ooling a number of coaches, commentators and even full football teams since early September, the senile gang of Geritol-guzzlers known as the Oakland Raiders were finally unmasked and had their walkers pulled out from under them by a lightning-swift squad of relentless assassins that call themselves the Tampa Bay Buccaneers here Sunday in Super Bowl XXXVII.

The hapless Raiders turned off their hearing aids, took out their dentures, curled up and lay down together on the 50-yard line, happily playing Roman-era Christians to the Bucs' roaring lions. When the final gun sounded, the sky was rent, the sun became as sackcloth, and lo, the moon became as Al Davis' pompadoured head. There was much wailing and gnashing of teeth among the Raiders' fans, and much cheering and ritual spilling of virgin blood from the fans of the Buccaneers. The final score was 487 to 13, but it wasn't really as close as all that.

Quarterback Brad Johnson, 12 and-a-half-year-old leader of the Tampa Bay eleven, completed over 800 passes, while 9-year-old wunderkicker Martin Gramatica booted so many field goals that the officials simply lost count and awarded the team a collective 212 additional points in the fourth quarter.

Commented 96-year-old wide receiver Jerry Rice, "What did you say? Did I take my medicine today? My granddaughter brings that fool-ass boyfriend of hers—he steals my stuff out of the garage. Huh? Who are you, anyway?"

Rice, who scored the only Raider touchdown on a 48-yard pass in the third quarter, became the oldest man to ever score a touchdown in a football game, let alone a Super Bowl. He was able to get open when two Tampa Bay defensive backs were caught out of position while giving the business to three of the "really cute" cheerleaders in the parking lot outside Qualcomm Stadium. Rice said he would have joined the defensive backs if only he'd seen the cheerleaders as well, but "I didn't have my distance glasses with me today. Besides, at my age, I need to tie a popsicle stick to it to get it to work anyway. Wait—who are you again?"

Wide receiver Tim Brown, a comparative youngster at age 88, and only slightly more lucid, added, "You know, we play them one game at a time. It's all right, we'll win next week." Reminded that the Super Bowl marks the end of football season, Brown responded, "The what? No, no, we play the Baltimore Colts next week, I'm sure of it. That Unitas fella, he's a tough bird. Did I take my medicine today?"

Ninety-three-year-old quarterback Rich Gannon: "We got jobbed by the refs on the coin toss. Did you see it? Everybody hates the Raiders, son. Everybody. Anyway, aren't we playing Sid Gillman's squad next week? We got to start planning for that game soon." Gannon set a record by having 37 passes intercepted and run back for touchdowns, 26 in the first half alone, and 16 other passes intercepted and mailed directly to various Tampa players' homes to be auctioned off for top dollar on eBay sometime in the next month.

"Huh? Maybe I'll bid on one of those," said Gannon, before he walked off the field aimlessly and was finally picked up in a bad neighborhood in Chula Vista, where he had been asking residents if they had seen his pajamas and whether or not he had taken his medicine that morning.

Defensive lineman Warren Sapp, a grizzled Buccaneer veteran at 16, had an amazing 73 sacks, 326 tackles and two hurries. He is known to his Tampa Bay teammates as "that raging fucking lunatic, watch out he doesn't get too close to you, he'll break both your legs and shatter a kneecap just as soon as look at you." When asked for a post-game comment, he began screaming gutturally and waving his helmet around him in a wide circle for close to twenty minutes, his eyes nearly bugging out of his head the whole time.

"Agga-ragga-wompona-wooo-hooo-haaa!! Whooo-ooo-eeeee sumbitch mothafuckin' sheeee-it bitch and a bastard god-DAYUM fuckin' ay!" he finally concluded. Asked for his assessment of the defensive plan, Sapp just muttered, "Fuck that, man, I'm dizzy," then said something completely unintelligible and threw up on NFL Commissioner Paul Tagliabue's tassled loafers.

Teammate Ronde Barber, a defensive back who will turn 14 next month, just shook his head at Sapp's antics and murmured, "At least he ain't got the rattlesnakes in his hands and his mouth this time. That's when he's really scary."

Asked if he could sum up the Bucs' strategy going into the game, Barber concurred with 11-year-old linebacker Derrick Brooks and head coach Jon Gruden, 20, that "The main thing was knees in the nuts from the word go, man, then slappin' them on they liver spots and talkin' shit about they grandchildren."

ich, dumb, white president George W. Bush, the "W" possibly standing for "Whitey," took the opportunity on Martin Luther King, Jr.'s birthday Wednesday to show where he stood on civil rights by denouncing the University of Michigan's affirmative action admissions policy.

It comes as a real shock to a handful of people who buy entirely into presidential soundbytes and vote-grabbing. The Bush administration has attempted to court minorities with promises of real changes in civil rights, though perhaps Bush intended the change to be a step backward and just purposely omitted saying what kind of change he was talking about.

Plaintiffs, also exceedingly white people from mostly non-impoverished families, have filed a lawsuit against the University of Michigan because they were not admitted to the school while members of minority groups were admitted, with possibly lower scores in some cases. University of Michigan policy allows for a points-based system that allows ethnic diversity as a deciding factor for admissions, and, in short, they had more white people than they could use, which is often the case with white people.

