New Rules: Polite Musings from a Timid Observer (13 page)

BOOK: New Rules: Polite Musings from a Timid Observer
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NEW RULE
 
Cut the shnizzle. We all know it’s hilarious when white people—especially old ladies—talk “street” on TV, but early reports indicate that every single network sitcom this season will feature at least one 8-year-old kid saying “shnizzle.” Attention all real rappers—you have guns for a reason. Use them.
Hysterical Blandness
 
NEW RULE
 
Don’t type “lol” unless you really “laugh out loud.” Many Web chatters have picked up the annoying habit of typing “lol” after just about everything you say. “How are you?” “lol” “The pope died.” “lol” “I slowly peel back the waistband of my cottony-white briefs, unleashing my fully erect 9-inch pole.” “lol” Look, if I wanted a kiss-ass session where every thought I utter gets a big, phony laugh, I’d call a meeting with my writers.
Flee Circus
 
 
NEW RULE
 
D
on’t say a woman is crazy just because she runs away from her wedding. She’d be crazy if she wanted to spend the rest of her life servicing this goober.
 
When I heard the news that a young bride-to-be had gone missing on a jog days before her wedding, I had the same thought everyone else did: Man, that Scott Peterson is
good.
Americans reacted to the so-called runaway bride by branding her as crazy for skipping town rather than marrying a Sunday school teacher in Duluth, Georgia. Ah, yes, the good life—the bake sales, the prayer meetings, the abortion protests—who could just walk away from all that? How come when the girl from
Titanic
ditches her fiance, it’s the greatest romance of all time, but when Jennifer Wilbanks does it, she’s a criminal loon with a case of temporary insanity? Temporary sanity is more like it. She was staring down the barrel of 14 bridesmaids and 600 guests in the Georgia heat watching a Baptist in a blue suit sanctify her sex life with Welch’s Grape Juice and a reading from
The Purpose Driven
Life—suddenly Grey-hound to Vegas looked pretty good.
Jennifer, I applaud your rugged individualism. You eloped with yourself. And to Vegas, baby—that’s money. I mean, what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas, whereas the woman who marries in Georgia... stays in Georgia.
Jen, you’re a free spirit, I can tell. Something inside you snapped and rebelled at the idea of living in a persistent vegetative state—which is why tonight I’d like to offer you an open invitation to come out here. We’ll even send you the $118 dollar bus ticket—first class, right behind the driver.
Come on! Come all the way over to the dark side. You can stay in my hot tub till you get back on your feet. You’re crazy and you don’t care about anyone’s feelings but your own—you belong in Hollywood. You’re a reality show waiting to happen. Plus there are a lot of eligible bachelors here. Pat O’Brien’s available. I can introduce you. And I’ve got some stuff that you can smoke that might alleviate some of that pressure behind your eyeballs. And don’t worry about that fiancé of yours. Believe me, by the time I’m finished with you, he won’t want you back.
BILL MAHER
I
 
RULES
 
I Do-Wop
 
 
NEW RULE
 
There’s nothing wrong with being a little old bald guy and marrying a 23-year-old. That’s why God created money. Stop talking about how embarrassing Billy Joel’s marriage is. Driving into every tree in East Hampton? That’s embarrassing. “We Didn’t Start the Fire”?
Embarrassing.
This is the first thing he’s done since “The Stranger” that makes perfect sense.
I Hear Dead People
 
NEW RULE
 
If you find a new record from anyone dead, it sucks. If Elvis or Tupac or Kurt Cobain thought they had a hit, they would have released it back when it could have helped them get blown.
Chicken Hawk Down
 
NEW RULE
 
T
he people in America who were most in favor of the Iraq war must go there and fight it. The army missed its recruiting goal by 42 percent a few months ago—more people joined the Michael Jackson Fan Club. We’ve done picked all the low-lying Lynndie England fruit, and now we need warm bodies. We need warm bodies like Paula Abdul needs... warm bodies.
A Baptist Minister in North Carolina told nine members of his congregation that unless they renounced their 2004 vote for John Kerry, they had to leave his church. Well—if we’re
that
certain these days that George Bush is always
that
right about everything, then going to Iraq to fulfill the glorious leader’s vision would seem the least one could do.
Hey, if it makes it any easier, just think of it as a reality show.
Fear Factor. Shitting Your Pants Edition. Survivor: Sunni Triangle.
Or maybe a video game: Grand Theft Allah.
I know, you’re thinking, “But Bill, I already do my part with the ’Support Our Troops’ magnet I have on my Chevy Tahoe—how much more can one man give?”
Here’s an intriguing economic indicator: It’s been over a year since they graduated, but neither of the Bush twins has been able to find work. Why don’t they sign up for Iraq duty? Do they hate America or just freedom in general?
That goes for everybody who helped sell this war—you gotta go first. Brooks and Dunn? Drop your cocks and grab your socks. Ann Coulter: Darling, trust me, you will love the army. You think
you
make up stuff? Curt Schilling? Bye-bye. You ended the curse on Boston? Good. Let’s try your luck on Fallujah. Oh, and that Republican Baldwin brother has to go, too, so that Ted Nugent has someone to frag.
But mostly, we have to send Mr. and Mrs. Britney Spears, because Britney once said: “... we should trust our president in every decision that he makes, and we should just support that and be faithful in what happens.”
Somebody has to die for that. Hell, Britney’s already knocked up, so that’ll save the guards at Abu Ghraib about 10 minutes. And think of the spiritual lift it will provide to troops and civilians alike when actual combat smacks the smirk off of Kevin Federline’s face and fills his low-hanging trousers with duty.
In summation, you can’t advocate for something you wouldn’t do yourself. For example, I’m for fuel efficiency, which is why I drive a hybrid car and always take an electric private plane. I’m for legalizing marijuana, so I smoke a ton of it. And I’m for gay marriage, which is why—oh well, you get the point.
 
I Promise I’ll Be Yentl
 
NEW RULE
 
Jewish people have to start having sex. The Jewish population in America dropped 5 percent in the last decade, which may explain why this country’s finances have gone to shit. Breed, you sons of Abraham—breed! We need you. Israel needs you. Kobe Bryant, Robert Blake, and Phil Spector need you. Plus, without Jews, who’s going to write all those sitcoms about blacks and Hispanics?
Inky Dinky Don’t
 
 
NEW RULE
 
Just because your tattoo has Chinese characters in it, it doesn’t make you spiritual. It’s right above the crack of your ass and it translates to “Beef with Broccoli.” The last time you did anything spiritual, you were praying to God you weren’t pregnant.
Inside the Actors’ Ego
 
NEW RULE
 
Stop calling acting a “craft.” What witches do is a craft. Those wallets that head-injury patients make are a craft. What you do is make us believe what isn’t so. You’re, you’re... a two-faced liar. And if you’re going to hand out awards for that, why snub the masters?
 
Internet Virus
 
NEW RULE
 
You can’t notify people by e-mail that you’ve given them chlamydia. The San Francisco Health Department has a new service that lets you send an Internet greeting card to someone you may have infected with an STD: “Roses are red, orchids are gray, congratulations, you have hepatitis A.”
It’s Dead, Jim
 
NEW RULE

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