Illustration by Bob AulThe U.S. in the late 1950s considered detonating a nuclear bomb on the moon to prove our military and technological might to the Soviets, a physicist involved in the project revealed in a May 16 New York Times interview. Ivan was whipping American ass in the space race at the time, but moon-nuking was scrapped after Air Force officials decided the risks outweighed the benefits, said the egghead, Leonard Reiffel. Flexing our muscles wasn't worth large chunks of lunar surface pummeling the planet? What pussies! They should have just convinced everyone it'd rain free cheese for days.
STRAWBERRY FIELD NOT FOREVER With eight months to go before the scheduled opening of California Adventure, city officials disclosed on May 16 that the Walt Disney Co. is getting serious about building a third Anaheim theme park in a strawberry farm just a mouse-eared balloon's flight from Disneyland. “The fact that they're talking to city staff is significant,” Anaheim Mayor Tom Daly told the Register. “I think the subject is warm now, and it's starting to heat up.” Days earlier, Disney announced California Adventure—which will include a re-created beach carnival, Hollywood back lot and “natural resources” (we're guessing that means smog, silicone deposits, manicured lawn clippings, etc.)—will open Feb. 8, 2001. In case the Mouseketeers have yet to have imagineered a theme for the third park, might we suggest California Misadventure, which would mimic such Golden State disasters as earthquakes, prison riots and anything spat out of the mouth of Huntington Beach-based immigrant-hater Barbara Coe. And a one and a two: It's a white world after all/It's a white world after all . . .
YOU DESERVE A BRAKE TODAY A thief racked up a whopper of a McDonald's bill with a stolen toll-road transponder, the victim reportedly told the Register on May 18. More than $200 in burgled burgers and fries were charged to Rancho Santa Margarita resident Don DeAngelis' Transportation Corridor Agencies (TCA) bill before he noticed his transponder was missing. In an effort to get someone—anyone!—to drive on the underused unfreeways, the TCA worked out a deal with Mickey D's to allow drivers to charge meals on the beeping windshield boxes that magically tally toll-road use. Catching the illegal consumer of $200 worth of McDonald's food should be easy: look for the driver of the car barely chugging its way up the northbound San Joaquin Hills toll road.
THE DICK CLUB About 200 members of Richard Nixon's tight-knit circle celebrated their 25th-annual private dinner together on May 17, according to the Washington Times. The location of the Richard Nixon Alumni Group gathering was not disclosed, although some press was reportedly invited (exsqueeze me? Where was our invite?). We're told the main speaker was former Senate majority leader Robert Dole, who likely culled material from his snot-and-tears-soaked eulogy at Dick's 1994 funeral rather than this famous quip, which he made when presidents Jimmy Carter, Jerry Ford and Nixon stood by one another at a White House event: “There they are: see no evil, hear no evil and . . . evil.”
WHO WANTS TO BEAT A MILLIONAIRE? DiMassimo Brand Advertising asked 500 Americans which millionaire's butt they would most like to kick, it was reported on May 18. The top 10 (in descending order) were: Rick Rockwell, Dr. Laura Schlessinger, Bill Gates, John Rocker, Donald Trump, Ron Perelman, all the Backstreet Boys, George W. Bush, George Steinbrenner and New York advertising honcho/restaurateur Jerry Della Femina. That got Clockwork thinking about the top 10 OC millionaires that we'd like to bitch-slap. They are (in descending order): Howard F. Ahmanson Jr., George Argyros, Rob Hurtt, “Doc” Edward Allred, William Lyon, Mark McGrath, Dean Koontz, Mo Vaughn, Paul and Jan Crouch, and whoever's getting fat off our bikini waxes.
OC Weekly Editor-in-Chief Matt Coker has been engaging, enraging and entertaining readers of newspapers, magazines and websites for decades. He spent the first 13 years of his career in journalism at daily newspapers before “graduating” to OC Weekly in 1995 as the alternative newsweekly’s first calendar editor.