Fair-weather Trail Blazers fans wait for the streetcar in Portland

CINCINNATI - In approving the streetcar plan last week, the City of Cincinnati is making a bold change in its approach.  Over the years, both Reds fans and Bengals fans have been coddled by the city, with over half a billion spent on two stadiums, when one stadium would have worked perfectly fine.

But what about Cincinnati's fair-weather sports fans?  They haven't really been Reds fans since 1990, and many still haven't gotten over Super Bowl XVI.  By approving the streetcar plan, Council member Chris Bortz says the city is repaying these fair-weather fans for venturing downtown, despite the lack of a winning sports team.

"It is time that the city recognize that fair-weather fans are people too," said Bortz.

"Although Reds fans and Bengals fans are also welcome to use the streetcars, this was really for the fair-weather sports fans," continued Bortz, "Well-meaning people who will most likely never go to Great American Ballpark or Paul Brown Stadium."

"And we can understand why the fair-weather Reds fans and fair-weather Bengals fans would want to avoid the stadiums as much as possible," he said, "That's why we designed the streetcar route to go in the opposite direction, all the way to Uptown."

The Cincinnati Zoo Train Boondoggle

CINCINNATI - City Councilman John Cranley voted against financing of the streetcar plan that passed this week. Council had rejected Cranley's plan to paint pictures of streetcars on buses, or "rubber tire trolleys" as Cranley likes to call them.

Council's new plan includes a route in Uptown, which prompted Cranley to grill fellow council members on the fact that Uptown already has a rail route for mass transit.

"The zoo train has been around for many years now," said Cranley on Wednesday, "And it still hasn't done anything to revitalize the zoo's inner core around the reptile house."

Cranley also mentioned that even the trains at the Cincinnati airport hadn't increased neighboring property values.

"The zoo train and the airport trains are only used by people who go to the zoo and the airport," said Cranley, "What about the rest of us?"   

"Cincinnati doesn't need to look to Portland for examples," he said, "We've already got mass transit rail routes around here, and look at how they've failed miserably."

2007-2008 Attendance Reasons     Religious:  31%     School:  22%     Irony:  17%     Sarcasm: 13%     Criticism:  9%     Dinosaurs:  7%     LSD:   1%

PETERSBURG, KY - School groups who are teaching fair and balanced theories (both the Creationist Theory and the Flying Saucerist Theory) on human origins aren't the only ones elevating the Creation Museum's first year attendance beyond projections. 

According to co-founder Mark Looey, 30% of museum visitors credited either irony or sarcasm factors as instrumental in their reasons for attending.

 "The irony appreciation attendees are known for their tendency to giggle or even roll around on the floor laughing," said Looey, "At first we thought they were having religious experiences." 

Looey also discussed how rising gas prices hadn't put a damper on museum attendance, but could affect future attendance. 

"When Jesus returns, I hope he will bring the dinosaurs back with him to help alleviate our rising oil costs," said Looey.

CINCINNATI - Bengals wide receiver Chad Johnson says he wants to leave the team for any team that has "a slight chance of winning the Super Bowl sometime within the next decade".

On ESPN this week, Bengals quarterback Carson Palmer told reporters,  "I just want to say this one thing to Chad Johnson if he's watching.. Who dey.. Who dey.. Who dey think they gonna beat dem Bengals?"

On ESPN the following night, Chad Johnson answered that Palmer's Who Dey chant, despite being a strong argument, had failed to convince him to want to stay with the Bengals.  He then publicly offered a prize Lexus to Mike Brown if he is traded.

Coach Marvin Lewis told reporters this week that he would put the wide receiver on a strict regimen of antidepressants, for his recent lack of "team player skills".

CINCINNATI - It has been a week since Pete Witte's last bad idea, and he is searching for new ones.

"In 2008, I'm on a roll," said Witte, "First, I sided with the housing agency in their refusal to transfer an abused woman, then I suggested that we run a streetcar line from Uptown to Bond Hill, and another streetcar from Westwood to Mount Washington."

"My latest idea of Section 8 housing at the Banks was a fantastically bad idea, but now I'm got the itch for another really bad idea."

Part of the benefit of Witte's bad ideas is that they get more attention than good ideas, especially supremely bad ideas like Witte has had this year.  Who knows, the next bad idea may even earn him a quotable on the Pete Witte ThinkExist quotables page.

