ccompanied with shock and outrage expressed by nampy-pamby New Age P.C. thugs across the country, the world learned last week of a group of ambitious and driven Northbrook, Illinois high school girls who take a genuine interest in school spirit and extra-curricular activities.

The "powderpuff football" game held Sunday, May 4, took on a decidedly un-powderpuff nature when the senior girls corralled the juniors into a group and began to splatter them with mud and human feces as part of a friendly hazing tradition. How they knew it was human feces and who identified it was not available information and asking the question only brought angry scowls from Cook County officials.

All girls involved reportedly knew the game would involve a hazing of the future seniors, but crybaby juniors alleged they had no idea the level of cruelty would be so high. Apparently kids today only know about initiation what they see on family-friendly high school shows like Seventh Heaven or something. This reporter would suggest girls on their way to a future initiation view fine hazing films like Full Metal Jacket or A Few Good Men. All in all, a typical end-of-school ritual gets a few more bruises and broken bones than planned, but anyone worried about our teens being slackers who let the future of America dribble down their legs while they watch Seventh Heaven found the news of the harsh initiation quite refreshing.

But the reaction of the PTA-whipped local school board and county officials? Criminal charges have been promised for the outgoing seniors involved in the incident. One group, however, has not lost perspective on the incident: Former Glenbrook North High School alumni.

"Sure, everybody knew what happened the last week of school," said Mitzi Burbank, class of 1993 and president of the Glenbrook North High reunion committee. "But everyone looked forward to it, like a rite of passage. Well, the juniors didn't. But they looked forward to it when they were seniors, the year after. It was tradition, and it was just so incredibly important to the students. Well, the seniors."

Class of 1995 Glenbrook North graduate Cindy DeSousa agreed.

"Oh, yeah, it was hell getting through it. I don't think we had any feces involved when I went through 'the gauntlet'… l'see, eggs, whipped cream, silly string—no, I think they missed the feces. But it sounds like a real sharp idea. Those girls really wanted to stand out from past classes!"

Other graduates, while admiring the girls' severe hazing, aren't admiring the incident's severity. Like Sue Gorton, class of 1955.

"I suppose it was bad, by today's standards," said Gorton, "but we had real wars and bloodshed back then, too. Hell, I know three or four juniors who didn't make it to senior year after their initiation—two went missing and one had a severe head injury that kept her in a coma until Woodstock. And we didn't just limit it to incoming senior girls either. We would haze some of the black students as well. They didn't go to our school, but that didn't mean we couldn't haze them."

Current Glenbrook North student and Class Treasurer Taylor Wick expressed support for the hazing as well.

"It's important to the social order to keep the hazing alive. If we don't have traditions to mark the change from underclass to ruling class, then it all starts to fall apart. Pretty soon people wouldn't even care what part of town you live in or what kind of clothes you're wearing. You know what they call that? Anarchy."

ollowing Tuesday's announcement by Elton John that he and Bernie Taupin would collaborate on a Broadway musical based on Anne Rice's Interview with a Vampire books, it was universally realized that a Broadway musical could be based on anything, no matter how stupid the idea. The notion, first proposed by the Broadway versions of Beauty & the Beast and The Lion King, inspired longtime commune reporter Ted Ted to announce Saturday he would create a musical based on the 1999 film The Blair Witch Project.

The Blair Witch Project, a documentary-style horror film featuring three Burkittsville, Maryland students' frightening encounter with a terrifying local legend, did not seem like an especially good musical show to Ted Ted, who was insistent on proving his point that people going to Broadway will sit through anything. Though not yet completed or started, the musical is in what Ted Ted describes as the "brainstorming" pre-production period, where he thinks of how to break up the movie into a two-act show and comes up with some dumb songs based on incidents in the movie.

Early work points to inclusion of a title song, sung by the Blair Witch character who does not appear in the original film, tentatively titled, "I'm the Blair Witch!" The song will be in the vein of the "You're a Mean One, Mr. Grinch" song from the good cartoon version of the Dr. Seuss How the Grinch Stole Christmas and not the pitiful Ron Howard/Jim Carrey movie version.

