Draft pick “fired up” about being selected by Broncos

by Dallas J. Delta

“With the final pick in the 2015 National Football League Draft, the Denver Broncos select Dovis Manning, quarterback, the University of Central Mississippi.”

The player chosen last is traditionally known as “Mr. Irrelevant,” but many such players have gone on to have successful NFL careers.

Manning, a culinary science major from Drew, MS with a 3.90 GPA, led the UCM Woodsmen to two consecutive Big South Athletic Conference titles and a huge upset win over Duke in the 2015 Carrot Bowl. Manning was on the patio at Ground Zero Blues Club in Clarksdale when he got the call from his agent informing him of his selection by the Broncos.

“It was so fucking funny,” Manning said. “I honestly didn’t think I was going to get drafted. I figured I was bound for the CFL, so I had been studying up on my Canadian, drinking a lot of Molson and listening to Nickleback. Me and some buddies decided to drive up here tonight to hang out at Morgan Freeman’s place, and I wasn’t even thinking about the draft. I had a pretty good buzz on when my agent called, and I thought it was my buddy Crandall fucking with me. He knew I wanted to move to Denver anyway.”

Manning explained that he had recently been cited twice in two weeks for misdemeanor marijuana possession by the Sunflower County Sheriff’s Office.

“That ain’t gonna be no fucking problem now,” he crowed. “I mean, of course, I am honored and excited to have been drafted at all, but for it to be Denver, I mean, come on! How fucking perfect is that?”

Manning, who claims to be the illegitimate fourth son of Archie Manning, father of current Broncos quarterback Peyton Manning, said that he faced and overcame adversity during his entire college career, and he feels that has prepared him well for the pros.

“Daddy and Peyton and Eli and all them didn’t never want to accept me as part of the family, even though I had better numbers than Eli in high school,” he said. “Everybody in Drew always knew that Archie and my momma had had a thing, but they didn’t never want to have nothing to do with me. Hell, I look just like all of them. Look at this giant fucking potato on top of my neck! We all look like this!”

They all look very similar when they throw a football, as well. Manning says that he is as excited about finally meeting his older brother as he is about Denver’s liberal cannabis laws.

“Peyton doesn’t look like he’s ever had a toke in his life. He could use one. I’m gonna smoke him the fuck out as soon as I get there and find the good weed store.”

Playing in a smaller conference allowed Manning to stay under the radar, until the big win over Duke. Manning’s name began coming up among scouts, who speculated that if Manning really was who he claimed to be, it might be possible to pick up a potentially elite quarterback for nothing.

Manning maintains that the level of play in the Big SAC is more competitive than most realize.

“Playing in the Big SAC isn’t quite like playing in the SEC or the Pac-12, or whatever,” he said. “We always said, ’You gotta have a big sack to play in the Big SAC!’”

LA Clippers Owner: "I Thought Blake Griffin Was White"

LA racist dating much younger woman
of African/Asian extraction

by Dallas J. Delta

LA Clippers owner Donald Sterling has come under fire for racist comments caught on tape by a woman alleging to be his girlfriend.  Sterling made several comments berating her for inviting black people to Clippers games and for posting a photo of herself with NBA legend Magic Johnson, who is black.

Sterling has not backed down from his comments, even after the NBA announced that they were investigating the matter, and as some in the media, particularly in Oakland, are urging Clippers players to boycott the rest of the playoffs.  Sterling was questioned by reporters today as he attempted to leave a West Hollywood restaurant, and was hostile and combative in his responses.

Sterling said, "You motherfuckers are getting to be a pain in my ass.  I can run my team however I want, talk to my girlfriend however I want, and rent apartments to whoever I want to.  Leave me the hell alone."

Sterling owns numerous apartment complexes in Southern California, and was investigated in 2008 for violations of housing laws.  Several of his former property managers testified that Sterling ordered them to "clear out all the Mexicans" and that he complained continually about black and Hispanic tenants.  He is also currently being sued by former Clippers General Manager and NBA Hall-of-Famer Elgin Baylor for alleged racial discrimination during Baylor's tenure with the team.

"Nobody told me that Blake Griffin was black," Sterling said.  "I thought I had found a honky I could build around.  That's why I called him 'The Vanilla Gorilla.'  Now what am I going to do?"

