n a move being sharply criticized by Democrats, President Bush announced his plan for a $350 billion tax cut. The cuts would be specifically to registered Republicans and corporations, and Bush promised the reduced taxes would spark growth in the job market and turn the economy around.

Democrats have denounced the move as a blatant attempt to curry voter favor and sustain the president's popularity, despite poor response to domestic issues. Bush's plan for tax cuts to corporations, they say, is more of the same failed Reaganomic "trickle-down" theory operating on the premise that monetary breaks to companies will produce new jobs. As for the reduced taxes for registered Republicans, it is an unbelievable act of hubris by a president with elephant balls.

In addition to the expected backlash by Democrats, the president was dismayed to find some moderate Republicans among critics of the plan. Early response to the idea called initial figures for a $700 billion tax cut too high, and though the president regained some support by lowering the projection to $350 billion, there are still some moderates calling it bad timing for additional tax cuts.

"Don't get me wrong, I could use that tax cut pretty bad," said Ohio Sen. George Voinovich, a leading opponent to the Bush plan, "but we're heading into belt-tightening times, we're looking at a $2 trillion deficit. Just so the president knows, 'deficit' is the one that means we owe that much. As for the tax cuts for Republicans, I don't even know if that's constitutional… but either way, we need to be paying off our huge debts before we start giving money away again."

Like other Bush critics, Voinovich is pointing to the expenses raised by Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, the airline bail out following the incidents, the $100 billion Iraq war, and the projected $600 billion rebuilding cost for Iraq, all of which have turned the estimated surplus over 10 years into a deficit.

Though Voinovich agreed political rifts were dangerous to Republican solidarity, the senator felt that opposing President Bush on the tax issue wouldn't hurt his long-term relationship with the White House.

"I will stick to my beliefs on the issue to best serve my conscience, and I'm sure the president will do the same. It is characteristic of our respect for each other to voice our disagreements."

The interview with Voinovich was cut short as masked men rushed in through doors and windows to strap the senator to his couch. The men then proceeded to wallop Voinovich with black socks filled with bars of soap, their silence countered with the senator's high-pitched shrieks of pain and tearful crying.

The White House would not comment on the hazing, only that they hoped Voinovich would see the wisdom of the Bush tax cut before any more pain was inflicted.

"It is vital and important to our economy that we encourage growth in the public sector," said the president, or someone sounding like Bush while the president moved his lips. "Statistics we've funded show that tax cuts to corporations produce that kind of job creation. As for the tax breaks for registered Republicans, I can't tell you what's partisan or what's vote-buying. What is important is that it is imperative to our administration's long-term plans that I get elected in 2004. These tax cuts are designed for that purpose."

ust when you thought the limits of science were established—girl, look out! Here comes Senator Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania, the politician who magically defies the change of time and remains stuck in the 1950s.

Santorum alerted the rest of America, scared and turbulent, but still living in the year 2003, when he stated in an interview printed last Monday that the Supreme Court would endorse incest and other immoralities if they overturned a Texas sodomy law the Court is hearing.

"If the Supreme Court says that you have the right to consensual sex within your home, then you have the right to bigamy, you have the right to polygamy, you have the right to incest, you have the right to adultery. You have the right to anything," said the senator living in the decade of the TV dinner and TV westerns.

Some Democrats and fellow Republicans have denounced the senator's remarks and asked for his resignation, worried that living in a time period of 50 years ago would interfere with Santorum's ability to keep informed in current issues. Key Republican party leaders have guaranteed to study the senator closely and divulge his knowledge of important government and cultural stuff.

"I guarantee you," said a personal aide to Santorum, Jeff Richards, "the senator is in full control of his faculties and knows what year it is. I can't explain any more than that. I've seen the TV on in his house, I assume he must get the news and the usual programs… he's just somehow filtered them out." Girl, I tell you, that Richards gave this reporter the eye. Beep beep on the gaydar, that's all I'm saying.

Few from the scientific community have stepped forward to explain, though a group at Harvard's Department of Quantum Mechanics are posing theories of collapsing personal wormholes. Psychologists from around the world are seeking medical background from Santorum's representatives, particularly interested in previous incidents of head trauma or hallucinations. The extremely early onset of Alzheimer's has not been ruled out.

Other theories have been offered, but not yet fully explored. My girl Ladyboy Smacky, she say Santorum look just like this guy pick her up three nights in a row last April and call her "Mommy" while she dress up like Martha Washington, but that guy had a mustache and was in Frisco, but she swear that dude Santorum so deep in the closet he sittin' on the box to a Colecovision.

