Apology, Inc.

Several days ago, as I was getting my haircut, I caught a TV clip of a middle-aged man in a suit dwarfed by a bank of microphones. Between pauses for self-loathing and tears, he was informing the gathered masses that his regrettable actions had betrayed the trust of both his family and friends. He spoke of the disappointment he felt in himself and the undue scrutiny and pressure that his mistakes created for those he loved.

For those of us who watch the news regularly, a teary-eyed man in a designer suit apologizing for “bad judgment” can only mean one of three things:

·         A prominent sports or political figure has been caught cheating on his wife.

·         A prominent sports or political figure has been caught cheating in the course of their job.

·         A prominent sports or political figure has been caught cheating on his wife with someone at their job.

The particular man in the example I witnessed at the barber shop was University of Tennessee men’s basketball coach Bruce Pearl, who admitted to providing “incorrect and misleading information to the NCAA.” However, I have come to believe his is but one example of a market that has remained largely untapped: The Prominent Male Figure Apology Template. With that in mind I have formulated an easy to use fill in the blank style apology that can be read at a press conference or released in writing. Think of it as career mad-libs:

I (insert name here) have regrettably squandered the trust placed in me by my family/employer/citizens and offer my sincerest apologies to all those negatively affected by the poor decisions I have made. I have betrayed your confidence and compromised the integrity of my position/office by my unscrupulous actions and can only humbly request your forgiveness.*

*insert dramatic pause followed by teary-eyed introspective gaze

 And while I am unable to change the past, I go forward with a renewed sense of purpose knowing that those who matter most to me remain at my side*

*cue solemn nod from wife or applicable stand-in

Regardless of the outcome reached by the current investigation, I have decided to resign my position/post/office effectively immediately as my actions over the past several weeks/months/years/decades have proven me devoid of the qualifications necessary to continue the work of this fine organization/administration. As we go forward, I ask the media to respect my family’s right to privacy and I again offer my apologies to those harmed by my thoughtless transgressions.

Thank You.

While the above paragraph provides the basic outline, our staff of “culpability-deferment specialists” will work with you to provide an apology to fit your needs. Packages include:

·         The Head-Coach Deluxe – includes enough material to cover two collegiate recruitment violations, one D.U.I arrest, and four solid allegations of verbal abuse. Available extras include sponsorship money amnesia and up to five occurrences of “spontaneous player G.P.A. inflation.” 

·         The Senator’s Special – includes enough material to cover three questionable campaign contributions, six inappropriate uses of travel expenses, and a single instance of consensual sexual contact with a female staffer. Available extras include love-child coverage and a special racial slur enhancement.

·         The MVP – includes enough material to cover two separate uses of a banned substance, three sexual assault charges (not to exceed more than 1 per calendar year), and a single instance of paparazzi assault.  Available extras include a “manslaughter special” that can be invoked when the player’s own bodyguard/chauffer/accountant dies as the result of a gunshot wound inflicted by the insured.  

Please note that due to a new policy implemented by our underwriters, we are no longer able to offer our “Dead Hooker Mitigation Special” or “The Dennis Rodman Contingency.”

A Date With The Devil

On September 14^th, Christine O’ Donnell stunned the Republican party by winning the right to represent Delaware in the United States Senate race against Democrat Chris Coons. She had faced former governor and current U.S. House of Representatives member Mike Castle, who by all accounts was a shoe-in for the Republican nomination. O’ Donnell was the dark-horse Tea Party candidate and no one expected her to come close to securing the nomination, much less win by six percentage points.  Her victory has caused infighting within the GOP as many of the party’s leaders (like Karl Rove) have publicly commented on her inability to lead while others (Sarah Palin) have openly endorsed her. 

As if this perceived upset hasn’t caused enough uproar, video has recently surfaced of O’ Donnell’s 1999 appearance on Bill Mahr’s roundtable discussion show Politically Incorrect where she claims to have dabbled in witchcraft and even dated a warlock although never going far enough to “join a coven.” For those who do not know, joining a coven is the dark arts equivalent of pledging a college sorority. While some see witchcraft as a forgivable youthful indiscretion, others fear that such an association could distance her from the conservative voters that won her the primary.

While I do not wish to dissect the probable impact of witchcraft allegations on a Republican candidate, there is one part of her story that fascinates me. In the same clip, she describes her first date with a witch where he took her to a “Satanic altar” that was adorned with “blood” and they had a “midnight picnic” there. In her defense, O’Donnell claims that the location and nature of their date had been a surprise to her implying that she would not have necessarily felt comfortable if given the option ahead of time.

In my mind there are only two possibilities that could have occurred in this alleged date scenario:

1.      She was more involved in witchcraft that she lets on.
2.      Her suitor took the biggest chance on a first date ever.

