Ultimate Fighter Fails Pre-Fight Physical for Being “Extremely Unhealthy”

By Terrence Dillard

SAN BERANDINO- Ultimate Fighter Doug “Thunderfist” Lowen will be scratched from this weekend’s UFC 134 pay-per-view event after failing his pre-fight physical. Dr. Vikram Choudary, the physician who performed the physical examination on Lowen, said that there was not a red flag in the examination, but that Lowen is a ticking time bomb with a list of health problems so long that he should be hospitalized indefinitely due to his condition.

Choudary went on to say that Lowen’s health problems reminded him of a hypothetical question from medical school. “I’m not exactly sure where to start, but it’s a miracle of science that Mr. Lowen is able to stand up, let alone participate in professional sports. Starting from the ground up, he had two broken toes on his left foot that never properly healed and now look like mangled cocktail sausages. He has two staples in his right ankle that are holding his Achilles tendon in place. I asked him if he knew how they got there, and he told me that when he sprained his ankle in training a few years ago, he Googled the surgery that the doctor did on Curt Schilling in the 2004 World Series and tried it on himself so he wouldn’t miss a fight. He has severe tendonitis in his left knee from an old weight lifting accident, but that’s his good knee considering the fact that he had his right kneecap replaced with a lens from a pair of aviator sunglasses after kneeing a guy with a metal plate in his skull. And that’s just below the waist.”

Choudary added that Lowen has a ruptured spleen, a condition that can be fatal if not treated promptly, but that Lowen reported feeling the symptoms for “two or three years, ever since that fight got stopped for the guy headbutting me repeatedly in the stomach.” He also has no knuckles in his left index finger, which Dr. Choudary postulated might have something to do with Mr. Lowen’s nickname.
“The truly appalling thing is that Mr. Lowen has been approved for fight after fight in the UFC, and any one of these debilitating injuries should have been enough to keep him out of the Octagon,” Choudary said of Lowen, who has lost his last six fights to bring his career record to 9-23. “I was called in as an emergency doctor because UFC’s in-house physician was riding dune buggies in Wyoming. How anyone could let this human punching bag continue to put his face in front of other people’s fists and call himself a professional physician is beyond me.”

[LEFT- Lowen after his last win.]

Choudary explained that Lowen’s problems go beyond what can be seen on a simple x-ray. After his initial examination, he had enough concern for Lowen’s health that he sent him to have a full MRI. The MRI indicated that Lowen had the marker for Chronic Traumatic Encephelopathy (CTE), the brain condition blamed for former professional wrestler Chris Benoit’s murder-suicide of his entire family. CTE expert Christopher Nowkinski weighed in by saying that allowing Lowen to fight with CTE would be “wildly irresponsible.” Nowinski went on to say that, “I understand that UFC is in the business of marketing violence, but at some point it becomes more likely that not that someone is going to die. If these competitors would rather get their names on Affliction shirts than see the age of 50, that’s their decision, but they should not be in the position to hurt other people.”

When presented with the results of the examination, Lowen seemed to be in denial about the conclusions. “I know that my brain thoughts are sometimes not as clear to me as the thinkings that there are for other people. I always do a punch or a kick better than book learnings. Does that make me too stupid to fight? I don’t know. Maybe it does, maybe it doesn’t. But what I do for work is to fight and that’s what I do so that’s what I’ll do if they let me or not. I might just get a ticket and start a fight and bet on myself. It’s no big deal.”

Choudary explained that Lowen’s delusions arise from his severe psychological problems. “I’m not a psychiatrist, but from spending 20 minutes around the man, I can tell you that he has enough psychological problems that he should not be involved in contact sports.” He said that Lowen likely has high-grade depression and a borderline personality disorder, which creates a vicious cycle whereby Lowen hates his life and fights to compensate, only to put himself in a worse position. “All things considered, Lowen is one of the most unhealthy people I have ever encountered.” But Choudary went on to say that Lowen, as sick as he may be, is typical of his profession, and that he expects the average life expectancy of a UFC fighter to be somewhere between 40-45 years.

