The Oppenheimer Report 4/4/11

A belated happy April Fool’s Day to one and all. Did any of you play a fiendish prank, and were any of you arrested for it? Though I was not feeling particularly mischievous this past week, I did Google the top 100 April Fool’s pranks of all times, and some of them were pretty good. For example, # 12 - In 2008, The BBC reported flying penguins in the Antarctic, supported by a video clip of the event. #16 - Porky Bickar (his real name) fooled his Sitka, Alaska neighbors into thinking that nearby dormant volcano Mt. Edgecumbe had erupted when he flew hundreds of tires into the volcano and lit them on fire. Years later, when Mt. St Helens erupted for real, someone wrote Porky and said “This time you‘ve gone too far!” #35 - In 1980 the BBC reported that London landmark clock tower “Big Ben” was going digital, and their Japanese affiliate claimed that the hands to the old clock would be sold off to the first four callers #41- In 1965, it was reported that Danish Parliament declared all dogs should be painted white in order that they be more visible at night. #93 - In 1986, a Paris newspaper reported that an agreement had been signed to dismantle and remove the Eiffel Tower from its present location and reconstruct it on the site of the new Euro Disney theme park, in order to make way for a proposed stadium to be built for the 1992 Olympics. And I love this one: #95 - In 1990 a news organization reported that designers of the already over budget tunnel, under construction at the time to connect England and France under the English Channel, had miscalculated, and the tunnel excavations, meant to meet in the middle of the Channel, were off by 14 feet. The report went on to say that the error would cost $14 Billion to rectify. How could I ever hope to compete with any of these hoaxes? For my part, I thought about dressing up like a giant squirrel and chasing Jasper around the house.



Here’s a sign of the times. Everyone who does the shopping in the family knows that food prices are soaring, but have you noticed that the packages are getting smaller as well? They’ve been doing this for a long time but it’s happening more frequently these days. Apparently, it is not so noticeable to the consumer if what was once a 16 ounce bag of pasta becomes a 13.5 ounce bag of pasta. Of course one figures this out when the food doesn’t go as far. It’s very sneaky. This reminds me of a Gahan Wilson cartoon I once saw in Playboy, wherein two executives are looking out the window at some giant smokestacks belching filth into the air, with smiley faces painted on them. The caption read something like: “I don’t know J.P., I don’t think it will fool them.”



A few weeks ago, Terry Jones, that boneheaded so-called pastor from Gainsville, Florida, made good on his promise on the anniversary of 9-11 to burn a Koran, in front of his thirty followers. That hateful gesture, insignificant as it must have seemed in America and in most other parts of the world, set off a firestorm in Afghanistan last week. The result was that twelve innocent people died, five of them Afghans, none of them Americans. America has troops in Afghanistan and Jones knew this, so he must have known that publicly destroying a Muslim holy book would endanger our troops. Shame on him. He proved nothing except that he was capable of stirring up a hornet‘s nest. He obviously wanted to demonstrate that Islam is a religion of violence, but if that were the case why then didn‘t the entire Muslim population rise up? By the way, has he ever read about The Crusades? Talk about a man of God sending the wrong message. I think Marx was wrong, religion isn’t the opiate of the masses, it’s the Molotov cocktail. Years ago there was a big uproar in Western New York because Karl Hand, a notorious Nazi sympathizer, had organized a rally to be held in Downtown Buffalo. Hand was a certifiable idiot who I believe had once guzzled anti-freeze in a failed suicide attempt. The rally took place, and almost no one showed up to support him, but hundreds were there to protest. That’s how to handle hatred; expose it and de-legitimize it. I am deeply saddened about the violence that occurred in Afghanistan, and I don’t condone that murderous vengeance, but it was horribly irresponsible of Jones to act as he did. In our country the overwhelming majority know that cretins like Jones (any relationship to the Kool-Aid guy in French Guiana?) are not to be taken seriously. Sadly his bad behavior did spark murder in a very different culture, and he is, in my opinion, guilty of knowingly inciting hatred. One can argue that Americans are allowed freedom of expression, but where do we draw the line?


Here’s an idea for an April Fools joke. Fly Terry Jones to Kabul and drop him off in one of the market squares. Let him light a Koran on fire there. Wouldn’t that be funny.



Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2011 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED