4/23
'Fun in Parks' Bill Worries Local Officials
Fun is euphemism for "whoopee" say some, but others say measure lets cities, counties decide whether to allow armed recreation in city & county parks

From APB reports. KNOXVILLE, Tenn. Local officials are decrying a bill in the state legislature that they say would allow people to have "fun" in Knoxville or Knox County parks - and they say they'll fight to ban fun in local parks even if the bill passes.

Joe Walsh, the city of Knoxville's parks and recreation director, and Don Henley, the county's parks chief, cited many of the same reasons for opposing the bill.

"Look, I was in the Eagles for many years," Walsh said. "I know what people really mean when they say 'Hey man, let's have a little fun.' It's all sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll. Everybody was making whoopee. Then we had confrontations all the time between players, parents and groupies. Things can escalate. It only exacerbates it when you give people a license for fun."

Walsh, who lobbied state legislators last year to oppose the idea, said if the current bill is approved, he plans to push for a new city ordinance outlawing fun in all Knoxville parks.

In a letter to Sen. Tim Burchett, R-Knoxville, approved by Mayor Mike Ragsdale, Henley said he is "very much in favor of fun, frolic and making whoopee."

However, Henley continued, "as manager of one of the largest park systems in the state, I see this legislation making our parks fraught with peril for citizens...


4/22
County Commission Saves Citizens from "Information Overload"
Heroic Intergovernmental Committee defeats Commissioner Broyles' evil scheme to drown Knox Countians with commission minutiae

From APB reports. KNOXVILLE, Tenn. In its Intergovernmental Committee of Justice meeting yesterday, Knox County Commission came to the rescue of citizens who might bombarded with "too much information" from county government.

Cruelly, Commissioner Amy Broyles wanted to post the minutes of all county committees on the commission Web site. It would have applied to Finance, Intergovernmental, Ethics, Audit, the Board of Zoning Appeals, Beer Board and the Vehicle Fleet committees.

"I want to make government more accessible, more accountable and more transparent by forcing citizens to have access to all of the same information that we have to wade through," Broyles declared. "I want them to feel the same rising panic I do when the data dam bursts and I feel my brain slowly drowning in the knowledge flood. I want their tiny minds overwhelmed, just as ours are. I want them to FEEL - OUR - PAIN!"

"How can you be so fiendish to make such a diabolical proposal?" protested Commissioner Sam McKenzie. "Are you some kind of arch-fiend super-villain that you can be so unfeeling? Even Lex Luthor wasn't so vicious. With our meetings on cable access and our online Spat Room and our committee minutes available upon request, citizens are bombarded with us 24/7 if they want to be. We are already 'transparent' enough. If we're any more transparent, the citizens will see that the emperor has no clothes. And believe me, nobody, but nobody, wants to see that. It'll boil their eyeballs in their sockets."

"Exactly, that's the beauty of my evil scheme!" crowed Broyles. "When citizens are overexposed to all our meetings and committees and forums and minutes and workshops and task forces and press conferences, and they see with their naked eyes our petty squabbles and tussles and foofaraws and whoop-te-dos, then...


4/19
Knox County's Girth Fest
County celebrates Earth Day with excess, waste

From APB reports. KNOXVILLE, Tenn. Too ravenous to wait for the official date, on Saturday Knox County agencies, businesses and community members celebrated Earth Day four days early in a orgy of consumerism and trash disposal.

April 22 was first set aside as Earth Day in 1970 to recognize the nationwide environmental movement. Near the end of the Clinton presidency, however, as waistlines expanded, consumer debt grew and landfills mounted in Knox County, county leaders acknowledged that Earth Day would never be a hit in East Tennessee. With that in mind, Knox County's Girth Day was initiated to herald Knox County's disposable lifestyle and high rates of obesity, diabetes and arterial disease.

"With more fast food restaurants per capita than houses and more trash production than job production, Knox County embraces its role as a McFood Mecca," said Knox County Mayor Mike Ragsdale at a ceremony marking the Knox County Girth Fest's 10th anniversary. "We are truly the consumerist capital of the world, the Caesar's of McCow Palaces. If you've a yen to shop, don't worry - a developer will bring the strip mall to your home. If you're hungry, just wait a minute. Someone will build a fast-food joint on you."

