fter the excitement of the sports-dominated weekend, Americans faced a rush of new programming afterward, with the exception of some repeats, most notable among them the State of the Union address Tuesday night by President George W. Bush.

Controversy has surrounded the address, as Republicans are quick to agree with Bush's support of tax cuts and military action against Iraq, Democrats aim to poke holes in the president's poor domestic policies, and most Americans convinced the speech is the same one given at the last State of the Union.

"I don't know," said Indianapolis, IN shop teacher Milton Haig, "they kept telling me it was new. I keep thinking I saw some people who weren't there last time, in the audience or in the background… but I'm pretty sure I saw it last time it was on and it was the same thing."

Some would not even entertain doubts about the broadcast, which the White House claims was entirely new material written and beamed live to America Tuesday, January 28, 2003.

"Of course it was a repeat," said Kitty Wong, Big Tobacco publicist. "I remember it clearly when it first aired. Bush said something about terrorism, then he said Saddam Hussein was evil and the U.S. was ready to go to war. Oh, and he said something about tax breaks because the economy can't grow unless people are out spending money and such. Yeah, sure I remember it well—I've seen it at least twice, probably more than that. That's like the Christmas episode or something they drag out whenever they need to fill a slot."

The Bush White House insisted the broadcast was a brand new speech.

"Of course it was a new State of the Union," said antagonistic press secretary Ari Fleischer. "The president, no president, has ever run a repeat of the State of the Union address and President Bush would not be the first—and quit making those little hand 'quote' signs whenever you say President. Tuesday night, despite these rumors and claims, the president put forth a new agenda to lower taxes and stimulate the economy, while clearly outlining his plan to hold Saddam to the disarmament promise he made years ago. And if that takes military force, then we'll use it. That's all new, folks."

The confusion is understandable, said former Newstime editor and quotable commentator Reg Sallad.

"Sometimes news doesn't move as fast as expected, and particularly in a down economy, the president likes to keep attention on foreign issues and potential enemies, and Saddam Hussein has been the outstanding villain for Republicans for more than a decade," said Sallad solemnly. "During periods of prosperity or extreme economic desperation, Americans feel there is no excuse for increasing military spending and sending American troops into war. Americans may be confusing the repetition in party soundbytes since they haven't really changed for either party in at least ten years. Or, it's entirely possible it was just a lame repeat."

Despite the assertion by most politicians that the speech was new and worth discussing, there doesn't seem to be much call for Americans to care either way.

Johann Regal, a Butte, Montana soccer coach: "At least the new TV shows are back on. There's an all-female Fear Factor that looks really hot, and that new Survivor, too. It's about time, those networks were stretching for filler programming lately. Did you see Tuesday night? They were running some 1989 speech by Bush, like right before the Gulf War started."

n the battle of post-game celebrations, the fans in Tampa Bay have nothing on the spirited Oakland fans. Sunday night, following the Raiders' loss to the Bucs, East Oakland sizzled and burned with young rowdies demonstrating their loyalty to the hometown team by trashing and looting stores, burning cars and spinning doughnuts in intersections all up and down International Blvd. More than 80 people were arrested in the melee, most for vandalism, destroying public property, or public drunkenness.

Meanwhile, in Tampa Bay, Florida's "Bay Area," exactly one person was arrested: a dyed-blonde Miss Thang who was baring her implants to the crowd gathered to celebrate the Buccaneers' first-ever Super Bowl championship.

Asked to comment, Oakland riot-participant Hector Barbazino said, "They only had one arrest down there? Day-um, bro! And it was for what? Some bitch flashin' her titties? Oh, that ain't right, yo."

"That ain't cool at all, man," added Barbazino's cousin, Ricky Ledora. "Shee-it, they ought to come to Oaktown and see how we get down here, yo. Look at Carlos over there in the chopped Toyota, yo, his bitch LaShanté be hangin' out the sunroof all damn night, and she butt-naked, man! Butt-naked!"

"Oh, yeah, bro. Bitches be throwin' they titties on my windshield for hours, yo. Pressed titties on glass, what I'm talkin' about." Barbazino commented, as he poured lighter fluid all over a parked Subaru station wagon and set a match to it. "Word, homes. If Ray-Ray didn't had to take my ride to go pick up his baby-mama before ten, we'd still be gettin' it, them titties on glass."

The word from Tampa Bay was that, other than the breast-baring incident, not a lot of carrying-on occurred. City residents marched a few times around the three blocks of the downtown area, some of them carrying American flags and singing "God Bless America," and a few people were observed drinking Mike's Hard Lemonade from bottles hidden in brown paper bags. After an hour of this, most of the crowd dispersed and went home to watch Alias.

In Oakland, however, it was a different story. The large crowd merrily jumped on moving cars, broke windows and set fires for hours. When the mob energy began to wane, police fired tear gas, rubber bullets and wooden dowels in an attempt to further incite the crowd and egg them on to new heights of destruction throughout the night.

"Come on, you miserable bastards!" shouted Sergeant Arnie Cocklip at the crowd, as he fired his service revolver in the air. "Let's show the world how we kick heiney in Oakland. We're number friggin' one, goddamnit! Break something! Burn something down!"

