Ringling, OK—Located only twenty miles from U.S. Route 35, Ringling residents question why “no one ever stops here.” The local gift shop, travel port, and gas distribution center reports only one item sold during the entire fiscal year.

Convenience store proprietor, Fran Mullins said, “The T-shirt we sold read: What happens in Ringling …No Really, What Happens in Ringling? It’s not really a joke so much as a cry for help.”

Despite the abysmal sales, the town continues to look forward from their porch chairs. “We’re not looking back,” said Mayor Johnson. “Nothing back there anyways. We think a mural on the side of Morley’s Hardware store might help—maybe of a bustling town. It’s a ‘paint it and they will come’ kind of philosophy. We are also thinking of a traffic light, so they have to stop. We just need to pave some type of cross street, I suppose.”

Warren Morley, of Morley’s Hardware added, “There’s talk of a Panda Express opening next year. This is solely for the purpose of improving tourism, because, frankly, there’s not much demand for panda meat among locals.”

Mt. Olympus—The Greek God, Zeus, is highly displeased with the Obama Administration’s arrogance. “How dare he force my hand on this, especially considering the sheer number of lightning bolts I’m typically palming at any given moment.”

Zeus feels some of the Obamacare mandates are in direct contradiction to his own belief system.

“You can’t expect me to pay for operations that defy Greek mythological principles,” said Zeus. His chief complaint involves Obamacare forcing him to buy insurance that includes amputation procedures. Zeus believes such amputations would forever disqualify the dead from crossing the River Styx into Hades. “If a person is missing a body part, Charon, the Ferryman, will throw them right out of the boat!” said Zeus. “Is it better to save an arm and spend eternity in limbo or Tartarus? Mortal fools! Obama is forcing this down my throat and I happen to know a thing or two about that. Just ask my father, Cronus.”

Zeus employs over 17,000 mortals but maintains he is only sleeping with the female ones. Zeus is now threatening to burn the White House to the ground unless an amicable compromise can be reached. When asked if he is jumping on the recent Christian bandwagon against Obamacare, Zeus replied, “Don’t conflate issues. Those people hold some strange beliefs.”

In related news, Zeus claimed the life of another golfer in California. “I f*&^ing hate golf,” said Zeus.

Cincinnati, OH—GOP nominee hopeful, Newt Gingrich, told reporters today he is conceding the race and will stand behind a younger less baggage-heavy version of himself. Gingrich’s handlers claim the move came after he started flinging his own feces at a group of Romney supporters yesterday while on the campaign trail in Cincinnati.

“Not only do we need a base on the moon,” said Gingrich, “we need time machines that can access temporal wormholes for the sole purpose of allowing politicians, like me, to step back in time and avoid the pitfalls they would later regret.”

The older Gingrich plans to drop out of the race and spend more time with some of his families. Meanwhile, the younger version promises to resume the fight with new vigor “right up until the convention!”

Gingrich believes no one with any character can pass the scrutiny presidential hopefuls all face. “This is not about me. This is about getting the best presidential candidate in place to beat Barack Obama next year. I am that candidate, or I will be that candidate through some heavily funded temporal trickery.”

Gingrich also explained how the “construction of this fantastic machine will create real jobs for real Americans.” He finished his speech by calling himself the Once and Future Ging and then compared himself to Mother Teresa, Ronald Reagan, and that guy from Stargate…before he started flinging more feces at some nearby Romney supporters.  

Punxsutawney, PA—Those who remain in Punxsutawney after Groundhog Day are now treated to a little talked about event. Punxsutawney Pete, the famous Pennsylvanian opossum prognosticator, predicted Six-more-weeks of slow economic growth and implied Obama’s policies are to blame.

The town of Punxsutawney has seen a steady decline in interest in Groundhog Day over the years. The town responded by adding this opossumy pundit to their busy groundhogian mix.