Budget Tips for the U.S. Government

By Fred Olsen, Co-Chair, Center for Family Responsibility

DAYTON- Lately, I have heard a lot about how the government is having trouble coming up with a budget that everyone can agree on. Even though the characters are different, the disagreements are very familiar to me, as I work with families having budget problems all the time at the Center for Family Responsibility, and through volunteer work at my church. All of my experience advising people on budget issues has made me aware of some of the common roadblocks to making a good budget that satisfies everyone’s needs. Whether dad wants a new lawnmower, mom wants a new ironing board, or Sally wants a new sundress, making a budget requires sacrifice by everyone. Today, I want to pass along some of the lessons that I have learned that can help make the budget as painless as possible.

1. Distinguish between Needs and Wants: The Government can save an awful lot of money by figuring out what it really needs, and what it just wants. I would tell the Democrats and Republicans to make a list of everything they will need to buy in the next year, then divide it up into two columns- one for Wants and one for Needs. Some expenses are necessities; the Government is going to have to budget for roads and schools no matter what. But, for example, the Republicans should ask themselves if they really need the Bush tax cuts. Could rich people live without a huge tax cut? That’s the kind of tough question the Government needs to be asking itself as it comes up with a budget.

[RIGHT- With irresponsible financial decisions like this one, it's no wonder the Government is having budget problems.]

2. Try before you Buy: Tell me if you have had this experience before: you see something in an advertisement on television and decide that you have to have it. You shell out your hard earned cash to buy it. It finally shows up on your doorstep, and after putting it together, it does little more than gather dust. Eventually, it gets relegated to a storage closet without ever living up to the money you paid for it. The Government faces this same problem. Take the F-22 Raptor twin-engine fighter jet, for example. For years, the Government wanted the F-22 Raptor worse than Ralphie Parker wanted a Red Ryder BB gun. It sunk billions of dollars into development of the air-to-air combat fighter, only to learn that it didn’t have a use for that technology after the end of the Cold War. If I was advising the Government at that point, I would have told them to try renting an F-22 Raptor, or maybe buying just one to see how it worked, rather than blowing a fortune on an entire fleet of planes that never get taken out of the hangar. The Government can save money in its budget by getting rid of things it doesn’t really need, and trying before you buy is a great way to test how necessary a purchase really is.

3. Little things add up: With a budget as big as the Government’s shaving even a few percentage points off the top can result in big savings. The Government should look into reducing interest payments on its debt by trying to get a home equity loan or line of credit to consolidate all of its debts in one place. I know the Government has had bad experiences with home equity loans in the past, but maybe it should shop around with some of the big lenders- like China, India, and Brazil- to see if any of them want to buy up all of the nation’s debt so the Government could make one, low monthly payment. Many people make similar mistakes with their banks. If you just assume that your banks fees are part of life, you might be missing out on better deals elsewhere. The Government should try to find a bank that offers totally free checking and offers the best possible interest rate. Even if the bank is just charging $20 per month in fees, that’s $240 every year, and it doesn’t take a mathematician to see that those numbers start to add up.

Even though the Democrats and the Republicans in the Government have had a hard time agreeing to a budget, I believe that by following these simple steps, they will be able to an agreement that pleases everyone. With a little bit of hard work and some “trimming the fat,” the Government should be able to avoid a messy conflict and finger-pointing that doesn’t help anyone.

Tales from the front lines

By Otto Stevenson

OMAHA- As it does every year, April has rolled around once again. As the snow turns to slush and the first blossoms form on the trees, it’s natural for a man to feel reinvigorated- excited about the prospects of a new summer.

But not me. See, for me, April stands for something altogether different. Something more depressing, more sinister. That’s because I’m a veteran; a veteran of the JC Penney Semi-Annual Sale. I have seen a lot in my seventy-two years on this big blue marble, but let me tell you that I have never seen something so decrepit, so depraved as the two-day sale that takes place every spring in that atrocity of a department store. The things I have experienced have made me question whether there is a God, but if there is, then there must be a hell, and that hell must look an awful lot like a JC Penney store after a Semi-Annual sale.