Obviously, if the young man in question met Christine though a sorcery mixer, he could be somewhat assured that she wouldn’t run screaming into the woods as the thought of having a chicken salad sandwich while lounging at the altar of the dark master. However, I would have far more respect for him had he chosen the location of the date cold turkey. After all, it takes a self-assured man to play his “How do you feel about blood sacrifices to the dark lord?” card so early in the game.

I would have loved to have been a fly on the wall when Christine came home and dished to her friends about the evening:

“He was such a gentleman; he brought Lunchables and then we drank sheep’s blood from the chalice of eternal torment. Then, just as the bone-marrow incense was burning out, he nervously took my hand and offered to carve a pentagram into my palm using the sacrificial dagger he had fashioned from the grave markers of the innocent. Afterward, we just sat there and quoted retribution incantations to each other in Latin. It was just like a Nicholas Sparks book.”

Of course, it is more likely that Christine had some idea of her beau’s interests and would have been far more shocked if he had suggested Starbucks and Trivial Pursuit.

I am also curious as to what the next big step would have been had the relationship worked out? Do Satanists marry? Is there a gathering of friends and family where the happy couple lights a dis-unity candle and pledges their lifelong indifference to each other while participating in a black mass? Is there a satanic priest that stands at the altar and delivers a canned message?

Dearly despised,

                      We are gathered here today in the presence of darkness and its eternal keeper to witness the soulless pairing of two heterosexual minions. While their beliefs do not allow them the luxury of personal fulfillment, they fervently desire to take advantage of several Federal tax credits only available to the matrimonially attached. We wish Judy & Frank years of crushing adversity tempered by parasitic guilt and hatred. You may kiss the damned. 

On a personal note, I think it would be infinitely advantageous to have a known Satanist as an older sibling. This ensures that it would take dramatic and repeated failure on your part for your parents to say:

“Why can’t you be more like your brother?”

It Could Be Worse......

We all have bad days at work. Your boss yells at you for wearing moccasins to a board meeting, a co-worker passes gas in the elevator and everyone assumes it was you, or the only radio station in town is playing Nickelback again; but the truth of the matter is that someone always has it worse. And I am not referring to your acquaintances that treat “having it worse” as a competition. We all know people who treat human misery as a game of ridiculous escalation:

Person A – “I think I sprained my ankle this weekend”

Person B – “I suffer from chronic ankle pain, plus several of my internal organs are operating at only 40%                       capacity”

Person A – “I probably hurt it helping my brother move; he lost his job and has to move back in with our    parents”

Person B – “The only time I got to help my brother move was when I was a pallbearer at his funeral”

Person A – “Yeah…So…..I gotta get back to work. I am pretty behind”

Person B – “I haven’t been able to catch up either since my home was burned to the ground by while I was in the hospital for sadness."

Instead, I am referring to the events in life that allow the rest of us whiners to place our problems into the proper perspective. One such example for me is the plight of the Chilean miners, 33 men trapped half a mile below the surface of the earth and squeezed into a living area roughly the size of a Quizno’s. Stranded since the roof of the copper and gold mine collapsed on August 5^th, these workers are subsisting on  whatever can be delivered through the three tiny “pigeon” holes that connect the miners to the outside world. 

Over the past month, the miners have been provided with some semblance of normalcy thought the use of electric lights, phone conversations, and even televised soccer matches. Onsite psychiatrists have thus far refused the men’s request for alcoholic beverages fearing a breakdown of the social order and just recently provided them with tobacco. Overall the group, whose youngest member is only nineteen, has demonstrated remarkable resiliency. Their enthusiasm even survived the news that it could be another two months before an escape hole could be drilled to provide them a three hour ride to safety. If that wasn’t daunting enough, the extraction tunnel will be so small that no one with a waistline of more than 35 inches could fit through it, so the men have been placed on a strict exercise routine.

On the one hand, I completely understand the reticence to provide a case of Miller Lite to a group of tightly-wound 33 men trapped in a mine shaft. Certainly no one wants to risk Frankie taking the power-shovel for a joy ride after downing a few cold ones and causing another cave-in. However, I wonder if withholding tobacco was a good idea. I have never smoked myself, but I have seen firsthand the palatable instability caused by a severe nicotine jones. Perhaps the officials are concerned for employee’s pulmonary health, which seems disingenuous to say to someone working 12-hour shifts in a Chilean copper mine.

Regardless, I must confess that their attitude in the face of extreme circumstances puts me to shame. Rather than allowing themselves to surrender to panic, they have established chores, routines, and designated areas for personal hygiene. I would like to go on record as saying that were I to have been in the mine when the roof collapsed and I found myself trapped, I would have run in concentric circles yelling “We are all going to die!” as I simultaneously soiled myself. This behavior would have continued until I was chemically sedated or my involuntary bowel-movements dehydrated me to the point of unconsciousness. After several days of this, I would crawl into the fetal position and sing “How Great Thou Art” until my voice gave out whereupon I would gently sob and whimper myself to sleep.

