corrente

If you're feeling well enough by now to giggle without fear of your head falling off (I read this way too early this morning and the dang thing went rolling across the floor and the cats batted it under the couch) go read the whole thing. This is severely edited...but I gotta tell you, with Dave Berry taking off for a year, I think we need the author of this piece, one Lex Alexander, to get a syndication deal for the duration:

(via Raleigh NC News-Record)

Jan. 25: BECAUSE THAT WHOLE ERA WAS, LIKE, *TOTALLY* BORING, MAN: A proposed revision of Georgia’s 11th-grade American History curriculum deletes everything between 1800 and 1876, including the Alamo, the Trail of Tears and the Civil War.

Jan. 30: MAYBE BECAUSE DARWIN’S WORK WAS PUBLISHED BETWEEN 1800 AND 1876?: Georgia’s state schools superintendent proposes striking the word "evolution" from the science curriculum.

Feb. 23: BUT HOW DOES HE FEEL ABOUT EVOLUTION?: During a speech to the nation’s governors, Education Secretary Rod Paige calls the National Education Association "a terrorist organization."

April 26: MATH MUCH?: Fox News reports that the economy is improving because "14 states now have an unemployment rate that is lower than the national average."

April 28: I COULD TELL YOU, BUT THEN I’D HAVE TO SHOOT YOU: The American Civil Liberties Union reveals that it sued the FBI three weeks ago, challenging parts of the USA Patriot Act, but that it had been barred until today from disclosing the suit … because of provisions in the USA Patriot Act.

May 18: THEY’RE NOT DEAD, THEY’RE RESTING: Officials in Cameroon arrest a woman carrying 266 dead parrots of an endangered variety.

July 14: BECAUSE TWO PEOPLE OF THE SAME SEX GETTING MARRIED IS *EXACTLY* LIKE FLYING JETS INTO SKYSCRAPERS AND THE PENTAGON AND KILLING THOUSANDS OF PEOPLE: Sen. Rick Santorum, R-Pa., defends a proposed constitutional ban on gay marriage by saying, "Isn’t that the ultimate homeland security, standing up and defending marriage?"

July 29: ANOTHER UNFUNDED MANDATE: Bush campaign aide Susan Sheybani suggests that Americans unhappy with their jobs should find new ones or begin taking the antidepressant Prozac.

Sept. 19: SMOKING KILLS: A Cleveland man is beaten to death at a bar after refusing someone’s request for a cigarette, police say.

Sept. 28: TWO WORDS THAT SHOULD NEVER APPEAR IN THE SAME SENTENCE: "SCALIA" AND "ORGIES": Supreme Court justice Antonin Scalia claims in a Harvard speech that his personal views do not affect his legal rulings: "I even take the position that sexual orgies eliminate social tensions and ought to be encouraged."

Nov. 2: YOU WANT A HOOKER TO GO WITH THOSE MORAL VALUES?: Voters in Churchill County, Nevada, support George W. Bush’s re-election by 72 percent — and the continuation of legal brothels by 63 percent.

Dec. 9: BY "MUTUAL AFFECTION AND CONFIDENCE," THEY MEANT "RIFLES AND BULLWHIPS": Cary Christian School receives nationwide attention for using a pamphlet on American slavery that teaches that slavery "was a relationship based upon mutual affection and confidence."

Dec. 14: OK, MAYBE SMOKING DOESN’T KILL: A 105-year-old English woman who had smoked since age 15 is cremated with a pack of Benson & Hedges cigarettes in her hands after dying of natural causes unrelated to smoking.