And you can't spit afterwards, either

Oral sex has been declared illegal in Singapore unless it is practised as a prelude to full sex, the island's Court of Appeal ruled. The court said the practice was "against the order of nature".

Rep. Helen Chenoweth said that term limits would get rid of out-of-touch politicians. Still holding those endangered-species campaign BBQs, Helen?

State Dept spokesman Nicholas Burns, cornered by the BBC on the differences in policy regarding trade with China and Cuba, said that constructive engagement worked in South Africa.

New in NY City: a kosher cybercafe.

An Alabama judge is ordered by the circuit court to stop his prayer sessions with jury pools and remove the large carved 10 Commandments.

Governor Fob (Fob?) James threatens to send in the National Guard and the state troopers to protect the plaques, saying "If we accept all judge's orders, we don't have a government of law, we have a government of men."

Is it my imagination, or a lot of really stupid stories coming out of Alabama lately?

The reward on Salman Rushdie's head is upped to $2 1/2 million. The British government has spent over $10 million keeping him alive.

Imperfect and ok with it

This is from www.pennpals.com, a website for folks in the joint. (Update: link no longer works) This is the women seeking men section, but check out the men seeking women section ("I love pizza, Big Macs, and Coors Light Beer. Are you out there?") and the death row section, where everybody is wrongly convicted. The typos are the web site's fault, not the prisoners', by the way.


Penn-Pals
Women seeking Men Penn-Pals Master Sheet

Click on a name or a picture and view that Penn-Pals Home Page!

[2]Gidget Lewis I am a Black-French-Indian Native. Currently in Texas Women Prison in Gatesville. Doing a 30 year sentence, been down 6 years. I have learned from my mistakes and I am seeking a long term friendship of lover, age 35 and up. Race is unimportant. My days spent here are very lonely. Without a companion to enjoy the night hours and days with. I'm in search of someone who knows the pain and fears of such admissable circumstances that have become part of my life. ......


[4]Kim McCullough HELP ! ! ! Single mother of two daughters. I am a perfectionist who is imperfect and OK with it. I am a dedicated, loyal, hard working, intelligent, loving and loveable woman. I am an artist, who is kind, empathetic, dependable, a great friend in need of constant challenges because I bore easily.

I am self-sufficient, versitile, eager for knowledge, ......


[6]Lora Zaiontz Honesty is a high priority. I'm incarcerated serving a life sentence for being a party to the crime of capitol murder. Please don't be afraid for I am truly a lost and lonely kitten, who continues to trust in peoples good intention. During my incarceration I have achieved my Associates Degree and now work on my batchor. I've been here thirteen years now. I was 17 years old at the time I came. The world I'll enter once free will be all new. I seek someone who will hold my hand always.

[8]Kim Leavelle Greetings Friends ! Don't let this prison garb picture scar you off. I'm Cinderella at heart; seeking pumpkins of all walks of life. I'm lonely and desolate; despite singing songs of dispair. . . and pity parties . . . I find humor does the soul good. I'm incarcerated for a non-violent robbery because of my previous addiction to drugs. If you are facing adversity in your life, let me pick you up and dust you off, then journey through life with smiles on our faces : ) Who needs glass slippers anyways? I hear they cause bunyons! ; ) 'wink & a smile'.......


[10]Je Donna Young Dynamic Multifaceted Lady - who wishes to correspond with a diverse sincere gentleman. I am a warm, compassionate woman seeking just the right man for me. True Old Fashioned Gentleman - Please respond to a sincere lady who wishes to correspond with a gentleman from a by gone era.......

[12]Jean Federico Hello, I have taken some wrong roads in life but now my head is together. I have spent many years in here. It's very lonely. I'm seeking an amiable, magnanimous man to write a lonely woman like myself. Please find the time to write me. I am lonely for companionship. I desperately need to socialize with people in society. I cry at movies whether they are sad or happy......


[14]Leslie Faulkner Hi There, I am looking for a nice man who is kind and understanding to write me. I do not receive any mail at all and desperately seek companionship. I am very outgoing & athletic. I am in here on a non-violent crime. I have turned my life around and need some mental suport. My family turned on me after this happened and I need someone to care.....

[16]Vicki Heyer I seek a sincere, caring, warm-hearted man, age 25-48, for friendship, possibly something more. I believe inner warmth is more inmortant than looks, age, race or nationality.....

