YOU'VE GOTTA DO BETTER THAN THAT, HUGO

All this outrage over Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez calling George W. Bush a "devil" at the United Nations is just a bit much. Doesn't anybody remember the following exchange between Dwight Eisenhower and Charles de Gaulle at the 1958 NATO conference in Brussels?

Eisenhower: "You, sir, are nothing more than an enormous, baguette-eating poopy-head! I can hardly see you through all the flies."

de Gaulle: "Mon dieu, how can I take seriously the ramblings of a certified fart-box such as yourself? May bumblebees suck foul nectar from your nipples until you curse your mother's oversized underpants!"

Yes, there was a time when world leaders really knew something about trading insults. We'll see you on the Amateur Hour, Hugo.

HELP ME DO THE RIGHT THING

This morning, as I walked across the university campus where I teach, a female student was striding in front of me. She was wearing a tight pair of gym shorts with the word "CHEER!" emblazoned in big letters across her backside.

I'm never sure of what passes for proper etiquette in these situations. Am I supposed to shout:

"GIMME AN A!

GIMME AN S!

GIMME ANOTHER S!

WHADDYA GOT.....?"

Or would that have been considered out of line? I could really use some help with this, in case I see her again tomorrow. Thanks.

TURNING THE CORNER IN IRAQ

According to an Associated Press story that appeared in the New York Times on Friday, an end to the violence in Iraq is, at long last, in sight. Researchers at the Senseless Slaughter Census Center in Chicago ("You kill 'em, We count 'em") project that, by the end of 2007, the hostilities between Shi'ites and Sunnis will have killed off virtually everyone in this troubled nation. In the words of Senior Analyst Winston Feckner, "there just isn't going to be anyone left to strap a suicide bomb to. The most likely scenario is that the government will be taken over by sand crabs that have migrated from the Iraqi desert into Baghdad."

Not surprisingly, the Bush Administration welcomed the news. "We can work with sand crabs," Vice President Dick Cheney said during a speech at a fundraiser. "And the ones we can't work with, we'll eat."

YOUR TAX DOLLARS AT WORK

A story in the September 5th edition of the New Haven Register reports that "Pudgy toddlers face a good chance of becoming overweight 12-year-olds, according to government research."

The same study also found that puppies frequently grow up to be dogs, and kittens almost always turn into cats if they live long enough.

THE ANTILLES: KILLING THEM SOFTLY

In a news story this morning on tropical storms, the reporter referred to the "Greater Antilles" and the "Lesser Antilles." I hope I am not alone in finding this language extremely offensive. Can you imagine the impact of such terms on impressionable youth growing up in Lesser Antilles? The message is clear: unless you leave the island of your birth, you will always be second best. No wonder the U.S. has major problems with illegal immigration. People want to live in a place whose name doesn't give them an inferiority complex. (Residents of Smuggler's Crotch, Arkansas, you have my sympathy.)

My modest proposal: the Greater Antilles should be renamed the "Really Good Antilles," and the Lesser Antilles should be known as the "Just As Good Antilles."

Please write your state representative in the United Nations. The children of the Caribbean are depending on us.