Every sale I have lived through has been a hive of pestilence, like a Biblical plague put on Earth to test the wills of men. Those who come out of it are scarred but hardened by the experience, and nothing will ever look quite the same to them again. Unfortunately, it’s no guarantee that anyone will come out alive. Lots of great young men have been taken in their primes by the JC Penney Semi-Annual Sale, all because they went along with their wives or girlfriends to keep them company, or just so they wouldn’t get yelled at later for staying home to watch baseball.

[RIGHT- A weary shopper gathers himself in the gardening section.]

One of the worst memories I have ever had came the night before the Semi-Annual Sale back in ’86. We were setting up an umbrella and some lawn chairs to sit in while we waited for the doors to open. My wife wanted to be in the front of the line because there were rumors of some great deals in the linen section and she didn’t want the good hand towels to be picked over by the time we got there. When we were setting up, it was still so dark out that we couldn’t see the other people waiting to get in, but we knew they were there. After a few minutes, we heard a crashing noise- apparently one of the bigger umbrellas had fallen down. Then, there was a sharp groan, like someone trying to catch his breath. The umbrella had fallen right on some poor sap who didn’t even see it coming. He laid on the ground moaning in pain for what seemed like hours. I thought about going to help him, but I knew it was too risky. Any movement would cause us to lose our place in line. Instead, we listened to him crying out in pain endlessly. He even started calling out for his mom. I thought that only happened in movies, but this was damn real. We all sat there listening to him wail on and on and couldn’t help but think, “why won’t you just die already? We need to get some rest before this sale!” After the sale was over, we saw it on the news. Chester Smith had been hit in the head with an umbrella pole and bled out in the parking lot to JC Penney. He was one of my best friends. You can’t imagine what it feels like to wish for one of you best friends to die. Let me tell you, it’s the pits.

As gruesome as that scene was, there are also images that were burned into my memory inside the store. I remember one time, we went to look at jewelry with another couple. My friend Barney was with his wife Fran. We all knew that Barney didn’t see so good. As we got close to the jewelry display, Barney said that he thought we should stay away until later. We all knew that he had poor vision, so Fran and my wife went ahead anyway. Sure enough, as soon as they got there, a pushy little Italian woman got mad because she thought they were trying to cut in line and steal the hoop earrings she was trying to buy. The woman lunged at my wife and inadvertently hit Fran square in the jaw with her elbow. Fran bit her tongue so badly that it bled. Medics and store security were called and they hauled the woman off, but that picture of Fran bleeding on the cheap department store carpeting will haunt me for the rest of my years.

Now we all like to think of ourselves as moral people, and we like to believe that we would do the right thing when faced with a difficult choice. The JC Penney Semi-Annual Sale is a test of our moral righteousness like none other. We all know what it feels like to have someone jump in front of you in the checkout line or to push past you to get the last pair of Dockers with a normal human in-seam. But we like to believe that we would not behave like savages when put in the same situation. Sadly, I have seen my wife sneak into a fitting room when someone was modeling skirts to her friend and steal the one that she wanted. If you ask her, she will deny that this ever happened. I wouldn’t even believe that it happened if you told me, but I saw it with my own two eyes.

As I have grown older, I have spent a lot of time thinking about sales and the human condition. Can there be such thing as a “good sale?” I say no, there is no such thing as a good sale. There can be a “necessary sale,” like when a store overstocked its winter apparel and needs to clear space for the new line of Tommy Bahama shirts. There can even be such a thing as a “just sale,” when you need new silverware and it is marked down 75%. But a good sale? I guess you’re talking to the wrong guy.

USA Network’s New Fall Dramedy

By Ed Aschbrunner

HOLLYWOOD- Let me begin by saying that I am not a television executive. Nor am I a producer, a show runner, a writer, or even a below-the-line PA. I don’t know the first thing about getting television shows on the air, but I have watched enough mindless commercials on the USA Network to pick up a thing or two. I’m not sure whether they made a concerted effort to produce a bunch of shows that have basically identical premises, or if it happened by mistake. When I look at the five or six most recent shows they have aired on their network, I definitely have a pretty good idea of what their executives like to hear in a pitch meeting.

