Barnes Burning

"Health Care Reform" Rebranded As "Jon Gosselin Sex Tape!!" To Boost Interest, Clicks

As Congress spends its summer recess preparing to inact health care reform legislation, a top campaign goal of President Obama's, when it reconvenes in the fall, key supporters are considering rebranding the effort as "Jon Gosselin's Sex Tape!!" The remessaging is an attempt to bring increased awareness, engagement, and interest to a topic that parties on both sides of the debate admit is complex, misunderstood, and stupefyingly boring.

"We need to jazz up the way we talk to the American public about health care," claims a top aide speaking on condition of anonymity because he's not authorized to talk about White House strategy -- or the top rated Jon and Kate Plus 8 show broadcast around the clock on TLC. "We need to sex it up. If we replace "health care reform" with "New Jon Gosselin Sex Tape!!" in public speeches, online, and in everyday debate we're going to hit Americans right where their attention is: on the ramblin' booty chasin' exploits of Jon Gosselin, the estranged co-star of that exploitive cable show detailing the lives of his eight children in the name of Nielsen ratings points. An average mother of three knows that managed-care reform is important, even crucial, to the well being of her family...but we need to take a more nuanced approach with her. Which magazine article or web link is she going to read? "Blue Dog Democrats Push Privatized Insurance Co-Pay Solution" or "Nanny Watches Kids, Kate Sobs In Bed After Jon Films Sex Tape In Glass Box Above Vegas Strip!"

The ploy simply attempts to get citizens to pay attention, if even only for a second. Once they're roped in with a salacious headline like "Jon Gosselin Promises Second Sex Tape If Kate Doesn't Shut The F#ck Up About The First One" or "Jon Gosselin Sex Tape Involves Glue Gun, Slip 'N Slide, and Madonna...All At Once" the communication will quickly go into detail on the finer, more pertinent points of health care reform. "It's a ruse, no doubt about it. Health care is still as bland and boring as a bowl of Original Shredded Wheat, but the message is more likely to stick once the reader or listener is drawn in with the latest gossip about what's going on in Jon Gosselin's drawers.

Supporters claim that several scandalous themes were considered alongside the Jon Gosselin angle. Ornery senators scanned trending Internet search phrases while staffers picked through Twitter and Facebook updates in an effort to glean current topics and rumors that could be exaggerated for maximum intrigue. "Michael Jackson Autopsy Pics," "Click Here For Free iPhone," "Lady Gaga Ringtones," "Sarah Palin Plastic Surgery Meltdown," "Jonas Brothers Methamphetamine Binge," and "Susan Boyle Sex Dungeon Discovered," were all bandied about as possibilities.

While a cynic might dismiss these tactics as a lowest-common-denominator way of taking advantage of average folks, Obama insiders insist that early testing with focus groups indicate people are more amenable to learning about this important debate once they've been primed with a bit of juicy celebrity gossip. "Health care is a snoozefest," admitted a prominent Senator on the Finance Committee. "Jon Gosselin gelling up his hair, hitting a Cancun nightclub for fruity drinks with 21 year olds, and stumbling off into the night with some floozy...now that's what I call a winning piece of legislation!"

"Swine Flu" Provides Convenient Cover For "Wine Flu"

Millions of Americans who suffer each and every day from what they euphemistically call the "wine flu" have found refuge in identifying their affliction as the "swine flu" to family, friends, and co-workers.

The swine flu, which originated in Mexico, is a respiratory illness affecting pigs that recently began infecting humans and has caused panic across the globe. "Really, it's just a matter of adding an "s" to the beginning of "wine flu" and that doesn't feel so deceitful. For me, it works," said Serena Miller an aspiring Broadway songstress who has been frittering away her time in New York City (and Daddy's credit limit) by drinking fancy bottles of Cabernet at hipster dinner parties in SoHo. "When I wake up to find I've missed yet another audition because I was arguing in a wine-soaked haze about Hegelian dialectic until three in the morning, saying I'm suffering from the swine flu goes over a lot easier. It makes the calls with Mom and Dad a piece of cake. The swine flu is a global pandemic, whereas the wine flu is only contracted by entitled, upper-middle-class blowhards who think they have a touch of genius about them. It's not a hard choice."

Frank Catellenti agrees. The hard charging Wall Street securities broker has spent the last three years plagued by daily bouts of the wine flu after his affair with a 24-year old co-worker was exposed and his wife and three children moved out. "It used to be, I'd nervously snicker about "a case of the wine flu" to my boss when he found me slumped at my desk with that glazed, hungover look. But this morning I sent my secretary an email saying I was staying home with the swine flu and I've been inundated with cards and flowers all morning. I've never been better!" he chimed as he cracked into a bottle of Clos du Val 2004 Reserve even though the clock read 10:35 AM. "This descent into mid-life alcoholic stupor is going to be painful and wrenching, but it's going to be a hell of a lot more pleasant passing it off as the swine flu."

Those referring to their wine flu as swine flu have two basic tips. Keep your communications about your illness short and don't make yourself available for discussion. Miles Flemming, a handbag designer and general bon vivant recently "tweeted" that he had swine flu to his Twitter network and wouldn't be available for 2-3 days, or more accurately, until The Sex and The City marathon on TBS concluded. Almost instantly, he was deluged with sympathetic responses and questions about the symptoms. "It was like 'ease off everyone!!' If I really had an exotic, highly transmissible disease would I chat about it online for hours on end? All I said was that I had the swine flu, let's just leave it at that." Flemming admitted that he can understand his friends' curiosity and prying questions however. "Everyone's spooked that they might have the swine flu themselves...and if you put back a magnum of rosé before dinner at Morimoto like I did last night, the answer might just be "yes."

Old Fashioned Loan Sharking May Be Solution To Financial Crisis And Credit Crunch

Banks are failing. The stock market resembles a cosmic yo-yo, rocketing up down with bi-polar ferocity on almost a daily basis. The credit markets are frozen. 401(k) savings and retirement plans are in shambles. The government has sprung into action, but are they doing all they can to stem this financial crisis?

Maybe not. A growing faction of elected officials is beginning to embrace a radical plan to inject liquidity and solvency into the financial system. Quite simply, they believe that Americans should turn to loansharking. "America's network of neighborhood mobsters and two-bit, money laundering hoodlums is an asset that we should not ignore," said a Treasury official who asked to remain anonymous because in his official position, promoting felonious interest rates as high as 55% would be unseemly and ridiculously desperate.

"Think about it," continued the official. "The stock market has disgorged over 40% of its year-over-year value. Jeepers, the S&P 500 was down almost 10% yesterday! At this point it's really a question of who you want to smash in your kneecaps: the goddamn markets or some thug named Bruno with slicked back hair and a maroon leather jacket. At least Bruno is liquid."

In these dire times, nobody (and we mean nobody) actually has the confidence to approve a loan if you're interested in buying a car, fixing up your home, or growing a small business. So as much as it may (literally) hurt to drive down to the scummy part of the city and plead with a Christopher Moltisanti lookalike for a few wads of cash that come with vigorish so crippling that your unborn grandchildren will still be paying off the principal when you croak, what other choice does the average citizen have?

"In the early part of the 20th century, this is how the economy worked," said the anonymous official. "I think most Americans have seen The Godfather II, and that situation wasn't so bad. The crooks on Wall Street will just be replaced with local crooks like Vito Corleone. At least he cared about his community! Is the pinch you're in right now really better than the pinch you'll be in when your hand's in a welding vice because the weekly payment is a little light?"