatorial race. 

 What was about to transpire has often been described as the most
 progressive and productive session of the State House in its
 entire history. Picking as his Chief of Staff, one of the 
 eggheads on the U Dub faculty, Professor Bishop, instead of 
 a party hack Yes Man, Al hit the ground running.

 Right off the bat he implemented his seperate juvenille justice 
 system and pulled those kids out of adult jails. Then he went on 
 a tear: modernizing the state's mental health system; modernizing 
 our prisons; pumping money into the state's colleges and universities 
 and creating community colleges; enhancing the state's investment 
 in its transportation infrastructure with, amongst other things, 
 a 2nd bridge across Lake Washington; creating a merit system for 
 state employees; creating a new Department of Commerce & Economic 
 Development; and bringing the 1962 World's Fair to Seattle. Etc.
 Etc. Etc. He likely sensed this window of opportunity wouldn't  
 last forever. So he made the best of it and brought Washington
 state, kicking and screaming, into the 20th century.

 In 1960, sharing the campaign stage with a young Jack Kennedy on 
 his way to the White House, Al ran for re-election. But with the
 Republicans on the ascent it was sure to be a close fight. Indeed,
 the state ended up going to Tricky Ricky Nixon in the presidential 
 end of matters. Thanks to his personal popularity, Al managed to 
 buck the trend and squeeze out a close win to earn a 2nd term in 
 the Governor's Mansion.

 The Huskies whipped the University of Minnesota to win their 1st 
 Rose Bowl that year and a couple years later, union thug Dave Beck 
 got thrown in the Hoosgow for tax evasion (he forgot to report all
 those payoffs, kickbacks and other gratuities from employers). The 
 infamous Columbus Day Typhoon ripped through Puget Sound in 1962 
 and we got hit with a bone-rattling 7 earthquake during Al's second 
 term. But aside from opening the World's Fair and cutting the ribbon 
 on that new floating bridge across Lake Washington, there weren't 
 a lot of highlights for Al.  Between petty scandals and no end of 
 partisan political bickering, little was accomplished and his 
 second term was as much a bust as the first had been a boon.

 The Republicans had continued to gain in strength and a 'renegade'
 Dan Evans, who had used our open primary system to sneak around
 his party's annointed fav, had little difficulty defeating Al when
 he tried for a three-peet. After 25 years in Olympia, Al was about 
 to get a peek at the other side of the American Equation - easy up, 
 even easier down. He was pensioned off to pastural obscurity.

 He made a number of tries afterwards for various offices - King
 County Exec, Governor, etc. - but came up short on all of them.
 He nearly bumped off Dan Evans when the latter was attempting a
 three-peet for the Governor's Mansion. It was a close race but,
 in the dying days, the Seattle P-I accused Al of having ties to
 organized crime. He was Italian afterall and, as everyone knows,
 all Italians are honorary members of the Mob - right? The accusations
 were baseless and without merit, but the P-I's hack job did the 
 trick. Al had no time to dispell the doubts and he lost by a slim 
 margin. The Hooterville Yacht Club strikes again.

 In our modern political system, essentially reduced to a corporate
 canidate raffle conducted by our News Nazis, Al would have never
 made it to first base. Poor kids don't rise from our Mean Streets
 anymore - they stay there. Our universities have become corporate 
 job-training centers intolerant of independant thought, spewing out
 graduates as utterly ignorant of the fine-arts and the world-at-large
 as any back-woods hick. Strapped with crippling debt, graduates are 
 forced to quickly find a corporate niche to work that debt off. A 
 souless, heartless corporate world whose social machinery debases 
 and degrades the Human Spirit with its bigotry, greed and 
 exploitation.

 The Big People won. They call ALL the shots now. They tell us 
 how to think, decide who we can vote for, what to buy. Their 
 needs come first. Ours has become a government of, by and for 
 them - not us. And they would not tolerate someone like Al, 
 who puts Little People first. If they couldn't 'persuade' him 
 to change his tune, they would crush him. That's their modus. 
 That's why there aren't any Als around anymore.