For the last three years, Pete has emerged from his hole and offered several predictions regarding our state of the union. Thus far he’s accurately foreseen the onset of the mortgage crisis, the end to the Iraq War, and the crushing defeat of Sanjaya on American Idol.

“We needed to keep the tourists around another night,” said Mayor Yokel. “We tried blocking the road out of town with a mock accident, but you can only get away with that shit so many times.”

The Mayor came under considerable scrutiny for the rumor that swarms of radioactively enlarged insects had surrounded the town in February of 2007.

“Even the Easter Bunny thinks Phil is a bad opening act,” said Yokel. The Mayor blames the slump in tourism on two major factors: “It’s so rare the little bastard sees an early spring in our future and, second, that damnable movie Groundhog Day! Folks are scared would-be-attendees might become trapped in a temporal loop and never leave this piss ant little town again. If Bill Murray was here right now I’d punch him in his raccoon face.”

Punxsutcoony Paul was unavailable for comment.

London, GB—Kermit the Frog and Miss Piggy attended last week’s London premiere of The Muppets. During the event, British reporters asked the pair what they thought about the growing tension between Fox News and the popular Hensonites. The cable news giant is also particularly angry at the Muppet, Animal, for urinating on Roger Ailes at the Propaganda for Dummies Symposium in San Diego last month.

When specifically questioned about Fox’s assertion the movie has a liberal agenda, Kermit said, “If we have a problem with oil companies, why would we have spent the entire film driving around a gas-guzzling Rolls Royce?”

Miss Piggy then chimed in, “It’s almost as laughable as accusing Fox News of, you know, being news.”

The Daily Discord later asked if the couple wished to retract their statements. “Certainly not,” said Kermit, “and I can tell you another thing: with Fox News around it aint easy being green.”

Miss Piggy stated she was more concerned about conservative’s recent racist attacks against Muppets in general, and added, “I know the women of Fox News are attractive, but to me it’s all just lipstick on a pig.”

She then asked to have her statement retracted, which we will now do:

Please do not read that last statement from Miss Piggy.

See Fox? That’s how you do a retraction. You should try it.

Lake County, FL—GOP nomination hopeful, Newt Gingrich “mistakenly” shook 11-month-old Jacob Horowitz’s hand and then proceeded to kiss Rebecca Horowitz, the infant’s mother, on the lips. This occurred on the campaign trail earlier today at a diner described by locals as “an area favorite”. One witness said the kiss was “not nearly as disturbing as what he did with his hands.”

The former Speaker immediately responded by saying his actions were intentional. “Look, the woman was very attractive and the baby had a pungent feces smell to it. What would anyone have done given those circumstances? I am frankly appalled that women everywhere go through such lengths to help Barack Obama by further reporting my unwanted advances to the media.”

Gingrich is also denying slipping the woman the tongue. “It’s preposterous. The destructive, vicious, unaccommodating nature of females is making it increasingly harder to govern this country. Many important legislators remain completely preoccupied by frigid Floridians like Mrs. what’s-her-name. Furthermore, I can assure you I do not smoke cigars that way. I also know the definition of what the word ‘is’ is and I have more lawyers than that ungrateful bitch has diapers.”

When questioned further about the misstep, Gingrich said, “I have no doubt that my esteemed colleague Ron Paul would have liberated the baby from the diaper on the spot. And Romney would have kissed the baby’s ass, regardless, because he panders to any poop anywhere, and with current polling data from Florida no one even cares what Zeppo would have done.”

Rome, IT—Francesco Schettino, the Captain of the ill-fated Costa Concordia, is being sought in connection to the fire that consumed his own apartment in Rome Monday. The incident completely torched the 17-unit apartment building in which the Captain was recently confined, pending a full investigation of his recent cruise ship tragedy.

After cooking a Franco American product for dinner, Schettino told the press, “Mistakes were made. I don’t usually cook for myself. I have people for that.”

