Guns on Wheels 7.3

Afraid that a recent gun buy-back conducted by the local police department had left residents of Knoxville, Tennessee dangerously under-armed, a local used car dealer recently held a "Second Amendment Saturday" promotion: Buy a car, get a free rifle. Greg "Lumpy" Lambert told Reuters that the day went well. He attracted several hundred gun lovers to the lot, sold three cars and gave out 15 to 20 squirt guns to children who stopped by with their parents. (Never hurts to start them young.) Lambert said he isn't planning to make the event an annual one, but that he is "thinking about giving away Godiva chocolates and teddy bears on Valentine's Day." No word on whether or not the bears will be packing heat.

Loose Lips 6.8

The Republican Party seems to be having a problem with some of its leading lights: They keep opening their mouths. George W. Bush's speeches have become virtual feasts of malapropism. Denouncing Al Gore's "class warfare," Bush tried in one recent speech to explain to his fans that he supported Americans of all classes--not just "the entrepreneurs and the farmers and the entrepreneurs." In another, he defined his concept of leadership: "A leadership is someone who brings people together."

Meanwhile, House Majority Leader Dick Armey apparently has decided that the best way to deal with jokes about his famously suggestive name is to turn these jokes into anti-gay slurs aimed at his colleagues. At a recent cocktail party, the Washington Post reports, humorist Dave Barry asked the house leader if he was really Dick Armey. Armey shot back with: "Yes, I am Dick Armey. And if there is a dick army, Barney Frank would want to join up."

A spokeswoman for Armey told the Post that the congressman was simply tired of people making jokes about his name. Of course, Armey hasn't always been opposed to making jokes out of other people's names: In 1995, you may recall, he got into some hot water after calling Frank, the Democrat from Massachusetts, "Barney Fag."

On Duty 6.4

Foot-in-mouth disease seems to have affected the party's dimmer lights as well. In Tampa, Florida, a Republican candidate for state Senate has raised hackles with a nasty yet oddly pretentious letter he sent to local representatives of the National Organization for Women. "You are in claim and deed, a hateful, bigoted organization of neurotics, bent on the destruction of all that is peaceful and living," David Weeks wrote. "It is my duty and conscience to destroy you and all you, heretofore, represent."

Asked to explain his comments by a reporter for the Tampa Tribune, Weeks chose to stay on message, as they like to say in the political world, noting that he felt it was his "duty, my obligation, my conscience, to destroy ... gay privilege, abortion, the hateful abuse of men ... the supposed liberation of women--everything they're for."

David Futrelle is a contributing editor of In These Times.