"I think we've made our citizens more environmentally aware of their carbon footprint," said Jan Humus, city of Knoxville solid waste promotions manager and co-chair of Girth Fest. "And with all the funnel cakes, alligators on a stick and all the other fried foods eaten at the Dogwood Arts Festival and all the trash tossed down after the Orange and White Game today, that footprint's only gonna grow. Knox County's gonna need a bigger pair of Earth shoes after all the consumption today."

Girth Fest's first year in West Knox County's Concord Park drew about 3,000 people, who consumed about twice their weight in fried food - or roughly 1.5 million pounds. This year Humus estimated that more than 10,000 people celebrating Girth Day would consume about four times their weight in fried food, and possibly still be hungry enough to scour the surrounding wooded hillsides and strip it of all consumables.

Girth Day's more than 100 sponsors and vendors were both pleased and wary of Girth Day patrons' boundless appetite for consumption.

"Yes, we're pleased as punch that the people are here buying our new all-beef pancakes," said "Flap" Jack Tarr, owner of Flappin' Jacks, a fast-food franchise that sells a variety of burgers on a patented syrup-injected pancake-style bun. "Our Jalapeño Hot Cakes are selling like...

"Snark Bites" 04/12-18

4/17
UT Vols to Scrimmage Knox County Officials
Exhibition match will replace traditional Orange & White game, raise funds for TIF project

From APB reports. KNOXVILLE, Tenn. The UT Vols' traditional Orange & White Game will not be held tomorrow, it was announced today. Instead, Knox County government officials will play an exhibition match against the University of Tennessee Volunteers football team.

Tickets will be scalped at the gates, and proceeds will help fund a Tax Increment Financing (TIF) project for a local blighted developer. Dwight Van de Vate, chief of staff for County Mayor Mike Ragsdale, said it would be a "great opportunity for Knox Countians to see county officials display good sportsmanship, because folks don't get many chances to see that in our government."

Mayor Ragsdale, acting as coach for Knox County, will lead a group of county officials and members of the Knox County Commission against new UT Coach Lane Kiffin's first Volunteer football team. Ragsdale said he thought the county had a "realistic shot" of winning the game.

"I realize they're football players and we're not, but we have a few trick plays up our jersey sleeves," said Coach Mayor Mike Ragsdale. "We've perfected our 'stonewall' defense during all the scrutiny my office has undergone. I'm an old hand at the old 'duck-and-cover' play, and several of our commissioners are masters of the 'pass-the-buck.' And everybody in county government knows the old fumblerooski. So, you know, I don't want to give them any scoreboard material, but we're a veteran team and I think we can put a few goalposts up on them."

One county official who's raising expectations as high as new property appraisals is County Property Assessor Phil Ballard. Ragsdale, however, was clearly seeking to prevent his rising star from getting a swelled head.

"Phil's doing OK," commented Ragsdale. "He's developed a knack for doing the old end-around. Now, we just have to teach him to do against the other team as well as he does it on citizens."

UT Coach Lane Kiffin explained that the scrimmage was an important lesson for his players...


4/16
Protesters 'Angry About Incompetence, Incumbents, Excess and Everything!!! (AAiiEE!!)'
Local "Protesters Without A Cause" join national "AAiiEE!!" movement

From APB reports. KNOXVILLE, Tenn. In a show of discontent with government incompetence as represented by TVA's coal-ash spill and Rep. Stacey Campfield's antics, a crowd Knoxville police estimated to top 1,700 people gathered on Market Square and dumped toy campers in the TVA fountains as part of a national "Angry About Incompetence, Incumbents, Excess and Everything!!! (AAiiEE!!!)" demonstration.

The local affiliate of AAiiEE!!!, who call themselves Protesters Without A Cause, Knox Ensemble (P-WACK-E), dumped the toy campers in the TVA fountains to "protest government waste and incompetence as personified in the extreme locally by TVA management and Stacey Campfield," said P-WACK-E spokesperson and organizer Kewl Tuffingdome. Curiously, Tuffingdome also said she lived in Campfield's district and voted for him often.

