SAN NARCISO, Calif. (Bennington Vale Evening Transcript) -- The small Amish enclave in the Kinneret Hills surrounding San Narciso County was rocked this week by the discovery of Tourette's syndrome in one of its teens, according to reports from the community newspaper and a local physician who resides near the area referred to as "Amish Acres" by neighboring residents. Tourette's is a congenital neuropsychiatric disorder characterized by physical spasms and peculiar vocal tics, which can include profanity, derogatory remarks and socially unacceptable outbursts. Elders within the reclusive Amish community said the "grave spiritual impurity" came to light Thursday after Tobias Verschmutzt, 12, disrupted school services by asking his teacher for a "gosh darn" pencil sharpener. The schoolmistress, a 22-year-old spinster, swooned with shock and fainted before her pupils. She remains unable to work and will need to convalesce for at least another week. In an interesting corollary, conservative politicians in the area are exploiting the incident to reveal the fatal flaws of social welfare programs like Obamacare.

EDITORIAL: I have spent the last two days, for the legitimate press, covering the massacre that took place at an elementary school in Connecticut. As a parent, an American, a global citizen, a humanist, it has been exhausting. But, not surprisingly, more exhausting is how this has inevitably turned into a soapbox for conflicting ideologies. Yes, the letters and requests have flooded my inbox. "End gun violence," they urge through visceral and impassioned appeals. But it's interesting, don't you think, how specific they are? End gun violence. Not "end violence." Then there come the bizarre and misspelled screeds from the extremities of the evangelical God Squad (and I'm not singling out Christians). They seek to persuade me that the Prince of Peace wants Middle Americans to carry guns everywhere to thwart gun-related violence. These are the same folks who boast to me of their desires to shoot up Family Planning centers and gays and non-Caucasians and insolent women and various other infidels in the name of Christ the Lamb or Allah or Yahweh or Jehovah. This is the same lot that shuns certain scientific truths and technological innovations because no mention of them exists in all the disparate scriptures. But God, in whatever its incarnation to them, wants these enlightened humans equipped with firearms. Which I also cannot find in the pages of their Holy Books.

Photo funded by state of Texas

AUSTIN, Texas (Bennington Vale Evening Transcript) -- In a letter to U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius released Monday, Texas Gov. Rick Perry formally rejected two key provisions in President Obama's healthcare overhaul measure. The proposals in question, struck down by a recent Supreme Court ruling, involved the expansion of Medicaid coverage and the establishment of online healthcare exchanges. As part of the court's decision, the federal government cannot withhold a state's Medicaid allocation if it fails to expand the program for the poor. And if a state chooses not to create an online healthcare exchange, the federal government can develop one for it. Perry joins a chorus of outraged Republican governors who refuse to support these measures. "I will not be party to socializing healthcare and bankrupting my state," Perry asserted. In the first two years alone, based on state figures, nearly two million people would be added to Texas’ Medicaid rolls. By Perry's calculations, that expansion could cost $27 billion over 10 years. "When you consider how much money taxpayers are already dumping into benefits packages for state officials and government workers, Texas simply can't afford to include two million more people."

BUCHAREST, Romania (Bennington Vale Evening Transcript) -- After five days of violent clashes between riot police and demonstrators protesting Romania's "eerie" austerity measures, Prime Minister Emil Boc warned of severe consequences if the aggression continues. The unrest, which left 59 people injured, is the worst seen in the country since the fifteenth century, when an outbreak of anemia and porphyria caused peasants to the storm the castle of the principality's ruling count. On Monday, thousands of protesters peacefully assembled to call for the ouster of Prime Minister Emil Boc and his close political ally President Traian Basescu. The dissent initiated in support of the deputy health minister's resignation over a controversial piece of proposed health care legislation. But even after the government canceled the bill, the demonstrations devolved into a general expression of discontent with "disturbing" austerity policies and poverty.

