Second Thoughts for June 18, 2012

• Washington Nationals outfielder and devout Mormon Bryce Harper made every ad executive jealous last week when he coined a term that instantly went viral. Asked by a reporter whether he was going to celebrate a big home run with a beer, he said, “That’s a clown question, bro.” The Internet lit up like the Las Vegas Strip. Suddenly, everyone was clowning around.

          Here is a sampling of questions that all can be answered, “That’s a clown question, bro:”

                          -How’s your Facebook stock doing?

                         -Should I pound on the cockpit door to ask a question?

                         -Will Utah vote for Romney or Obama?

                         -Is Obama going to repeal the Affordable Care Act?

                         -Will Orrin Hatch agree to any more debates?

                        -Will New York’s Madison Square Garden search for a soft drink sponsor?

                       -Want to invest in real estate derivatives?

         Then there were the much deeper clown questions on Twitter that will keep you thinking for a while:

                        -I see you’re smiling on the outside, but how do you feel on the inside?

                        -Do you have those suspenders in rainbow?

                        -What do I look like, some kind of Bozo?

                        -Would anyone like to smell the flower on my lapel?

                        -I need to hire entertainment for my nephew’s birthday party. Any suggestions?

                        -How many of you can fit in that little fire truck?

• Some cities are offering to pay off student debts if a recent graduate agrees to move there and accept a job. No answer yet as to who will pay off what the city has to borrow to implement this program.
• One city offering to pay off student loans is Niagara Falls, N.Y. Its population has dropped from 100,000 to 50,000 since 1962. Of course, the only available job is at the Tasty Freeze.

• Isn’t that kind of like offering to pay for a girl’s prom dress if she’ll go as your date? Has any young man ever found that to be a winning strategy?
  

•  Police in Springdale, Utah are in trouble for allegedly pulling over foreign tourists and making them pay tickets immediately, in cash. So lighten up. Maybe they just wanted the ones from Third World countries to feel at home.

• Researchers at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill have discovered that people in other large nations, including China and Brazil, are becoming sedentary and overweight just like Americans. At last, we’ve discovered the secret to world peace. What if they called a war and everyone was too fat and lazy to show up?