Democratic mayoral candidate Jack Ellis wants criminals to know they will find slim pickings if he becomes the city's top elected official. "Just to be clear, I’m not talking about the cowboy hat wearing actor who rode the atomic bomb in the movie Dr. Strangelove," Ellis said. "That's another Slim altogether. I want to establish Macon as a city with zero tolerance for crime," Ellis said Wednesday during an afternoon news conference at his campaign headquarters in downtown Macon. "We won't tolerate these zeros anymore."

"I'm against crime and I've always been against crime," Ellis said. "It's not that I'm against Mom, the Flag or Apple Pie, it's just that those things seem to be under control so I think we should focus on crime. I'm going to turn up the heat in the summer, I going to make them cold in the winter, I'm going to make things darned uncomfortable for them. And when I'm through with city council I'm going to make criminals really uncomfortable," Ellis said. "There'll be no safe havens in Macon. We're going to make all their havens as unsafe as possible." Asked about other initiatives, Ellis said "When I'm through with crime, I'm going to talk to the Cagles people about getting two chickens in every pot."

Macon Police Chief John Vasquez and City Councilman Jim Lee say the annual FBI breakdown of crime statistics for Macon are extremely misleading. The two say serious crime is actually down instead of up. They didn’t comment on semi-serious crime, sort-of serious crime or almost serious crime. And, they say, the misleading nature of the report is due to the way the FBI compiles its data.

"They take our data and present it without any ‘massaging’ whatsoever," Lee said. "The statistics as they present them are very raw. We don’t think the public should consume them until we cook the numbers, so to speak." Media experts agree that it can be dangerous to present the untrained public with objective facts without accompanying analysis. Independent thought can lead to all manner of unexpected consequences.

Vasquez and Lee offered examples of how the FBI may overstate crime rates. Some crimes such as assaults may later be upgraded to murder if a victim dies and the FBI counts it as one assault and one murder. Crimes that are reported but later turn out to be false reports are also reported raw to the FBI and counted in their totals.

"We have a blast with these numbers," said one FBI analyst who asked not to be identified. "These local yokels never compare the subtotals to the grand-totals. We release reports that overall crime is down nationwide, then we release local numbers showing that crime is up in all localities. The Washington bureaucrats are happy and the local officials go scrambling to explain their local numbers. It’s a real hoot to watch them squirm."

A recent court ruling challenged the new method EPA officials use to measure ozone levels. The new "8 hour" method results in Macon violating standards while the old "1 hour" method results in Macon meeting the standards. Macon has failed to comply with ozone standards the last two years when tested under the new method but would have passed with the old measurement method.

"Who cares what the court says," said EPA official Ben Dover. "We’ll just change the standard or otherwise change the rules next year anyway. Our mission is to hassle local governments and private property owners just because we have the power to do so and we intend to carry out that mission no matter what."

"We just wish they’d make up their minds," said Macon Chamber of Commerce president Paul Nagle. "A few years ago, they were whining about ozone depletion and imposing strict limitations on CFC (chloro-fluorocarbons) gases such as freon and aerosols." CFCs are reported to destroy ozone molecules. " Maybe we’ll just get a giant spray can with CFC aerosols and turn it on," Nagle said. "We may even start a campaign to get area vandals and graffiti artists out with spray paint cans. We’ll give them free spray paint and a number of vacant city buildings to work on."

Mayor Jim Marshall will present his final budget to Macon city council Tuesday, a budget he described as "truly balanced." The state mandates balanced budgets from municipalities however, the best Macon has been able to deliver in recent years has been "sorta kinda balanced" budgets. Essentially, previous budgets borrowed from reserves to cover deficit spending in excess of revenues. "In previous years, we budgeted for monies we never spent, such an vacant positions on the payroll. This year, we just won't budget for non-existent employees and, voila! We're balanced," Marshall said. "Since those other mayors lacked our savvy with accounting tricks, they haven't presented a 'truly balanced' budget since 1981. Our budget goes a step further in balance. You can stand it on its end and it won't fall over. No one has ever presented a budget that does that to my knowledge," Marshall said.

Bibb County Public Works director Larry Brown will take an early retirement in the wake of alleged misuse of city resources, death threats and claims of abuse to city slaves. Macon city councilman Charles Dudley described the Public Works department as "the local slave camp." Attorney Lars Anderson, representing Brown and speaking on a local radio show on AM940, said that "We want it to be clear from the settlement package that Mr. Brown did nothing wrong and that this is a political witch-hunt. Accordingly, we required an adequate compensation package as an inducement to retire." It has been suggested that Mr. Brown would do some fishing with his now abundant spare time. "Part of the package includes several slaves to bring him mint julips, bait his fish hooks and clean his fish," said one city source who spoke on condition of anonymity.