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (Bennington Vale Evening Transcript) -- Postal workers at the North Pole were inundated today by millions of letters from children who received video game systems, smart phones, tablets and other "in-demand" items instead of the two front teeth they requested. "I've been good all year," ten-year-old Barrett Nostrom of Sweden lisped, "why didn't Santa bring me my teeth? We have no use for this Xbox 360 machine on the farm. I opened it, and there were no Xs inside the box. I tried to use it as a doorstop for the goat pen, but the animals ate it right away. Cheap and worthless thing. But the equally misleading Apple device we got last year, which contained no fruit, did hold out much longer. Mother says it's the smoothest ironing board she's ever used."

TRENTON, N.J. (Bennington Vale Evening Transcript) -- Much has been made in the news about the current batch of 2012 Republican candidates, all squaring off against one another, gaining and losing ground, hating gays and immigrants, loving God and Reagan, and leaving America’s uninsured to die on the streets, a campaign promise that has met with thunderclaps of eerie applause. Conservatism is all the rage, and being able swing farther to the right than one’s opponents -- with a greater level of rage -- is a tactic famously endorsed by Richard Nixon himself. Yet even with his conservative credentials under close scrutiny, New Jersey Governor Chris Christie has received a groundswell of support from like-minded conservatives who have urged him to enter the race. But Christie seems reluctant. Asked whether he will run, Gov. Christie offered an interesting response. Citing the example of Ronald Reagan, he stated: “I know, without ever having met President Reagan, that he must have felt deeply in his heart that he was called to that moment, to lead our country. But what I feel in my heart right now is primarily suffocating plaque and too much cholesterol. They want me to run the country? I can’t even run a lap around my sofa. So, as with Reagan, my decision depends on God.” What Christie can run, his nervous challengers say, is his “big, fat mouth. And that’s important at this stage in the game.”

Though Christie’s weight has been mentioned countless times in the media, political strategists say it will become a legitimate issue for Christie should he enter the fray. “Even worse,” one aide said, “it might bring focus back on the need for health care. That’s a Republican deal killer.”

In Support, San Narciso Based Republican Candidate Unveils Health Care Credit Card Plan

SAN NARCISO, Calif. (Bennington Vale Evening Transcript) -- Based on the audience reaction to the discussion of treating America’s ill and uninsured, which took place during Monday’s Tea Party sponsored debate, letting poor people die on the streets could be the solution to cutting taxes and lowering the deficit. Host Wolf Blitzer posed a hypothetical question to Texas Rep. Ron Paul, a doctor, asking how society should respond to a healthy 30-year-old man who decides against buying health insurance but then requires intensive care for six months after falling into a coma. As a Libertarian, Paul is a staunch limited-government advocate. He said the treatment of this patient should not be the government’s burden to bear alone: “That’s what freedom is all about, taking your own risks.” But the rabid applause from the audience drowned Paul out before he could clarify his statement. Blitzer also interrupted and asked, “Are you saying that society should just let him die?” Several loud cheers of “yeah!” erupted from the crowd, followed by laughter. Most of the candidates later admitted to being taken aback by the response, but they defended the crowd’s “passionate” sentiments.

On Tuesday, San Narciso’s own F. Chester Greene, a new dark horse candidate entering the race, explained, “I understand what they were really saying. That the best way to cut taxes is to cut out those drains on the system: in this case, the poor, uninsured and terminally ill. Especially immigrants. I see it as an opportunity to get creative with health care options. Unlike my peers, I have a plan.”

DETROIT, Mich. -- Dr. Jack Kevorkian, the controversial figure who championed assisted suicide and an individual’s right to die, passed away involuntarily at a Detroit-area hospital. He was 83. Kevorkian, who was released from a Michigan prison in 2007 after serving eight years for second-degree murder, had been suffering from kidney and respiratory problems.

As a result of Kevorkian’s loss, Democrats working on President Obama’s health care initiative have found themselves in a tough spot, much to the glee of Republicans. An administration spokesperson said Kevorkian’s passing is a tremendous setback to the Obamacare Death Panel Agency (DPA): “We had always envisioned Dr. Kevorkian heading up the DPA. Now, we’re not sure a suitable replacement even exists. It appears that Republicans may get their way on this piece of the health care legislation -- we’ll have to scrap the death panels for the foreseeable future.”