Author Archive

Dear Art & Chris,
I was in the news a lot the early part of the week. It seemed that my political career was all but done. Then several famous people died and suddenly no one was paying attention to me anymore. If I want to hold on to my aspirations of holding national office, including the presidency, what can I do to keep myself out of the news?

-Mark Sanford, Governor South Carolina

Mark,

How to keep yourself out of the news, you mean besides not cheating on your wife? I think that option is still on the table. You’re gonna need to stop taking so many hikes on the Appalachian Trail. You know, during the wet season… The aroused season. Stop fucking other women. You could also switch your political affiliation. Perhaps people wouldn’t care so much about your marital indiscretions if you didn’t run on a platform of being some sort of perfect representative of God’s will on earth. We’d like to quote a passage from The Bible, “And thou shalt not nail Argentinean hose bags on taxpayer money.” This is coincidentally the only use of “nail” or “hose bag” in The Bible.
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Dear Art & Chris,

I know you guys have become known for your groundbreaking and insightful takes on bleeding edge current events. However, I was wondering if you could address one of the enduring questions of the modern era and end an age-old feud. Which is the better Back to the Future sequel, Part II or Part III?

-Joe Bereta, www.baratsandbereta.com

Joe,

We know this is a sensitive issue that divides families and turns brother against brother. That said it also divides your humble columnists. Art prefers Part II and Chris prefers Part III. We will both make out case and allow you, the reader, decide who’s right.
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Dear Art and Chris,

Iran is a country often in turmoil.  As a young college student, this past Friday was my first chance to vote in our Presidential election.  I followed the election as closely as I could, and begrudgingly became a supporter of the Reform party’s candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi, the dramatically less of two evils compared to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.  As a young woman in Iran, President Ahmadinejad represents repression, censorship, and backwards-economic policies.  Mousavi didn’t seem like he’d back off some of Ahmadinejad’s ridiculous international posturing, but he at least offered the possibility of modernization, more liberal social laws, and a chance at building an economy based on more than just the ebb and flow of oil prices.  Unfortunately, according to the official story Mousavi lost to Ahmadinejad by over 8 million votes.  This seems unlikely, and many people have said that the results seem fraudulent. Now I’m filled with sorrow and rage.   Art and Chris, I’m not famous but I am in need of advice, how do I cope with such a devastating loss among such questionable circumstances?

-Massoumeh Umidvar, College Student, Azad University

Massoumeh,

We sympathize with your anger and disappointment.  While we can tell you that time and patience will soothe your rage, we feel like that would be a dishonest answer.  Honestly, we believe the only right course only appropriate course of action is open rebellion with a goal nothing short of revolution.  We’re hard pressed to think of a time when revolution is more justified then when the democratic process is openly halted in favor of maintaining an intolerant, hateful leadership.  Though we’re not encouraging violence, it’s our understanding that the bulk of Mousavi’s supporters are members of the middle class, and have the power to completely halt the structural and financial institutions on which Iran is dependent.  Clearly organizing a revolution will be difficult when your leaders have the power to stop text messages and access to the Internet, but this is all the more reason that revolution is necessary.
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Yo, Arthur and Christopher,

You getta load of the cajones on these Miller people? Mama Mia, These a’ sons of a bitches, they thought they could get away with portraying the entire paisan community as a bunch of meatball mouthed Mafiosi. We let Miller know that if they kept running their offensive commercials they ran the risk of a terrible accident. Italian-Americans either would, or would not accidentally stop buying all Miller products. Miller respected our generous offer, and kindly withdrew all advertisements supporting their new “taste protection can” featuring Sopranos actor Frank Vincent as an insulting Italian stereotype. My question to youse is how can we capitalize on this victory and start to change these hateful stereotypes.