Local authorities claim, Capt. Schettino immediately called the Judge in the Concordia case and said, “The building, she is ablaze!”

The Judge ordered him back into the flaming structure and questioned why he didn’t call the Italian Fire Service first. Capt. Schettino said he tried to, but had already tripped out of the fire escape and landed in an alley dumpster, where he spent the next 45 minutes trying to find his cell phone.

“So whose cell phone are you using to call me?” asked the Judge. Schettino responded with a crackling noise as if he was losing the signal and then hung up.

Capt. Schettino allegedly tried to follow the judge’s order by reentering the building, but somehow jammed his recently recovered cell phone into the base of the lobby’s revolving door, trapping several dozen egressing tenants inside of the burning structure. Authorities claim Schettino did manage to set off a warning flare that only served to set fire to a nearby building. The Captain later admitted, “Flares seem to work best over water.”

The controversial Captain also denies sailing the apartment building too close to the rocky shoreline on a request from the women in 3B. “That’s just silly,” said Schettino. “And, as for the fire, it could not have been prevented. The fire extinguisher malfunctioned and shot a white powdery substance right into my face.”

Washington, DC —President Barack Obama informed the press today of his intention to raise the debt ceiling in a new, more phonetically friendly fashion (PFF).

“We want folks everywhere to feel less concerned about our nation’s debt,” said Obama. “And what better way than through creative relabeling? My economic team is hard at work, not only printing more funny money from Panama, but renaming key monetary designations for your spendular enjoyment.”

U.S. Secretary of the Treasury, Timothy Geithner, told the press, “We have changed the billion dollar mark to the whatmeworry, and a trillion will now be referred to as a Zen-mullet. Also, the Megafonzie, a measure of coolness from Futurama, will now be the equivalent of just under 22-trillion dollars.”

When asked, how much under 22-trillion, Geithner replied, “Just a measly albatross vreeble. Point being, we are currently only a half a Megafonzie in debt, which you have to admit sounds a lot cooler than 11-trillion.”

Each time the U.S. dollar’s bond rating is decreased, Team Obama will simply change those names as well. “I think being downgraded to something like Sparkle Bling status doesn’t sound as bad,” said Geithner.

Even Republicans like the idea, but they will still vote against it on principle.

“…the ‘we just want to get re-elected’ principle,” as clarified by Republican Minority Leader, Mitch McConnell. “If Obama would have just met us halfway, like maybe at that sports bar…”

Radio talk show host, Rush Limbaugh, added, “We need to change the name of the currency itself not the increments, maybe something from the Hitchhiker’s Guide…like the Flanian Pobble Bead or the Triganic Pu. Changing the increments is just more of Obama’s financial chicanery!”

Modesto,CA—Last night, 27 year old Farcus Laubstein made the fateful decision to watch the Evil Dead trilogy. He did this not long after successfully hacking into a Cyborg software site and acquiring considerable summoning points in the game Runescape. The California man allegedly downed two bottles of Arctic Devil barley wine and started reciting passages from H.P Lovecraft’s fictional grimoire, the Necronomicon, “just for a goof.”

The sinister combination created an inter-dimensional rift and a subsequent chain of diabolical events not seen since the last episode of The Apprentice.  

Laubstein was last heard screaming and gouging out his own eyeballs, which people who knew him claim may have been due to viewing the last episode of The Apprentice. He scratched only one word onto a nearby table, Nucttelmeron, which Hogbein believes is either a demon, or a hazelnut cocoa spread.

Laubstein’s home was burned to the ground along with any and all evidence of the hell spawn he unleashed. Dr. Sterling Hogbein, of the Hogbein Institute and Lube, has tried to duplicate the conditions, but has thus far only managed to summon “a wicked burp.”

His failure has not disheartened the demonologist and cross dresser. “I will repeat the conditions again and again until the desired results are reached, or my VHS tape of the Evil Dead II gives up the ghost, whichever comes first,” said Dr. Hogbein.