Despite the failure to pinpoint the source of Santorum's confusion, others are stressing the importance of bringing him up to date with the year 2003 before it becomes a problem.

"We have 50 years of history to cover with the senator, so obviously we'll have to pick highlights," said Professor of Cultural Studies at the University of Chicago and real sweetie Isis Oviate. "We should start with telling him World War II is over—more than likely he knows, but we shouldn't take chances. The geographical maps and political make-up of the world should be explained slowly so he knows all of that, about Stalin's death and, eventually, the fall of the Soviet Union, of course. We would hate to offend an ally with some disparaging remarks against Russia. We'll tell him all about Iraq, but one thing at a time. Take it slowly. The sexual revolution alone ought to leave him quaking in his wingtips. Maybe we'll just sum up the Kinsey Report and see how he responds to that."

As Research Editor for the commune, you can bet your collection of used nose plugs that I get my share of stupid questions. "Why is Skyy vodka clear when the sky is blue?" "Who is my biological father?" "What does it mean if my pregnancy test comes out tie-dyed?" "Did you eat all the Oreos again, asshole?" It's enough to make you quit, and I have several times. Unfortunately, the book I'm writing on underground pope boxing in the 14th century has grown so large it's impractical to try and remove it from my office, so here I remain.

However, every once in a while someone asks a question worth answering, besides "Does anyone want pizza?" This time it was the commune's ambassador to our hostile downstairs neighbors at "Crochet!" magazine, Boris Utzov. The other day I was flushing Boris out from under my desk, where he'd become lodged while looking for treasure. After thanking me in his uniquely baffling dialect, Boris asked the question that's been haunting me these past few weeks: Why do people have children? Actually, in retrospect now I have a sneaking suspicion that he was trying to ask me how people have children, but his analogy about a duck in a noose was hard to follow at the time.

Regardless, the question remains. The "why" question, that is. For an answer to the "how" question I refer you to the excellent work of Ms. Tanya Titanic, who has far more experience than I and who is more well-loved by the camera, I assure you.

As for the why, it is important to begin with the understanding that in ancient times, children were seen merely as a cheap source of slave labor that could be eaten in a pinch. Much like in the modern-day Orient. Children, with their miniature proportions and nimble fingers, were useful for defusing bombs and luring fierce animals away from the valuable members of the tribe. They were also fun to bet on in numerous ways. In jungle cultures, children could be used to retrieve fruits from trees that contained deadly snakes and spiders which would scare off tribe members who knew what snakes and spiders were. In some cultures, children were sent outside to check on scary noises in the middle of the night, protecting less stupid elders from boogeymen and other forms of certain doom.

As civilization advanced, children were used primarily as a food source for the upper classes. Needless to say, the term "kids meal" once held a far different connotation than it does today.

With the birth of modern science, it was discovered that children were high in cholesterol and snot, and subsequently the practice of child-eating fell by the wayside. Eventually it was replaced by the unfortunate practice of child-rearing, which has persisted in one form or another to this day.

Children who were once useful for pearl diving and as stock for soups became an eye-nose-and-throat-sore, as whining of children replaced dining on children and everyone was noticeably crabbier for it. Countless lives were ruined and going to the beach on the weekend became a major pain in the ass. Soon children were even allowed on airplanes, no longer relegated to the ball bin in the belly of the plane. Before long, normally reasonable Arabs were crashing planes into buildings left and right in protest of infants in coach who had been crying in shifts for 14 hours straight.

Saying what happened, however, is far easier than explaining why it did. The tyranny of hormones is an acceptable excuse as to why a pregnant mother might refuse to expel the growing menace from her womb for nine months of overstayed welcome, but what happened to the voice of reason once the tot was shat out into the world? Is it mere sentimentalism or misplaced loyalty that keeps otherwise sane adults from cutting bait and showing this presumptuous little moppet the door?

The best explanation I can offer is that it can all be blamed on Sesame Street, the long-running PBS pro-child propaganda hour. The show has, irresponsibly if not criminally, propagated the falsehood that children are delightful creatures of mirth who brighten the world around them. It is simply too late to discover otherwise when you have one of your own and it loudly wants every cookie in the store, right now. So curse Sesame Street then, if you choose, though a little field research beforehand could have saved you some serious trouble in the long run. Eighteen years worth, by my estimate.

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