Judge to R. Kelly: Stay the Hell Away from Michael Jackson

ook County Circuit Judge Vincent Gaughan granted alleged musician R. Kelly permission to attend this month’s Grammy awards in a decision handed down this week, on the condition that Kelly avoid all contact with fellow age-of-consent-impaired hit factory Michael Jackson during the ceremony. Though unexpected, legal experts are applauding the judge’s decision as a deft move likely to quell public fears that the two might swap child-molesting secrets backstage at the awards ceremony.

Kelly, nominated for two Grammies for his double-platinum album that’s actually titled “Chocolate Factory,� is awaiting trial on child pornography charges stemming from a 2002 video that allegedly shows the R&B singer engaging in sexual acts with a 14-year-old girl. A spokesperson from Kelly’s record label was unable to confirm if the video in question was for a cut off Kelly’s new album, or if it was one of several previous music videos showing the singer engaging in sexual acts with 14-year-old girls.

While many have applauded Judge Gaughan’s move, some have called it unnecessary considering that Jackson isn’t nominated for any Grammies this year and will likely only show his face if he can sneak it through the bomb-detecting machines at event security. Gaughan, however, defends the efforts to prevent his own personal vision of hell from coming true.

“Because I feel that it’s in the best public interest for Mr. Kelly to be able to attend this ceremony, I won’t deprive the world of the soulful beats and funky grooves of his child-fucking music,� explained Gaughan. “From ‘Freak You Weekly’ to ‘Stained Retainer,’ Kelly has long captured the essence of lusting after the unattainable, not-quite-ripe fruit. However, there’s something very wrong about imagining Kelly hanging out with a ripe fruit like Michael Jackson, and I won’t have that on my watch. Especially after I’ve just eaten. Likely or not, America can’t afford to see the two of them together at the Grammies, the Oscars, or even at a Yankees game this summer. And God forbid I see pictures of those two parasailing in Cancun on some kind of child molester double-date vacation at some point in the future. Yuck-o-rama.�

Scandal first found Kelly in 1994, when he produced Age Ain’t Nothing but a Number, the debut album of 15-year-old R&B sensation Aaliyah, which featured a joke title that would only become funny years later. That same year Kelly and Aaliyah secretly wed, then hastily annulled after Aaliyah’s parents Naaaomben and Shizbitch Haughton forbade Kelly from getting his statutory freak on with their high-school student daughter while they were home.

Apparently emboldened by his brush with infamy, Kelly got his lawsuit on dozens of times during the second half of the decade, settling out of court on charges of allegedly impregnating a 16-year-old, coercing a 15-year-old into participating in an underage girl orgy, and abusing his responsibilities as a Girl Scout troop leader. No sooner were these suits settled than dozens more 14-year-old girls came out of the woodwork, including a Chicago-area 9th-grade health class that claimed Kelly had impersonated their teacher and sexed up the entire class one afternoon in 1996.

Despite the numerous allegations, Kelly’s career showed no ill effects, with the singer scoring two number one hits in 1999 with “Shit, This is Gettin’ Expensive� and “Girl You’re a Woman to Me.�

However in February 2002, elephant shit hit the fan when the Chicago Sun-Times reported it had found a videotape showing Kelly having sex with a 14-year-old girl, and copies of the tape in question were quickly sold as bootlegs and on the Internet. Despite the claims of authenticity in the Sun-Times promotional materials, there was some initial public question as to whether the man on the tape was really Kelly, whether the girl really was underage, and whether the action was truly “all-anal� or merely the product of deceptive camera angles. Police later confirmed the authenticity of the tape after investigating the Sun-Times’ exorbitant shipping charges.

Singer Jackson recently pleaded innocent to seven counts of performing lewd or lascivious acts on a child under 14 and two counts of administering an intoxicating agent, then went on some weird rant about how he calls wine “Jesus Juice� and kids should be able to drink juice.

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At one time a distant relative of mine told a timid and anxious nation that we have nothing to fear but fear itself. And mostly I agree with that, except I thought I'd ammend it since it's a different world today.

For one, first and foremost, in the wake of recent events, there is a renewedfear of bio-terrorism. Anthrax, anthrax everywhere! Sure, it would seem likewe're not in any immediate danger if we don't work for politicians or newspeople, but now they say that crap can rub off on other mail just by being mixed together. Whoa-ho! That ought to send a chill creeping right up your spine.

Let's not forget what started all this panic. We have to admit that we have terrorist attacks and retaliation to fear. More specifically, we have crazy hijackers commandeering planes and flying them into national monuments and highly-populated tourist attractions to fear. Not to mention long-standing favorite terrorist actions, like driving exploding trucks or cars into populated buildings or planting undetectable bombs where we can't find them to fear. That's pretty scary shit.

Then there's the whole idea of Muslim retaliation from foreign countries and militant groups that side with terrorists. They could rip apart global alliances or even, in most drastic situations, start a holy war with our country. Jesus damn! How did this shit get started? You're goddamn right we have that to fear, even if not as much as some of the other stuff first. And everybody's got a nuclear bomb these days. What if some nutjob decides to set it off? Or the president gets really pissed off or we elect some senial nut like Reagan, remember the '80s when every day you woke up thinking today is going to be the day that wrinkled fascist thinks he's he's buzzing his secretary and BOOM! Fucking Ameritoast. So even if we don't get bombed by our enemies we could explode ourselves into smithereens, thank you very much, Mr. As-Yet-Unknown Senial President of the Future.