Sterling also admitted, "The real reason I fired Vinny Del Negro last year was because I found out that, in Italian, his name means 'Vinny the Nigger.'  All I want is for there to be one team in this damn league that looks like the Celtics used to."

Reaction around LA, where it is not creepy for an 80-something billionaire to have a hot, young girlfriend, has been mixed.  Reaction everywhere else on the planet has been uniform in it's condemnation of Sterling.

"That's just gross," said Claire Macadoo, a waitress at Chili's in Batesville, MS.  "I don't care if he's a go-zillionaire, I ain't sleeping with some nasty old man just so I can sit courtside for a stupid basketball game."

Desoto County secedes from Mississippi

by Dallas J. Delta

SOUTHAVEN - On the heels of the separation of the Crimean region from Ukraine and it's annex by Russia, voters in Desoto County have voted overwhelmingly to secede from the state of Mississippi and join Tennessee.

The results of the hastily called referendum saw 82% of the ballots cast in favor of the separation.  "It wasn't as high a margin as the Crimeans," said County Administrator Vanessa Lynchard, "but that is still a vote you can't ignore.  The people of Desoto County have spoken with a practically unified voice."

Opponents accuse Lynchard, who is acting as Governor of the State of Desoto pending action from Nashville, of seizing power by allowing Tennessee Governor Bill Haslem to flood the county with out-of-work musicians and actors from Midtown Memphis to come troll around the streets of Hernando, Southaven, Olive Branch, and Horn Lake acting all mopey in order to depress the populace into compliance with Haslem's designs on the booming North Mississippi County.

Haslem has made no secret of his territorial ambitions, and has long had his eye on the region, one of the few Mississippi counties that shows signs of economic growth.  "I'd trade Memphis for Olive Branch and Hernando any day of the week," he said at a recent press conference.  "The rest of the state is sick of Memphis blowing the curve on every statistic from crime to education to obesity to every damn thing else.  The only reason we kept them around this long was because of the barbecue.  We don't even like the music.  The rest of the state listens to country."

Lynchard indicated that she was in control of all county agencies, and would co-ordinate with envoys from Nashville over the coming weeks to ensure a rapid and efficient transition.  The move is being resisted most strongly by ethnic Horn Lakites, most of whom did not find out about the referendum until this morning.

"Glad those people like to sleep late," said Lynchard.  "Now, maybe Bill can just get Arkansas to take Memphis, then we'll be squared away.  Why should there be a Memphis and a West Memphis?  Unify Memphis.  We call upon the international community to recognize the right of free people everywhere to determine their own political associations.  What's good enough for Sevastopol is good enough for Southaven.  We will suffer no more under an incompetent government in Jackson!"

President Barack Obama was told about the results of the referendum this afternoon, and shanked an easy five-iron into the pond on the eighth at Grand Oaks.

Airplane found behind Missouri casino

Agricultural pilots often use dirt roads
as runways.

by Dallas J. Delta

CARUTHERSVILLE, MISSOURI - The missing Air Tractor AT-602 crop duster that went off radar and vanished last week has been found on a dirt road behind the Lady Luck Casino RV Park.  Pilot Cooter Holland was located by TSA authorities at a nickel slot machine on the main level of the casino.

Holland, 37, of Bay, Arkansas and his plane had been reported missing on March 10 when he failed to return to his airstrip east of Bay following a routine fertilizer application.  His wife, Sheryl Crow Holland, 20, called authorities when she arrived home at 3 a. m. and Holland's truck was not in the driveway.

"There weren't nobody in here with my babies," she said.  "His sorry ass was supposed to be home.  Cooter was supposed to be home at 6:00, and I didn't go out until 7:00.  That son-of-a-bitch knew I was going to Chili's in Paragould with Reeta and Dwayne and Janice.  He don't never answer his phone, but I figured he had to be close to the house. I put Jay Jay and Pooter in bed watching a Bubble Guppies DVD and locked the door and went.  I couldn't believe it when I got home, the babies were fine, but Cooter weren't nowhere around."

Investigators determined that the airplane was last seen spreading a load of urea onto a field just north of Manila, Arkansas, near the Big Lake National Wildlife Refuge.

Speculation had been rampant throughout Northeast Arkansas and the Missouri Bootheel since the plane was reported missing.  Theories ran the gamut from terrorism, to mechanical failure, to pilot error.

