Style Conversational Week 1293: Our adaptable Constitution
The Style Invitational Empress on this week’s contest and results
Four ideas sketched up by Style Invitational cartoonist Bob Staake as
possibilities for this week's contest illustration. I had suggested the
paper airplane, but I didn't hesitate to choose Bob's own idea of the
paper dolls. (Bob Staake for The Washington Post)
Four ideas sketched up by Style Invitational cartoonist Bob Staake as
possibilities for this week's contest illustration. I had suggested the
paper airplane, but I didn't hesitate to choose Bob's own idea of the
paper dolls. (Bob Staake for The Washington Post)
By
Pat Myers
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Pat Myers
Editor and judge of The Style Invitational since December 2003
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August 16, 2018 at 3:23 p.m. EDT
Welcome toEnemy of the People Day
!
And given that this very morning, the president chose to celebrate the
freedom of the press thus:
THE FAKE NEWS MEDIA IS THE OPPOSITION PARTY. It is very bad for our
Great Country....BUT WE ARE WINNING!
... what better time to try to help him understand what the First
Amendment — not to mention the rest of the Constitution — is all about?
This week’s Style Invitational, Week 1293,
is a wide-open contest as to format (as long as it’s something that we
can fairly easily put in the print paper or share online). I think it’d
be fun to include several approaches, everything from knock-knock jokes
to song parodies to graphics. Of course, your work has to be original —
and please remember that we’re a humor/wordplay contest: Bitterly
impassioned plaints don’t tend to work in the Invite; I call them
“screedy.” The humor can be sharp, but — especially in something
lengthy, like a poem or a song — it shouldn’t convey deep anger without
some balance of levity.
Frederick Loserfesters gather under a head named variously Lawrence Elk
and Elk Capitan at the White Rabbit gastropub. (Someone on the wait staff)
As far as I can tell, we haven’t done such a contest before in our
25-plus-year history. We’ve had, of course, the occasional entry about
the Constitution, like this cynical definition from 2002 by Chris Doyle:
“Strict constructionist: One who interprets the Constitution as he
believes the document’s slaveholding, misogynistic, elitist authors
would have.”
But our big tribute to the National Blueprint was one of my favorite
contests ever, one that I remember judging during a beach vacation. It
hardly relates to this week’s, but it does give me an occasion to share
the amazing results. (And speaking of Chris Doyle ...)
/The contest announcement, August 7, 2005/
“Week 622: Our Sunday Constitutional
*For any offense whatever, members of Congress shall receive punishment
on their large seats, delivered with a branch by a common criminal.*
“This week’s contest, suggested by Peter Metrinko of Chantilly, was
inspired by the new law, hustled through Congress by Founding Father
Sen. Robert Byrd, that all 1.8 million federal employees, plus students
at all schools receiving federal funds, must receive “educational and
training materials” about the U.S. Constitution. Since so many
Washingtonians will soon be perusing this foundation of our society for
at least a whole minute, there ought to be at least a magnet in it for
them: Write a new article or amendment to the Constitution, using only
the words contained in the existing document (including amendments).
Remember, this is a humor contest, so don’t get all passionate and
screedy on us.”
/And four weeks later: /
Report from Week 622: in which we [zub zub zub]... It seems as if half
the entrants suggested “Congress shall make no law.” Some enterprising
Losers noted that the Constitution includes the names and states of the
39 signers (beginning with “Go Washington”).
/Third runner-up: /No person of excessive tonnage shall remove his
jersey at a public event. (Pam Sweeney, Germantown)
/Second runner-up:/ Congress shall make no laws that direct people to
work out with weights and engage in regular body training. We the People
are no longer into the exercise thing. (Chris Doyle, Forsyth, Mo.)
/First runner-up, the winner of the Snake Wine containing a whole
snake:/ No persons shall in all cases be given what they do desire but,
upon trial, at times may be informed that they shall receive that for
which they be needful. -- M. Jagger (Russell Beland, Springfield)
/And the winner of the Inker:/ Those persons resident in the District
are second-class, inferior citizens. But they have the right to death,
taxes and post offices.(Marty McCullen, Gettysburg, Pa.)
/Honorable Mentions: (I’m posting a partial list; you can see the whole
set on Elden Carnahan’s Master Contest List here
.)/
When a male and his date are to go to a party or other event,
particularly one with an appointed time, if his date should redress more
than three times, he is within his rights in going alone. (Brendan
Beary, Great Mills)
No president shall be subject to impeachment for exercise of a
disorderly member. -- W.J. Clinton, New York (Fred S. Souk, Reston)
Congress shall have the power to void the laws of the state of Georgia
(under the section entitled “crimes against nature”) that deny the right
of any citizen, and particularly a citizen by the name of Rufus Dobbs,
to engage in sex with a bear, notwithstanding the fact that one such
bear has granted consent, is of age, and has not been given any
intoxicating liquors for at least a few days. -- R. Dobbs, Stone
Mountain, Ga. (Chris Doyle)
Congress shall make no law abridging the right of people to have sex
whenever they desire and with a hundred persons at the same time if they
care to at, like, a private party or whatever. -- P. Hilton, New York
(Chris Doyle)
A person being considered for Supreme Court justice will be required to
have no preference in regard to most things. In fact, each judge shall,
on at least six cases, declare his sole opinion to be: “Whatever.”
