Bailing out on 2008: Dave Barry finds Americans eager to put financially catastrophic year behind them
by Dave Barry | Tribune Media Services
How weird a year was it?
Here's how weird:
• O.J. actually got convicted of something.
• On several occasions, "Saturday Night Live" was funny.
• Gasoline hit $4 a gallon — and those were the good times.
• There were a few days in October when you could not completely rule out the possibility that the next Treasury Secretary would be Joe the Plumber.
• Finally, and most weirdly, for the first time in history, the voters elected a president who -- despite the skeptics who said such a thing would never happen in the United States -- was neither a Bush nor a Clinton.
Of course, Not all the events of 2008 were weird. Some were depressing. Millions of people started out the year with enough money in their 401(k)s to think about retiring, and ended up with maybe enough for a medium Slurpee.
So we can be grateful 2008 is almost over. But before we leave it behind, let's take a few minutes to look back and see if we can find some small nuggets of amusement. Why not? We paid for it.
January
Presidential contenders swarm into Iowa expressing sincerely feigned interest in corn.
The Iowa caucuses produce two surprises:
On the Republican side, the winner is Mike Huckabee, folksy former governor of Arkansas (or possibly Oklahoma). Not competing in Iowa are Rudy Giuliani, whose strategy is to stay out of the race until he is mathematically eliminated; and John McCain, who entered the caucus date incorrectly into his 1996 Palm Pilot.
On the Democratic side, the surprise winner is Barack Obama. A mesmerizing speaker, Obama electrifies voters with his exciting new ideas for change, although people have trouble remembering exactly what these ideas were because they were so darned mesmerized.
Obama's victory comes at the expense of former front-runner Hillary Clinton, who fails to ignite voter passion despite a rip-snorter of a stump speech in which she recites, without notes, all 17 points of her plan to streamline tuition-loan applications.
February
Amid much fanfare, Congress passes, and President Bush signs, an "economic stimulus package" under which the federal government will give taxpayers back several hundred dollars apiece of their own money, the idea being they will use this money to revive the U.S. economy by buying TV sets made in China. This will seem much more comical in the fall.
The battle between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton heats up as the two engage in a series of increasingly hostile debates, including one in which Secret Service agents have to tackle a large, angry, red-faced man who bursts from the audience shouting incoherently. This turns out to be Bill Clinton, who is swiftly dispatched by his wife's campaign to work his magic on voters in the crucial Guam caucuses.
March
Barack Obama addresses the issue of why, in his 20 years of membership in Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago, he failed to notice the pastor, Jeremiah Wright, is a racist lunatic. In a major televised address widely hailed for its brilliance, Obama explains ... OK, nobody really remembers what the actual explanation was. But everybody agrees it was mesmerizing.
Obama's opponent, Hillary Clinton, gets into a controversy of her own when she claims that, as first lady, she landed in Bosnia "under sniper fire." News outlets quickly locate archive video showing she was in fact greeted with a welcoming ceremony featuring an 8-year-old girl reading a poem. Clinton's campaign releases a statement pointing out that it was "a pretty long poem."
April
Barack Obama gets into trouble in the Pennsylvania primary with rural voters for saying that rural Americans are "bitter" and "cling to guns or religion." Responding to charges this statement is elitist, Obama responds: "You are getting sleepy. Very sleepy."
On the Republican side, John McCain gets wind of something called the "Internet" and orders his staff to give him a summary of it on index cards.
In economic news, the price of gasoline tops $4 a gallon, meaning the cost of filling up an average car is now $50, or, for Hummer owners, $17,500. Congress, responding to the financial pain of the American people, goes into partisan gridlock faster than ever before, with Republicans demanding oil companies immediately start drilling everywhere, including cemeteries, and Democrats calling for a massive effort to develop alternative energy sources such as wind, the sun, tides, comets, Al Gore and dragon breath.
May
The International Atomic Energy Agency releases a report stating Iran is actively developing nuclear warheads. In response, Iran issues a statement asserting (1) it absolutely is not developing nuclear warheads, and (2) these are peaceful warheads.
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac invest $17 billion in an Herbalife franchise.
The big spring Hollywood hit is the film version of "Sex and the City," which draws millions of movie-goers, including an estimated three men, two of whom thought they were in the theater for the fourth Indiana Jones movie, "Indiana Jones Experiences Frequent Nighttime Urination."