Lou Rago, Italian American Human Relations Foundation of Chicago

Louie,

If we’re going to brainstorm would you mind bringing over some of momma’s ziti, and please don’t skimp on the Pecorino from Scatturo’s. Seriously though, you’re acting like you woke up next to your prized horse’s head. I think everyone knows that since Obama’s election racism sleeps with the fishes. We realize that your concern is that people will stereotype all Italians as members of the mafia. Fact is this would be a far kinder generalization than what’s actually become of the Italian people in America. (Italian-American Christopher Francis Genesius Toia wrote the remainder of this paragraph) Respectable Italians made a decision to continue living in the cities to which they immigrated. Granted, they continued to treat one another like absolute gutter shit, but most of their grievances were private. Other Italians chose to move to the suburbs, or ghettos, as I like to call them. Suburban Italians developed an affected accent, donned ridiculous jewelry, abandoned good food in favor of frozen, and are in general just plain embarrassing. On the one hand they complain about negative stereotypes, on the other hand they usually do this while showing off how they got their new BMW to play “That’s Amore” whenever they honk their horn. Which is frequently. Suburban Italians make the guidos of Brooklyn look like foreign dignitaries by way of comparison.
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Dear Art & Chris,

-Neil Cole, founder, The Candie’s Foundation

Neil,
Future consequences have never stopped anyone from pursuing pleasure. By way of illustration here are 20 examples. Our current financial crisis, hard drug users, thieves, adulterers, lactose-intolerant people eating ice cream, that time the writers of this column played Rock Band for 7 solid months instead of having social lives, drunk drivers, people who date strippers, watching the game instead of studying, spending money frivolously, crossing Michael Davis, backyard wresting, eating a can of frosting for lunch, watching the Lord of the Rings trilogy in one sitting, agreeing to see a friend’s one-man show, playing truth or dare while drunk, going to Williamsburg (either New York or Virginia), staring at an eclipse, getting a film degree, fucking Bristol Palin without a condom. See it happens all the time.

Everyone over the age of, like, 6 understands that sex can lead to pregnancy. Or at least aware of some weird stork story. Teens are certainly aware that sex can lead to pregnancy. Unfortunately they have about 5 million other thoughts in their head; 4.9 million of those thoughts are, “man, I want to have sex right the fuck now.” The other thoughts are about how they’re going to twitter about the sex afterwards.
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Dear Art & Chris,

I am in a real spot. I’m commissioner of the NFL, the most profitable sports league in America. This past week the one-time highest paid player in our league, Michael Vick, was released from prison after serving time for conspiracy to run a dog fighting circuit. He’ll probably be free to play for a team this season if his indefinite suspension is lifted. Is this something I can consider? Is there space in our league for a man like this?

Roger Goodell, Commissioner, National Football League

Roger,

We totally understand your concern. You run an entertainment industry and you have to be afraid that a significant public outrage could hurt your product and diminish revenue. If tomorrow’s front page was plastered with stories about Tom Cruise killing dogs it would probably hurt his ability to make movies. Actually, that would kind of be a relief to find out that was the worst thing going on in Tom Cruise’s life. Note to Tom Cruise’s publicist: cop to dog fighting.

That tangent aside your product is the most violent professional sport with the possible exception of boxing. Why wouldn’t people pay to see Michael Vick get chased around the field by people bigger than him? During the player introductions you could list the dogs that each defensive player has owned in their life and how much they loved them. It’ll be like A-Rod, people will come to the games to boo him. The game in which he gets injured the place will go nuts, even if it’s not in Philly.
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Dear Art & Chris,
I’m a third grader in living in Southern California. All I’ve seen on the local news this week is coverage of El Monte Police Officer George Fierro kicking suspect Richard Rodriguez in the head. Rodriguez had just led police on a 40 minute chase and had surrendered and was lying on the ground with his hands flat on the ground above his head when the blow was delivered. This has made me distrust what I’ve been told in schools about having faith in the police. With incidents like this how can I still trust cops?
-Juliette Borghesan