(Brendan Beary)
After this date, no one ever engaged in the work of acting shall be
president. One was sufficient. (Peter Metrinko, Chantilly)
Both houses of Congress shall open each session with the following
declaration: “The Lord has delivered His blessings on the United States
of America and on the Republican Party.” Members who think this
unreasonable are hereby directed to go have sex with themselves. -- Ann
Coulter, Washington (Chris Doyle)
The president and members of Congress shall remove their heads from
their business end. (Kyle Hendrickson, Frederick)
Until such time as our party is not in power, Representative DeLay has a
free pass for all crimes, misdemeanors and felonies but treason. He will
also define what may or may not constitute treason. We trust him.
Actually, we have no choice. (Brendan Beary)
If any person should be required to answer the call of nature without
the proper papers, particularly when sitting for number two, that person
shall be granted the right to subject the previous person to cruel and
unusual punishment. (Mark Hagenau, Derry, N.H.)
When engaged in sex, neither party shall raise the issue of who will pay
the water bill. (Kyle Hendrickson)
Underage sex is hereby prohibited, given that we are way older now.
(Russell Beland)
/Anti-Invitational (using only words not found in the Constitution): /
Privacy? Abortion? Church separation? Equality? Sexual orientation? Hah!
Look again. -- New Supreme Court, Washington (Russell Beland)
/And Last: /In that we in Congress are concerned for the people who
continue to enter this Washington Post thing just to have their name
published in the papers, we hereby direct that they do themselves a
favor and try to have an actual life from now on. (Chris Doyle)
/And Also Last: /No title of nobility, such as King, Prince or the like,
shall be granted -- except by the Post on Sundays in one section. (Marty
McCullen)
*ZOO AND FALSE*: THE ANIMAL FICTOIDS OF WEEK 1289*
/(*Non-inking headline by Jesse Frankovich)/
Typically clever fake trivia in this new chapter of The Big Invite Book
of Total Bunk. As usual, many of this week’s inking entries were plays
on well-known bits of trivia, such as Russell Beland’s (he’s baaa-aaack)
take on Van Halen’s famous contract rider demanding bowls of only
non-brown M&M’s in the band’s dressing rooms. (I’ve added links to a few
of these.) Many of the entries seemed a little windy this week (or did I
have stronger coffee than usual?); if I pared your entry a bit, you’re
not alone.
I’m always excited to discover a First Offender among the week’s inking
entries — especially at the very top of the list. David Schwartz’s
Shar-Pei joke makes him the third newbie to win the Invite this year;
Luke Baker won with his horse name in May, and Meg Winters with her
scoreboard abbreviation in February. It’s an aberration, though, to have
that many rookie winners; they were the first in ages. And Week 1289
might even have been Dave’s first time even entering. Hope to see you
again soon, Dave — you do want to win a Loser Magnet, right?
Meanwhile, last week’s winner, Danielle Nowlin, had to settle for second
place with her joke on the “Jaws” theme; on the other hand, there are
lots of kiddie fingers in her household that can wear those
cuteanimal-extremity finger caps.
Danielle has more than 300 blots of Invite ink, but it’s the first trip
to the Losers’ Circle for Susanne Pierce Dyer, who nabs Ink No. 3 along
with her choice of Loser Mug or Grossery Bag — and then Nos. 4 and 5 as
well with honorable mentions. What a week — do we have a new Obsessive here?
*What Pleases Ponch: *Our usual Ace Copy Editor, Doug Norwood, had to
work on a big Page 1 story yesterday (feh), so he turned the Invite over
to Panfilo “Ponch” Garcia, who noticed that I had the spelling “savanna”
in one entry and “savannah” in the other. (The Post’s style — i.e., the
spelling that’s listed first in in Webster’s New World Dictionary — is
“savanna” for the African grassland; the Georgia city does remain
aitched.) As for his faves, Ponch proved himself a big fan of Loser Jeff
Shirley: Of his four favorite entries, all from the honorable mentions,
three were by Jeff: the trumpeter swan with the spit valve on its neck;
Nostradamus’s prediction of Bigfoot porn (well, I guess we can call
Bigfoot part of the “nonhuman animal kingdom,” the parameters I supplied
in the contest announcement); and that “the Puritans referred to marital
relations as ‘playing possum,’ since they moved as little as possible.”
*HAPPY FESTERING IN FREDERICK*
Thanks again to Loser Kyle Hendrickson for arranging last weekend’s
Loserfest gathering in Frederick, Md. The Royal Consort and I spent all
day Saturday visiting the Monocacy Battlefield, where the Union’s loss
to the Confederates in 1864 at least bought time for the army to
reinforce Fort Stevens in Washington and repel the Rebels from the
capital; the National Museum of Civil War Medicine (takeaway: Thanks,
Obamacare); a race of those old-fashioned giant-wheeled pennyfarthing
bicycles through the city streets; a walk through the town’s lovely
parks, and untold thousands of calories of restaurant food. It was the
first Loser event for Frederick resident Lennie Magida, who joined us
for lunch on Saturday, as did Chris Damm, who drove over from West Virginia.
*NEXT LOSER SIGHTING: SEPT. 16 IN VIRGINIA*
Loser Brunch #211 will be at noon on Sunday, Sept. 16, at one of my
favorite restaurants: It’s Aditi, an
Indian restaurant (with buffet) in the Kingstowne complex across from
the movie theaters, off Van Dorn Street a couple of miles outside the
Beltway. It’s a smallish but surprisingly elegant place, and a great
value. I will make every effort to be there; RSVP to elden.carnahan [at]
gmail [dot] com. Details at the Losers’ website, NRARS.com (click on
“Our Social Engorgements”).
Don’t forget about the gl-/go- limericks from Week 1292;
you still have till Monday. Then you can
settle down and draft your Constitution.