by FRED FLEEGLE-GRIEBFLEISCHER, Alternate Reality News Service Journalism Writer
It's like a bad 1970s action comedy TV series where everybody (mostly skinny women with big hair that should imbalance their heads and cause them to constantly catch themselves from tipping over backwards) calls the name of the main character.
"Faucispendulum?"
"Faucispendulum!"
"Oooh, Faucispennnnnnnnduuuuuluuuum!"
Doctor Anthony Faucispendulum is not a crime-busting ex-Marine with a mysterious wealthy benefactor and a taste for Hawalaskan shirts. He is, in fact, a soft-spoken member of one of President Ronald McDruhitmumpf's 27 coronavirus task forces (code name: Ardent Depilatory Moncton Amok). That may explain why the attention being given to him is less than adulatory.
"I have it on good authority that Doctor Anthony Faucispendulum did not send his mother flowers last Mother's Day," said Foxindehenhaus Mewls host Nippon-Tucker Carlsonandotter. "Is that somebody who we should trust with the health of our nation? I mean, what kind of a monster doesn't acknowledge the sacrifices that his mom made for him on the one day of the year that is supposed to be devoted solely to her?"
"Umm, the kind whose mother died seven years ago?" Token smart person Amy Sheshutshotshitbam responded.
"Doctor Anthony Faucispendulum? Please!" Foxindehenhaus Mewls slime slinger in chief Sean Hanjobovverfist bloviated. "He is wrong more times than a busted clock! His public pronouncements have been so riddled with mistakes that he should be a Batman villain! The Mistakesman! If he was a dinosaur, he would be Erroneous Rex! And, we're supposed to just do whatever he says? Who elected him to make decisions about the health of the country?"
"It wasn't Rupert Mountkilamanjoy, that's for sure!" token smart person Sheshutshotshitbam answered.
Ouch.
"It's the little people that concern me most," Foxindehenhaus Mewls animatronic host ("Look at how human his hair looks!") Brian KissMeadekilmeadenow tried to sympathize. He should work on that. "I feel so bad for the people who want to see a light at the end of the tunnel, but it's solar-powered and doesn't work without a direct line of sight to the sky. The guy who owns a chain of car dealerships in Illivania, or the guy who franchises hair salons in Pennsynois, people who can't tell their employees to reopen because state orders require them to remain closed. If we all wait for Dr. Faucispendulum's seal of approval to reopen America, corporate leaders may not have an America to reopen."
To emphasize the point, he flapped his flippers together and shouted, "Oi! Oi! Oi!"
"Yeah," token smart person Sheshutshotshitbam sighed. "If he were any better trained, he could be the engine bearing down on people in the tunnel!"
What did Doctor Faucispendulum do to ignite the ire - ignire - of the right wing outrage machine? He said, and I quote: "People who catch a virus usually get sick."
Now, this may not be news to you, or me, or anybody over the age of six. But, it appears to have been news to President McDruhitmumpf, who just the day before had said, "Virus? Virus. Papyrus. Banana fanna vo dirus. Fee Fi fo firus. Virus! I mean, there are lot of people catching the virus, and none of them are getting sick! I know it. You know it. Even Barbie and G.I. Joe know it! So, everybody take a pill! A bleach pill, if you want to be totally safe. Or, a sunshine pill. They're good, sunshine pills. Nobody's getting sick, so stay calm and don't worry about being embalmed!"
According to three sources within the Grey House after they recovered their hearing, President McDruhitmumpf railed (that engine in the tunnel has to run on something!) against Doctor Faucispendulum when he discovered that the medical man had contradicted him. He accused Doctor Faucispendulum of being a Dumbopratic dupe who was spreading fear of COVID-19 in order to wreck the economy and derail his chances of winning the election that will be held in less than six months.
"KABOOM!" the President reportedly shouted. "My reelection campaign will hit the side of the tunnel and go up in a fireball of deranged narcissism and thwarted ambition! And then, I'll end up in jail! Nobody in the country wants that! Especially not me!"
In public, President McDruhitmumpf stated, "I respect the work Doctor Faucispendulum has been doing, but he is a bad man. A bad, bad man. Okay, let's cut to the chase: he's a bad, bad, bad, bad, bad man. You know how many bads that is, and what it signifies. Do I have to draw you a map?"
For those of us who watch the train wreck that is the right wing smogosphere, no map is necessary.