taunch pro-death advocates applauded court refusals to reconnect Terri Shiavo's feeding tube over the weekend. The court hearings were seen as last-ditch legal efforts by Schiavo's parents and pro-life groups to keep the brain-damaged woman alive, but judges of the state court of Clearwater, Florida bizarrely sided with science over politics and religion, to the lament of fans of life everywhere.

Terri Schiavo has been in a persistent vegetative state since 1990, when prolonged blood loss to the brain brought on by heart failure induced her current condition. The case has become a focus for pro-life and anti-life groups, as Schiavo's husband, based on alleged comments made by Schiavo before her condition started, wants his wife's feeding tube removed, and her parents want her to live a long, long time. While most medical specialists have concluded Schiavo will never recover, doctors who put their religion convictions ahead of flimsy scientific evidence have come to bat for the parents, saying Schiavo demonstrates some degree of awareness of her environment. The woman's feeding tube was removed March 18, the only means for pro-death advocates to euthanize patients under current laws.

The Schindlers, Schiavo's parents and the key speakers on the pro-life side of the debate, have brought aboard anti-abortion-rights activist Randall Terry, who, since Schiavo cannot speak now on her own behalf, argues the woman must be fought for like a big fetus, despite claims by her husband, who knew her before the tragedy, that she would not want to be kept alive in such a state. The Schindlers have accused all judges who have sided with husband Michael Schiavo of being part of a "crusade to kill" his daughter.

Governor Jeb Bush, brother of the country's most legal president ever, has in the past interceded on the Schindlers' behalf to reconnect Schiavo's feeding tube on one of the many occasions it's been disconnected, but legal efforts by the Governor have so far failed to pass muster with the Florida Senate. Though he has not taken more direct, controversial action as of press time to keep Schiavo alive, Bush's sentiments are clearly pro-life.

"I've consistently said I can't go beyond what my powers are and I'm not going to do it. There are 90,000 abortions that take place in this state every year. That troubles me more than I can ever describe," said the Governor, finding a comparison where few would dare. Bush also negatively compared the decision of Judge George Greer not to reverse his decision, based on the testimony of a doctor affiliated with the Schindlers, to court decisions to review death penalty cases.

On the pro-death side, representatives for Michael Schiavo pleaded with the media and legislators to not involve themselves in the family's most painful ordeals for the sake of political or religious agendas, and for the love of God, quit calling them "pro-death advocates." The media responded by splashing the story, covered from multiple angles, on page one of every national newspaper and running constant updates in between television shows. Politicians responded by making resentful speeches and making deals in the House and Senate over the woman's future. When asked if anyone in Congress planned on interceding to bring soldiers home from Iraq, Afghanistan, or other dangerous locations overseas, most Congressmen said it didn't seem like any of their business.

isaster and certain robot servitude were averted earlier this week when a summit between U.S. President Bush and our soon-to-be robot overlords ended in an embarrassing technical glitch, with all seven of the gigantic city-destroying machines freezing in place simultaneously, each displaying a perplexing message of “LOAD PLAIN LETTER� on their ominously glowing LCD display panels.

According to confidential information from our office copier Xero, these robot invaders come to us from the planet Shmoob, orbiting a distant star in the left-hand part of the sky. After landing in a huge crater that flattened the entire state of Wyoming, the robots apparently were disappointed that their arrival garnered no attention whatsoever and proceeded to destroy major American cities outside Wyoming as a means of getting the nation’s attention.

The first of the robots was spotted Saturday in Illinois, devouring railroad tracks and downing entire rivers like they were rivers of cola. Another was spotted bathing in Lake Mead later that day, and yet another reportedly took a dump in the Nelson Aquifer.

By day’s end all seven robots had made their presence known in various humorously destructive ways. After our robot guests completely razed Chicago, destroyed Miami, and in a strange twist, took time out of their busy schedules to stomp the small town of Hurkle, Iowa into the dust, they made their way en masse to Washington D.C. to demand the immediate surrender of our tiny, flesh-based government.

At first, Bush administration officials believed they could fool the robots by turning out all the lights in the White House and hiding behind couches and other furniture, believing the robots would take the bait and assume that no one was home. Unfortunately for the White House strategists, however, these weren’t your run-of-the-mill stupid killer robots, and their highly advanced neural mesh quad-processors made short work of the administration’s subterfuge. After the robots had torn the roof off of the Oval Office, and one of the invaders began wearing it comically as a hat, it became clear that our leaders would have to address this crisis in a more adult fashion.

