From: rone@chort.usc.edu (Ron A. "5150" Echeverri)
Subject: Article in L.A. Times (5/27/1992)
Summary: A funny view
Keywords: REPRINTED WITHOUT PERMISSION. so don't gripe :-)
Date: 28 May 92 08:48:58 GMT

Hehe... this showed up on Page 3 of Section A today. I am resubmitting this
w/out permission (i imagine all newspaper articles are copyrighted or some-
thing). It was written by Peter H. King in the column "On California".
=========

               "Coming Next to Your TV: Quaylevision"

       Don't pick on Dan Quayle for blaming the L. A. riots on Murphy Brown.  
The vice president is right:  Television can bend minds.  To this day, when
caught in a moral quandary, I simply ask myself:  "What would Hoss Cartwright
do?"  It works every time.
       My question is, what TV shows shaped Quayle?  "Lost in Space" is not
the correct answer, but we're warm.  I assume, like everyone, he watched "I
Love Lucy," but i wonder what he made of Lucy and Ricky sleeping in single
beds.  I also suspect he noticed that, throughout 14 seasons, Ozzie never once
left Harriet and the boys for work.  How do I get a job like that? young Dan
might have asked himself.  And in 1988, George Bush provided the answer.
       But enough.  Since the Murphy Brown dust-up, I've been thinking about
what it would take to please the Veep.  After a long weekend on the couch, I
have the answer--a schedule of morally acceptable TV programs Quayle can pitch
to Hollywood.  The list:

       "Golfing With White Men."  This show combines both sports and public
service.  Each week, a different public figure is flown on Air Force Two to a
whites-only country club.  There, he--and they will only be he's-- golfs with
Quayle and, in between shots, discusses urban policy.  To gain bipartisan
appeal, the first guest will be Bill Clinton.

       "Eight is a Start."  Meet the Wades.  In just 72 month, this Ft.
Lauderdale couple have produced eight happy youngsters--and they're only
getting started!  He works as a milkman.  She keeps the kids in cookies!  And
still has her figure!!!  In the first episode, the 8-year-old brings home a
condom from the school dispenser.  Mrs. Wade, sewing needle in hand, sets out on a mission.

       "You'd Better Make Room for My Daddy."  When junior needs a job, it's 
Dad to the rescue.  When junior receives his Vietnam draft notice, it's Dad to
the rescue.  When junior's C average makes it tough to get into law school,
it's Dad to the rescue.  Sponsored by Indiana Bell to promote a new jingle: 
'Reach Out and Put the Touch on Somebody.'

       "Where's My Mind?"  A game show based on utterances of a famous vice
president.  Contestants are challenged to decipher such comments as, "There is
nothing that a good defense cannot beat a better offense."  Or, in greeting
Samoans, "You all look like happy campers to me!"  Or, and this one's strictly
for the tougher bonus round, "What a waste it is to lose one's mind--or not to
have a mind?"

       "The Outlaw Murphy Brown Jr."  A gripping morality play, this one
projects forward 25 years to chronicle the hard life that awaits Murphy Brown's
fatherless child.  By day, young Brown toils as a mindless government regula-
tor.  By night, he pillages Radio Shacks.

       "Just Say No!"  A home video show that encourages amateur sleuths to
ambush friends, relatives, even strangers, at a moment of moral crisis.  The
idea is to sneak up just as Mom and Dad are moving toward an unusual sexual
position, or Grnadpa is reaching for one Miller too many, roll the camera and
shout:  "JUST . . . SAY . . . NO!"  Big cash prizes--upon conviction.

       "W*A*S*P*S."  Witty tax lawyers find loopholes in the tax code each week.  Heavy on repartee.

       "Gigglin' Island."  In Quayle's view, the sexual undercurrent of
"Gilligan's Island" was way too strong.  What were we to think of the Professor
and Mary Ann's nature walks, or Tina Louise's cleavage?  This spinoff features
Charlton Heston as a stern but loving leader of a Boy Scout troop.  The
enterprising lads spend their days deforesting the jungle island and telling
knick-knock jokes.

       "Father Still Knows Best."  Quayle finds little fault with the original
sitcom, but would like to see "Fronk," the family's Latino gardener, busted by
the INS in an early episode.  Just as a message.

       "The Evening News . . . With Oral Roberts."  A roundup of news,
features and reading from the Book of the Apocalypse.  Once a week, the anchor
interviews God, or an appropriate guest saint.

       "Mr. Ed Goes to the White House."  See, there's this vice president.
And no one will talk to him or give him serious work.  They believe he's a
political liability, a laughingstock who always says the wrong thing.  He
despairs of ever getting a crack at the Big Job.  One day, cutting the White
House lawn, he meets a swaybacked horse.  They talk.  The sage horse counsels
the young vice president to keep his conservative credentials intact, keep
patient and not fret when people poke fun at him.  "Same thing used to happen
to me," the horse says.  "But well, you know, the liberals got the laughs, but
I got the votes."
       This one stars Quayle himself in the Wilbur role.  An old Western actor
named Reagan plays the horse.

-- 
"All this machinery making modern music               \ Ron Echeverri-BSCS 1995
 Can still be open-hearted.                            \   Univ. of So. Cal.
 Not so coldly charted, it's really just a question     \______________________
 Of your honesty, yeah, your honesty."       - Rush, 'The Spirit of Radio'