June
Barack Obama finally claims the bitterly contested Democratic nomination when Hillary Clinton, behind on delegates and in debt to the tune of $25 million, including $9 million for hairspray, suspends her campaign and declares she has "no hard feelings" and will do "whatever it takes" to help Obama get elected "even though he is scum." A gracious John McCain tells the press he "looks forward to a spirited debate with Senator Mondale." Before he can take questions, he is informed by his aides he has an important meeting.
In economic news, Chrysler announces a plan to lay off workers who have not been born yet. The lone economic bright spot is the iPhone, which is selling like crazy thanks to the release of a new model enhanced with the capability of sucking pieces of your brain out through your ear until all you want to do is play with your iPhone.
The scientific community is elated by NASA's announcement the Phoenix Lander has detected ice on Mars. The elation turns to concern when, several hours later, the lander detects a Zamboni machine.
July
Barack Obama, having secured North and South America, flies to Germany without using an airplane and gives a major speech -- speaking English and German simultaneously -- to 200,000 mesmerized Germans, who immediately elect him chancellor.
Meanwhile, John McCain, at a strategy session at a golf resort, tells his top aides to prepare a list of potential running mates, stressing he wants somebody "who is completely, brutally honest." Unfortunately, because of noise from a lawn mower, the aides think McCain said he wants somebody "who has competed in a beauty contest." This will lead to trouble down the road.
In sports, the government of China, in an effort to improve air quality for the Beijing Olympics, bans flatulence.
August
Barack Obama, continuing to shake up the establishment, selects as his running mate Joe Biden, a tireless fighter for change since he was first elected to the U.S. Senate in 1849. The Democratic Party gathers in Denver to formally nominate Obama, who descends from his Fortress of Solitude to mesmerize the adoring crowd with an acceptance speech objectively described by The New York Times as "comparable to the Gettysburg Address, only way better."
Meanwhile John McCain, still searching for the perfect running mate, tells his top aides in a conference call he wants "someone who is capable of filling my shoes." Unfortunately, he is speaking into the wrong end of his cellular phone, and his aides think he said "someone who is capable of killing a moose." Shortly thereafter, McCain stuns the world, and possibly himself, by selecting Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, a no-nonsense hockey mom with roughly 114 children named after random nouns such as "Hamper."
War breaks out between Russia and Georgia over South Ossetia and Abkhazia, serving as a stark reminder that, in an increasingly uncertain world, we, as Americans, have no idea where these places are.
September
The Republican convention gets off to a tentative start in St. Paul, Minn., when President Bush and Vice President Cheney are unable to attend, partly because the organizers told them that the convention was in Atlanta. The mood improves when Sarah Palin dazzles the delegates with her winning smile, detailed knowledge of what is on the TelePrompTer, and spot-on imitation of Tina Fey.
The presidential campaign is soon overshadowed by the troubled economy. The federal government is finally forced to take over Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac after they are caught selling crack at a middle school. But that is not enough, as major financial institutions, having lost hundreds of billions of dollars thanks to years of engaging in practices ranging from questionable to moronic, begin failing, which gives the federal government an idea: Why not give these institutions more hundreds of billions of dollars, generously provided by taxpayers?
October
Congress passes, and Technically Still President Bush signs, the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008, and everyone heaves a sigh of relief as the economy stabilizes for approximately 2.7 seconds, after which it resumes going down the toilet. The International Monetary Fund implements an emergency program under which anybody who opens a checking account anywhere on earth gets a free developing nation.
The economy dominates the presidential campaign, with the focal point being "Joe the Plumber," an Ohio resident who asks Barack Obama a question about tax policy and within hours is more famous than the Dalai Lama. He draws intense scrutiny from the news media, which, using investigative reporters borrowed from the Palin-yeti beat, determine "Joe the Plumber" is in fact (1) not named Joe, (2) not a plumber, (3) a citizen of Belgium and, (4) biologically, a woman.
In the presidential debates, John McCain, looking and sounding increasingly like the late Walter Brennan, cites Joe the Plumber a record 847 times while charging Obama's tax policies amount to socialism.
In noneconomic news, a Las Vegas jury convicts O.J. Simpson on 12 counts of being an unbelievable idiot. He faces more than 60 years in jail, which could end his relentless quest to find the killer of the people he stabbed to death in 1994.
November
Barack Obama, in a historic triumph, becomes the nation's first black president since the second season of "24," setting off an ecstatically joyful and boisterous all-night celebration that at times threatens to spill out of The New York Times newsroom. Obama, following through on his promise to bring change to Washington, quickly begins assembling an administration consisting of a diverse group of renegade outsiders, ranging all the way from lawyers who attended Ivy League schools and then worked in the Clinton administration to lawyers who attended entirely different Ivy league schools and then worked in the Clinton administration.