I will boil down every USA Network dramedy down to its base elements for you in Mad Lib form: “Displaced former [insert exciting/prestigious profession here] is forced to leave his/her job and he/she has to learn the ropes of being a [insert tangentially related, less exciting/prestigious profession here], all while dealing with his/her crazy friends and family in an exotic locale. Hilarity ensues.”

If there was one show that followed this archetype, it wouldn’t mean anything. If there were two, it would be a coincidence. If there were three, we could roll our eyes at USA because they had clearly decided to piggyback on one successful show with a couple of others. But they have at least five of these shows that have the exact same premise. I’m not even sure that one of the shows was successful, so the only explanation I can imagine is that NBC rejected most of these ideas but wanted to promote the actors use them in a more interesting project on the parent network somewhere down the road. The ideas are just so bereft of creativity that I can’t accept that a TV executive would green-light them in good faith. I can’t accept it.

Think about it: Burn Notice- a former spy has to leave the agency to work as a private investigator in Miami while his old agency hunts him down. Royal Pains- a doctor moves to the Hamptons to start working as a physician to the rich and famous at their mansions. Fairly Legal- a former big city attorney becomes a sassy mediator in fast-paced Manhattan. White Collar, In Plain Sight, Covert Affairs. It’s all the same shit packaged with a different profession in a different city with different wacky friends and relatives.

So here’s my idea. You start with a sexy profession that will get people interested. It can’t be something remotely blue collar because the show has to be a sort of prism into the lives of the more interesting. I’m going to go with fighter pilot. There hasn’t been a good fighter pilot show or movie since Top Gun, so the job should slide nicely back into the national consciousness. But the guy has to have suffered some misfortune that prevents him continuing to be a fighter pilot, and it can’t be his fault. I want my star to be a roguish playboy named Bradley Austin (ooh, be careful, two first names!), so I’m going to say that he got into a bar fight over a girl and injured his eye, so he no longer has perfect vision and can’t be a fighter pilot any longer. I don’t know if Ryan Phillipe’s career has fallen far enough to take this role, but I have my fingers crossed.

[Look, Mr. Phillippe, I know this isn't how you saw your career going. But a paycheck's a paycheck.]

He also needs a new job that is somehow vaguely related to this old job, is clearly a step down in prestige, but is still interesting enough for people to tune in. He’s a pilot for a private helicopter company that rents out its service to the oh-so-very rich. That serves the dual function of putting him in high-pressure situations and setting up for some great B-Reel footage of gorgeous city skylines and landscapes. It’s also more plausible to bring in hot romantic counterparts if they are the wives and girlfriends of rich guys who rent out the helicopters.

The location, if you haven’t already figured it out for yourself, is Los Angeles. It’s almost too easy. You can do cameos by C-List actors who you can put in your commercials- “This week, Bradley has to fly Corey Feldman to Michael Lohan’s celebrity high-stakes poker game, or he risks losing his $50,000 buy-in! Will he make it through an earthquake?” Plus, in L.A., you can do the old Entourage trick and just pan through the streets of L.A. showing hot women, cool cars, and beautiful weather for 1/3 of your show’s airtime if you run out of ideas.

Lastly, we need to add some relation who complicates the story. I have two ideas. First, Bradley’s best friend is Gerry White, a black guy who he met in the Air Force who is still in the service, but who inexplicably is always available at a moment’s notice. He’s the only guy in the show who might be more suave than Bradley, and they frequently try to one-up each other trying to pick up women, playing bar games, and racing fast cars through busy freeway traffic while identifiable and adrenaline-boosting songs by Disturbed play in the background. Oh, and both Bradley and Gerry somehow have multiple high-end cars, motorcycles, and other accoutrements that are WAY out of their earnings brackets. If this guy sounds like he’s ripped off from Terrance Howard’s character in Ironman, it’s because he is. I wonder if Donald Faison is available?