"Oh my, yes, I've voted for Stacey in every one of the previous elections he's been in - however many that's been now, 22, 23?" explained Tuffingdome. "He's such a nice young man, always knocking on my door, begging for my vote. Utterly incompetent - but so very nice."

Asked why she voted for Campfield if he was incompetent, Tuffingdome replied, "Why, it's important to have incompetents in office so we can hold these protests. Stacey is a symbol of incompetence we can really rally 'round. The truth is, a whole lot of us P-WACK-Ers voted for the boy. We vote him in, and then complain about the way government is run and then burn him in effigy. It gives us something to do."

Campfield had good-naturedly promised to take part in a dunking booth at the protest. He did appear briefly, but was spotted by process servers who are trying to serve him with a summons to Knox County General Sessions Court to answer charges by Meredith Leahy, a former tenant of an apartment in a house Campfield owns at 1122 Stewart St.

Leahy is suing Campfield for not returning her $585 deposit, plus the court's $102 filing fee and court costs, records show. Leahy alleges that Campfield refused to inspect the premises after she cleaned it to move out before her lease expired on July 31, 2008, and he has avoided talking to her ever since, so she filed suit to get her deposit back.

The process servers almost caught Campfield as he clambered into the dunking booth, but he saw them, splashed water on their summons to make them illegible, then made a dramatic dash across the World's Fair Park with the servers close on his heels, as the assembled throngs wildly cheered him on.

Campfield was last seen swimming upstream in the Tennessee River, his pursuers having given up the chase at the shore...


4/15
Group Wants Knox County Commission to Go Forward Backwards
"Going back to the way we were is the only way we can move forward," says spokesperson for group fighting commission downsizing

From APB reports. KNOXVILLE, Tenn. A group trying to reverse last fall's vote that reduced the size of the Knox County Commission filed a motion Monday afternoon asking Chancellor Mike Moyers to build a time machine and travel back in time and revisit their lawsuit, which he tossed out last month.

Moyers dismissed the case March 9, saying none of the plaintiffs had the legal standing to make the time-travel request, and besides, time journeys always end badly anyway.

County Commissioner Dave C. Wright, who represents East and North Knox County's 8th District, was among the plaintiffs. Other plaintiffs were Charles Drew, D. H. Andrew, Dustin Corum, Lee R. Johnson, Patti Walker, Carson Dailey, Marvin Marvin, and attorney Marty McFly.

The lawsuit, filed in November, seeks to fight entrenched nepotism, cronyism, favoritism and factionalism by targeting the Knox County Election Commission's certification of the Orange Petition, which led to a measure on last fall's ballot to reduce the number of county commissioners from 19 to 11, establishes anti-nepotism and conflict-of-interest policies and prohibits county employees from serving on the County Commission.

Voters narrowly approved the measure. The plaintiffs argued that, despite appearing to be aligned with their concerns, the anti-nepotism, cronyism, favoritism and factionalism amendment that passed was, in reality, a cleverly disguised tool of Knox County's behind-the-scenes powerbrokers, and was actually designed to help them maintain their power hold.

"Doc, you gotta believe me," explained Marty McFly, attorney for the Anti-Now Nine. "The group that used subterfuge to get this motion on the ballot is trying to maintain the behind-the-scenes power of Knox County's current Powers That Be."

"TPTB - that means The Powers That Be, if you didn't catch that - are trying to maintain their power by changing the status quo in order to maintain the status quo," added the Anti-Now Nine spokesperson Marvin Marvin. "They are very clever that way. But we are trying to break the power of TPTB. And since TPTB are trying to maintain the status quo by changing it, we are fighting to change the status quo by keeping it the same. The only course is for Knox County to go forward by going back. Going back to the way we were is the only way we can move forward..."


The Dogwood Snark Festival Is Underway!
Festival offers "Dogwoods gone wild!" in startling new direction for staid celebration

From APB reports. KNOXVILLE, Tenn. Call it a midlife crisis. Or maybe it's just a case of changing with the times. However you characterize it, as it approaches its 50th anniversary next year, the Dogwood Arts Festival is branching off in shocking new directions.

Lisa Duncan, who became executive director last June, said she is promoting a broader vision that combines kitsch, pop culture and food.