 Friend of the working man, fighter and champion of the cause 
 of the Little People, he was one of those old-fashioned pols 
 who rose from our Mean Streets to the highest levels of power, 
 hobnobbing with presidents and making history. But he never 
 forgot his roots. He stayed one of us. No other governor since 
 has come close to his compassionate committment to those most 
 dependant on the state - the mentally and physically disabled, 
 prisoners, pensioners, orphans and the like. With that big 
 heart of his he took care of ALL the people and made many an
 American Dream come true. The old Palooka was certainly one 
 of, if not THE very best governor we've ever had. 

 Today (the 21st) is his birthday. I'm sure he'll be wearing
 a fresh new red rose. Why not join him? 

[Inspiration courtesy of:
                http://www.historylink.org
Cheap shots, shameless bias, shady innuendo, borderline slander 
and other forms of historical revisionism are purely of my own 
invention.]
.................................................................... 

    "Before, I was disappointed at being too young or too 
     inconsequential to make Nixon's list."

		      - David Barash -
                      U Dub Psych Prof
              on making the Cheney Blacklist of
              'unpatriotic academic dissenters' 
                    

......................................................................

                     'OL YELLER'S TWAT
             (aka The War Against Terrorism)                 

 Our latest excursion in Afghanistan pretty much establishes 
 the fact that our military, despite being the most formidible 
 in human history, is essentially a One Trick Pony - all they 
 got is a passing game. Take their air power away and there's 
 bugger all left. They got no running game at all. They're 
 afraid to get down on the ground and grind it out. They can 
 punish, but they can't dominate. They always need someone 
 else to do their bleeding for them. This time they 'borrowed' 
 the Russians Northern Alliance to do that bleeding. They 
 routinely ignored the NA's counsel and showed them great 
 disrespect during our Snuff Fest. You can bet NA will remember 
 that now that they run the show. And you can bet others are 
 taking notes. The word's out - we're assholes. Our 'friends' 
 will be more expensive.

 President Yellowbelly's response was a poorly thought-out,
 ill-conceived and largely botched operation. Osama remains at
 large, the Taliban remain intact, Mullah Omar is also still
 at large. Al Qaida and it's primary funding sources in Saudi
 Arabia are all intact. Aside from blowing up a lot of useless
 goat pastures in the mountains, what of substance did we 
 accomplish? There was no need to panic and start shooting from 
 the hip. Yeller had plenty of time to be more deliberate and 
 effective in his response. Instead, he blew it. His screw-ups 
 will cost us dearly in the long run. As will his failure to 
 deal with the bureaucratic incompetents who made the NYC/DC 
 attacks possible in the first place.

 Having grossed out everyone in sight with our Afghani Snuff
 Fest and having convinced the world that we're the biggest 
 cry-babies on the planet, we're off to the Philipines. They
 have already balked at the idea of doing our bleeding for us.
 Yellowbelly's TWAT has hardly started and already he's 
 running out of willing volunteers.

......................................................................

                      MONDO VATICANO

 Papal news on television took on an interesting new twist
 in Sofia, Bulgaria recently. When the lady reading the
 news got to the Papal item, she suddenly whipped off her
 bra. Apparently it was her way of expressing her joy at
 the pending visit to Bulgaria of Future-Super-Saint JP-2.
 The station was reportedly beseiged with demands that it
 vastly increase its Vatican news. And the Church in 
 Bulgaria reports a massive flood of new converts. I think 
 they may be onto something here. 

			+	+	+

 In England, the Church wasn't allowed to hide it's pervert
 priests in a dark closet. The government authorized a committee 
 from the House of Lords, the Nolan Committee, to explicitly 
 instruct the Church on how it was to handle future cases and 
 ensure its compliance. This week a rather interesting lady was 
 chosen to head up the new child protection strategy. Not only 
 is she a single mother with two kids, she's also an agnostic. 
 She has over 25 years of experience in child services.

