For immediate release:
Bed-of-Pain,
Okla., Jan. 76 (Special)…..Pogo, Okefenokee’s First Citizen and its
favorite-son candidate for the Presidency, climbed out of a sick bed today to
attack what he called "the twisted truth behind the Elephant Rebellion in
the Nation’s Capital." In an impassioned speech at the City Zoo, Pogo
declared that Elephants, no matter of what party, have a right to decent working
conditions and job security. He pointed in indignation to the treatment
"suffered by the loyal pachyderms of the opposition." Claiming that
old-line symbols were being replaced by the machine made elephant, hammered
together out of rubber, cotton, and "Rube Goldberg clockworks", Pogo
called for an immediate investigation starting at the "top" and
finishing at the "bottom". Trunk experts from Oshkosh have stepped
forward with an offer to "nose out" the matter
A question from a baboon in the audience, a
retired municipal judge, led the candidate to remark, with a twinkle in his eye,
that "You can pierce an elephant’s hide but you can’t hide the whole
elephant." This was denied by wire immediately by the Elephant Growers
Association, manufacturers of mechanical street parade elephants. This group has
been under special attack by the fighting possum who has indicated that machine
replacements are starving out the regulars (or live-type pachyderms).
"No wonder the younger elephants led the
rebellious stampede of 42 circus performers, as reported by the Associated
Press. Here they’ve put these ersatz beasts on wheels and the old-line bull is
not only walking, he’s working for peanuts."
Peanut growers throughout the south were
scheduled to meet tonight in an effort to bring pressure on what was termed
"this latest assault upon the agricultural economy of the nation."
(Copyright 1956, Walt Kelly)
