The Moe Howard Treatment

This time of year, the Christian world gears up for one of the holiest days of the year, celebrating the birth of Christ with renewed interest in joy, peace, and loving giving. Realistically, what the world needs now is not so much more peace and joy, but an attitude adjustment from none other than Moe Howard. No, I’m not necessarily talking about Moe Howard the actor, but rather his alter ego, the Moe Howard stooge character who could knock some sense into a person with a loose slap across the face.

(Wow, what a segue! I mentioned Christ in the topic sentence and finished the paragraph with a tongue-in-cheek reference to Three Stooges humor. Where in hell am I going with this, you may be asking? Read on...if you dare.)

I don’t come to the topic of Moe Howard accidentally. This weekend was the monthly open house of the Stoogeum in Spring House (www.stoogeum.com), and I’ve had Moe on my mind. Also, the trailer for The Three Stooges movie by the Farrelly Brothers is showing up in theaters and on the Internet. The movie won’t be released until April 2012, but the trailer is already causing some controversy. A brief informal survey of my fellow volunteers on their thoughts about the trailer ranged from indifference to a grimace of horror. Perhaps we should withhold further judgment until the movie is actually released, but, in the meantime, be forewarned: there are Stooges in our immediate future.

I’m writing as if they are coming back from somewhere, when actually the originals never went away. Oh, the actual actors are long gone, but their 290 plus shorts have been in continuous and I daresay uninterrupted syndication somewhere in the world every day since 1959. That has got to be a record, but who’s counting?

In any event, I dearly wish Moe Howard could come back if only to use his talents one more time. I don’t make it a habit to advocate violence, but there are so many people today that have their priorities screwed up. One such group of people is the 536 men and women of the United States Congress. Now I know they’re a very easy target right now with their approval rating in the single digits, but all of them — Republicans, Democrats, conservatives, liberals - need a dose of the Moe Howard treatment.

As an example, there are currently 14 million Americans who are out of work. It was determined this week that 49% of all Americans are at or below the poverty level. So, what did our Congressional knuckleheads consider this past week? Policies to create jobs? Nada! Legislation to improve financial opportunity for poor Americans? Nope! They voted to repeal a forthcoming Bush-era rule that would have discontinued the federal government’s use of old-fashioned incandescent light bulbs in favor of energy saving CFL bulbs.

Let it now be known that incandescent light bulbs are forever safe in the United States! As for unemployed Americans...ummmm, sorry, you’re on your own.

Moe wouldn’t necessarily have to draw blood or break bones. Perhaps line up one caucus in a straight line so he can he deliver one of his patent pending multiple slaps. Or an eye poke here or there; perhaps deliver one to a person who has a reputation for breaking into tears. I won’t mention his name, because lord knows I might get a visit from the Secret Service who will want to politely ask me if I was serious when I specified that a certain act of violence be performed on a certain legislator. Ladies and gentleman of the Secret Service, you should know me better by now. You should know that after five years this blog is seldom serious.

As for the rest, Moe can plant cream pies on their kissers. That should make them realize that they have their heads up where the sun don’t shine, and they should be more responsive to the problems facing all of us. I reiterate (or, in true Stooges speak, I should say I regurgitate): millions are unemployed, but light bulbs are more important. All I can say is “Moe, please come back and slap some sense into all of them...hard!”

(Thank you for reading. “Nyuk, nyuk, nyuk...”)