But first, President Bush reportedly resorted to his time-honored “What in the hell is THAT!� running away ploy, which ended quickly when the president ate shit into a ditch and cracked his safety helmet.

Early hopes that the robots just wanted to use the White House john were dashed when the machines issued their ultimatum on weird stock-market ticker tape that issued forth from the smallest robot’s crotch. Regardless of the hilarious means by which they issued their demands, the robots earned the respect of all present after engaging in a rousing game of hacky sack with the corpse of the late Vice President, Dickson Cheney.

Following the unexpected freezing of the robot invaders, President Bush and what remained of his top administration officials sat in silence for several minutes, until Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice took the cue to approach one of the robots and start jiggering with various hatches and levers, trying to find the source of the error.

In the days since, the White House has had technicians working on the downed bots day and night to correct this strange malfunction, a circumstance that many have complained is anticlimactic, to say the least.

“We’ll get these gigantic, thundering beasts back on their feet in no time,� promised a confident Rice. “And then we’ll finally answer the mystery of where they came from and what they did with Ed Begley Jr. I for one am dying to find out what their deal is.�

Ladies and gentlemen, I don't mean to shock you out of your pants (particularly you fatties), but I've got the most shocking news to report: Apparently I, Rokwell T. Finger, have been married for a while already.

I'm not defecating with you. Nor am I talking about my two previous wives, Arvelyn, the foul temptress, or Wyfe, my mysterious first spouse I never seem to reveal much about. No, this insidious beast is, as far as I can tell, some third entity I married more recently, after Arvelyn and after Wyfe, but before my engagement to my latest love, Ginger Baker.

You can't imagine, even with hyper-space imagining goggles, how surprised I was to get a call informing me I had abandoned my wife on a deserted island known as Australia, somewhere in the Pacific Ocean. Her name is Felchyana Finger, which is either an incredible coincidence or the tart has even taken to using my name. I called her a filthy liar, and now that's added into the lawsuit. Oh, yes—she's suing me for abandonment. And now slander. As far as I'm concerned, she can sue me for complete forgetment, because apparently she has a case for that more than anything else.

People, believe me, if I knew I had a wife, I never would have started up with Ginger Baker. Heart be damned, and loins be voodoo'd. I am not the kind of man who goes out milking cows when he has a jug of milk at home, even if it's goat's milk. Actually, I have never met this Felchyana character, and I can't fathom how I would even meet an Australian. But we were married. Her lawyer has pictures of me with her and everything. I'm not sure how they got me into that ridiculous Wild Kingdom get-up, but the woman tricked me into marrying her, there's obviously no end to her powers.

Not that I've met her—beyond our time of marriage, that is. We're speaking through attorneys, her attorney and me, who is representing myself. He's a nice fellow, her attorney Nick Digby, but you can't understand a damned thing the man says. I suppose they all speak that way on his primitive island.

Nice, yes, but he's been spinning some cock-and-balls story about the FBI giving me a new identity, me hiding from the mob, then some nonsense about getting kidnapped by pirates. Honestly, do they think me an idiot? What kind of sane person goes around offending the mob, marrying Australians, and turning pirate overnight? It doesn't sound like me at all. I'm not buying it.

But, from a legal standpoint, Digby and the foul-mouthed wife of mine have some kind of case, I can't deny that. Worse than that, they have me over a barrel, and it's full of piranha who are nibbling my kibbles 'n' bits. If I want to marry Ginger Baker—and I do—I'll have to find a way to settle things amicably with Ms. Down-Under. Or I suppose that's Mrs. Down-Under. No matter what lies she spins about me, the important thing is not to take it personally, just keep friendly, and try to walk out of this a single man.

In the interest of honesty, I have to tell Ginger Baker what kind of man she's marrying. What I'm trying to decide right now is whether to wait until after we're married, or if it's quite necessary I tell her before. My conscience is telling me the latter, but I'm not sure how much I can trust my conscience, given that I'm a man who has huge gaps in his memory and has married women at the drop of a veil before. Ah, the dilemma! Torn between two women, only one of whom I really want. I suppose many men would happily trade places with me. If anyone wants to, try to match my height and my approximate looks so Felchyana won't be able to distinguish us.

º Last Column: Ol' Lee Loves Chachi
º more columns