"We want Knoxville to be an arts destination city, but we did a survey last year and the only thing people ever seem to remember about Dogwood Arts is funnel cakes and artsy-craftsy-kitschy trinkets," she said. "So we are embracing what's memorable: Next year, we'll be renaming ourselves the Funnel Cake Arts Festival. But this year, we're throwing open the rest of the event to experimentation. Call it 'Dogwoods gone wild!'"

Duncan said that, despite the name remaining "Dogwood Arts Festival" this year, the organizers want to begin transitioning from dogwoods to funnel cakes in 2009.

"We want to honor our history and tradition with the dogwoods, so this year we are introducing Woody, the Dogwood Dog," explained Duncan. "The Woodies are little robot dogs that will guide visitors to different events and bark brief descriptions of each event. They will stay with us in the new Funnel Cake Arts Festival next year, and I'm sure people are going to love them."

However, robot dogwood dogs aren't the only way the festival will mark its heritage.

"We want to begin phasing in the funnel-cake emphasis this year," said Duncan. "Since funnel cakes are already such a fixture of the festival, it only seemed natural to find a way to combine the cakes and the dogwoods. So this year, the Dogwoods Trails will all feature funnel-cake shaped dogwoods. It's amazing what you can do with topiary..."

"Snark Bites" 04/05-11/09

4/11
Knox 2010 Budget Scandal-Free So Far
Mayor touts audacious "no-new-outrages" budget for 2010

From APB reports. KNOXVILLE, Tenn. Knox County Mayor Mike Ragsdale aims to present a no-new-outrages budget for the 2010 fiscal year, even if property tax rates don't appear to be cooperating with that goal.

"That decision is the mayor's," Financial Scandal Director John Troyer said. "His instruction to me is to develop a budget at the same scandal rate as 2009. My role is to balance the boo-boo budget for 2010 using only the blunders from 2009 - which is quite a challenge, because I have no control over bungling in other county departments."

Troyer, who is working to put the scandal budget together for the mayor's April 28 presentation, said scandals are down about 5 percent, but property appraisal outrage has increased 35 percent over last year. Property appraisals easily make up a generous portion of the scandal budget when citizen outrage about them boils over.

"Citizen outrage at property appraisals is a very dependable scandal-generator," explained Troyer. "It's always simmering, but when property appraisals go up while everything else is going down, then we can count on that outrage to make up for any shortcomings we might have in our own office's outrage output or peccadillo production."

At the same time, the Knox County economy is faring better during the economic recession than many other Tennessee counties because of several "large, government-funded, tax-wasting employers," including the University of Tennessee, the Tennessee Valley Authority, the State of Tennessee and Knox County government...



4/8
Commissioner Wants County Take-Home Vehicles for All
Proposal aims to shame those currently using county cars into giving them up

From APB reports. KNOXVILLE, Tenn. Some 56 county mayoral and sheriff's employees, including many top-level administrators, would be shamed into giving up their county take-home vehicles under a proposal by Commissioner Mark Harmon to be presented at the April 27 commission meeting.

Harmon said he doesn't have a "good grasp of how much shame this proposal will generate yet, but it will be substantial." He said he expects to calculate the shaming total in time for the commission meeting.

Harmon is chairman of a task force that has been examining the use of shame and public humiliation for county officials who indulge in outrageous excess. Information provided to the task force by county departments shows at least 3,013 outrageous officials. The task force also found 516 take-home vehicles in total, including 136 in general county government and 380 in the sheriff's office, which mostly includes cars driven by patrol officers.

His motivation, Harmon said, is "to build the esteem of the average county worker and to bring us more in line with what other local governments do in terms of take-home-vehicle prestige by giving all employees county cars..."


4/5
Briggs Proposal Would Put County Under C.O.N.T.R.O.L.
Plan would use original 'Get Smart!' TV series' agency, not Steve Carrell's tepid 2008 movie remake

From APB reports. KNOXVILLE, Tenn. Control of Knox County government would fall under the auspices of C.O.N.T.R.O.L., the spy agency from the Get Smart! TV show, if a county commission proposal gets traction that would wrest control of independently elected fee offices away from C.O.N.T.R.O.L.'s nemesis, KAOS.

