State legislators approved the Governor's plan to lease the Indiana Toll
Road to a consortium of Spaniards and Australians for 75 years.

Legislators voted to return a Ten Commandments monument to the Capitol
grounds that a federal judge found unconstitutional  six  years  ago.  "I can't
think of anything else I'd rather be sued about," said State Senate President
David Williams.
                                                                      [courtesy Courier-Journal]

"Open societies require discussion and debate, not firebombs,
 blasphemy laws and threats of assassination."

    -- Ellen Johnson, President of American Atheists

Officials closed the city newspaper in Volgograd, Russia, after it
published a cartoon showing Muhammad, Jesus, Moses and the
Buddha watching TV together.  . . . The Arab European League
web site published a cartoon showing Hitler  in  bed  with  Anne
Frank  saying,  "Put this in your diary." . . . A Minnesota woman
was arrested for biting off another woman's nose (which was re-
covered with a search warrant and reattached).  .  .  . A 7-year-
old girl was married to a stray dog in New Delhi. .  .  .  A British
nurse slapped co-workers with a frozen trout. . . .  Psycho Path,
Divorce Court and Farfrompoopen Road placed 1, 2 and 3 in a
poll for wackiest street names in the U.S.  Farfrompoopen is the
only road to Constipation Ridge in Tennessee.

"Collin Lake" sent us an e-mail titled "Lena Ponce."

The County Commissioners  of  Martin County,  one of eight Indiana
counties allowed to switch to Central time,  resolved to urge all other
southwestern Indiana counties to petition for Eastern time.

Police  found  a  goat  in  a storage room in the basement of the Alpha
Gamma Rho fraternity house at Western Kentucky University in Bow-
ling Green,  without food or water or room to walk around. . . .

Children were killing themselves and one another in a new game called
"choking" . . . .
                                                                       [courtesy WKYU-FM]

The "Patriot Guard"  motorcycle  gang  was patrolling soldiers' funerals in
and around Fort Campbell,  providing security against demonstrations by
Kansas' Preacher Phelps and his gay-bashing gang.
                                          
                                                                   [courtesy Courier-Journal]

"The song's been in the closet for 20 years.  The timing's right for it to come out."

-- Willie Nelson, on his new release "Cowboys Are Frequently, Secret-
    ly Fond of Each Other"

"So, what's the big deal about Chappaquiddick?"

-- Senator Ted Kennedy, Democrat of Massachusetts

"If he'd been in the military, he'd have learned gun safety."

-- Senator Chuck Hagel, Republican of Nebraska

A hunter in Michigan was shot by a companion who mistook
the victim's elbow for a squirrel.  .  .  . A hunter in Texas was
shot by a Vice President who mistook him for a  quail  (or an
Iraqi, or a liberal) .  .  .  . An Arizona State University student
arrested for masturbating in a  school  library  said the internet
connection in his dorm wasn't good enough.  .  .  . A Michigan
man convicted of having intercourse with a sheep was ordered
to register as a sex offender. . . . A teacher in Pensacola, Flori-
da, allowed students to skip his gym class for $1 a day. . . . In
Tulsa, Oklahoma,  a man bit off his girl friend's nose and swal-
lowed it.
               [courtesy Harper's Weekly, Courier-Journal, NPR]

Dean Anthony-Q10902 wrote Mon 6 Feb 2006 @11:15:32 CST:

How ironic it is that a depiction that associates Muhammad
with violence would inspire his followers to violence.  Their
actions would seem to jusitfy the image.

Edwin F. Kagin wrote Tues 7 Feb 2006 @11:51:39 EST:

We are reminded of the words of Edwin,  from  Baubles of
Blasphemy:  "Blasphemy is the crime of making fun of ridic-
ulous beliefs someone else holds sacred."

Bruce Mitchell wrote Weds 8 Feb 2006 @16:56:44 PST:

The cartoon I liked best  (sorry,  no  image):  Of a benign-looking
Prophet who stands on a cloud turning away a line of suicide bom-
bers with, "Stop, stop, we have run out of virgins."

Is that what you were looking for?  Courtesy Rory Lewis Band.

.

We  did  not get any entries from subscribers in our contest for best Mu-
hammad cartoon, but Mr. Kagin has forwarded to us a Muhammad car-
toon blog:  http://www.cagle.com/news/blog/  -- Ed.


