Jim Cook: Check for the Laid in the USA label

Instead of going to the trouble of writing a longwinded, boring column about government silliness, my kid or scatalogical material this week I’ve decided to write five short columnettes.

Think of them as the Japanese automaker version of my column: smaller and more efficient.

Why the change of format, you may ask? Emotional instability brought about by my contraction of Bendii Syndrome, a very real illness afflicting famous Vulcans such as Sarek, has left me unable to focus on just one topic.

Here we go:

Meet the new boss, same as the old boss: Dothan will elect a new mayor this month, and if things follow their usual course, the new mayor will be greeted as a messiah.

Then he’ll make a decision.

After that about half the town will think he’s the devil incarnate and a possible Yankees fan until the next election.

Democracy, ain’t it great.

Tube boobs: Broadcast television stations around the country are reporting viewer losses after the switch from analog to digital signals. This is despite the fact that the switch was advertised in about a million commercials over the past two years, and all folks had to do to accomodate the change was to buy a frickin’ antenna.

For anyone who didn’t pick up an antenna already, I suggest that you not get one, as television already appears to have already rotted your brain enough as is. Read a book. One without pictures. Please.

Check for the Laid in the USA label: South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford’s revelations about an Argentinan lover have rocked the political world in that state, leading to calls for him to resign from politicos concerned about family values and Sanford’s use of state funds to visit her.

I think they’re missing the real issue here: outsourcing.

How are America’s homewreckers supposed to compete with cheap foreign labor who will ruin the careers and lives of America’s elite for a fraction of the cost it takes to employ the services of an American golddigger?

Celebrity deathmatch: Farrah Fawcett, Michael Jackson, Karl Malden, Billy Mays. The celebs have been dropping like flies over the past few days, leading the more paranoid (or aware, as I like to call it) among us to suspect a possible
conspiracy.

So, who’s behind this, you may ask. Who benefits?

Easy. Newspapers. A dead celebrity will sell a lot of newspapers, and let’s face it, not much else is doing that these days.
So, while reporters would never do something as unethical as shoot a celebrity with a blowdart tipped with curare during an interview. ... Oh, hell, of course we would.

Watch your back, Miley.

Does this mean no Russian Roulette either? As if living in Russia wasn’t bad enough already, the country just banned gambling, shutting all its casinos and gaming halls. According to sources, this has put a big damper in developer Ronnivich Gillichev’s plan to build a development called Communist Crossings, as investors Borat, Boris Badinov and Sean Connery have all pulled out of the project.

Russian leader Vladimir Putin can expect an angry call from Joey on this one, rest assured.

Don’t cry for me Miss Argentina. But do send candid photos if you’ve got ’em to .