As it becomes increasingly clear the federal government's plan of giving hundreds of billions of dollars to dysfunctional companies has not fixed the economy, the government comes up with a bold new plan: give more hundreds of billions of dollars to dysfunctional companies. Soon, the government is in a bailout frenzy, handing out money left and right, at one point accidentally giving $14 billion to a man delivering a Domino's pizza to the Treasury building.
December
The National Bureau of Declaring Things That Make You Go "Duh" declares the nation has been in a recession since December 2007. The bureau also points out, according to its statistical analysis, "for some time now, bears apparently have been going to the bathroom in the woods."
The CEOs of the Increasingly Small Three auto makers return to Washington to resume pleading for a bailout, this time telling Congress that if they can reach an agreement that day, they will throw in the undercoating, the satellite-radio package AND a set of floor mats. "We're actually LOSING MONEY on this deal!" they assure Congress.
President-elect Obama, continuing to bring change in the form of fresh-faced Washington outsiders, announces that his secretary of state will be Hillary Clinton. The position of secretary of defense, currently held by Bush appointee Robert Gates, will be filled by Bush appointee Robert Gates. Responding to rumors that he also plans to retain Dick Cheney, Obama insists that he has tried to ask the vice president to leave, "but nobody knows where he is."
In other political news, federal authorities arrest Democratic Illinois Gov. Rod "Rod" Blagojevich after wiretaps reveal that he was ... OK, that he was being the governor of Illinois. Everybody is very, very shocked.
The economy remains the dominant issue, with retailers reporting weak holiday sales as many shoppers pass up pricier gifts such as jewelry and big-screen TVs in favor of toilet paper and jerky. As the year draws to a close, the president's Council of Economic Advisers warns the current recession "could spiral downward into a full-blown depression," leaving the U.S. with "no viable economic option but to declare war on Japan."
In another troubling note, U.S. intelligence sources report Iran is developing "a gigantic rocket-powered shoe."
The point is, if you have any money left, you should spend it soon.
And happy New Year.
— Dave Barry is a humor columnist for the Miami Herald.
by Dave Barry | Tribune Media Services
How weird a year was it?
Here's how weird:
• O.J. actually got convicted of something.
• On several occasions, "Saturday Night Live" was funny.
• Gasoline hit $4 a gallon — and those were the good times.
• There were a few days in October when you could not completely rule out the possibility that the next Treasury Secretary would be Joe the Plumber.
• Finally, and most weirdly, for the first time in history, the voters elected a president who -- despite the skeptics who said such a thing would never happen in the United States -- was neither a Bush nor a Clinton.
Of course, Not all the events of 2008 were weird. Some were depressing. Millions of people started out the year with enough money in their 401(k)s to think about retiring, and ended up with maybe enough for a medium Slurpee.
So we can be grateful 2008 is almost over. But before we leave it behind, let's take a few minutes to look back and see if we can find some small nuggets of amusement. Why not? We paid for it.
January
Presidential contenders swarm into Iowa expressing sincerely feigned interest in corn.
The Iowa caucuses produce two surprises:
On the Republican side, the winner is Mike Huckabee, folksy former governor of Arkansas (or possibly Oklahoma). Not competing in Iowa are Rudy Giuliani, whose strategy is to stay out of the race until he is mathematically eliminated; and John McCain, who entered the caucus date incorrectly into his 1996 Palm Pilot.
On the Democratic side, the surprise winner is Barack Obama. A mesmerizing speaker, Obama electrifies voters with his exciting new ideas for change, although people have trouble remembering exactly what these ideas were because they were so darned mesmerized.
Obama's victory comes at the expense of former front-runner Hillary Clinton, who fails to ignite voter passion despite a rip-snorter of a stump speech in which she recites, without notes, all 17 points of her plan to streamline tuition-loan applications.
February
Amid much fanfare, Congress passes, and President Bush signs, an "economic stimulus package" under which the federal government will give taxpayers back several hundred dollars apiece of their own money, the idea being they will use this money to revive the U.S. economy by buying TV sets made in China. This will seem much more comical in the fall.
The battle between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton heats up as the two engage in a series of increasingly hostile debates, including one in which Secret Service agents have to tackle a large, angry, red-faced man who bursts from the audience shouting incoherently. This turns out to be Bill Clinton, who is swiftly dispatched by his wife's campaign to work his magic on voters in the crucial Guam caucuses.