Juliette,
You can not trust the police. The difference between a stranger and a police officer is that the police officer will always have a gun and never have candy. We’re not saying that all police want to kick you in the head. They do want to frame you for crimes, lock you up for non-violent drug offenses, and tear gas and club everyone at your peaceful protest. Of course after they do these things the blue wall of silence will protect them. Again, we’re not saying it’s bad to be a police officer we’re just saying that the kind of people attracted to such unchecked power tend to be little better than the criminals they lock up.
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Dear Art & Chris,
This past week my business, Kentucky Fried Chicken, had a bit of bad publicity. After Oprah gave out a coupon for a free meal and our restaurants there were seemingly instant reports of interminable lines and our New York City locations stopped accepting coupons en masse. Our official response to the furor is to offer people a rain check coupon that specifies the day they can come back for a free meal. As we clearly have no desire to actually this right do you guys have any suggestions on how we can further stick it to our customers.
Roger Eaton, President, KFC

Roger,
You guys really didn’t see this coming? We’re mired in a once-in-a-generating economic crisis and you don’t think “FREE MEAL!” is going to elicit an overwhelming response? If you were afraid of giving away too much food perhaps you should have substituted one of your less palatable menu items. There would not have been long lines and incidents over your new oven-blackened chicken ass meat. Although good luck on that roll out.
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Dear Art & Chris,
I seem to have a medical problem and seeing as I have no health insurance I’ve decided to let you guys diagnose me by mail. I have a stuffy nose, my eyes itch and I have a mild fever. I want to make sure this isn’t swine flu. Please tell me it isn’t swine flu.
-Dan Ventimile

Dan,
You, sir, are completely fucked. You have so much swine flu. Your personal death clock has just about run out. We would make peace with your loved ones or at least get an awesome hooker, have her wear one of those paper masks. We also think the only responsible thing to do is call anyone you’ve ever touched and tell them they might have swine flu.

Dear Art & Chris,
I’m a senior in high school and now that I’ve been accepted to college I have almost no desire to go to my remaining classes. The calendar says the school year goes on for another month but I just have no drive. What’s causing this? Does it have a name?
-Megan McRoberts

Megan,
What you have is becoming increasingly common especially among high schoolers. It’s called swine flu and it is going to kill you and your entire family. According to the New York Times this is “ a… virulent form of the flu.” Your only hope now is to hide under your bed and hope that death can’t find you there. Your schoolwork should seem particularly meaningless now.
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Dear Art & Chris,

I was just made the first selection in the 2009 NFL Draft. Along with the prestige I signed a contract for $78 million over six years. This would all be great except for a small hitch, I was picked by the Detroit Lions. Not only is there the matter of joining a team that won zero games last season this also means I have to live in Detroit. I am concerned about the bad reputation that Detroit has. What do you think I should do?

-Matthew Stafford, QB – Detroit Lions

Matt,

It would be hard to deny that Detroit has seen better days. In fact going by the average sale price of a house sold in Detroit in February you could buy 2,859 houses over the course of your contract, and that’s assuming you pay 50% to taxes and agents and hangers-on. We’re pretty sure this literally means you could buy the entire town. Detroit might be the only American city that can look south to Canada but we assure you the entire continent looks down on Detroit. continue

Dear Art & Chris,

Recent spy reports suggest that you will need to break the format of your popular column this week because of alleged drunken behavior at the birthday party of another Michael Davis World columnist. Is this true? Say it ain’t so.

Peter Bart, Vice President and Editorial Edior, Variety

Pete,

We’re so glad you asked. We would like to categorically deny these allegations. The following list of things we hate is, in no way, an artless way of meeting an impending deadline. We hope you enjoy it.

Secession talk. The governor of Texas and the Georgia state senate have both made noise about seceding from the union this month. This idea failed 140 years ago and that was before the military industrial complex. Major combat operations wouldn’t take a week.

VH1 love-based reality shows. Many young people have a difficulty differentiating between fucking and love. VH1 has a problem differentiating between love and crappy television.