"I thought for sure that Cooter had gone Al-Qaeda on us," said Truman Campbell, a Bay resident who also happened to be at the casino at the time the authorities arrived.  "He's always been nutty.  He might have wanted to fly that thing into the side of the mall in Jonesboro, for all I know.  This casino isn't that big.  I can't believe I didn't see him.  I've been here since yesterday, myself."

TSA publicist Tipperary Knobel said that Holland was questioned for several hours in the poker room by investigators, but released when it was determined that he had broken no laws.

"The poker room was a good place for us to talk because it is only open on the weekends and was empty," said Knobel.  "Why play cards here when you are so close to Tunica or St. Louis?  Anyway, Holland landed his plane, legally, on an abandoned county road, got permission from the farmer to park it there, hiked around to the casino, and apparently went on a little winning streak at the crap table."

Knobel said that Holland had rented a room at the Drury Inn and Suites out by I-55, taking a shuttle bus to and from the hotel at least twice, but that most of the time he was at the casino.  Holland won two thousand dollars playing dice, then hit a large jackpot on a $5 slot.  At one point he was up over $9000, but had lost it all by the time the TSA arrived.

"He had just gone to the ATM to get out twenty dollars for the nickel slots," said Knobel.  "He should have gotten back in that plane and flown his ass home after he hit that Triple Diamond machine.  I don't understand people who can't leave when they are winning."

Holland was escorted from the casino by his wife, Reeta, Dwayne, and Janice.

"Hell, it looks like three-fourths of Bay is in Caruthersville this weekend," said Campbell.  "If Mr. and Mrs. Corning had been over here, we would have had enough of the town council present to legalize casinos at home and we wouldn't have to drive all the way over here."

Hannity says US should stand with Putin

Putin fan and part-time
contractor, Sean Hannity

by Dallas J. Delta

NEW YORK - Conservative commentator Sean Hannity said this afternoon that he believed that the United States should accept the outcome of today's referendum in the Crimea and that it was his belief that Russian President Vladimir Putin was within his rights to annex the former Ukrainian province.

"It really comes down to one thing," said Hannity, speaking to a group of customers in line behind him at Lowe's.  "Barack Hussein Obama is wrong about everything.  What makes you think he is right about this?"

Hannity, who was at Lowe's picking up a case of caulk when he heard about the outcome of the vote in Crimea, said that he felt that since President Obama lied so much during the health care debate, and failed to protect the American consulate in Benghazi, that he had come to the conclusion that Putin must be the one Americans should trust.

Crimeans voted over 90% today to secede from Ukraine and join Russia, and Hannity said that he had a hard time disagreeing with anyone who would vote in those kinds of numbers opposite of the way President Obama wished.

"I just wish we could get the Senate to do that," he said, wistfully.  "Obama is making all this noise about how we should stand with the government in Kiev, and how he is going to help rebuild the Ukrainian economy...how about he fix the one he was elected to fix first?"

"Obama is running around, trying to act tough, like a kid with a bloody lip on the playground whose friends have stopped the fight," said Hannity.  "Barry H. knows he's not going to do anything but talk, but he is going to talk his ass off, you can be sure of that.  The Russians know he's all talk.  We know he's all talk.  Sanctions?  Yeah, I'm sure Putin is shaking in his boots.  The Poles and Swedes should be the ones shaking.  Don't Russian despots always go to war with Sweden and partition Poland after they finish annexing Crimea?  Obama has no idea who he is dealing with, and Putin has my full support."

Hannity scoffed at Obama's attempts to resolve the situation diplomatically.  "He (President Obama) gets the '2014 Neville Chamberlain Award for Vacillation in the Face of Aggression,' he said, adding, "it has been kind of funny watching John Kerry chase his tail and try to sound important."

Sean Penn seizes power in Venezuela

Venezuelan Supreme Leader
Sean Penn

by Dallas J. Delta

CARACAS - Following months of unrest, American actor Sean Penn has taken control of the government in Venezuela with the co-operation of the Venezuelan military and the United States entertainment industry.

Penn was a close adviser of former Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, and flew to Caracas last week for secret meetings with top military officials who were unsatisfied with President Nicholas Maduro's inability to stabilize the nation's political situation.  Violent clashes have erupted across the country in recent weeks as Maduro has sought to consolidate his hold on power.