Legislation proposed by Commissioner Colonel Doctor Richard "Maxwell" Briggs, M.D., begins working its way through commission this month. Briggs argues that county government as it currently operates is dysfunctional and "would you believe that placing it under C.O.N.T.R.O.L.'s control would either make it work better or put the 'fun' in 'dysfunctional?'"

Briggs argues that having C.O.N.T.R.O.L. authorize payroll, staffing levels, salaries, contracts, warrants, wire taps, electronic surveillance, phone shoes, nude bombs and other functions historically controlled by individual officeholders would take the element of KAOS out of the budget.

County Law Director "Mr. Big" Bill Lockett, however, has said Briggs' proposal is built on faulty understanding of the dynamics of comedy and drama.

"What Commissioner Colonel Doctor Agent Richard 'Maxwell' Briggs, M.D., fails to understand is that you must have both C.O.N.T.R.O.L. and KAOS for things to be interesting," explained Lockett. "If everything is under one central office, then there's no tension, no conflict, and that's boring. Besides, you've got to give the people what they want, and in the last election, they said they wanted KAOS and C.O.N.T.R.O.L. in county government - a balance of sorts. It's like a Zen thing, a yin-yang thing. Maxwell Brigg's got a yen for yang, but with yang must go yin, or else you're doing an end run around the will of the people."

"The old zen-thing-yen-for-yang-but-you-gotta-have-yin-yang-end-run-around-the-will-of-the-people-double-talk trick, eh?" replied Briggs. "I've almost fallen for that before, but not this time, fella."

Speaking from the Cone of Silence, Dwight Van de Vate, Mayor Mike Ragsdale's chief administrative henchman, said,

".....................................raise the danged cone, Mr. Mayor? There! As I started to say, the fate of the free world, or at least the United States, or maybe the citizens of Knox County, or, at any rate, the fate of our next budget rests with Maxwell Briggs' plan."

Asked if his senior staff is currently in serious discussions to prepare the fiscal 2010 budget, which will be presented April 28 and which the commission must approve by June 30, Mayor Ragsdale said, "What? What? I can't hear you..."

"Snark Bites" 03/29-04/04

04/03
Black Hole, White Elephant Gobble City, County Budgets
Convention center, Minvilla Manor: ravenous devourers of public funds

From APB reports. KNOXVILLE, Tenn. Two projects much doted upon by local government officials appear to be eating their governments out of house and home - and political capital. The Knoxville Convention Center white elephant, the pet of Mayor Bill Haslam's father, "Big" Jim Haslam, will require additional public feedings this year. And black hole has been discovered at the heart of Minvilla Manor, the pet project of Volunteer Ministries and the 10-Year Plan to Fund Chronic Homelessness, and a favorite of Mayors Haslam and Ragsdale.

A black hole develops when too much matter, usually in the form of cash and investments, gets concentrated in one project and becomes so dense that a gravity sink, also known as a money pit, cash drain, boondoggle or black hole, is formed.

Black holes can suck up all available funding and put such a strain on government resources and energy, that government officials wear themselves out dumping funds into the monstrous, money-sucking boondoggle. If not checked, black holes can grow to consume nearby properties, neighborhoods and even entire political futures...



04/02
Commission May Hold Sing-Off for Seat Reduction
Commissioners could adapt Marvin Gaye songs to decide who stays and who goes

From APB reports. KNOXVILLE, Tenn. While the Knox County Redistricting Committee was approving guidelines for redrawing district lines yesterday, an ad-hoc committee of Knox County Commissioners discussed proposals to determine which seats will be eliminated in the coming reduction of the commission chairs from 19 to 11. Commissioner Mark Harmon suggested the method that drew the most interest: Adapting Marvin Gaye songs, singing them before a live audience at the next commission meeting and deciding by audience reaction who keeps their seat.

"Marvin Gaye did several songs that seem well-suited to this occasion," said Harmon. "'What's Going On,' 'Mercy, Mercy Me' and 'I Heard It through the Grapevine,' just to name a few. Each of us could choose one, change the lyrics to fit the context, sing it for the audience, and whoever gets the most applause, their chair is retained and whoever gets the least is eliminated."

"Why not just choose one song and whoever does the best rendition, their seat stays?" recommended Commissioner Paul Pinkston.

"The same song 19 times? Don't be silly!" retorted Harmon.

