Recently in (motto: ""), residents reported an outbreak of . Perhaps you think there are no in . Perhaps you are an idiot.

As the French say, au contraire (literally: "!"). I have here in my hands a copy of an Associated Press article sent in by alert reader , whose name can be rearranged to spell "", although that is not my main point. "", by the way, only has the letters "" in in common with "Monica Lewinsky", so there is no other reason to mention Monica Lewinsky in this column.

According to a quote which I am not making up, from Mayor (formally "Mayor " and informally ""), ranks as a major crisis just behind , and (insert your "" joke here), as evidenced by the following conversation between government employees:

FIRST EMPLOYEE: ""

SECOND EMPLOYEE: ""

FIRST EMPLOYEE: ""

Fortunately I have a suggestion for Mayor , and that is: George Steinbrenner's .

No, seriously, my suggestion does not involve George Steinbrenner's , although it might involve Tobacco Institute scientists. My suggestion is more along the lines of a coup de grace, from the French coup, meaning "", and de grace, meaning "". The procedure (you may want to write this down):

But instead the city council (motto: "We'll when you pry the out of our cold, dead fingers") thinks that they (the ) will soon, sending this message to the public, and to the world: "".

Speaking of which, "The Outbreak" would be a great name for a rock band.

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