I accuse the writers of The Onion of conspiring together to slay me by laughter. This one almost finished me off, I’m still in recovery.
Bush Braces As Cindy Sheehan’s Other Son Drowns In New Orleans
Curse them! Any other candidates for best Onion headline ever?
Well, the one I think a lot of people were curious about was their first headline after September 11th, 2001. It turned out to be classic – funny but not disrespectful:
Hijackers Surprised to Find Themselves In Hell
Not their laugh-out-loud funniest, of course, but one of their most memorable.
Their finest moment had to be during the disputed 2000 election:
**Nation Plunges Into Chaos: Pro-Bush Rebels Seize Power In West; D.C. In Flames
Clinton Declares Self President For Life
Bush Executes 253 New Mexico Democrats
Bob Dole: “Bob Dole’s Been Shot”
McVeigh Urges Calm**
Clinton Deploys Very Special Forces to Iraq
One of the greatest features of the Onion articles are the accompanying Photoshopped pix–this one had a picture of a cargo plane photoshopped to look like a short bus.
Clinton drops “Da Bomb”. Referring to Pres. George Clinton.
The headline when they started up again after 9/11
HOLY FUCKING SHIT!
I think their best stuff is in the collection “Our Dumb century” .
**Martin Luther King: “I Had a Really Weird Dream Last Night”
German Jews Worried About Hitler’s ‘Kill All Jews’ Policy**
and my personal favourite
Holy Shit Man Walks On Fucking Moon
My favourite of the post 9/11 edition was
**[God Angrily Clarifies ‘Don’t Kill’ Rule](God Angrily Clarifies Thou Shalt Not Kill Rule) **
thwartme
With the photo of Clinton in a white generalissimo’s uniform and some of his comments, that one was a classic.
I also remember a subhead that said something like “Life turns into Bruce Willis movie.”
The whole post 9/11 issue is available in the Onion archives here.
Agreed that some of the best Onion headlines are from “Our Dumb Century.” One I particularly liked:
Anthropomorphic Juice Pitcher Among Dead in Jonestown Cult Suicide
–Cyanide-Laced Juice Found Inside Giant Pitcher’s Glass Body
–Deceased Container as Yet Unidentified
–Enormous Pitcher-Shaped Hole Found in Jungle Commune’s Wall
I’m pretty sure there was also one linking the McCarthyism hysteria to Charlie McCarthy, the ventriloquist’s dummy, but I can’t seem to find it…
Falsehood Discovered on Internet
‘Urban Legends True,’ Says Friend Of Cousin’s Roommate
African-American community terrorized by Ask Murderer
Why Do All These Homosexuals Keep Sucking My Cock? was the best headline/article ever.
My favorite has always been:
Supreme Court Rules
Supreme Court Rules
http://www.theonion.com/content/node/30137
That article never ceases to remind me of Marbury v. Madison (1803).
Everything about the HOLY FUCKING SHIT! issue was great. I can’t put into words how helpful I found it at the time. I loved the God article, but my favorite may be “Not Knowing What Else to Do, Woman Bakes American-Flag Cake.” It perfectly encapsulated just how at a loss everyone was. Or everyone I knew, anyway. Also wonderful was the TV grid, which showed programs like “America Looks Around for Someone to Hit” (NBC), “Fuck It, Here’s Some Zebra Footage” (Animal Planet), and “Oh Shit, Man… Oh Shit!” (Public Access – also home of "Extremely Uniformed Debate).
–Cliffy
I always got a kick outo f the one for Our Dumb Century
World’s Largest Metaphor Hits Iceberg
and
WA-
in huge font with the sub headline “Banner headline continued on page 5”
How about the one where congress was demanding a new Capitol, with retractable dome and superbox seating?
Funny, yes, but then the Beijing Evening News picked it up as a true story.
They were so lame that their correction pointed out that certain regular American papers run funny fictitious stories, so it wasn’t really their fault they were fooled.
:smack:
In regards to the 9-11 issue, I think my favorite was “Massive attack on Pentagon makes page 17 news”, in one of the sidebar newsbriefs (no accompianying story).
But if we’re going to talk about Onion classics, I think it’s hard to top the one about J. K. Rowling teaching kids how to cast spells.