Washington, D.C., March 12, 2006 -- Vice President Dick Cheney, a leading advocate of the use of torture in the so-called "war on terror", successfully demonstrated the effectiveness of the technique this month by allowing himself to personally undergo a one-week program of "coerced interrogation", the compassionately conservative term for the practice. During the week, the Vice President proved the value of torture by unwillingly confessing to a wide range of infractions, some of them quite surprising.

Boulder, March 22, 2014 -- Genetic engineers at the world-renowned Tweek-e-Gene Institute in Boulder, Colorado, announced today the successful production of the world's first live custom-designed human Manga-baby. The baby, a healthy boy weighing 2.3 lbs. and measuring a lanky 38 inches from head to toe, will be named Ichi the Killer.

Ichi the Killer, prototype Manga-baby

Trend-spotters confidently predict Ichi will be the first boulder in a virtual landslide of specially-ordered designer Manga-babies.

Montgomery, Alabama, August 2, 2007 -- Alabama Governor Bob Riley, who led a successful if short-lived effort to alleviate Alabama's water shortages through a government-sponsored state-wide "Pray for Rain" campaign in July, is now urging Alabamians to increase pressure on the heavenly potentate with a newly proclaimed "Curse Drought" initiative.

Alabama Governor Bob Riley (Rep.)

Los Angeles, March 19, 2010 -- Andy Warhol's famous phrase, “In the future, everyone will be fat and slightly stupid,” correctly prognosticated two alarming social trends that have led to a sharp rise in the incidences of heart disease, diabetes, right-wing talk radio and other obesity-related maladies among the ever-larger American populace.

What the eccentric 1960s pop artist failed to predict, however, is another trend that now has sociological statisticians scratching their unkempt scalps: the remarkable rise in short-term celebrity status among citizens from all walks of life.