Corzine to Save State With Stoop Sale
April 1, 2008 –
In the face of a steadily-mounting budget crisis, New Jersey Gov. John Corzine yesterday announced plans to hold a weekend stoop sale in hopes of plugging the state's predicted $2.9 billion shortfall. "With no end in sight and the weather getting nicer, I believe that now is the time to liquidate some of my most valuable assets," he said at a morning news conference, holding up a slightly worn copy of Daredevil #181. "Some of these items will be extremely hard for me to part with–but the people of New Jersey cannot wait any longer for relief."
 According to Corzine spokeswoman Lilo Stainton, the assorted offerings–which include Billy Joel LPs, hundreds of baseball cards, and a collection of neatly-folded t-shirts–would be sold on the steps of City Hall this Saturday, from eight A.M. until sundown. "The governor is serious about removing the millstone from around New Jersey's neck," she said, gesturing towards a basket of vintage Star Wars figures. "If he wasn't, he wouldn't be parting with his original Chewbacca, that's for sure." She added that the sale represented the "tough choices" that Corzine often refers to in his speeches. "He's willing to sell his Keith Hernandez rookie card and his complete set of Hamburglar juice glasses–and it's never easy to give up your old National Geographics. But this is the kind of sacrifice that the governor talks about all the time."
As he taped up signs in downtown Trenton, Corzine admitted that while the stoop sale would be difficult for him emotionally, he was thankful that New Jersey's fiscal problems would soon be ending. "I'm selling my Shel Silverstein books and my lucky flannel shirt," he sighed. "But if it leads to a balanced budget and lower taxes, it'll be well worth it." Rutgers University economist James Whitfield, meanwhile, was cautiously optimistic about the sale's effect on the state's seemingly endless money woes. "It remains to be seen whether a single stoop sale can offset years of mismanagement and a recession that gets worse by the day," he said. "But we shall see. He certainly is selling a lot of cool stuff."
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Ancora Psychiatric Hospital to Kinda Start Paying Attention
March 25, 2008 –
Following the escapes of three potentially dangerous inmates since September, administrators at Camden County's Ancora Psychiatric Hospital have announced a bold new initiative to "kinda start paying attention." "We know that our neighbors are anxious about having someone like Rahim Harris roaming around," hospital spokeswoman Ellen Lovejoy admitted yesterday, referring to the paranoid schizophrenic who was returned to the institution Wednesday after a ten-day disappearance. "So we are rededicating ourselves to, you know, maybe kinda start paying attention or something."
 According to Ancora security manager Willis Randolph, the new attention-paying procedures will be both sweeping and stringent. "Starting April 1, our guards will not be allowed to watch hour-long dramas on their desk TVs, and Sudoku is strictly off-limits," he said sternly. "However, crossword puzzles will still be acceptable–so long as they're of an easy-to-medium difficulty." Head Therapist Niles Pinfield said that the hospital would "also take a closer look at giving home visits to someone like Mr. Harris. After all, he did allegedly stab his own mother with a screwdriver."
Lovejoy insisted that the new measures would put an end to Ancora's troubling patient-flight problems. "From now on, door-locking will be mandatory, and no longer subject to games of rock, paper, scissors among the guards," she said. "And if a double-murderer like DeWitt Crandall wanders off, as happened in December, we will do everything in our power to pull ourselves away from Us Weekly and bring him back." Randolph acknowledged that the harsh new rules were likely long overdue. "Three escapes in just a few months are a lot, I know. But sometimes you just want to read the comics."
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