"Well, why not?" persisted Pinkston.

"Because who wants to hear the same song 19 times," interjected Commissioner Amy Broyles. "The audience would get tired, and whoever sang the last 8 times would be the losers, obviously. I mean, by the time you got to the 19th, the audience would have a nervous breakdown."

Mayor Mike Ragsdale, who attended the meeting at the courtesy of the commissioners, offered a different concept.

"Couldn't you make it Lou Rawls songs?" pleaded the mayor. "I do a killer version of 'You'll Never Find.'"

He then sucked in his breath and intoned in a somewhat thin tenor,

I'll never find, as long as I live,
Someone who loves me tender like I do.
I'll never find, no matter where I search,
Someone who cares about me the way I do...


04/01
County Toots Horn for 'National County Government' Week
Knox to promote week of "good government awareness," May 3-9

From APB reports. KNOXVILLE, Tenn. Knox County is tooting its horn over its role in "National County Government" Week, May 3-9 - and county officials say they want you to do the same.

At a press conference this morning, Dwight Van de Vate, Knox County Mayor Mike Ragsdale's chief of staff, said, "We're so excited about announcing Knox County's participation in National County Government Week, we want to toot our horns about it! We'll be tooting on plastic kazoos and cardboard noisemakers at noon today, and we want the citizens of Knox County to join us! At lunchtime today, if you're in your vehicle, honk your horn in honor of your favorite county official or employee."

Knox County has teamed in a special cooperative effort with the Knoxville Tourism & Sports Corp., to promote the week. "Toot Knox County's Horn" will be the promotional slogan, said KTSC President Gloria Ray, and giant kazoos will be installed around the county, which, when tooted upon, will play a "fun-filled phrase that says something interesting and useful about Knox County."

"We're sure they'll be an enormous hit," said Ray. "And they were a steal at only $5,000 to $17,000 each..."


03/30
Lambert Threatens to Talk Commission to Death
Escalation of censorship flap may engulf entire commission in confabulation conflagration

From APB reports. KNOXVILLE, Tenn. In a growing war of words that threatens to plunge Knox County's legislative body into palavering pandemonium, Commissioner Greg "Lumpy" Lambert has accused fellow Commissioner Colonel Doctor Richard M. Briggs, M.D., of politically correct motivations in his efforts to censor Lambert for an incident at the March 23 County Commission meeting. And Lambert has warned that he will not be silenced - that he will, in fact, "talk Knox County Commission to death" to preserve the idea of freedom of speech.

"My vocals cords are my strongest firepower, my mouth my most potent cannon and my tongue my most explosive missile in the never-ending battle to keep the right to insult and intimidate people at commission meetings open to all," explained Lambert. "I won't take this lying down. I'll take it sitting down and talking, the way I usually do."

Lambert referred to talk that Briggs, a heart surgeon, wants to run for county mayor.

"And to do that, he thinks you have to be a yellow-bellied, chicken-livered, skunk-striped, fraidy-cattish, 'politically correct' jellyfish,'' said Lambert. " You have to be all nice and sweet and kissy-faced and never say the tough things people don't want to hear, which is why he wants to silence me, because what I say, people don't want to hear..."

Old "Snarls" or "Yikes!" column - Constitutionally Protected Cliches

I am not sure when this was published. I'm thinking it may have been from just before "Snarls" started, which was in 2000, I believe. So "Constitutional Cliches" may have been one of the last "Yikes!" I did, except for a couple under the pseudonym "V. Lorne Hopps."

But "Cliches" is one of those I think never made it on line until now. Of course, since Metro Pulse deleted its archives, most of the ones that were on line prior to 2004 aren't anymore, so I may start trying to find them and post them just for the halibut.

Constitutionally Protected Cliches
To save us from ourselves, PCers want freedom of speech to become a thing of the past

by
Scott McNutt

The early bird may get the worm, but I've never been one for early to bed, early to rise. Of course, not even my mother would claim I am healthy or wealthy, least of all wise. Anyway, I've always preferred just to tie one on, burn the candle at both ends, and let the cards fall where they may. Even if I wake up hitched to a girl who got beat with an ugly stick.

You're probably asking, "Scott, What gives? You've become a walking cliche! Have you lost your marbles?"

