WE'VE (ALMOST) GOT HIM!
by Untrue News Iraq reporter Johnson Sperl

Military authorities told McGuffin's The Untrue News that Saddam Hussein is only two hours away from capture. "We're definitely catching up." said Staff Sgt. Myron Slewyn of the Coalition Public Information Office, based in Baghdad. "Two weeks ago we were four hours away from getting him. Last week it was three hours, and now only two hours. The net is closing. With a $30 million price on his head, you can believe I'm doing everything I can to locate him. We'll only be twenty minutes away from him by fall."

US special forces have come close to capturing Saddam a number of times, only to find that the dictator had left several weeks before troops arrived, or had left several months before troops arrived, or in most cases had never been there at all.

"But we'll find him all right." said Sgt. Slewyn, pausing to pull the burnoose off the head of a turnip vendor who resembled Saddam slightly. After insuring himself that the vendor was not Saddam, Sgt. Slewyn continued "He has many people still willing to help him, and many places to hide, but he has to move sometime, and when he does, we'll be there. I'm told he's in disguise. He could be a taxi driver, a street vendor, even a reporter." The sergeant stared suspiciously at a reporter who was then roughly shoved up against a wall, arrested, and forced to spend seven hours in a US military police barracks being questioned by young men with backwoods accents before being released.

UNTRUE NEWS REPORTER CEASES IRAQI COVERAGE

Reporter Johnson Sperl has left his job as McGuffin's The Untrue News Iraq reporter. After his failure to secure an embedded position with any of the hundreds of news services now posting from Iraq, Sperl obtained a slot with Untrue News, but was later arrested and beaten by US troops who suspected him of being Saddam Hussein.

According to the story he told his editor Mark McGuffin, Sperl, who is 5'4", thin and a redhead, was arrested by US military police, taken to a cell and interrogated.

During this time he was beaten, and liquor was forced down his throat. Cocaine and marijuana were planted on him, as well as an address book containing the names and phone numbers of Iraqi prostitutes forged to look like his handwriting. His shirt collar and underwear were smeared with lipstick, and he was deposited outside an officers' club near US military headquarters, where he was discovered by other reporters and given assistance.

Several people thought they saw Sperl drinking in the club most of the evening, and dancing with Shirley McGuffin, Untrue News' Asian correspondent and wife of Mark McGuffin, but this could not be verified.

Untrue News editor-in-chief Mark McGuffin said "Johnson Sperl is a fine reporter, always seeking the truth in any given situation, no matter who it hurts. He will be missed." No reason was given for Sperl's departure.

KOBE'S BEEF

In a brief statement to McGuffin's The Untrue News, basketball star Kobe Bryant said:  "I'm a top professional athlete alone in a swanky hotel room in an unfamiliar town. A lovely young hotel employee knocks on my door unbidden at midnight. I let her in. We begin engaging in consensual sexual activities. She decides to stop. I say no. How does that add up to rape? Sure, women have the right to say no, but so do men!"

YOU ASK, WE ANSWER.

After a brief speech in the White House rose garden late last week, George W. Bush took journalists' questions about US involvement in Iraq. Reporters noted that unlike previous Q&A sessions, as Mr. Bush spoke they could hardly see Cheney's lips move. Later, Bush's answering of questions while Cheney drank a glass of water brought stunned admiration from the reporters.

AN ADMIRABLE ACHIEVEMENT