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Dear Art & Chris,

A few months ago I gave a rant on CNBC that jumpstarted a populist movement that I’m very proud of.  I denounced President Obama’s plan to help people whose mortgages had gone into foreclosure.  I even suggested that there be a “Chicago Tea Party” to protest this.  In the weeks since this idea has seemed to catch fire.  This week there will be protests in every state in which people will dump tea to show their outrage over Obama’s policies.  Will you please inform your readers about these events and perhaps even join us this week?  We’ve got a lot of cool speakers.

-Rick Santelli CNBC

Rick,
Yeah, we won’t be doing that.  We’d even like to encourage our readers to learn less about your protests.  If you’re out there and know anything about this topic, go pour yourself a stiff drink.  Bonus: it’ll make us funnier.  We will, however, devote this column to pointing out how you and your brood are insane hypocrites.  Strap yourself in.
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Dear Art & Chris,

This week someone in my office sent out acceptance letters to all 46,337 applicants to our university.  That included 28,889 students who we had not, in fact, accepted.  This was probably crushing to many of these kids who have worked long and hard to get into college, I mean not hard enough but you know.  What can I do to make it up to these kids?

Mae W. Brown, Assistant Vice Chancellor University of California San Diego

Mae,
We think you have an obligation to provide these people with the college experience that they were otherwise deprived.  These kids clearly weren’t at the top of their classes so we think you should give them the part of college they were really after.  Throw them a really sick kegger.  Go all out, free red cups, a mid-level beer (Rolling Rock or better) and find some way to get a bunch of hot girls there.  For tips on getting hot girls to show up to a party in San Diego consult the M.O.T.U. (if he won’t answer I would recommend offering free course credit).  Run it for an entire weekend and let them trash the coolest looking building on your campus.  Your model should be the end of  Animal House.
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Dear Art and Chris,

Hey, I’m the guy from the ‘Shamwow’ infomercials. “You’ll say Wow everytime,” that’s me. Anyway, recently I picked up a prostitute and she started biting my tongue and I beat her up. Long story short I’m in a bit of trouble with the police. I’m concerned not only for my own image but for maintaining the image of Shamwow as a quality product. What can I do?

Vince “Shamwow” Shlomi

Dear Shamwow guy,

Slow down. This isn’t some fast paced infomercial; we’re concerned with the facts. Fact one: Your tongue was being bitten by a prostitute, which means at some point you thought it was a good idea not only to kiss your prostitute but to make the moment more romantic with a French kiss. Here’s some advice we’re going to throw in at no extra cost, don’t kiss hookers. Actually, we have another piece of advice, DO NOT KISS HOOKERS. Here’s the thing, we were going to get some cheap laughs out of the whole “you don’t know where their mouths have been” thing but everyone in the world is already aware of that, it’s dicks. It’s not like prostitution is a new thing it is the world’s oldest profession. That means you blatantly ignored thousands of years of social convention and decided to put your tongue in her mouth. We’re not germophobes but kissing a hooker has got to be about as toxic as licking the basement floor at the center for disease control.
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Dear Art and Chris,

Last week on Jay Leno’s network, President Barack Obama gaffed, saying during an interview on the Tonight Show with Jay Leno that his average score of 129 in bowling, “was like the Special Olympics or something.” Even though President Obama apologized to Special Olympics Commissioner Tim Shriver before the interview even aired, the scandal persists. You guys are famous for apologizing for things you don’t care about and never thought were wrong anyway; tell me how to make this go away.

-Bill Burton, White House Deputy Press Security

Bill,
We’re sorry you thought we were good at fake apologizes. If it’s any consolation we feel terrible about this. See, it’s that easy. Book Obama on one of those softball throwing politics shows like Meet the Press with David Gregory. When David asks President Obama if he’s sorry about his gaffe, Obama responds, I’m sorry that people were offended by my comment. It was, frankly, retarded of me to say that. Oh shit, can we edit that? We’ll get it in post.” Then David will smile and the scandal is squashed. Either that or you can set up a media event where a handicapped person beats Obama at bowling, and like every time Obama misses a spare, a different ‘tard gets to throw a pie at his face.

