Sardonika

Robot???

WASHINGTON, D.C. (SPINews) -- In a recent poll conducted by the Sardonika Policy Institute here, 38 percent of Americans said they believe President Obama is a robot created in Kenya.

The poll's results were not surprising, nor were these other truths that a third-to-half of the United States holds to be self-evident:  Global warming is caused by rap music, every night the sun drags itself into a Holiday Inn Express, and Nancy Pelosi is Eva Braun spelled backwards.

President Obama had no comment, but White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs, in yesterday's session with the media, said, "We wish to reassure all Americans the president is very human -- notably, he just got trounced shooting a game of H-O-R-S-E with Kobe."

New Airline Fees

 SARDONIKA (SPINews) -- On its website today, Sardonika Air has posted a list of new fees that will be added to domestic and international airline tickets.  

The airline cited the rising cost of jet fuel, routine fleet maintenance, and gross mismanagement and corruption.  

The fees are a last ditch effort to avoid going belly up and begin immediately:

• Carry-on pocket comb -- $10
• Seat back adjustments -- $5 per degree of incline
• One peanut -- $1
• Having a beer with disgruntled flight attendant -- $40
• Ear phones, right ear -- $15
• Ear phones, left ear -- $15
• Getting cursed out in grand style by disgruntled flight attendant -- $50 
• Restroom entry -- $2 per visit
• Restroom exit -- $100 per visit
• Captain's tip:  $50 or 10 percent, whichever is higher
• Going for a ride on an escape slide with disgruntled flight attendant -- $500
• Soft landing -- $1225 
• Soft landing in Hudson River -- $2,000

The King & Cranks

 SARDONIKA (SPINews) -- President Sarah Palin?  Baseball Without Borders?  Hotels Without Boarders? Who knows?  And that's exactly what the Sardonika Policy Institute wants to find out.

The nation's one and only think tank has announced it's fall lineup of in-depth $50 studies, starting with the political future of America's beauty-pageant presidential wannabe, Sarah "Mama Grizzly" Palin.

Other studies:  

• When newspapers fold, where will TV get its news?
• Why do fools fall in love?
• Elvis & American Idol:  Would he have won?  (Simon:  "Hey, what's with the lip curl?")
• Bull testosterone: Can it save the Democratic Party?
• Was Mark Twain right?  Do we go to heaven for the climate and hell for the company?
• Crows, ravens, blackbirds, jackdaws -- who cares?
• The Republican Party: Too much bull testosterone or too much bull?
• Does Google google itself?
• New al Qaida secret weapon:  Motel bedspreads
• Tarragon:  Is it overrated?
• Was PowerPoint invented by the Devil?
• New funding for American public schools:  Make kids pay for parking
• Why can't Barack Obama be as cuddly as Glenn Beck?

Prayer Answered

 GAINESVILLE, Fla. (SPINews) -- During the retreat by wacko right-wing, pistol-packing preacher Terry Jones from his International Burn A Koran Day bonfire, SPINews uncovered a transcript of his talk with The Almighty.

REVEREND TERRY JONES: It's a warning to a bunch of violent crazies. I don't get all the damn fuss. 

GOD:  Uh ...
 
REVEREND TERRY JONES: Any towelheads cause trouble in Eye-RACK or Afghanistan and our troops'll bomb their sorry asses back to the stone age, whenever that was.  
 
GOD:  Hold it --
 
REVEREND TERRY JONES:  And I don't want to hear from Barack Hussein Obama -- there's another  rag head.
 
GOD:  Wait --
 
REVEREND TERRY JONES: I don't understand why you're hanging me out here to dry.  

GOD:  If you'd just shut up --

REVEREND TERRY JONES:  Maybe I'll just burn a buncha Muslims !
 
GOD:  Maybe I'll  just turn you into a pig and you'll end up as link sausage in a supermarket in Tulsa.
 
REVEREND TERRY JONES:  (garbled)
 

Castro: Just Kidding!

HAVANA (SPINews) --- In a recent interview Cuba's ex-president Fidel Castro, seemed to admit that the nation's "economic model" no longer worked. A day later he said his words were taken out of context and misinterpreted.

SPINews got a follow-up audience with Castro and asked him to clarify his comments. 

"I was joshing," Mr. Castro told a SPINews reporter as they rode through the neighborhoods outside Havana in the back of his 1954 Chevy limo. "Cuba is a workers' paradise and our communist economy runs like a top --"

He was interrupted by a muffled explosion and the car lurched to a stop. "Caramba!" cried the driver."We are down to three cylinders!"

"People don't understand my sense of humor," Castro explained. "I'm long-winded. That reporter should have waited for the end of my story." 

Before dozing off, he sighed, "I wish this was a '57 Chevy.  Those babies were real sex machines."

Hiking back to Havana in search of a mechanic, the driver hustled trying to beat the nightly power outage. "His longest joke has lasted 51 years," he said.  "And he still hasn't come to the punchline." 

Then he grabbed the reporter's lapels and whispered, "But that's strictly off the record."

Presidential "State Visit"

SEATTLE (SPINews) -- President Ruttles landed here yesterday on what he thought was a state visit, and took the ferry to Squammish Island in Puget Sound where he spent the afternoon digging geoducks.