"Nick had his chance," said Penn, speaking from the floor of the National Assembly this morning.  "But he never understood what Hugo and I were trying to accomplish here.  It has become apparent that I am the only one who knows what to do, and I'm going to have to step in and fix everything."

Early this morning, a commando unit from the Venezuelan Air Force escorted Penn onto the floor of the National Assembly while elements of the Venezuelan National Guard cracked down on uprisings throughout the country.  Penn said he expected things to calm down quickly.  "If everyone would just chill out, and stop looking out for their own interest, everything would be so cool, and we can get everything situated here.  Otherwise, we are just going to shoot all the assholes who won't cooperate, then everyone will see that a bunch of really committed millionaire actors are all that are needed to point everyone in the proper direction."

Penn is being supported by elements throughout the US entertainment industry, with public service announcements being filmed continuously, and fatuous screenplays about South American peasants overcoming bourgeoisie oppressors being rushed through development at many major Hollywood studios.  Not all assistance has been welcomed by the new Supreme Leader, however.

American entertainer Alec Baldwin was stopped at the Venezuelan port of Maracaibo late today attempting to enter the country to join Penn.  The actor and former MSNBC host tweeted that he expected to join Penn's administration in Caracas as "Minister of Public Photography of Public Personalities Public Oversight Public Department," but members of the Venezuelan Coast Guard held Baldwin's ship several miles offshore by placing loudspeakers on their decks and playing looped recordings at full blast of David Horowitz lecturing the Duke University Languages and Literature faculty about liberal bias in academia.  Penn said, "Alec can go to hell.  I've got this.  I don't need him down here.  He can have Uruguay."

Putin outed by Moscow 12-step group

Russian President reportedly
struggling with addiction.

by Dallas J. Delta

MOSCOW - Despite the tenets of such organizations which stress absolute anonymity, several members of the Tverskaya Street Twelve-Steppers Narcotics Anonymous group came forward today claiming that Russian President Vladimir Putin had for years been a regular member of their group, but recently had stopped attending meetings.

"Vlad came to our group every week, and several other groups around Moscow," said Ivor W., a former heroin junkie, now clean eleven months.  "I never really talked to him, personally, but he sponsored a buddy of mine I was in treatment with.  He quit coming not too long after I got clean,  but he when he was around, he always had some really great things to say when he shared."

Yevginy X. credits the group, and Putin specifically, with saving his life.  X. was dying from methamphetamine addiction when a social worker told him about the group.

He said, "Vlad P., well, Putin, I guess I can say now, anyway, Vlad, was one of the first people I met at the first meeting I went to.  He was making coffee, and I had the jitters so bad I was spilling mine all over the place.  He gave me another cup and said, 'Don't worry about the mess, tovarisch.  We will tell everyone the Chechens did it.'"

X. said that meeting led to a years-long friendship and that he became close with Putin as he overcame his addiction. He said that Putin was very active in the Moscow addiction recovery community, and usually went to at least four or five 12-step meetings a week.

"Sometimes he would go to more," X. said, "if he was having a really bad week.  Vlad struggled with recovery.  It was never easy for him, but it seemed like he was working a good program, keeping things in check, trying to help people.  Some people in the groups gave him a hard time, though, because he never wanted to wear a shirt, and because his addiction wasn't actually to drugs."

X. explained that some 12-step groups are very strict about membership.  Groups that cater to specific intoxicants such as alcohol, narcotics, or sex in many cases do not permit cross-contamination within their membership rosters.  X. said that despite this, Putin had found meetings where he was accepted, and that he had been an enthusiastic participant at meetings, often leading discussions on various topics.

"Vlad couldn't very well find a 'Power Mad Lunatics Anonymous,' now, could he?  Being addicted to power is no different from being addicted to cocaine, or Scotch, or social media.  He was trying to find help, and he did, at least for a while.  Get in where you fit in, I say, and that's what he would say, too.  He was doing so good.  From what I can tell, he hasn't been to a meeting since the Olympics started, and now you see what he's gotten into.  He needs to call his sponsor, or call me, and get to a meeting."

The Tverskaya Street Twelve-Steppers meet at noon on Tuesdays at the Buffalo Event Room above Pushkin Pins Bowling Lanes.