[18]Aquilia Horace Hello ! I am a very young and sexy lady. I'd love to start to receive mail. I'll answer all letters. I'm presently incarcerated. I'm really not a hardened criminal, I made a mistake and am paying for it now. I've learned a hell of a lot. I'm in need of some new loving and caring friends who will grow to love me for the person I am today.

[22]Denise Jacques A 6' 2" Blue Eyed Doll looking for a man who is financially secure and willing to give a little help. Also willing to forgive a mistake and be emotionally supportive. I am willing to relocate. If interested please send a letter and photo....

[24]Robbie Coakley Single White Female, 34 years old, 5' 6" . Small, slim lady looking for a friendship, possible companionship, willing to relocate. I'm a fun, loving cowgirl looking for someone who is willing to live life to the fullest...

[26]Linda Paisley A "normal", attractive, vivacious, 5' 7" brown eyed beauty with a killer smile, outrageous personality, whose mission is to seek out and and find a professional or businessman 30's - 50's, who still has a twinkle in his eye.....

Coddling criminals

The guy who got life under CA's 3 strikes law for stealing a slice of pizza has had his sentence revised on appeal. He will be out after only 4 years (with good behaviour). With such leniency towards pizza theft, the republic must surely crumble.

Speaking of republics that crumbled, does anyone have the *words* to Virginia's "state song emeritus", recently demoted from its status as state song, or perhaps that's kicked upstairs, when it was discovered that it was the "darkies" who were supposed to be doing the Carrying Back to Old Virginny.

The State Dept accuses Germany of discriminating against Scientologists. Evidently, Madeleine Albright is now dating John Travolta.

Finally, from an LA Times article about yesterday's TV coverage of Yeltsin, designed to prove that he was in fact still breathing:


"This situation reminds one of the last days of Konstantin Chernenko," Sergei Markov, a political analyst with the Moscow Carnegie Center, said in comparing Yeltsin's staged appearances with the heavily edited glimpses Russians got of their last leader to die in office.
After a 13-month stint, the wheezing and frail Chernenko died in March 1985 at age 73.
Recalling one highly choreographed shot of Chernenko congratulating visitors to his "office" on International Women's Day--two days before his death--Markov said the film was taken at an awkward angle to obscure the fact that the hospitalized leader had no pants on.


What a coincidence: that's just how Clinton likes to celebrate International Women's Day!

Tom Carson of the Village Voice says that Clinton's new cabinet does look like America--pudgy, bamboozled, potentially truculent, bereft of fashion sense, mysteriously unconvincing.

Incidentally, to give the middle class a greater say in the running of the country, the Lincoln Bedroom is now charging hourly rates.

Italian prison inmates will be allowed to keep pet birds and fish, the Vatican came out against smoking, the ban on pornography in military PXs was declared unconstitutional, the Vienna Philharmonic will allow in women, Brigitte Bardot was acquitted of violating France's anti-racism laws, Playboy magazine is now the best-selling magazine in Ireland less than a year after it was unbanned, and the local Tory party in Kensington-Chelsea, the safest Tory seat in Britain, has found a suitable replacement for Sir Nicholas Scott, who you will remember for being found drunk in a gutter: Alan Clark, the world-class adulterer, who once screwed a friend's wife and both her daughters, presumably not at the same time, a man so rich that he criticized Michael Heseltine as being the sort of man who buys his own furniture, and whose motto, I quote here from his published diaries: "Girls have to be succulent, and that means under 25." The good burghers of Kensington-Chelsea found him suitable, extracting only one promise from him: that he not vote in favor of banning hunting.

Some Federal District Court judge in NYC decided not to find anti-abortion clinic blockaders guilty of contempt of his own injunction. He says that since he acted as both judge and jury at the previous trial that resulted in the injunction, he had the right of a juror to ignore laws he believes are wrong. Needless to say, he is a Reagan appointee.

Pyromania in the news

2 women leave the Citadel, citing harassment. The president of the Citadel says nonsense, it's customary to set all new recruits on fire.

In the Sunday NY Times Week in Review section, there is a picture of a South Korean striker on fire. The headline: "Seoul Takes Its Cue From Mrs. Thatcher".

A pig just got a face-lift. There are real reasons, but the story's funnier if you don't know them.

Poland is starting a cavalry unity. If there are real reasons I have yet to determine them. They can use pictures from the cavalry in action against German tanks in 1939 in the recruitment posters. Are we sure we want these people in NATO?

Y'all will remember several articles I sent a few months ago about a British insurance company offering policies against haunted houses, second comings and alien abductions. Well, it seems the whole thing was a fraud. It collapsed as the guy in charge issued a fake giant check for 1 million pounds, supposed to be presented by the chick from the X-files, to some abductee. Oh the perfidy!