March
Barack Obama addresses the issue of why, in his 20 years of membership in Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago, he failed to notice the pastor, Jeremiah Wright, is a racist lunatic. In a major televised address widely hailed for its brilliance, Obama explains ... OK, nobody really remembers what the actual explanation was. But everybody agrees it was mesmerizing.
Obama's opponent, Hillary Clinton, gets into a controversy of her own when she claims that, as first lady, she landed in Bosnia "under sniper fire." News outlets quickly locate archive video showing she was in fact greeted with a welcoming ceremony featuring an 8-year-old girl reading a poem. Clinton's campaign releases a statement pointing out that it was "a pretty long poem."
April
Barack Obama gets into trouble in the Pennsylvania primary with rural voters for saying that rural Americans are "bitter" and "cling to guns or religion." Responding to charges this statement is elitist, Obama responds: "You are getting sleepy. Very sleepy."
On the Republican side, John McCain gets wind of something called the "Internet" and orders his staff to give him a summary of it on index cards.
In economic news, the price of gasoline tops $4 a gallon, meaning the cost of filling up an average car is now $50, or, for Hummer owners, $17,500. Congress, responding to the financial pain of the American people, goes into partisan gridlock faster than ever before, with Republicans demanding oil companies immediately start drilling everywhere, including cemeteries, and Democrats calling for a massive effort to develop alternative energy sources such as wind, the sun, tides, comets, Al Gore and dragon breath.
May
The International Atomic Energy Agency releases a report stating Iran is actively developing nuclear warheads. In response, Iran issues a statement asserting (1) it absolutely is not developing nuclear warheads, and (2) these are peaceful warheads.
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac invest $17 billion in an Herbalife franchise.
The big spring Hollywood hit is the film version of "Sex and the City," which draws millions of movie-goers, including an estimated three men, two of whom thought they were in the theater for the fourth Indiana Jones movie, "Indiana Jones Experiences Frequent Nighttime Urination."
June
Barack Obama finally claims the bitterly contested Democratic nomination when Hillary Clinton, behind on delegates and in debt to the tune of $25 million, including $9 million for hairspray, suspends her campaign and declares she has "no hard feelings" and will do "whatever it takes" to help Obama get elected "even though he is scum." A gracious John McCain tells the press he "looks forward to a spirited debate with Senator Mondale." Before he can take questions, he is informed by his aides he has an important meeting.
In economic news, Chrysler announces a plan to lay off workers who have not been born yet. The lone economic bright spot is the iPhone, which is selling like crazy thanks to the release of a new model enhanced with the capability of sucking pieces of your brain out through your ear until all you want to do is play with your iPhone.
The scientific community is elated by NASA's announcement the Phoenix Lander has detected ice on Mars. The elation turns to concern when, several hours later, the lander detects a Zamboni machine.
July
Barack Obama, having secured North and South America, flies to Germany without using an airplane and gives a major speech -- speaking English and German simultaneously -- to 200,000 mesmerized Germans, who immediately elect him chancellor.
Meanwhile, John McCain, at a strategy session at a golf resort, tells his top aides to prepare a list of potential running mates, stressing he wants somebody "who is completely, brutally honest." Unfortunately, because of noise from a lawn mower, the aides think McCain said he wants somebody "who has competed in a beauty contest." This will lead to trouble down the road.
In sports, the government of China, in an effort to improve air quality for the Beijing Olympics, bans flatulence.
August
Barack Obama, continuing to shake up the establishment, selects as his running mate Joe Biden, a tireless fighter for change since he was first elected to the U.S. Senate in 1849. The Democratic Party gathers in Denver to formally nominate Obama, who descends from his Fortress of Solitude to mesmerize the adoring crowd with an acceptance speech objectively described by The New York Times as "comparable to the Gettysburg Address, only way better."
Meanwhile John McCain, still searching for the perfect running mate, tells his top aides in a conference call he wants "someone who is capable of filling my shoes." Unfortunately, he is speaking into the wrong end of his cellular phone, and his aides think he said "someone who is capable of killing a moose." Shortly thereafter, McCain stuns the world, and possibly himself, by selecting Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, a no-nonsense hockey mom with roughly 114 children named after random nouns such as "Hamper."
War breaks out between Russia and Georgia over South Ossetia and Abkhazia, serving as a stark reminder that, in an increasingly uncertain world, we, as Americans, have no idea where these places are.
