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Turtle Party slow to
react to Lite column

"Oh Charles I saw your gazette. I was on 97.1 and within the first five minutes I caused numerous traffic fratalities when I was questioned on the Dave or Danny Glover Show in Saint Louis. Sean Hannity blocked my second interview because he felt I was threatening the Bush candidacy."

I received that cryptic missive recently and the scary thing is, I understood it.

It came from presidential candidate Larry J. "Scooterball" Schuetter, founder of the Turtle Party. Scooterball apparently only recently got around to reading a Honolulu Lite column I wrote last year about fringe political parties like the National Barking Spider Resurgence Party and the Turtle Party.

In case you missed it, Scooterball lost the election by only a narrow landslide. In his note, he's blaming his loss on Fox commentator Sean Hannity, which, I have no reason to believe is not true.

I also believe he could have caused "numerous traffic fratalities," although I've never actually seen a "fratality."

The Turtle Party has a massively detailed platform that includes no taxation, raising the minimum wage and the "abolition of ending abortion practices" and providing emergency contraceptive pills for "students who have unplanned sexual activities." Surprisingly, the Turtle Party platform says absolutely nothing about turtles.

Anyway, would-be President Scooterball wanted you all to know that he loves Hawaii.

Now the news ...

Flaming dung a danger

LONGMONT, Colo. (AP) » Authorities are considering charges against Forest Service workers for a large forest fire ignited after gusty winds spread flaming cow dung.

The workers were conducting a "controlled burn" when the cow dung alit and became aloft, spreading the blaze out of the controlled area.

(Shouldn't the cows get some of the blame for the fire?)

This meal a nail-biter

SAN JOSE, Calif. (AP) » A diner bit into a segment of a human finger while digging into a bowl of chili at a Wendy's restaurant, health officials say.

The San Francisco Chronicle reports that the woman spit out the well-cooked digit and warned others to stop eating.

Inspectors believe the finger had been torn off, possibly by manufacturing machinery.

(Anyone making a joke using the term "finger food" will be prosecuted to the full extent of the law.)

Ants will dig the heat

NEW SCIENTIST.COM » Global warming may lead to swarming invasions of tiny ants, a new study shows.

The study by the University of Oklahoma of 665 ant colonies in environments ranging from rain forests to frozen tundra suggests that in warmer environments, ants shrink in size and boom in population.

(Happily for the ants, global warming also leads to more picnics.)

Honolulu Lite on Sunday

Just exactly when did little paper bags with string handles begin to take over the planet?

Quote Me On This:

"The softer the currency in a foreign country, the harder the toilet paper." -- John Fountain