"I could have done this at home," the president grumbled.  "What happened to my state visit?"

What happened was the Sardinoka Presidential Palace got it wrong.  Instead of a state visit to Washington, D.C., President Ruttles had actually been invited to visit Washington state.  

The invite came from Sardonika's "sister island".

SPINews phoned the White House and was told it had no word on any such visit.  

"President who"? said Press Secretary Robert Gibbs.  "And where, exactly, is Sardonika?  It sounds like a some kind of Fox News hoax."

Making the best of a cloudy situation, President Ruttle's office released his schedule for the next two days which, besides the clam dig, includes a tour of the Octopus Museum, a recording session with a Seattle grunge band Peach Jam, a panel discussion with six winos at Pioneer Square, salmon flinging at the Pike Place Market, a long walk in the rain, and a quick climb up 14,410-foot Mt. Rainier (shown above).

The president said the climb sounded OK "as long as it only takes a couple hours and there's a john at the top."

Bobby Lee Orca Freed

SARDONIKA (SPINews) --- After serving 23 years of a life sentence at Sardonika Sea World, Robert (Bobby) Lee Orca was released into the wild yesterday. DNA evidence, not available at the time of his trial, exonerated him of the 1987 crime for which he was convicted: swallowing a 26-year-old wind surfer just off the Sardonika Pier. 

"The  thing that bothers me the most," said Orca, "will I ever get my good name back?"

Orca was clearly referring to the years in which the public and the press derisively tagged him "The Killer Whale."

Prosecutors were contrite and said they would reopen the case. "There was always some suspicion that a giant bivalve might have been involved," said Major Fargo Frango who moonlights for the DA.

"I'm not bitter," insisted Orca, as he swam out to sea. "I learned some marketable skills while I was inside. Like treading water, balancing a beach ball on my nose and making kickass jailhouse wine." 

Missing Marathon Champ Found Living Under Pier

SARDONIKA (SPINews) ---  National marathon record-holder and Olympic hopeful, Paavo McPhee has turned up alive and well and living under the Sardonika pier with his pet cat, Kevin. Sports enthusiasts were concerned when the runner went missing two weeks ago. 

"I've never been happier," McPhee told the search party that found him propped up against a piling with a bottle of Johnny Walker Red balanced on his belly. "Ever since I found out that heavy drinkers outlive teetotalers, my life has changed."

Rescuers were able to piece together McPhee's story from his ramblings and rough figures scratched in the sand next to his bedroll.

Apparently, the devoted fitness addict had believed that a healthy, puritanical regime would lead to a long and joyful life, even if that meant miles of tortuous running, aching joints, pulled hamstrings and knee surgery. 

Everything turned around when he read the study on alcohol consumption and longevity released last month.

McPhee has gained 140 pounds, laughs easily and admitted that his marathon time may have slipped a bit: "Two, maybe three weeks."

Yin & Yangsters

SPLENDIFEROUS FALLS, S.D. (SPINews) -- Religious devotees and Eastern mystics have long embraced the philosophy of yin and yang, and now so do four practicing "Yangsters" who live in an old boxcar on a siding in this small town of 623.

The four grizzled, and self-proclaimed monks, are former hobos with beards and scars and tattoos on their arms (skulls, crying Jesuses and spider webs) and knuckles ("LOVE" "HATE"). They have also converted the boxcar (shown at left with the yin and yang symbol) into an "eastern monestary".

The town mostly leaves them alone, and, in fact, the four have even joined the local Rotary.  

Led by Brother Casey Jones, they have insulated the car, grow their own food, dress in Snuggies and hold religious sing-a-longs for which Brother Stella plays guitar.  The "services" attract a handful of followers and the curious who occasionally toss a buck or two into the guitar case.  Says Brother Fast Rattler: "We're all about peace, love and cooking Thai."

"The Northern Pacific is now the Burlington Northern Santa Fe," said Brother Wheatfield Waving.  "We think they lost track of our home.  Our fear is they'll remember it someday and we'll end up in a freight yard in El Paso." 

School for Paparazzi

SARDONIKA (SPINews) -- In the face of dying newspapers, Sardonika University has reorganized its School of Communications, with Journalism 101 and Political Cartooning now part of the Department of Archeology.

Among the new courses are Paparazzi 101 and 201, Sexy Cable TV Newsreading 225, Tweeting 264, Introduction to Blogging 356, Anchoring for Bimbos 222, History & Theory of Reality TV 224, Sunday Talking Heads 426, Philosophy of Shouting & Foaming 288, Whacked-out Supermarket Tabloid Writing 330 and 340, Pronouncing Really Hard Names 311, Advanced YouTube 417, Screw Libel Laws 245, Fuck the Facts 421, Sources: You Don't Need no Stinkin' Sources 401 and All Kinds of Goofy Shit 376.  

Sar U will also offer an MFA (Master's Facebook Account) and a Ph.D in Talk Radio.  For its doctoral program, the college will require a tough admissions exam and an IQ score below 100. 

"We want to get the kids ready for the real world," says school dean Cindy72.  "Like snarky writing, crotch-shot photos and working at home in your pajamas."