No Rhyme, No Reason, No Ma

Honest question - was anyone in the entire state entertained by Bill McAuliffe’s poem in the Star Tribune (entitled Rappin’ Up 2003: A year in despair)? Did anyone, besides McAuliffe and his and editors, find it at all witty, provocative, or creative? Anyone? Fellow despairing lefty travelers? Old people? People with head injuries? Anyone? Anyone?

I guess the answer is a resounding ‘yes’, since the Star Tribune ran a nearly identical poem the very next day - Nick Coleman’s “Times Better and Worse (and sometimes in Verse)". I say again, nearly identical. Check out these excerpts. First from McAuliffe:

So fear not, sad Twins fan, joy's not sent to the shower
Shannon's in left; and here comes Joe Mauer!

Now from Coleman:

Til they went to New York, where they got a cold shower.
But they're makin' a move; they got the home boy, Joe Mauer

Another example, first Coleman:

But on with our poem, let's not be too tardy:
Man of the Year goes to St. John's Gagliardi
And as long as sports heroes, we mean to be hailin'
A woman, now cheer: Gopher hoops' L. Whalen!

Now McAuliffe:

Gotta love that Lindsay Whalen, all-American guard.
Got her own bobblehead, and her team is goin' far.
The Johnnies won it all with a coach named John Gagliard-i
and put his winning total at the top of the card-i.

Same tone (attempted whimsy), same structure (none, except for attempting to rhyme couplets while cramming in as many references to names and events as possible), and same topics. Both written by individuals with no skills as poets or records of accomplishment in verse. Published on back-to-back days.

How does this ridiculous state of affairs transpire at a major newspaper? I know nothing of newspaper editorial planning, so I can only speculate. Seems to me there’s only two possibilities. Either the editors are so out of touch with reality, they think these things are hilarious social commentary and planned for this duplication to occur. Or, there was no coordination between Coleman and the editorial staff, this duplication came as a surprise to everyone, and the editors decided to run both of them anyway (because Coleman couldn’t or wouldn’t write something else).

Embarrassingly out of touch or embarrassingly out of control? My money’s on the latter, but I wouldn't be surprised at either.