xxxNews Of The Weirdxxx
Bizarre but true stories about real people collected by syndicated columnist Chuck Shepherd.
An April Wall Street Journal report highlighted several states’ elementary school “anti-bully” policies that have banned rough-housing, name-calling, and even “mean looks” and pointed gossip, and encouraged teaching the little kids a language of sensitivity and tolerance. However, one problem some kids fear from such training and language is that, as they move up to middle schools and run into other kids who will be baffled by such sensitivity, the tolerance-trained kids are even more likely to get beaten up.
In mid-March, as war started in Iraq, a resolution was introduced in the Seattle City Council offering support for U.S. troops. However, some council members wanted to use the resolution to express opposition to the war, while others wanted to go beyond troop support to commend the war itself. When the Council finally agreed on a politically bland-enough resolution on April 14, it meant that the members had been fighting over the wording of the resolution for a longer time than it took U.S. troops to enter Iraq and capture Baghdad.
A 17-year-old boy lost sight in both eyes in a “potato gun” accident in Denton, Texas, in April. The “gun” (a length of pipe in which a household explosive is ignited, propelling a potato out the other end, although in this case, it was not a potato but a frog) was being experimented with by several teenagers but failed to fire, and the victim, who had been a mere bystander, stepped up to have a look down the pipe to see what might have gone wrong, just as the gun finally fired.
According to an Associated Press report, six candidates for city offices in Charleston, W.Va., misspelled their party affiliations in their official filing forms in January. Among the variations were “Democart,” “Democrate,” “Repbulican” and “Repucican.” In fact, one of the city council incumbents had, four years earlier, also declared himself to be a “Democart.”
Send your Weird News to Chuck Shepherd, P.O. Box 18737, Tampa, Fla. 33679 or [email protected]
Copyright © 2001 by Chuck Shepherd
NEWS OF THE WEIRD