CINCINNATI - Explaining that City Council wasn't "surreal enough" for him, Councilman Christopher Monzel proposed a paradox this week.

"All public trash cans ought to only have litter in them," said Monzel, "Anyone caught putting non-litter in a trash can would face a $100 fine under this ordinance. "

Monzel claims that his new paradox ordinance will remove the need for any  public services trash can collection within the city. 

"The cool thing about this paradox is that anyone using the public trash cans at all will be guilty of disposing non-litter," said Monzel, "After all, if you throw anything in a trash can, it is not litter, by definition."

"Of course, if you litter you also face a fine."

Monzel recommended that everyone just "hold on" to any trash until they get home. 

CINCINNATI - Mark Brown, the bus smoker who was tazed and arrested last week, told reporters that the smoke-in was a protest against smokers' declining First Amendment rights. 

He also drew comparisons between himself and Rosa Parks, in her refusal to leave her seat on the bus.

"Yep, I guess you can call me Rosa Sparks,"  said Brown,  "Lucky for Rosa, they didn't have tazers back then."

 "This Ohio smoking ban has gone too far, when you can't even light up a Marlboro on the Metro," he continued.

Brown is also organizing a smoke-in on area public transportation.

"I hope other smokers will join me in a smoke-in on every Metro and TANK bus across the region,  (singing) We shall overcome.. we shall overcome... we shall overcome someday."

CINCINNATI - As Earth Day approaches, the locally-sourced diet known as "Locavorism" is gaining lots of attention throughout Cincinnati, most prominently in the Cincinnati Locavore blog. The concept is based on the fact that less fuel is spent transporting our food if the food is grown locally. 

These turkeys didn't do any of their shopping at local farmers' markets, and are paying the price

In other words, that orange that you ate for breakfast probably flew first class from Miami to Cincinnati.  It was no doubt an exclusive chartered flight just for the orange, so you can imagine all the fuel that was spent on just one orange.  Why that orange only cost you 25 cents is a mystery, but the point is that a Cincinnatian should always travel to Florida first before eating an orange.

Locavores also encourage simple cooking, with meals that contains less than 10 ingredients. This is more out of necessity than simplicity, since there are only about 10 local foods available at any one time.

On the other side of the spectrum are the distantvores.  Distantvores eat an exlusively far-away diet, possibly because they haven't discovered the joy of eating more expensive local food.  Locavore Sarah Samuels has a plan to exterminate these irresponsible distantvores.

"Distantvores just won't stop eating food grown halfway across the country," said Samuels, "And they are eating a ton of this food, too.  The way I see it, we should just kill them off, preferably by eating them." 

"The sooner we eat these distantvores, the sooner we can stop them from destroying the environment."

Anyone in Cincinnati reading this who eats an exclusively distantvore diet (especially any of our farm animal readers) is advised to exercise caution.   The chicken feed, soybeans, or pig slop that you eat might taste good, but it came from far away and that makes you a target for locavores. 

CINCINNATI - Global consumer products giant Procter & Gamble is launching a rap label to help promote its TAG body spray and other product lines. 

The Dealer has obtained a transcript of a recent freestyle rap by the first hot recording star off of the label, who goes by the name "A.G.", an abbreviation for "A Gangsta":

The jacket slung over the shoulder proves he's a serious candidate

MADEIRA - New Ohio 2nd Congressional District candidate David H. Krikorian started his run as an independent (Democrat) last week, but very little is known about the Madeira businessman.

Before he decided to run for Congress, Krikorian spent his days peddling caricatures of Vada Pinson and Rawly Eastwick.   His biggest claim to fame is vouching for a suspected assassin of Barack Obama, who was also peddling Obama caricatures.

"He was only trying to assassinate Barack Obama's nose, ears, and chin, using clever playing card caricatures,"  Krikorian had told Secret Service agents at the time.

Nevertheless, Krikorian's greatest accomplishment is not infecting AIDS victims with malaria.  Although Krikorian's candidacy gives the Cincinnati Beacon an opportunity to endorse someone in November, it will be all for naught, as Krikorian plans to donate all of his Election Day votes to Victoria Wulsin anyway.

"I've contributed to her campaigns at least four times, including her 2008 campaign, but my candidacy will be the biggest contribution of all," says Krikorian.

"Neither Victoria nor I can win alone, but I figure if I just donate my vote totals to her in November, she will have a chance."