We’re sorry for the previous paragraph, we didn’t intend for it to be insensitive towards the mentally handicapped. We’re sympathetic towards the difficulty the retarded might have understanding our jokes and we’re sorry that they’ll never be able to get it. See? All better.

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Dear Chris,

I’m starting an introductory improv class this week.  This is a big change for me considering I currently do all of my comedy from the safety of a keyboard.  The site that publishes me doesn’t even run a photograph  I’m unsure of my ability to perform in front of an audience.

By way of background I want to tell you a story about my elementary school play.  We were doing a production of “The Emperor’s New Clothes” and I was playing the emperor.  I got stage fright so badly that I ended up just staring out at the audience.  I had to be forcibly removed from the stage by a janitor after it was clear that I wasn’t going to get over it.  Also this was at the end of the play so I was completely naked at the time.  It was a traumatizing experience.

You have a fair amount of experience taking improv classes so I thought you could help me out by telling me some of what to expect and how to get over any stage fright I might have.

-Arthur Tebbel, Michael Davis World Columnist

Art,

While I appreciate you asking me for advice, I thought I’ve been pretty clear in the past when I’ve said to you, “Art, you’d make a shitty improviser.” I’ll admit that secretly I never truly felt that way.  It’s always pretty funny watching you fail.  Until you start crying.

Quick bit of background.  Art’s learning long-form improv, a style of improv where one audience suggestion is used to set off a series of loosely connected scenes that will culminate in a final scene that deftly connects all the disparate elements of the prior scenes.  Many of SNL’s most famous actors like Jon Belushi and Chris Farley, came from improv troupes such as the Groundlings and Second City.  Long form improv has been enjoyed for years, but started its current rise to fame when NYC’s UCB Theatre had the innovation of offering $2 beers to patrons.  Now improv shows across the nation are frequently sold out and improv schools train legions of new improvisers every month.  But, what are these classes actually like?

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Dear Art and Chris,
Recently I’ve decided it’s okay for the Catholic Church to start selling Indulgences.  In return for a negotiable sum of money Catholics are pardoned for their sins, which may or may not reduce the time they spend in purgatory.  We’ve been looking through this website’s archives and, how many can we put you guys down for?
-Pope Benedict XVI

Benny,
According to the Bible, “…It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.” (Matthew 19:23-24)  We’re assuming that’s just because the rich man failed to purchase enough Indulgences.  Unfortunately your God wasn’t smart enough to realize that one day people would be rich enough to build a needle big enough to drive a whole circus parade through.  We enter and exit our apartment every day through the eye of a giant needle, on camelback!  How’s that for a loophole, your Holyness.

This is absurd the bible states that ,”whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven”, Matthew 16:19.  If we don’t expect the rich to be held accountable for their crimes on Earth, why should we think they’d be held to task for their sins in Heaven.

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Dear Art & Chris,
I am king of comics movies.  Here we are less than two weeks away from the release of my film adaptation of the most celebrated graphic novel of all time.  I think that means this is going to better than Casablanca and Citizen Kane combined.  It should be noted I have seen neither of those movies.  Also my copy of Watchmen had no words.  You guys are really into geek cinema.  How excited are you to see this movie?

-Zack Snyder

Zack,
We won’t lie we’ve seen an awful lot of movies that probably fit into this genre.  We saw both of The Matrix sequels at midnight showings.  We even both saw Batman and Robin in theaters.  We think you should understand the depth of our commitment to movies like this before telling you that we could not possibly be any less excited to see your take on Watchmen.