Reluctantly, the worn out crowd complied with police orders and thoroughly trashed a nearby McDonald's, a Kelly-Moore paint store and the Gomes Tire and Service Center. Said one young reveler, Jose Chingamadre, "After we burned the three Chevys over on 151st, and threw bricks through the window of the day-care center there, I was ready to go home and watch Alias. But then the cops made us stay out here and keep going. Man, those dudes are like hard-asses, you know?"

Damage in Oakland was estimated at over $100,000, with the police that were present throughout the night gathering the day after to vote on which of the rioters would receive a full share, and which only half shares. "Them little slacking sonsabitches that only broke a couple windows or just missed a pedestrian while they were spinning doughnuts think they're getting a full share, they better think again. Punk-ass bitches gotta show me something special to get that," Sergeant Cocklip explained.

In 1947, a researcher at MIT realized that he knew the Pope. Well, not him personally, but his cousin Bernie once met a guy who's grandfather's shoeshine man once stepped on the Pope's robe when he was staggering out of a bar one night, so that was pretty damned close to knowing the Pope. This researcher's gears started turning upstairs as he realized the ramifications of what he had discovered. "I'll be shit in dip, I know the motherfucking Pope!" he yelled to no one in particular.

Then he promptly went out and got shitfaced in celebration, dying of liver failure in a cheap motel nine years later after waging a half-assed battle with alcoholism. But while he was at the bar he had mentioned, loudly and in the form of a song, his discovery to a man in a pirate costume who was occupying the barstool next to him. The pirate said "Arr, the Pope indeed!" and moved further down the bar, but another researcher sitting at a table within earshot heard the conversation. He was less of a fuck-up and actually did something with the information, thank God.

He sold the idea to a third researcher for a fix of heroin, and went off to Naked Lunch his way into oblivion. This third researcher wrote the idea on the back of a map of Utah, where it stayed in his trunk for ten years, until he went to sell the car to a naïve college freshman who actually believed that the car's monstrous rust problem was a new high-tech ventilation system. When the researcher was cleaning out his trunk he found the map with the idea scribbled on the back, and since he had recently been fired from the University for selling test tubes as magic condoms, he decided to make this his next project.

He called the project Six Degrees of Mark Womack, because Mark Womack was his name and he liked to tell naïve freshman girls he had six degrees so they would sleep with him. When one would occasionally ask what his degrees were in, he'd make up subjects like Astrocomedy, SuperBiology and Calculean. Womack spent the first six months of research feverishly trying to figure out how he knew the Pope, and why he couldn't kick this lousy fever. First he called everyone he knew to ask if they knew the Pope, then he just started calling people at random from the phone book in hopes of finding a link. After six months and an assassination attempt by the phone company, the answer finally came to him while he was driving to the police station to bail his brother Don out of jail.

Don had once been arrested for sneaking into Madonna's house dressed in a floor-length evening gown, and Madonna had of course recorded the theme song for the Pony Express: "Express Yourself." Pony Express rider Wild Buffalo Bill McLanihan had once shot Walter "Left Turn" Sykes for riding his horse too slow on the hauling-ass trail, and Sykes was the maternal great-great-grandfather of Father Parrish Lunt, who once French-kissed the Pope at a Vatican mixer before being reassigned to Buggery Beach on Easter Island.

It was almost brilliant in its simplicity! And more importantly, it proved scientifically that Womack kind of sort of knew the Pope. He ran out into the street half-dressed to share his incredible news with the world, and was run over to death by a trolley.

Luckily for science, that pirate-dressing guy from the bar ten years previous had been working on the same problem this whole time, mostly while he was in the doctor's office awaiting his weekly treatments for lupus. Samsonite Cooks had taken a somewhat different approach than Womack, focusing instead on the idea that any two people on earth could be connected by a chain of six or fewer acquaintances. He came up with this idea after running into an old ex-girlfriend he'd been avoiding and subsequently misunderstanding the title of Womack's project. However, he quickly realized that this was bullshit, since it's not like Leon down on 6th street knows the freakin' President. Shit. That dirty dog would need at least 100 steps and a hang glider.

Thus, the idea lay dormant in Cooks' sock drawer for another forty years until he sold it in a sports bar men's room to Michael Bacon, celebrity brother and one half of the celebrity-and-his-brother musical duo The Bacon Brothers. Bacon was desperate to step out of the shadow of his actor brother Kevin, a man who wears jogging shorts so hideously small you can see his Bacon bits. Michael Bacon pitched the idea to Ernie Bradley, an upstart board-game publisher desperate to step out of his own brother's shadow, and there the parlor game Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon was born. Michael became rich but still could not escape from his brother's shadow, so he had to settle for playing out of key when Kevin sang, making him look like an asshole.

Science jumped on the Six Degrees idea and claimed it was real, much as they did after the first Star Wars became popular. The world took notice, said "Huh, weird" and went back about their lives. More importantly, however, a young scholar-for-hire named Griswald Dreck started his own mail-order business, linking customers to the historical figures of their choice for a nominal fee, and ended up landing a regular columnisting job after he linked Red Bagel to Ivan the Terrible in four steps flat. It's a small world, as they say. Or sing.

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