In a petition supporting the plaintiffs' case against U of M, Bush, with the help of many white White House staff people, wrote, "At their core the Michigan policies amount to a quota system that unfairly rewards or penalizes prospective students based solely on their race," the president said. Basically, the fact they are minorities is an unfair advantage to them, wrote the rich son of an ex-president.

Later, to a White House press group, Bush continued, "It's the American way for people to overcome diversity, ain't it? That's what I'm trying to do here."

When Bush was told he sounded like an asshole by aides, he amended his statements later.

"What I meaned to have said, is that overcoming obstacles and stuff is real hard. And getting into college is real hard. Ethnic people of all races should have to overcome their own obstacles to get in and not get in because of they races—be they black, white, brown, or Arabs. It's unfair to let people in because of they skin color. This policy of racist-based admission provides an unfair 'vantage to non-white people, and I cannot abide that. I guarantee you if this policy was in place where I went to school, I would not have gotten in."

Spokespeople for the University of Michigan agreed: "It's true. Bush never would have gotten in here."

Many congressman, also rich and white, have opposed Bush's stance on affirmative action. Besides Democratic presidential hopefuls for 2004, a handful of Republican senators pleaded with Bush via letter before the announcement to resist supporting the plaintiffs. The decision, they said, would do harm to the system of higher education.

It is believed the president received the letter before issuing his petition, but aides say he may not have read it since it looked really long and used a number of words that he didn't want to have to look up.

Following on Trent Lott's pro-segregationist remarks in December and his thousands of failed apologies in its wake, the move could do a lot to damage the "compassionate conservatism" agenda by the Republican party to embrace minorities while still keeping them at arm's length.

According to some within the GOP, Bush must quickly again issue pro-unity words as quickly as possible to reaffirm that position, and preferably before taxes are again raised on the working classes.

I find myself shocked and disappointed with all of the commune staff. No—more disappointed than shocked, with a hint of disgust. So much so I can't even address them, you, in person. I'm hoping to express myself and my disillusionment adequately in my usual space for ranting against outsiders. Oh! Disillusionment! I forgot I was disillusioned in addition to the disappointment, shock, and mild disgust I feel.

You would think my good, if somewhat comical, name would be enough after all these years of employing you ilk of questionable backgrounds. I stood by you when you needed me most. Everyone called many of you unhirable, and I proved them wrong. Though, true, they ultimately had the last laugh. When editors and website employers were treating you like something they scraped off their shoe, and not in a good way, I took you in and allowed you to spread your wings and soar. Except for Omar Bricks, who took the metaphor quite literally with that batsuit. But you know what I mean.

It's true, when we negotiated the contract to prevent you striking back in July, I made quite a few promises. It's also true I cannot keep all those promises now—for good reason. It's a matter of public record since I accidentally published a private diary page my brother Gay is in a legal fight to take over the commune. Fighting these allegations has cost a lot of money, money I don't have or don't want to personally spend. I have had to dip into the commune secret fund to prevent this hostile (and smelly, to boot) takeover. Therefore, obviously, I lack the funding I had previously counted on when negotiating contracts.

To see myself abandoned like this! It leaves me… well, see the first paragraph. Again threatening a walkout just because I have failed to follow through with a few of those promises. I thought we were a family. Apparently we are, like my deceitful no-good brother is family. But I thought we were a better family.

It's true, I can't afford those fancy ergonomic chairs for the office as I pledged to buy in December 2001 and again promised to deliver this year. If you ask me, your posture is good enough. Ergonomic chairs at this point would be tampering with God's plan to form your backs to his will—or Buddha. If you believe in Buddha. I can't make good on the chairs right now, or the staple removers to finally get those mis-stapled papers apart, but you know me. I'm Red Bagel! Sooner or later I'll make that promise again, and I'll keep it. I promise.

We are a low-traffic website with honorable intentions and lofty goals, but not much more. This was never a get-rich-quick scheme, and I never promised you folks a rose garden. Or actually I may have; if I promised a rose garden, I'll get you a rose garden, but I can't do it before this legal nonsense is settled. Until then, I can bring in a fresh bouquet of daisies daily until we get the rose garden up and running. This I promise to you. And it's not a lame never-kept promise like staple removers and the ergonomic chairs.

What about the promises I did keep? Did you ever think about that? Ramrod Hurley has yet to be put in charge of anyone else again, and has yet to find where we stashed his desk. You all got the piggyback rides. What do you want—blood? I can give you blood by the barrelful, if I thought it would help. It will just take me a few days to get in touch with my blood guys.

I'm full of self-pity over all this feuding. Self-pity for you. You have allowed personal greed and horrible spinal curvature to come between this family. Gay Bagel? Fuck Gay Bagel. He's no Bagel in my book. You guys are the real Bagels, as far as I'm concerned.

If you call the planned walkout off, I'll even put that in writing. Legal name changes for everyone!

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