Remember when Gus Van Sant remade Psycho?  It was slavishly faithful to the original; a shot-by-shot remake.  It was also absolutely terrible.  It’s clear you’ve read the book and are trying to recreate the iconic visuals but there’s so much depth in the book that your movie seems entirely devoid of.  Just because you can translate something visually to the screen doesn’t mean you’ve adapted it.  No one here will argue against the merits of pornography but it’s fucking on film.  It in no way approximates the sensuality of lovemaking.  I imagine in your Watchmen there are a lot of bleached anuses.
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Dear Art & Chris,

While President Obama and his new friends were out having a ball, the Republican Party, the party of ideas, were brainstorming some doozies.  I think everyone can agree that the Grand Old Party has gone on quite a win streak these past few news cycles.  The American people know that the Republican party won’t vote for a package that’ll stimulate the economy if it’ll mean your kids will have to stimulate John’s packages in the future.  We’ve effectively shifted the conversation from “how much America needs this stimulus package?” to “why the democrats aren’t practicing bipartisanship?”  How can we keep this momentum going?
-Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) Minority Leader

Mitch,
I have bad news.  You haven’t developed a new tactic, this is the same tired crap that Karl Rove has been trotting out for the past eight years.  If you guys can win an argument you make sure it looks like everyone’s wrong.  Worse news yet, this childish tactic lost you guys a presidential election and at least six senate seats.  If you guys keep up this momentum pretty soon we’re going to be taking letters from the revived Whig party.  Which would be a relief, at least those guys were in favor of giving money to science.

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Dear Art and Chris,

Next week I’m going to be in Los Angeles, and I was wondering where I could score some of that sticky Cali Green?  Oh sorry what I meant to say is as a 14 time Gold Medal winning athlete I feel that I must show an appropriate amount of remorse.  Remorse at losing my lucrative million dollar endorsement deal with Kelloggs.  Goodbye Wheaties Box, hello High Times Sportsman of the year.  This sucks, Wheaties paid me money, High Times bought me a box of Wheaties, but I had to give them back the box so they could make a bong.  Is there anything swimming related I can do to restore my image as one of America’s greatest, most wholesome, athletes?

-Michael Phelps, Olympic Swimmer

Michael,
We don’t know where to score weed, but sources tell us its easy to get a medical card and purchase marijuana legally in the state of California.  Just don’t use appetite loss as an excuse, you’re already famous for your 10,000 calorie a day diet.

We are a little surprised you were dropped by Kelloggs, the company that’s slinging Smacks.  We feel this sends the wrong message, keep the kids doped up on Smack, but keep these Smacks fiends off dope.  Basically, Kelloggs seems to feel that endorsing someone who has used pot is the same as endorsing the use of pot.  However, they don’t feel that naming one of their flagship cereals after heroin is problematic.

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Dear Art & Chris,
Who ever thought I could run a comic book company anyway?
- Senior VP-Executive Editor, DC Comics

Senior VP-Executive Editor (A.K.A. Dan),
That’s an excellent question.  Certainly not either of us.  We certainly didn’t watch ReBoot as a kid and think how I wished those guys were in charge of the most famous characters in comics.  I bet you nailed the interview though.  It probably didn’t hurt that the company was practically in shambles when you arrived.

You have done a thoroughly terrible job though.  Pop Art…and Chris’ own Art Tebbel has cut his DC books down to two per month after a lifetime of a minimum 20 dollar/week habit.  You took away almost every bit of character development that took place in the ten years preceding your taking the job.  To get the characters back to their “iconic states” or rather what they were when you were a kid.  This is the equivalent of if Julie Schwartz had decided in 1956 that what they needed to do to revitalize the Flash by bringing Jay Garrick back, maybe giving him a new hat.  Instead he brought in a new character and changed comics forever.  When you wanted to revitalize the Flash franchise you didn’t create you went back to the well.

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Dear Art & Chris,

This past week we celebrated the 25th anniversary of the Macintosh computer and it should have been a banner week for me.  I was in charge of developing the first one.  However the Academy Awards really threw a wet blanket on my week when WALL-E was denied a nomination for Best Picture.  The Reader?  Really?  How angry should I really feel about this?
- Steve Jobs, Apple Inc.