I'll shoot straight with you: I'm playing possum. If I'm crazy, I'm crazy like a fox. I've seen the wave of the future, and the rising political tide will lift all boats and swamp them. So nobody better rock the boat anymore, because common sense has crawled under a rock, and only the politically correct are left to rock our cradle of liberty.

To PCers (pronounced "peckers"), the constitutional idea that each of us must protect the other's freedom of speech is like setting the fox to guard the chicken coop. Ironically, PCers believe they are the sentinels of liberty when they trample the Constitution under their heels. And no sense arguing once the PCers' minds are made up! Try to speak your piece publicly on some politically incorrect topic -- say, being anti-abortion: The PCers will shout you down by claiming you're the one yelling "Fire!" in a crowded theatre. They don't care that they're throwing the baby out with the fire hose water.

So we're all scared to death to break any political eggs in our omelet of democracy, because we fear getting our unjust desserts. Which means we all end up with egg on our faces, walking on eggshells down the primrose path of political correctness. Well, I'm no trailblazer. I'll follow the yellow-stained road. Lions and tigers and bears, like hell! I'll just speak softly and carry a big lawsuit.

Yeah, maybe folks who live in glass houses shouldn't throw stones, but everybody must get stoned. If they don't, these thin-skinned PCers are gonna have a cow, man. I mean, it's so easy to get their goat these days. Like shooting fish in a barrel. The PCers seem to have a monkey on their backs about everything. Always putting their high horse on a soapbox. Maybe if they'd just get off their pedestal and get drunk as a skunk, they wouldn't always act like they had a bug up their butts. But the tide of uncivil war has turned, and their ship came in on it. If you can't beat 'em, join 'em, I say. Anchors aweigh!

Surprised? Thought you knew me like your own brother, eh? Didn't believe I'd turn traitor on the Constitution? Beats turning the other cheek only to get poked in the eye with a sharp stick. Besides, everybody's doing it. And if you think that's a whopper, then somebody has been feeding you a hook, line, and sinker! This is no fish story I'm telling you.

Think you can still talk the straight talk? Well, remember, PCers have eyes in the backs of their heads, and even their ears have walls. So don't step on the wrong toes when you put your foot down. Even if your bark is worse than your bite, don't go spreading it around, because when you lie down with dogs, you may wake up with Big Brother listening to the flea in your ear. Better to let sleeping dogs hear no evil and speak no evil. And see no evil, either, because that may be Big Brother's fly on the wall.

With the PC police peeking through every keyhole, free speech's days are numbered. Don't buy that? Still standing by that old saw, "Give peace a chance"? Yeah, right. It'll have a snowjob's chance when hell freezes over. Put that in your pipedream and smoke it.

You may think tolerance is the cat's meow, but just try to live and let live; you'll wind up licking your wounds, because it's a dog-eat-dog world. And if you keep whistling past the graveyard, some loose cannon will get you with a shot in the dark. I'm telling you, right now using cliches is the only way to fly like an eagle that has landed. In other words, it's time to stand pat. Better to play it safe than sorry, because if you don't play, you can't win, even when the game is rigged. Catch my drift?

Maybe you think I'm trying to take you for a ride just to sell you down the river. Can't you see that's all water under the bridge we'll cross when we come to it? If you want, we can always burn the bridge later. For now, I'm just going with the flow of water over the dam. I'm not trying to rain on your parade. But when it's raining politically correct cats and dogs, we'll all drown like rats if we think we can just demand whatever floats our boats.

Let's play it smart and ride out this storm of uncivility. When the dove of peace guides the ship of state through the treacherous PC seas, and we're firmly anchored to sound Constitutional ground, and the sunshine of reason warms our hearts again, then we'll all eat pie in the sky over the rainbow of civil discourse.

Until then, we gotta keep up the act so the PCers will let down their guard. Sure, we look like chickens running around with our heads cut off. Let the PCers'll think we're cuckoo; they're counting their headless chickens before they hatch. Sure, we're crazy... like a fox left to guard the chicken coop!

Got a bone to pick with this piece? Blame Steve's Cliche List at http://www.phy.duke.edu/~stevel/cliches/cliche_list.html.*

*I'm pretty sure that link is long dead.