Also being considered for the Blair Witch Broadway play is a song for the scene where two of the young filmmakers are searching for their friend, which will probably be called simply, "Josh!" and be very much in the tradition of South Pacific or something really gay like that. Plans are also being developed for a long, sonorous ballad titled something like, "I'm So Scared" to be belted out by the lead female character.

The musical will probably not be very good, promised Ted Ted, but it will sell out instantly and run for a very long time on Broadway due to Ted Ted's plan to cast has-beens or one-hit musical wonders in the lead roles. Initially being considered for the three roles are Debbie Gibson, Jordan Knight, and Jesse Camp. Not being ruled out is the idea of inviting the three has-beens from the original film to reprise their roles in the Broadway show.

"The idea stems," explained Ted Ted, "from my deep, unrelenting contempt for Broadway and the shallow shells of human beings who put any trendy piece of garbage on the stage because idiots who think it makes them hip to be seen going to Broadway or who jump on big Broadway bandwagons will pay to see it. I utterly loathe and despise Broadway people, the lowest of the already-low grade of showbiz people."

Broadway people could not be reached for comment, given that Ted Ted did not bother to try.

To those of you, like critical sourpuss Sen. Robert Byrd, who chastise President Bush for dressing like an air force pilot and landing in a jet on an aircraft carrier to announce the Iraq war is over, I say this: Let he who has never copped a stance like a seasoned military vet and been chauffeured via jet to a political speech meant to further your position with the voters cast the first stone.

People love to pick on the president, and I should know since the commune used to be one of those people. And, I'll admit, back when I ran my struggling alternative news website www.poopoftheday.com I was on the Bush-bashing bandwagon. We were the first in our bandwith to report of the president's history of frivolous cocaine usage, his poor test scores and muddy academic record, and even the way he rigged the election by eliminating eligible black voters with fraudulent claims they were convicted felons. But what the heck! Let bygones be long gone, it's a new era and the people seem to like the second Bush more than the first, and I say the people are always right.

The fact is, Bush has waged an entirely successful war on Iraq for the benefit of the Iraqi people, and now the big fat jealous Democrats are coming out of the woodwork to nitpick the president to death. Saying he's exploiting the military and shamelessly electioneering his way to the 2004 campaign trail, and he looks like Iceman in that stupid flight suit.

Then they claim the Iraqi populace is already turning against us, and our plans for leadership are getting bogged down as the Bush administration tries to plant business-friendly candidates the people don't want as the new leadership. They even say there are no weapons of mass destruction found and that's the reason we went over there in the first place—you couldn't be wronger. We went over there for regime change, if you recall. I remember it plain as yesterday. Where do you get this weapons of mass destruction claptrap?

It's slightly possible that may have been one element of our reason for launching ground forces into Iraq, it's been a while since it started, but I'm pretty sure if you check the press records or ask the president he'll tell you the Iraqi people sent a secret coded message asking for our help. I think Saddam also sunk the Luisitania, I'll have to check Fox News for that one. But all of this is pointless needling of the president's plan, because weapons of mass destruction will be found. If not exactly in the Iraqi borders, they were no doubt dragged to Syria. We'll keep looking for the weapons before Saddam can continue to re-locate them, even if we have to look in Pakistan and India. No further than Russia, I'd say, unless that devious bastard hid them in Nebraska or something.

With a 60-70% approval rating, the president needs support now more than ever. There are powerful special interest groups just sniffing for any weakness they can find to take him down, special interests groups like hippies, environmental activists, black voters, or Susan Sarandon and Sean Penn. Don't cow-tow to these radicals. If they had their way, George W. Bush probably wouldn't even be president.

If you ask me, I think President Bush looked quite powerful in his flight suit and air force helmet. It's a shame he had to give the speech so quickly after his pilot landed, otherwise he could have stuck to the original plan, which I hear was to don a snappy sailor suit, which would have kicked ass to see. Sailor suits always make presidents look good. Plus, you put a dog next to him and he looks like the Cracker Jack mascot.

º Last Column: Here's Your Objectivity, Dyke
º more columns