Steve,

Sure you should be angry, the Oscar voters are a bunch of ancient buffoons, but not that angry.  You may be on a leave of absence from your day job (and feel better by the way) but you took a company with a group of die hard fans and turned it into one of the most respected brands in the world.  I mean I guess there are people out there without iPods but I wouldn’t want to meet any of them.  You also built a successful animation studio from the ground up and when you had beef with Michael Eisner over your deal with Disney you basically decapitated him.  I mean sure you got dissed this week but you’ve got a lot to be happy about.

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With the inauguration of America’s first black President happening on our date of publication we were swamped with letters this week so this week we’re going to try to get to as many as we can.

Dear Art & Chris,

I have a long history of using the courts to promote causes of social justice and I think you’ll really like my latest cause.  I’m suing the Presidential Inauguration Committee because they’re dividing the 5,000 portable toilets equally among men and women.  I believe this is unfair because women take longer in the bathroom and will lead to more waiting for female spectators.  What do you think of my case.

    - John Banzhaf Professor of Law, Georgetown University

John,
I think you’re missing the forrest for the urine-soaked trees.  This is 5,000 toilets for an estimated 2 million people.  That’s one toilet for every 400 people.  We lived in apartment with four people and one toilet and that wasn’t enough.  Everyone with the misfortune to have to use the bathroom at this is going to be in for a world of trouble.  I think your time would be better spent suing them to provide diapers for everyone.  That seems like the more humane way to go.

Dear Art & Chris,

You probably remember me.  I was the woman at the Democratic National Committee rules meeting who said the democrats were throwing the election away for “an inadequate black male.”  So I got that one completely wrong but I’m not over this yet.  What should I do today while the rest of the world watches the inauguration?
-Harriet Christian

Harriet,
We here at Pop Art…and Chris are really solid feminists who respect women and think of them as our equals.

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Dear Art,

This past weekend, the satiric community lost its brightest star, me.  As of Saturday January 10th I have decided to dedicate my life to the revolution.  California has outlawed all alcoholic beverages that are ’spiked’ with caffeine.  Among these beverages is Sparks, the drink that dragged my lazy ass through college on the hazy back of its caffeinated camel.  Granted, Sparks has many side effects.  After consuming this sudsy stimulant outbreaks of awesomeness have been known to occur.  I for one found that the more Sparks I consume the less drunk I become.  Ahh Sparks, saccharine sweet savior, and now the state of California has told me it’s illegal for me to drink.

Giving up my mad Michael Davis World money will be difficult.  I expect without my comedic creativity PopArt and…??? will quickly deteriorate into a mediocre dissemination on the minutiae of economics in the Marvel Universe.

Apparently Sparks is a beverage targeted at the teen and tween crowd.  I too find Hannah Montana unbearable without knocking back a few.  Throughout high school I drank.  Alcohol is to beverages as porn is to literature.  Whenever I had access to porn, liquor, or both, I indulged.  Hell, I wish Sparks existed when I was in high school then maybe I would have passed a test or two.

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Dear Art & Chris,

I run a company, you might have heard of it, General Motors.  We’re having huge problems right now but chief among them is that it seems no one wants to buy our cars.  The cars we’re making are better than ever.  An op-ed in the New York Times this weekend lauded the improvements I’ve made to the company.  What else do we need to do here?

-Rick Wagoner, Chairman & CEO of General Motors

Rick,

It’s an amazing coincidence that you wrote to us this week.  Both of us here at Pop Art… and Chris have bought new cars in the last 3 weeks.  Art was quite enamored with the Pontiac G8 GT and after a weekend of getting quotes decided to buy one from a major national chain of dealerships.  When he showed up to close the deal they could not find the car they had agreed to sell.  After a day off for New Year’s they called and said the vehicle was on display at a Costco and could not be removed until that night.  The next day that turned into Monday and, as of this writing, we have neither received or even laid eyes on this car.  This is the kind of thing that makes people reconsider buying your cars.