And here’s the kicker. Bradley’s dad is a successful politician who objects to Bradley’s carousing ways. Played by J.K. Simmons, Terry Austin is a California Senator who can’t put up with Bradley jeopardizing his career. Being a Senator introduces a natural tension and opens up the possibility for countless other plot devices down the road. I suppose there has to be at least one recurring female character. Aisha Tyler can be his hot coworker at the helicopter rental company with an attitude.

So here’s the short version, “Bradley Austin was a hotshot pilot in the Air Force [shot of him flying a plane and yelling “Woooohoooo!] until an eye injury got him a medical discharge. Now, he’s partying his way through Los Angeles [shot of him taking shots at a bar and general revelry]. But it’s not all fun and games. He’s learning the ropes of being a helicopter pilot to the stars [clip of Mark Cuban yelling at him to hurry up] all while trying to keep his politician father off his back [shot of J.K. Simmons shaking his head in disappointment]. This fall, it’s Ryan Phillippe in The Son Also Rises on USA. Characters Welcome.”

Japan Deploys Old People to Solve Nuclear Problem

By James Hornung

TOKYO- The nation of Japan, facing a potential nuclear meltdown after a catastrophic tsunami, has faced the difficult situation of having workers risk life and limb to repair the radioactive site. To reconcile the problematic situation, the nation’s government has begun to ask its senior citizens to take the lead in the recovery effort.

The government cited several reasons why it chose old people to help deal with the potentially disastrous reactor. Perhaps the most important reason is that they will have less to lose. The Japanese are famously efficient people, sometimes trading sentimentality for better production, so it comes as no surprise that they would see the value in risking the lives of 80 year olds rather than young people with valuable lives still ahead of them. Moreover, nuclear radiation is a leading cause of birth defects, and if those exposed to radiation are well past their child-bearing years, it naturally follows that it minimizes the risk of birth defects.

[LEFT- While these volunteers are willing to help, they have long lives ahead of them that the government would like them to continue living. Old people don't have that same problem.]

Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan explained the decision. “We were faced with a terrible situation that left us no good choices, so we had to try to find the least bad alternative. Sending our old people into a radioactive nuclear power plant is certainly not optimal. I’m sure that some of our nation’s finest soup recipes and fishing stories will never come out of those reactors, but the job has to be done. On the positive side, killing off many of our old people will save the young from many unpleasant trips to nursing homes. Also, there’s no scientific basis for this, but I have been thinking that if they melt on the spot like the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark, we won’t need to bury their remains, which will save some space in our already crowded country.”

Mr. Kan was also asked how the country arrived at the age of 65 as the cutoff for who would be asked to enter the nuclear reactor. He responded, “because I’m 64 and this should be over in a few months.”

It would seem as though Japan is depending heavily on old people either being extremely civic-minded or borderline suicidal. To help motivate people to volunteer for a very undesirable job, the government has developed a detailed marketing plan. As with most Japanese marketing plans, it will involve cartoon kitties telling people to go into the nuclear reactors and will remind viewers that not going into the reactor would bring great shame to the country and family. Perhaps the most brilliant part of the marketing plan is the strategy to target former kamikaze pilots from World War II. The advertisers plan to guilt trip the survivors for not completing their jobs during the war and blaming them for the eventual loss of the war. They will also tell them that they only way they can make up the great debt to their country is to perform a similar act of self-sacrifice by going into the nuclear reactor to repair the damage.

The trickiest part of the project is that nobody has any idea how to actually fix the nuclear reactor. The best solution they have come up with so far is to pour seawater on it because it looked like it was getting too hot. Nuclear physicist Yoshi Nakamura explained that

the country and its scientific community are in uncharted territory. “We’re just going to tell the old people to go in there and see if it looks like anything is broken. Hopefully, they will just sort of suck up the radiation and the power plant will stop glowing and pulsating. Every time we send someone in there, they get instantly evaporated. We are going to try sending a lot of people in together to see if the radiation targets only a few of them, and we’re going to cover them in mud so they don’t overheat as quickly. Now that I think about it, the radiation sounds

a lot like the Predator. I’m going to suggest to the panel to try to make it bleed, because it is a well established scientific principle that if it bleeds, it dies.”

[RIGHT- An artist's rendering of what the radiation may look like.]

