By BILLY MURPHY
Laugh Lines

Here's another installment in the award-avoiding, lowly acclaimed series concerning the world around us.

What a genius Bill Clinton has proven to be. I have finally figured out his ways. Every time there is a complex national issue at hand, Clinton diverts our attention away from it with a faux-scandal concerning himself.

What a patriot he has been, subjecting himself to shame and ridicule at every juncture for the sake of national security. Case in point; he goes on television and artificially admits to an affair with a White House intern so he can distract the world from our ant-terrorist operations. Brilliant strategy. "Wag the Dog" in reverse!

Remember the Gennifer Flowers' gossip? He used that contrived rumor to avert our attention from George Bush's important campaign issues. Paula Jones and health care, Monica (the first time around) and the Pope in Cuba and Iraq, Kathleen Willey and North Korea... the list goes on and on. Just know if Clinton ever gets caught in a homosexual dalliance, we'll be bombing China shortly after.

Hurricane Bonnie hit this week and proved yet again that North Carolina has more trailer parks than any other state in the union.

And why do they use the ugliest names for hurricanes? Fran, Bertha, Bonnie? These are not the names of models. You never hear the forecaster point to the weather map and say, "Batten down the hatches, Iman is heading to your house." No one would leave. All the women would be driving out of the state, with the men still at home, saying, "C'mon, Claudia, drop in on me."

And what's with the eye of the storm reporting? They send a guy into the path of the storm, tell him don't shave or comb his hair for a few days and think this is Pulitzer material? These guys are there like they think it's Vietnam. Meanwhile when the camera's not rolling they are in the local Bennigans running up the station's expense account on beer and burgers.

I wanna see them send the helicopter guy into the storm. Now that's action reporting. And what is with the guys who name the hurricanes? They proved to me they are a bunch of humorless neo-nerds. As soon as they discovered a second storm following Hurricane Bonnie, they should have named it Clyde.

Now for the real news: two of the Spice Girls are reported to be pregnant. And NO, one of them is not "Baby" Spice; this would be too ironic.

I say "reported" because these girls are known to say or do anything for publicity. From posing nude to dressing up like dolls, the Spice Girls will do what it takes to make an impact. Maybe we should name hurricanes after them. Wouldn't be too bad to hear a warning that Hurricane Sporty was gonna hit.

I have been pretty sad myself since Ginger left the group. I just hope she still gets residuals from the "Gilligan's Island" reruns.

Things are just not the same in the world anymore. Drugs are rampant, children are murdering children, and the Spice Girls now number only four. I guess this band will got the way of other rock groups who lost a vital and irreplaceable member: The Doors, The Supremes, Led Zeppelin, The Who, Van Halen Twice.

The Spice Girls haven't been rendered totally inconsequential though, who knows when the president of the United States might need them to save the country.