That is not to say that they do not have problems; one miner, Yonni Barrios, has been maintaining both a wife and a mistress for several years. In the past he has been able to keep these two worlds separate, but a few weeks ago they both showed up for a candlelight vigil at the site. After some idle chitchat and an innocent “So how do you know Yonni?” the situation rapidly deteriorated. Now the two women prowl the grounds of the mine waiting for the Mr. Barrios to resurface; each one claiming ownership of his affection. Yonni has yet to comment, but sources close to the situation believe he may have already volunteered to be rescued last.

Strippers and Sunday School

For the past four years, members and staff of New Beginnings Ministries Church in Warsaw, Ohio have taken action against a grave threat to the moral fabric of their beloved community. Night after night they have gathered with their digital cameras and driven nine miles to shame the patrons of a local “adult club” known as The Fox Hole. Over the years, the church has utilized several tactics to diminish the club’s business, including posting photos of customers on the church’s website (often with their license plate numbers), badgering customers by asking what their wives or mothers would think of their behavior, and loudly picketing with signs that refer to the dancers as “whores” and “prostitutes.”

Understandably, this behavior is frowned upon by the club’s current owner Tommy George, who has spent years amassing the upscale clientele associated with exotic clubs in rural Ohio. Mr. George has decided to fight back and has organized a counter-protest against the church. So every Sunday, he, and a small platoon of exotic dancers descend upon New Beginnings Ministries Church and hold up signs chastising the congregation for their lack of grace and humility. They have declared that they will stop picketing only if the congregation returns the favor.

New Beginning’s pastor, Bill Dunfee, has stated that "It's not about a personal battle. It's about a battle between two seeds: right and wrong, good and evil, light and darkness” and vowed to continue until The Fox Hole has seen it last lap dance. He believes that the adult club exploits the workers and encourages marital infidelity. The pastor has even offered to help the strippers pay their bills if they agree to quit. Although none of the protests have turned violent, both groups are unwilling to back down.

This scenario presents several interesting facts:

I believe that the church has underestimated the tenacity of a man brave enough to sport a quasi-mullet and open a low-budget strip club in the heart of Amish country. Obviously he is not someone easily discouraged by adversity, traditional business models, or community sensitivity. Besides, if history has taught us anything, it is to never cross a man with two first names.

To be fair, I can identify with Pastor Dunfee’s dim view of The Fox Hole. After all, nothing makes property values skyrocket like a windowless plywood shack across from a trailer park that uses a rented sign to advertise “1/2 price lap dances.” And I doubt that anyone would argue that strippers are the cornerstone of a healthy marriage (especially their own). However, it might open a better dialog if the congregants refrained from calling the dancers “whores.” I have yet to meet a woman that responds to a derogatory remark with “Tell me more about Jesus.”

I will say that regardless of the church’s motivation, it is probably not a good idea to use the money from the offering plate to pay the strippers’ utility bills for them. In such adverse economic conditions, I am not sure that the church should be encouraging those who are already gainfully employed to quit their jobs in order to support them with tithe money. I can just see the bullet items in the next budget committee meetings:

· Roof Repairs - $579.33
· Baptismal Maintenance - $253.24
· Digital Cable for Unemployed Strippers - $189.14

This situation does present an interesting moral dilemma. The church certainly has every right to peacefully protest what they see as an amoral establishment, but is packing up a busload of congregation members and driving them nine miles up the road to picket for hours on end the correct usage of the church’s resources?

Perhaps that time and effort over the past four years could be devoted to a soup kitchen, or building a Habitat for Humanity House, and as one of the female entertainers pointed out, at least the girls aren’t sitting on their couches being supported by welfare.

Strippers, like car valets, only exist because someone out there is willing to pay for their services. If Tommy George can afford to employ ten full-time dancers in a town with one stop-light and a Citgo, perhaps the church might want to utilize a different approach. After all, I doubt that very many of these women grew up dreaming of a career that paid them in a roll of sweaty singles dispensed by even sweatier men. If the church wanted to offer them an alternative, maybe they could take some money and create a scholarship fund so that the strippers could go back to school and establish careers outside of adult entertainment without going on welfare (church sponsored or otherwise).

For now, it appears that the only thing the two sides can agree on is that the town isn’t big enough for the both of them. Pastor Dunfee and his crew have recently expanded their protests to include an “amateur hot-body car wash” in a bordering county, but he made it clear that closing The Fox Hole is still their first priority. Ironically, thanks to Dunfee’s tireless efforts and publicity, The Fox Hole has become the most well-known strip-club in Ohio. Maybe these two can work together after all…