If you are interested in applying to help fix the broken nuclear reactor, you are over 65 years of age, and you have a horrible feeling of shame that causes you to want to die, but you still want to help Japan, contact Japanese Union of Plutonium Engineers for more information.

Aborting a Retarded Fetus Is Better that Giving a Retarded Baby Up for Adoption

By Frank Medlock

Is there a more self-serving and offensive thing a person could possibly do? Tempting to do, of course, rather than give up the rest of your life taking care of a kid whose best outcome is to sort of be able to take care of himself. But there is no greater burden you could possibly put on the rest of society.

Before I go any further, I want to address the readers who are put off by the fact that I am using the word “retarded.” I’m not going to stop using, and there are two reasons. First, it is the most general and descriptive word. Everyone knows what it means and it’s in the DSM-IV because it is the official term for the variety of disabilities. Also, the word is not inherently bad. I don’t care if it has been used in a hateful context. The word itself means that the person’s psychological development was impeded in some way. The development was retarded. The person was retarded. The word makes sense. The word “nigger” was invented to express disdain. The word “faggot” was adopted from the idea that gays should be burned to death. Those are inherently hateful words. Whatever hate is in the word “retarded” is just a reflection of social reality. If you come up with a new word to replace it without changing the fact that retarded people are looked down on socially, then that word will eventually be considered hateful too. “Nigger” was replaced by “negro” when blacks were still extremely marginalized, so that word eventually became perceived as hateful. If you replace “retarded” with “developmentally disabled,” middle school kids are still going to use it to make fun of each other, and activists will eventually get pissed off that the word is being used. Then we’ll have to find another new word, which I would say is pretty retarded.

But back to the point, there are definitely arguments for why you should be able to give up a retarded baby for adoption. On one hand, it’s kind of hard not to be sympathetic. I mean, all we hear about is how having kids changes your life and how every parent’s life revolves around his or her kids, but there’s a pretty big step up from going to soccer games or piano recitals and wiping your 22 year-old’s ass for the fourth time of the day. Maybe the worst part would be the period before the child is born but after you have found out that the baby is going to be retarded. Anticipating the misery that is to come would be atrocious. Well, I guess that’s not the worst part. The worst part is still having to spend every free minute trying to prevent your retarded kid from causing a total disaster. I admit that when you’re staring down the barrel of that gun, it would be hard to avoid pulling the adoption trigger.

On the other hand, the decision to give up the retarded baby for adoption is basically saying, “Hey, my life is too important to be disrupted by taking care of a retarded baby.” Maybe you could delude yourself into thinking that someone else wants to take care of the baby, but that is a lie. Nobody affirmatively wants to take care of a retarded baby; people just have an appropriate sense of responsibility not to throw that job on the government or some random person. They know that it is arrogant and self-centered beyond belief to think that someone else should have the completely thankless job. Believing that someone really wants to raise the retarded child is like thinking that people like picking up their dogs’ shit. Nobody likes it; you just do it because it would be fucked up to leave it for someone else to do.

Giving up a retarded kid for adoption would probably destroy the rest of your life. How could you ever feel good about yourself after doing something like that? You wouldn’t donate money to charity, because it’s not like you’re ever going to get back on the positive side of that ledger. You might still have friends, but you would always know that the friends probably look down on you for being a selfish prick, and they’d constantly worry that you’re going to pass off some responsibility on them instead of taking care of your own business. Anything you ever did would be under a dark cloud of guilt, knowing that the fun you’re having is only possible because you completely dicked over someone else who is probably spending that time reassembling a book case that your biological child tore apart for no apparent reason.

There is an obvious solution here, but you probably don’t want to hear it. When you weigh all of the options, you pretty much have to abort the fetus that is going to become a retarded baby. Think about the other possibilities. If you keep the baby, you will ruin your entire life. You are taking on a responsibility that will take up all of your time, and will not be remotely enjoyable. What you now think of as a horrible day will become a pretty good day, and there won’t be anything better. If you give the baby up for adoption, you will be annihilated by guilt for the rest of your life, and that feeling will be justified. You will have taken all of that evil I just described and passed it onto someone else. From a net social value standpoint, it’s even worse than keeping it because there is one life ruined by responsibility and another ruined by guilt. However you feel about abortion, you have to admit that it’s the socially optimal outcome. The only way to deny that argument is to say that someone would actually derive happiness from raising a retarded child, and I already explained why making that argument proves that you are a self-centered jerk.