Christmas traditions

At the South Pole, the tradition is the annual run around the world, 2.7 miles that covers 24 time zones.

The mayor of Moscow decreed that stores in central Moscow not displaying ornate xmas decorations would be fined. Remember: if it's not banned, it's compulsory.

Finally, the British holiday tradition of betting on whether they'll be snow on xmas has cost bookmakers over 100,000 pounds.

I love Christmas news stories. Here's one: 6-year old British girl electrocuted by xmas tree lights while family looks on in horror. Yes, that's real. Finland sent its annual huge xmas tree to the holy land where Israel, exercising its stewardship of the world's holy sites, put it into quarantine for a month. A Buddhist decided to escape the materialist world to meditate on a Welsh mountain; a helicopter descended on him to try to "rescue" him. In Belgium, the paedophile-paranoid police raided a Satanic cult. The high priestess, or whatever she's called, said she found the raid "terrifying". Now, correct me if I'm wrong, if you're planning to deal with the Forces of Darkness, shouldn't you be able to deal with a little police raid with relative equanimity?

Humanitarian aid X 2

Our first story, broken by the London Sunday Times, is that Israel smuggled tons of hashish into Egypt from the 1960s until the late 80s for sale to Egyptian soldiers, who showed a massive increase in addiction.

2nd:
Toxic Waste Sent to Bosnia as Aid.

John Major, in an interview with Good Housekeeping designed to increase his appeal to women, revealed that he calls his wife "Little Grub." Tony Blair refuses to disclose any pet name he might have for Cherie.

In entirety, from the NY Times digest for the NY region section: "The Queens teen-ager who was beaten into a coma by several youths in a subway station had been harassed recently for being "clean cut," his father said."

By the way, the last words of Len Tuggle, executed in Virginia yesterday: "Merry Christmas." And to all a good night, I guess.

British fox-hunters, in their perrenial fight against hunt saboteurs, are now going after them with helicopters, which sounds a heck of a lot more fun.

JFK's second-most-famous mistress, Judith Exner, whom he shared with Sam Giancana, says that she got pregnant by him in 1962 and had an abortion with his knowledge.

McDonald's opens in its 100th country. Believe it or not, there has never been a war between 2 countries possessing McDonald's. Civil wars don't count, which is good because Belarussian riot police attacked the crowd that gathered at the opening.

Irony

At Carl Bildt's party celebrating the 1st anniversary of the Dayton peace accords for Bosnia, many celebrants were hospitalized with salmonella.

Authorities in the Czech Republic wanted to establish a Sigmund Freud museum in the house in which he was born. The landlord preferred to make it into a massage parlor, or, perhaps, a "massage parlor".

It must be the silly season. The London Times is full of stories about people on trial for running over ducks, a scientist trying to get an import license for rhino dung, complaints from its neighbors that the French embassy is too dirty, a man whose photos of his expedition to the Arctic were lost by the chemists and wants 30,000 pounds to go back, etc. Yesterday we got the news that the newest hot business in Kabul is the sale of bones to Pakistan for soap, chickenfeed and something else I forget, and yes that includes human bones, which for some reason are easier to find in Afghanistan these days than animal bones. An adult male skeleton weighs 13 pounds and fetches about 45 cents.

According to the SF Examiner, the word Nixon used for the rich Jews was cock-sucker. I was hoping for something ethnic.

Keep the faith

New story from the Nixon tapes: September 1971 Nixon asked Ehrlichman on several occasions to go after the tax returns of the rich Jewish contributors to Democrats. "I can only hope that we are, frankly, doing a little persecuting."

I'm curious. The Reuters report says that Nixon used an expletive to describe the Jews. Anyone know which one?

Also on Nixon, you've read the stories, now read the transcripts from the alcoholic-in-chief:


CONVERSATION BETWEEN NIXON AND H.R. HALDEMAN
4/30/73 BETWEEN 10:16 AND 10:20 P.M.:

Nixon: Hello.

Haldeman: Hi.

N: Hope I didn't let you down.

H: No sir, you got your points over, and now you, now you're, you've got it set right and move on. You're in right where you ought to be.

N: Well, it's a tough thing, Bob. For you, for John, the rest, but Goddammit, I'm never going to discuss this son of a bitching Watergate thing again. Never, never, never, never. Don't you agree?

H: Yes sir. You've done it now. And you've laid out your position. You've laid out your, you've taken your steps. You've...