Oh, shit, I didn't even mention trying to get on a plane. If you think those college dropouts laid off from the McDonald's are going to check your bag well enough to find any potential weapon, good luck to you. These guys are lucky to dress themselves in the morning, I bet. Or they'll be so busy checking for Arabs with boxcutters they'll let Johnny Militia and his constituency of fruitcakes through the metal detectors with Ryder truck manure bombs strapped to their fucking back. Remember, it wasn't so long ago when young white Americans were the biggest enemy to freedom you'd ever fucking seen. These assholes are so worried about the threat the U.N. poses to us they must have missed, oh, I guess the part of the Constitution that says don't blow up your own fucking country, you dumbasses.

And that ain't it, no sirs. Let's not forget the big G, the Creator, the Man Upstairs, His Holy Capitalized Self. He's always giving us the shit: Tornadoes, Hurricanes, Earthquakes—check that out, wake up for a nice day of going to work and making some bread and the fucking ground opens up under you! Holy shit! Forgot to mention that part in the Bible, eh, Your Holy Groundripper, Sir? I don't know what apostle was supposed too get that shit into the Bible but he sure fucked up big time.

Then there's always the dumb shit. Getting hit by lightning, falling off the house while re-shingling it, the real dumb stuff the obituary columns won't even print 'cause it looks so retarded. And then there's car accidents up the whazoo. Car accidents claim more people in a regular year than any terrorist attacks do.

And disease and cancer and getting shot by some random dumbass who thinks you flipped him off in traffic. Shit, you know what, I don't even want to get up in the morning anymore. Nothing to fear but fear itself? Yeah, that's kind of right, ol' Mr. Roosevelt. Although I think you forgot to mention, oh, EVERYTHING. Thank you very fucking much.

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People are always trying to set me up. And I'm not just talking about all the backstabbers planting evidence or hiding their plastic baggies in my pockets when the cops show up. I speak of the dating life.

It's like I literally have some huge sign around my neck that says, "I want you to fix me up with a numbnuts!" Figuratively speaking. Everyone and their sister knows someone and their brother that I would "just love." But this past week was the worst. It seemed like everyone I knew all conspired at once to send me out through a gauntlet of bad dates. I don't need to tell you it was a lot of fun, if your idea of fun is having Captain Hook as your gynecologist.

First was my sister, proving once again she's the dull blade in the family toolbox. The guy was some lawyer from her law firm, and *yawn* what a bore he was. All he could talk about was money. He told me he made a lot as a lawyer, like I even asked, but he really didn't need any of it since his family invented the cases they use for CDs and made like a trillion dollars in the 80s. I tried to make conversation, and asked if he owned any CDs. He said he owned three music studios and two music review magazines and people were always sending him free CDs. Like I needed to know all that. I just was wondering if he could make me a copy of that "Safety Dance" song. So I ditched him when he went to the bathroom, and thankfully haven't seen him since.

If it's even possible, mom always does even worse. The guy she set me up with didn't even really show up to dinner, but in fairness, he is in maximum security. The letter he sent was real nice, a bit awkward, since he didn't know my name and just called me "that chick on the outside." From what I gathered, mom wrote to him after seeing him on CNN and she thought we'd hit it off. At least I didn't have to sneak out of the restaurant. I wish somebody had shown up to the place, though, besides that courier. That dildo wouldn't even stay for a drink.

If you thought I was tired of this already, you're more than right. But still everybody's persisting. Ramon Nootles here at the commune set me up on a date and when I show up, it's him again. I told him I've had it up to here with him, and gestured to a body part. That only seemed to make him more excited. So you can guess I didn't even get to sit down on that date.

Toot, my little brother, he's got a good heart, but his friends are all screwed up. He must have scheduled the date over a bad cell phone connection or something since the restaurant turned out to be some motel room and three bald guys showed up at the same time. Talk about miscommunication. Even with 3-1 odds they were real downers. They only wanted to talk about religion and surrendering my soul to the Leader of Glorious Light. They had some interesting pamphlets, though, and of course the Leader is both divine and righteous and will lead us to the cherished afterlife in the path of heaven. But none of this gets me out of being set up with spazzes, obviously.

Leave it to dad to put a big fat sore point on the end of the week. He talks up his candidate for blind date all week and I actually look forward to meeting this guy. He's fun, he watches TV all the time just like me, he despises books, he's a crack sniper, he's a crack addict, recovering, and thinks women should be called girls. Sounds like a dreamboat, huh? Well, dad also forgot to mention he's my Uncle Luke. Dad gets confused a lot. Everyone else remembers you can't date blood relatives, at least not north of the Mason-Dixon line, so we just had a quick dinner and parted on good terms, until the next bail-out.

Advice to anyone who wants to set me up on blind date: Don't. Or if you absolutely have to, just remember I'm really busy and have been working a lot lately. I'm a hot property again, so really put some backbone into it. Now that I'm having a comeback dating uncles and Ramon Nootles is out. Period.

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