Somali Pirates Extremely Glad Not to be known as Somali Terrorists

By Rafael Sturdevant

MOGADISHU- Public attention has been focused on civilian uprisings across the Middle East in recent weeks, but another news story has persisted in the region: Somali Pirates in the Gulf of Aden continue to attack ships and capture hostages to hold for ransom. While these attacks have been only moderately successful, perhaps the Pirates’ greatest success has been in avoiding the label “terrorist” from the American government. As long as they maintain the pirate moniker, they will likely remain free to plunder as much booty as they please.

Ever since the attacks of September 11, the application of the term “terrorist” to any person or political entity has been an essential death sentence. The name “pirate,” on the other hand, is more often associated terrible baseball teams and Halloween costumes, especially slutty ones. And even though the government’s official policy is to never negotiate with terrorists, its official policy toward pirates is to make fun of them and laugh.

The American public has a similarly light-hearted view of pirates. Most Americans have little knowledge of the Somali Pirates’ attacks. When asked for his reaction to the recent execution of four hostages by the Somali Pirates, Darren Grovsky, a factory worker from Dayton, Ohio responded, “What did they do, make them walk the plank?” He proceeded to high five a nearby white guy.

If the Somali Pirates truly want to be taken seriously, it will be crucial for them to do things that don’t seem so damn funny. The fact that their “pirate ships” look like chunks of flotsam that Cubans use to raft from Havana to Miami does not create the same terrifying imagery as the Jolly Roger. Moreover, their actions would not seem like such a joke if they started choosing hostages who did not share names with correspondents from the Daily Show. When Americans hear that Rob Riggle was killed at sea, it is difficult to take the suggestion seriously.

[LEFT- These guys need to work on their costumes. They don't look anything like Captain Jack Sparrow from the movies.]

President Obama recently delivered a speech to the American people in which he urged the country to take the threat of Somali Pirates seriously. “These actions by the rebels in Somalia are uncalled for and extremely dangerous,” Obama snickered. “Continued behavior that goes against international law will not be tolerated… or we’ll make you swab the deck. I’m sorry, I just can’t take these guys seriously.” Obama then covered his face and turned away, and could be seen laughing so hard he almost started to cry.

While the benefit of being known as pirates rather than terrorists is probably responsible for the Somalis continued success, some of the pirates feel that they are not getting the respect they deserve. “I do not wear a skull-and-crossbones hat; I am a vicious killer who deserves recognition,” said Mohammad Hassan, the captain of a Somali Pirate ship with a crew of more than 10 men. “Do the Americans think that I am not evil enough? For Christ sakes, who does a guy need to kill to get carpet bombed these days?”

Nonetheless, the Somali Pirate craze has caught on in some unexpected ways. For instance, birthday party supplies with a Somali Pirate theme have been flying off the shelves of party stores nationwide. Sherri MacDougal, the mother of 8-year old Teddy Masterson-MacDougal, said she recently threw a Somali Pirate birthday party for her son, and it was a smash hit. “It was such a fun time! Instead of making pirate hats, all of the kids just wore blackface. We played ‘pin the machete on the sailor,’ and he kids sat in a circle for a game of ‘innocent civilian, innocent civilian, hostage.’ Everybody had a great time. I would definitely recommend it to a friend.”

As the threat of Somali Pirates remains problematic for American tourists in the horn of Africa, the American government has considered measures that would encourage civilians to undergo the appropriate threat assessment. Rejected ideas include a color-coded threat level for the area and educational brochures to be sent to anyone who buys plane tickets to Somalia. One idea that has gained some traction is simply rebranding the Somali Pirates with a more appropriate name. So far, the name with the most support has been Somali Seamen, because it sounds even funnier.