September
The Republican convention gets off to a tentative start in St. Paul, Minn., when President Bush and Vice President Cheney are unable to attend, partly because the organizers told them that the convention was in Atlanta. The mood improves when Sarah Palin dazzles the delegates with her winning smile, detailed knowledge of what is on the TelePrompTer, and spot-on imitation of Tina Fey.
The presidential campaign is soon overshadowed by the troubled economy. The federal government is finally forced to take over Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac after they are caught selling crack at a middle school. But that is not enough, as major financial institutions, having lost hundreds of billions of dollars thanks to years of engaging in practices ranging from questionable to moronic, begin failing, which gives the federal government an idea: Why not give these institutions more hundreds of billions of dollars, generously provided by taxpayers?
October
Congress passes, and Technically Still President Bush signs, the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008, and everyone heaves a sigh of relief as the economy stabilizes for approximately 2.7 seconds, after which it resumes going down the toilet. The International Monetary Fund implements an emergency program under which anybody who opens a checking account anywhere on earth gets a free developing nation.
The economy dominates the presidential campaign, with the focal point being "Joe the Plumber," an Ohio resident who asks Barack Obama a question about tax policy and within hours is more famous than the Dalai Lama. He draws intense scrutiny from the news media, which, using investigative reporters borrowed from the Palin-yeti beat, determine "Joe the Plumber" is in fact (1) not named Joe, (2) not a plumber, (3) a citizen of Belgium and, (4) biologically, a woman.
In the presidential debates, John McCain, looking and sounding increasingly like the late Walter Brennan, cites Joe the Plumber a record 847 times while charging Obama's tax policies amount to socialism.
In noneconomic news, a Las Vegas jury convicts O.J. Simpson on 12 counts of being an unbelievable idiot. He faces more than 60 years in jail, which could end his relentless quest to find the killer of the people he stabbed to death in 1994.
November
Barack Obama, in a historic triumph, becomes the nation's first black president since the second season of "24," setting off an ecstatically joyful and boisterous all-night celebration that at times threatens to spill out of The New York Times newsroom. Obama, following through on his promise to bring change to Washington, quickly begins assembling an administration consisting of a diverse group of renegade outsiders, ranging all the way from lawyers who attended Ivy League schools and then worked in the Clinton administration to lawyers who attended entirely different Ivy league schools and then worked in the Clinton administration.
As it becomes increasingly clear the federal government's plan of giving hundreds of billions of dollars to dysfunctional companies has not fixed the economy, the government comes up with a bold new plan: give more hundreds of billions of dollars to dysfunctional companies. Soon, the government is in a bailout frenzy, handing out money left and right, at one point accidentally giving $14 billion to a man delivering a Domino's pizza to the Treasury building.
December
The National Bureau of Declaring Things That Make You Go "Duh" declares the nation has been in a recession since December 2007. The bureau also points out, according to its statistical analysis, "for some time now, bears apparently have been going to the bathroom in the woods."
The CEOs of the Increasingly Small Three auto makers return to Washington to resume pleading for a bailout, this time telling Congress that if they can reach an agreement that day, they will throw in the undercoating, the satellite-radio package AND a set of floor mats. "We're actually LOSING MONEY on this deal!" they assure Congress.
President-elect Obama, continuing to bring change in the form of fresh-faced Washington outsiders, announces that his secretary of state will be Hillary Clinton. The position of secretary of defense, currently held by Bush appointee Robert Gates, will be filled by Bush appointee Robert Gates. Responding to rumors that he also plans to retain Dick Cheney, Obama insists that he has tried to ask the vice president to leave, "but nobody knows where he is."
In other political news, federal authorities arrest Democratic Illinois Gov. Rod "Rod" Blagojevich after wiretaps reveal that he was ... OK, that he was being the governor of Illinois. Everybody is very, very shocked.
The economy remains the dominant issue, with retailers reporting weak holiday sales as many shoppers pass up pricier gifts such as jewelry and big-screen TVs in favor of toilet paper and jerky. As the year draws to a close, the president's Council of Economic Advisers warns the current recession "could spiral downward into a full-blown depression," leaving the U.S. with "no viable economic option but to declare war on Japan."
In another troubling note, U.S. intelligence sources report Iran is developing "a gigantic rocket-powered shoe."
The point is, if you have any money left, you should spend it soon.
And happy New Year.
— Dave Barry is a humor columnist for the Miami Herald.