N: Interesting thing. You know we haven't heard. The only cabinet officer that has called , and this is 50 minutes after the thing is over, is Cap Weinberger, bless his soul.

H: Hmm.

N: All the rest are waiting to see what the polls show. Goddam strong cabinet, isn't it?

H: You'd better check and be sure, cause I, they may, you know, we've had a...

N: Nah, nah. No, no, no. They know. They know. They know to call, you know. They know they can get through. But in any event, I just wanted you to know that Cap called & he was all the way.

H: Good.

N: But let me say, you're a strong man, Goddammit, & I love ya.

H: Ha.

N: And I, you know, I love John, and all the rest, and by God, keep the faith. Keep the faith. You're going to win this son of a bitch.

H: Absolutely.

N: You notice what I said about the violence and so forth on the other
side.

H: Yeah.

N: I mean there were some, there were some intricacies in this, that only (unclear) would understand.

H: I got those. And I want to get the (unclear word), cause there are some things to work on from there that.

N: All right.

H: That uh...

N: I thought it was good, too, to sort of end on what I deeply felt (unclear word) on a religious note, you know, God Bless America. I mean, I don't, I'm certain, I must have, have, you know, I must have driven you up the wall.

H: Didn't drive me up the wall, but I felt that way (crosstalk). I'm all for that. I completely agree.

N: I don't know whether you can call and get any reactions and call me back, like the old style. Would you mind?

H: I don't think I can, I don't, I don't.

N: No, I agree.

H: Puts me in kind of an odd spot to try and do that.

N: No. Don't call a Goddam soul. The hell with it. Let me just say,
(unclear words)...from me, from you, I haven't heard from any cabinet
officer except Weinberger an hour afterwards, and thank God, and no
staff member.

H: Well, now, when I called the board said they were instructed not
put any calls through, so...

N: The hell with that. I told them to put all the calls through.

H: Well, that may be why you haven't gotten them though. Because
that's...

N: All right.

H: What told me.

N: All Right. I'll change it. I'll change it. Fine, but God bless ya,
boy, God bless you, I love you. You, you know.

H: Okay.

N: Like my brother.

H: Oh, we'll...

N: All right boy.

H: We'll (unclear word) it up from here.

N: Keep the faith.

H: Right.


CONVERSATION BETWEEN NIXON AND WILLIAM P. ROGERS
SOMETIME BETWEEN 10:20 AND 10:32 P.M.:

Nixon: Hello.

Rogers: Hi, Mr. President.

N: Hi, Bill.

R: Gee, that was terrific. Really superb.

N: Don't give me that shit, you know. You know.

R: No, I really mean it.

N: You and I (unclear)...kind of rough, you know, afterwards, I, I,
shouldn't have done, done it, but, you know, I, uh, think, you know,
the, the operators and the rest. All of a sudden, I sort of, sort of
broke down a bit, and I, I don't, you know, I'm not that kind of a
man.

R: Oh, hell (unclear). I tried to get you right away, but your damn
system is tough to get through. I finally got through to Barker,
but...

N: Been trying to get through to you all day. I mean I told Rose,
Goddammit, any cabinet officer is to get through from, from the minute
after the speech. And only one I've heard from is Weinberger. So I
wondered what the hoot, what the hell's happened to everybody else.

R: I don't know what the Goddam system is. Anyway, I called. I tried
to get Barker, I tried to get (unclear). I finally got Barker, and he
took a message. Anyway, I thought it was superb, I don't know how you,
I don't see how you good have done any better. I think it's the best
delivery I've ever seen you give. I thought the delivery...

N: What, what parts of it did you like, Bill?

R: I liked all of it. I just thought it was great. I, um...

N: You didn't mind the God Bless America? That was my intuition
(unclear) I just sorta felt that way.

R: No, I, I, I thought it was, you know, I thought it was great. I,
uh, suppose some of the (unclear word) editorial writers may not like
it, but the public is going to love it. That's what counts. Uh. And I
thought the whole, the whole tone couldn't have been better. I didn't
think it was, I didn't think it had any, any rough spots in it. I
didn't think that you had any (unclear words) or anything of that
kind. No, I thought it was superb. I couldn't improve on it. I just
thought it was great. Adele was watching...

N: What did Dell think?

R: She thought the same thing. She, you know...

N: Smart woman.

R: She's critical.

N: You married a smarter wife that you, than you are. You know, like I
did.