Bibb county schools reported a 30-40% absentee rate on Friday in the wake of widespread rumors of bomb threats made against certain schools. "Security was air-tight at Westside," said Bibb schools campus police chief Mike Dorn. "Air tried to get into the school through a number of entrances, but we stopped it in every case. We had no trouble at all," Dorn said.

The biggest rumor was that a "major party was going down at Lake Tobesofkee" said one student who asked not to be identified. "Mom and Dad bought that bomb threat story hook, line and sinker," said another student at Westside High. "My mom was going to make me go, but when I kissed her and said ‘in case I never see you again,’ she caved and let me stay home. We plan to do one of these bomb rumors every week now, it’s great to have an extra day to sleep in."

Bibb school officials searched the internet methodically and could find no trace of any threats against central Georgia schools. "That’s because they don’t know what they’re looking for," said one student and self-proclaimed hacker. "The real internet posting was about the party we had planned. It was going to be a BOMB!" "Bomb" is a slang term for "great" similar to "cool" or "groovy" from the seventies or sixties.

"One of my buddies raided his Dad’s liquor cabinet and another was going to get a keg from his Mom’s restaurant. We were planning to get bombed. Somebody mentioned the words ‘bomb’ and ‘internet’ in the same sentence and the next thing you know, we got bomb dogs sniffing around the schools while parents are keeping their kids home. We scheduled the party for 12 noon so it worked out great!"

US Senate members, notably Sen. Max Cleland (D., Ga.), changed positions Friday proving beyond a shadow of a doubt that they are, in fact, living entities and not wax mannequins as had been widely speculated. Of course, given that the movement was to pass more waste-of-time gun control that fails to address the real problem, it does not completely dispel the dummy rumors. "There’s no proof whatsoever," said one political analyst, "that members of the US Senate have any brains at all. That would be far too large of an assumption based on the action we’ve witnessed of late."

A Bibb County school board policy was harshly criticized because it discriminates against students who fail tests. The policy prohibits students who fail the state-mandated graduation test from wearing their caps and gowns and participating in the graduation ceremony. "Let me be clear on this," said Bibb school policy wonk Skippy P. Nutbutter. "We have never entertained a suggestion that these academically-challenged students should attend the ceremony in the nude. That would be rewarding to some of them who clearly would like that idea."

Some guidance counselors, self-esteem advocates and soft-hearted noodles have suggested that the graduation ceremony be segmented to allow the under-achievers to participate with their classmates by providing them with provisional or special diplomas. "It's not fair to deny these kids a graduation and a diploma cause they can't pass a goofy test. I didn't pass no test when I graduated and it ain't hurt me none," said one parent who asked not to be identified.

"In the spirit of enlightened compromise, we are discussing a tentative plan to allow these non-achievers to wear a special cone-shaped cap and a gown with a special symbol to designate them as graduating without actually passing," Nutbutter said.

Nutbutter indicated that the plan is still under discussion and not final at this point. One detail to resolve is which symbols to place on the non-passing graduate's gowns. "Right now we're considering an "X" for those who fail literacy and language arts and a "0" (zero) for those who fail math or science," Nutbutter said. Other suggestions have been to dispense with special symbols and go with a camouflage pattern on the gowns. "In addition to concealing our failures in the ceremony, they could use these gowns later for hunting or survival purposes," Nutbutter said.

Controversy erupted over proposals to purchase a new manufactured home for a county employee. Bibb commissioner Joe Allen said, "It's not nice to make this employee live in a dilapidated structure owned by the county." Since the county has provided this housing since 1977 and Bibb has a strict policy against forcing squalor on employees, Allen thinks the county must buy a new mobile home for the employee in question. "Although we never should have made this deal in the first place and it's not clear whether there are taxable income implications, we have to continue it because that's the way we've always done it," said Allen. "We have a firm policy against any kind of change." Other commissioners, sensing the smell of pork, suggested that if it's done for one county employee, then we have to do it for all. "That's another firm policy we have, fairness," Allen said. "Maybe we could make a deal with the Bibb School Board since they always use a lot of trailers, the county might get some good buys on used models. Also, the School Board has a lot of land that we could set up as trailer parks to earn some extra revenue," Allen added.

Disclaimer: The accounts, quotes and stories on this page are wholly fictitious and intended as satire and humor. Although real names may be used and all good humor has an element of truth, this stuff ain't real. If you didn't already know these stories were bogus, then you're not too bright. --Steve Scroggins