There are something like six times as many dealerships for American cars as there are for imports.  This is clearly causing some king talent dilution.  Perhaps fewer dealerships with the cream of the crop sales people would do less misplacing of $30,000 cars.  From what we’ve seen of your staff you should probably consolidate to about four or five dealerships nationwide.

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Dear Art & Chris,
In the Los Angeles Times this Sunday, there was a front page story accusing the officers under my supervision of using excessive lethal force.  What can we do to repair our image?

Jacqueline Seabrooks - Chief of Police, City of Inglewood

Jacqueline,
Come on.  Your department has shot and killed five unarmed suspects since 2003.  Coincidentally three of those suspects were under the age of 25 and black.  One of the others was a schizophrenic.  The LAPD, a bastion of departmental ethics and a department that oversees a population greater than 20 times as large has killed fewer unarmed suspects since 2005.  You need to chill your people out.  They aren’t living in a Tupac song.

In the same period, since 2003, your officers have fired on moving vehicles four times, an act forbidden by most police departments.  It’s hard enough to navigate through the LA area without having to avoid the entire city of Inglewood.  It’s probably safer to live in a Michael Bay movie.
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Dear Art and Chris,
I made some bad investments this year, and my holiday season might be a little tight.  I have a lot of people to provide gifts for and I feel like I’m going to let them down when their stockings are light, their tree barren.  How can I provide Christmas cheer on a budget?
-Santa Claus

Dear Santa,
If a man who can travel around the entire world in a night on a sleigh driven by magic reindeer can’t make money in this market what hope do the rest of us have?  Our first piece of advice, especially after watching the senate debate the auto bailout, is that you have to crush any form of union your elves might have.  They didn’t go to college, so you don’t owe them a living wage.  Also think about the children, the Chinese children who could make your products for far less money.  Everyone does it, in fact the rest of this paragraph will be written by Chinese labor.  I bet you haven’t noticed any decrease in quality, you do however now have lead poisoning.
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Dear Art and Chris,

My band and I just signed a deal to be the house band for Late Night with Jimmy Fallon.  We’re worried that our fans will think that after 15 years of being one of the best acts in hip-hop, we’ve sold out.  As beacons of integrity, how do you think we can hold on to our street cred?

Questlove, The Roots.

Dear Questlove,

We’re pretty sure that this is a great opportunity for you.  White people have always been trendsetters in the black community.  You’re probably familiar with our work in putting a price on your art and then keeping 99% of the proceeds.  Being on Jimmy Fallon’s show is certain to help you cross over to a mainstream white audience without sacrificing any of your core fans.  Just ask Queen Latifah how much Taxi helped her.
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Dear Art and Chris,
These are tough economic times and it seems that everywhere I look businesses are failing.  My company is hanging on to the edge and we’re turning to the government for help.  How can we redeem ourselves in the eyes of the taxpayer?  How can we be a better business?
-Vikram Pandit, CEO Citigroup

Dear Citigroup,
When we received this e-mail we were convinced it was a prank.  It’s like asking us “I just found several kilos of uncut cocaine, where can I deliver them to the proper authorities?” You’ve lucked into an amazing bit of fortune and are asking for a way out?  This isn’t about saving your image; the people who are going to hate you for this are going to hate you.  What you want is advice on how to work this for all it’s worth, that we can help you with.
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Dear Art and Chris,
I am the mayor of the city of Batman, Turkey.  I’ve recently filed suit against Christopher Nolan and Warner Brothers for the royalties my city deserves. What do you think my course of action should be?
—Huseyin Kalkan.

Dear Mayor Batman,

This isn’t what Batman would do!  Batman doesn’t file lawsuits,Batman gets results.  It could be years until the courts throw away this frivolous lawsuit, and you want action now.  We’re going to have to recommend that you get a costume, something that would scare you, terrify you.  Is there anywhere nearby you can get a costume of a liberated Kurdistan?  You’re going to have to don your costume and find Christopher Nolan, unfortunately a search of Google maps did not yield his address, we hope your Bat-computers will fare better. continue