R: That's right. Now, how'd you think it went? I

N: I don't know anything about it. You know, I've, I've gotten. You
know, I've been through a hell of an experience, you know. I was just
reading, uh, Adams' memoirs, and Adams, you know, to his credit, did
come in and say, look, I'll resign.

R: Yeah, yeah.

N: But Haldeman and Ehrlichman didn't. I had to tell them they had to
resign. That was a Goddam, tough son-of-a-bitch.

R: Yeah.

N: You know.

R: I, I tell you this (unclear), you made a lot of improvements on the
speech. I thought it was pretty good last night, but it was a hell of
a lot better tonight. You must have done a lot of work on it today.

N: Worked all day on it. Yeah.

R: And, well, I, I just think you oughta be happy with the speech. I,
I don't...

N: But, the cabinet thing, they were putting out Thursday, but
(unclear) move to Wednesday. I think we ought to get it over quickly.

R: I think it's probably better.

N: Is that all right with you?

R: Right, right.

N: Because, you're, you're the cabinet now, Boy.

R: No, no.

N: No, I'm not givin' you any bullshit, you know that.

R: Incidentally, I, I think things look pretty good for Packard, I, if
you still want him. I think you ought to give him a call. I thought
the

N: I think I'll wait til tomorrow, though. I mean it's...

R: I don't want you, I don't want you to do it tonight, but I just
mean...

N: Right.

R: I talked to (unclear), I talked to Mansfield, I talked to George
Mahon.

N: What'd they say?

R: Well, they thought he'd be great. They thought he'd be great.

N: And they'll, they'll waive the...

R: Oh, we'll figure out something to do about that.

N: That's right, that's right. Good of you to call, Bill, you've been
a...

R: That was a great speech, and get some sleep.
N: Great (tape cuts off)


CONVERSATION BETWEEN NIXON AND BILLY GRAHAM
BETWEEN 10:20 AND 10:32 P.M.:

Nixon: I had, I had, I had to tell Haldeman and Erlichman to resign,
which they wouldn't do voluntarily, and that was tough.

Graham: Well, your sincerity, your humility, your asking for prayer,
all of that, had a tremendous impact.

N: You really think so, Billy?

G: I really, I'm telling you the truth, and I'm not trying to just
encourage you. I know you get all that. But I really mean it.

N: Well, that's good of you Billy. You've been a friend, and, and
(tape cuts off)
________________________________________________

Transcribed by Washington Post Staff researcher Barbara J. Saffir from
tape Tape #197 RC-3, available at the National Archives

Russian cuisine

It seems that "prescriptions" for marijuana under Prop 215 are valid under current Nevada law, and possibly other states as well.

Clinton's book Between Hope and the Remainder Table, or whatever it was called, sold miserably, and most of the copies are being returned to the publisher, which thinks it's unseemly to remainder a book by a president, but I suspect will swallow Clinton's pride. It sold nowhere near as well as the book by the former FBI agent about Clinton's love life etc, much less Hillary's book, but did outsell Dole's book. Interestingly, the publisher of the latter says that the Dole campaign lied, inflating the number of copies printed. In other good news, fewer than 20% of Newt Gingrich's 1945 sold.

John Deutch's last act as Director of Central Intelligence was to revoke the security clearance of the State Dept official who leaked to Rep Toriccelli that the Guatemalan colonel responsible for killing an American was a CIA informer.

There is an interesting 7-part series in the LA Times on homicides in LA, and how badly they are handled, with loads of anecdotes like the guy who rotted in jail for 4 months because the LAPD couldn't be bothered to check his time card at work that showed his alibi. Well worth reading but long, so I'm not sending them out, especially as most of you are on vacation right now. I'm afraid I didn't save the 1st one, or see the next 2, but I will send out the rest to anyone who asks.

A new record was set today when a Japanese furniture mover ate 23 1/4 hot dogs in 12 minutes.

A heart-warming story from the NY Times: a 14-year old girl sets fire to her house after years of physical and sexual abuse such that one could only be sorry she hadn't taken out more of her family. Her father has never visited her in jail but did send a picture of the burned-out house on her birthday. Naturally, the state of Indiana put her in a maximum-security prison ($25,000 a year) instead of the juvenile treatment center ($82k) the judge begged the state to put her in. You're waiting for the punchline, well I've got two: she has found a new mom in the joint, or "the closest thing to a mom I ever had" in another murderer, and second, she has been ordered not to talk about being abused in group therapy sessions because her fellow inmates in the special-needs unit are upset by her stories, since they all abused or killed their children.

And Thurgood Marshall used to be an FBI informer. I don't get it.