ONCE MORE INTO THE BRIEF, DEAR FRIENDS…

News In Brief:

• An Evansville, Indiana man is in serious condition after being shot by Secret Service agents after the man fired several shots outside the White House. Conservatives immediately went into a night-long conference to figure out a way that the attack could be blamed on Bill Clinton. "This was really our last chance to get him," said a glum Larry Kleyman, founder of the group Judicial Watch, which has filed numerous lawsuits against Bill and Hillary Clinton. "We thought maybe we could get him jailed for the trashing of the White House offices," added conservative columnist Ann Coulter, "but George W. Bush stabbed us in the back by not calling for an investigation. God, I just hate Bill Clinton SO MUCH!" At that point, Coulter broke down in tears and had to be led away by Kleyman, who was also weeping uncontrollably.

• Clinton-haters were given new hope, however, by an announcement from Senator Arlen Specter, who announced that the recent flap over the pardon of fugitive financier Marc Rich could lead to another impeachment of former President Clinton. Specter said that his legal research led him to believe a former president ``technically could still be impeached.'' Specter is also expected to call for further prosecutions of former Presidents. "That SOB Grant has escaped justice too long," vowed Specter.

• Meanwhile, former President Clinton, stung by criticism of his plans to open a taxpayer-funded personal office in a pricey New York office building, decided to relocate to cheaper office space in Harlem. The new office will be located in a 14 story office building on 125th street and will be the home of Clinton’s new rap record label, to be known as Bubba Boy Records. "Yo," Clinton said in a press conference, "All that drama about the Manhattan crib was just wack, y’know what I’m sayin’? Right now, I’m chillin’ in the new crib, dog. Word up." Harlem community leaders who had originally welcomed the Clinton move issued a one-sentence press release, saying only "There goes the neighborhood."

• On February 7, White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card appeared before the White House Press Corps and stated that the White House would be closing its Office of National AIDS Policy and the Office on the President's Initiative for One America, both established during the Clinton Administration. Less than an hour later, Card announced that he had been incorrect and vowed that the offices would remain open. Card also issued several other corrections, such as: Card is not actually Chief of Staff, but is instead the Secretary of Transportation; Dick Cheney’s real first name is "Fred", and there really is no such person as Donald Rumsfeld.

• The Vatican has announced that it is considering naming St. Isidore of Seville as the Patron Saint of the Internet. Isidore was nominated two years ago, but his patronage has not been officially confirmed. Vatican sources cited Isidore’s love of learning, his encyclopedic knowledge, and his habit of mailing thousands of identical parchments filled with blonde jokes to his friends.

• President Bush has announced an immediate and significant increase in military pay. "After all," the President noted, "how much can it cost to give one guy a raise?" Later White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card announced that the pay raises would not be given after it was explained to Bush that the Army’s new slogan "An Army of One" did not mean that there would only be one soldier to pay.

• In other defense news, President Bush announced a new, scaled-down version of his proposed anti-missile defense system which Bush said would not violate the 1972 ABM treaty. The new system would require the hiring of five thousand twelve-year-olds who would stand on the coast of the Continental United States and try to knock incoming missiles out of the air with slingshots. "It would have exactly the same amount of effectiveness as the systems we’ve been testing at half the cost," Bush promised. Bush was expected to use the savings for a speech therapist to teach him how to pronounce the word "nuclear."

COPYRIGHT 2001 BY JERRY D. RHOADES, JR.