			+	+	+

 The veridict came down for the first of Fr. Geoghan's three 
 criminal trials for child molestation - guilty. He has an 
 additional 90 civil suits pending against him. He's the former 
 priest from the Boston Archdiocese who had a long history of 
 diddling kiddies. He's a sick man. He needs help. And since 
 he's a predator, it's imperative that he be removed from 
 society. If there's a villain in this story it is Cardinal Law. 
 Knowing Fr. Geoghan had a serious problem, knowing the
 disasterous effects that problem has on its young victims, 
 Cardinal Law none the less did nothing to deal with it beyond
 shuffling Fr. Geoghan around from parish to parish whenever
 things got too hot for him, keeping him supplied with an endless 
 number of new victims. Why? Compassion? Hell no! To save his own 
 goddam useless ass. With a choice of: the welfare of the kids 
 or the reputation of his Archdiocese - he chose to screw the 
 kids. He weaseled out of criminal charges but he's getting 
 nailed in civil court. The good Catholics of Boston will now 
 pay through the nose for his incompetence, cowardice and 
 immorality. Cardinal Law gives me cause to believe in Evil. 
 He emits the odor of sulphorus fumes.

			+	+	+

 Fr. Thom Crandall made his first appearance in U.S. District
 Court in Pensacola, Florida this week. He was handcuffed and
 shackled. The former high-school cross-country coach is accused 
 of running Ecstacy and methamphetamines from his rectory at St. 
 Rose of Lima in Milton, Florida and his condo in New Orleans. 
 He was discrete about it - he always removed his "FRTHOM" vanity 
 plates from his 2000 Cherokee when travelling to the Big Easy.
 He's also quite the card. A big Notre Dame football fan, he dyed
 his hair blond every fall and called himself "The Golden Domer".
 The kids thought he was terrific. Now we know why. The DEA claims 
 they got his negotiations all down on wire-tap tape though they 
 haven't yet revealed who the squealer is. Fr. Thom's parishoners 
 are, of course, shocked by all this. I suppose they'll want the
 Cherokee back eh. I don't think they knew about the condo. Phew!
 Sounds like "The Golden Domer" ain't gonna have to worry about
 room and board for the next decade or two. But he better be
 careful about who he bends over in front of.

			+	+	+

 Pope Ratso the First (aka Cardinal Ratzinger) shoved the old 
 Pollock outta the way this week to remind everybody he will 
 be retiring soon. It's his little joke. He ain't go'n nowhere. 
 At best he'll just slither back into the shadows, out of sight, 
 to pull Future-Super-Saint JP-2's strings. But it's entirely 
 likely he won't even bother with that much pretence. Being the 
 Vatican's Grand Inquistor means never having to kiss anybody's 
 butt. He's got all the dirt on all those guys. He's got them 
 all by the short ones. Stiff him and there would be some very
 embarassing 'leaks' about certain Cardinals and Bishops, possibly 
 even a Pontiff (JP-2 was rumored to have had a mistress and
 even a Love Child back in Krakow), in the world press. He's got 
 tons of it stashed away for safe keeping. With a decrepit, sickly 
 old fart sitting dysfunctionally in Peter's Chair - Ratso rules 
 the roost. He has become the de-facto Pope. Retirement in any 
 real sense is totally out of the question. This is his moment 
 to shine. Once JP-2 croaks, Ratso's yesterday's news. He's too 
 old and too German to ever get the job through the front door. 
 Remind you of anybody?

--------------------------------------------------
 The above is copyright material. You want to use it,
 ask. You want to make money off it, gimme some first.
 I'll let you know if it's enough. You want to steal it,
 I'll sic my lawyer Yoshi 'The Proctologist' Rasmussen
 on you baby. He'll teriyaki your sorry butt and turn
 it into Lutefisk.
~--------------------------------------------------
 MAIL:    tofoggymoment@yahoo.com
 ARCHIVE: http://www.geocities.com/tofoggymoment
--------------------------------------------------