FGDean@aol.com wrote Mon 6 Feb 2006 @12:29:09 PST re the
Santa Cruz teacher doing time  for filming little boys licking whipped
cream off each other's toes:

Dumb  News from California:  It's about time!

But -- that goes without saying, no? -- Ed.

Sago mine disaster survivor Randal McCloy Jr.'s  wife  sued her hus-
band's brother for selling photos of the comatose McCloy to the Na-
tional Enquirer.
                                            [courtesy Louisville Courier-Journal]

An Ellettsville official proposed ticketing residents who park cars in
their yards.  "This  is  not  Kentucky!"  said Planning Director Frank
Nierzwicki.  [Did he really say that? We don't know. We just made
that up. But he might have said it. And he might be wrong!  --  Ed.,
Tabloid Headlines]
                                                           [courtesy Courier-Journal]

"We didn't pick those oil prices out of our nose."

-- Vladimir Putin

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld compared Venezuela's
Hugo Chavez to Hitler,  pointing out that both were lawfully
elected. . . .  Vladimir Putin said Russia has missiles that zig-
zag. . . .  Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi sang a love
song on the radio. . . .  Just before the Super Bowl the Pitts-
burgh Steelers' Jerome Bettis  became the first person to re-
ceive a Key to the City of Detroit since Saddam Hussein.. . .
Genetic tests found that  30  per  cent  of African-Americans
have white male ancestors.  . . .  A former strip club waitress
in Boston mailed condoms filled with explosives to strip clubs
and a television station. . . . A survey found that teen-age girls
now outnumber boys nearly 6 to 5 in first use of cigarettes, al-
cohol and marijuana. . . . A Philadelphia bus driver grabbed a
woman by the hair, knocked her head into a pole, opened the
door, and tossed her into traffic after she yelled at him for mis-
sing her stop.
                      [courtesy Harper's Weekly, Courier-Journal]

"Alston Latasha" and "Engel Latasha" sent us e-
mail titled "bikini"  and "diaspora,"  respectively.

Where you been, Pete Falcon?  A tabloid turns its lonely eyes to you.

A drug-sniffing dog taken by police for demonstration to an elementary
school in New Albany bit a sixth-grade girl in the face.

"Yum Brands," the corporation that owns KFC (formerly known as Ken-
tucky Fried Chicken),  Taco Bell,  and Pizza Hut,  has purchased naming
rights to the Kentucky Derby. . . .

A Louisville policeman speeding the wrong way down a one-way street to
the scene of a drug bust killed another motorist in a collision. . . .

Thirty-five state legislators -- most of them Democrats --  are sponsoring a
bill  to authorize display of the Ten Commandments in public buildings  and
the words "In God we trust" above the Speaker's dais in the House of Rep-
resentatives.  It has passed the Committee on State Government unanimous-
ly.                                       
                                                                        [courtesy Courier-Journal]

Cindy Sheehan -- now a candidate against Dianne Feinstein
for Senator from California -- was  arrested  for wearing an
anti-war  T-shirt  to President Bush's State of the Union ad-
dress. . . .  Beverly Young, wife of Congressman Bill Young
(R-Florida),  also  was  ousted,  for wearing a T-shirt saying
"Support the Troops"  (but she was not arrested). . . . Prime
Minister Silvio Berlusconi of Italy promised to  abstain  from
sex until April 9. . . . A starving Kenyan woman cursed God,
hit a cooking pot with a stick, and died in her sleep. . . .  Ha-
waiians  were  trying  to  get  the  humuhumunukunukuapuaa
named permanent state fish after its 5-year term expired. . .  .
A substitute teacher in Santa Cruz, California, was sentenced
to a year in jail  for filming little boys  licking  whipped  cream
off each other's toes. . . . Columbian smugglers were implant-
ing puppies with packets of heroin.  .  .  .  A New Hampshire
woman, frustrated by her husband's denial of her requests for
money, hired two thugs to rob him.

	Tabloid special! Here's that cartoon of Muhammad that has all those towel- heads stomping the Danish flag.
	(and, just for the sake of equal time, here is Borf Books' own creation)

"Heck Luebbert" sent us an e-mail titled "wincey immemorial."