Joe Bob’s America: March 17, 1989 (Patreon)

(A post from the archives I thought you might enjoy reading while you wait for tonight’s frightful festivities…Happy Friday, Mutants! See you tonight! 💘)

Joe Bob’s America:

March 17, 1989

The National Institutes of Health just got a big check from the government to study the 100 trillion cells in the human body and find out how they can mess with fetuses to upgrade the population. In other words, if I understand this deal right, they're gonna figure out exactly what each gene does and why your body is put together with little twisted ladders that have nose hairs growing out the sides. (I made D's in biology, I'm doing the best I can.)

Anyhow, there are some things about your genetic DNA that I think you ought to know, things they've already found out:

1. They have isolated the SAT gene. When enlarged a billion times under the electron microscope, the SAT gene shows an exact score: "567 verbal, 685 math." This means that, when the baby is born, he's already coded for the SAT and doesn't really need to study for it. He can if he wants to, but there's not really any point. You've either got a Harvard baby or a Chico State baby, and there's nothing you can do about it.

2. The strongest, most weather-resistant genes belong to cement contractors in the Ozark Mountains. If left unchecked, these genes will gradually dominate over all other genes in America and we will become a race of mashed-potato-eating hawkers of concrete.

3. Researchers have discovered a "wild card" gene in Go-Kart track owners that causes them to put satellite dishes in their front yards.

4. We now know that Brigitte Nielsen can't help it.

5. The desire to surf is caused by a chromosomal disorder called "Dude Syndrome," where the normal shapes of the 43rd and 44th chromosome become juxtaposed in a "goofy-foot" pattern. This can be corrected with long-term therapy, but early tests show that patients lose the desire to surf but develop an even stronger desire to hang-glide.

6. Playboy Playmates and Sports Illustrated swimsuit models were tested separately for signs of any special "jiggle" genes, and it turned out that the Playmates were missing large portions of their cerebellum. This has nothing to do with genes. It was merely an interesting but unrelated result of the project.

7. Fourteen-year-old boys at the East Windham Preparatory School in Bridgeport, Connecticut, were put to sleep to see if this would have any effect on their parents. Later, researchers went to the Bedford School in Asheville, North Carolina, and reversed the process, to see if the death of a parent would have any effect on the student. In both cases, it took an average of two years for the family member to notice someone "missing." Further research showed this to be the result of what is now called the "Scotch-and-soda" gene group, which also causes these people to order personalized checks with swans on them.

8. Bryant Gumbel has no genes. Researchers are looking into the possible reasons.

9. A strong faction with the federal government wants to take the genes of Marlo Thomas, graft them to the genes of Charles Manson, and see what happens. "You get that extra little oomph in the mix when you mix apples and oranges," explained one researcher. To test this idea, lab technicians are using Marlo Thomas rats -- rodents that display Marlo Thomas-type behavior -- and Charles Manson rats. So far the tests are inconclusive, since all the Marlo Thomas rats have devoured the Charles Manson rats.

10. A special top-secret unit of the NIH is looking into the ethical problems surrounding the search for perfect genes. Would it be ethical, for example, to eliminate a cancer gene from the population, if it also meant losing professional women's volleyball? The answer, at this point, is a probable "no." "It's too much like playing God," one of the guys said. "If the Almighty put professional women's volleyball on the earth, He must have had a reason. Who are we to judge?" Another question being looked into is "If you took all the genes from a bodybuilder like Arnold Schwarzenegger, and you injected them into the body of Pee Wee Herman, what would it look like?" This project has been temporarily delayed due to an outbreak of nausea among the research team doing the work.

My personal opinion of this project is that I don't think it should be left in the hands of the people with defective genes who are in charge right now. We should wait until we have much healthier genes, like maybe after we've grafted some E.T. genes onto the human race, and then turn these guys loose with a test tube. Otherwise one of em's gonna look up and say, "We seem to have had a little accident here in the lab," and then a hundred years from now we'll all have walrus teeth and hickeys on the end of our noses. Sandy Duncan would be president. It's not something you really wanna think about.