As the title of this feature tries so valiantly to assert, we don’t think that the Foreigns are really that different than from us. Sure, they jabber in weird languages and wear funny clothes, but when it comes right down to it, we all have the same basic set of human needs: we all want to get high, to have sex while we’re supposed to be working, to fake the deaths of our political enemies, and, of course, to live forever by extracting the organs of the healthy and powerless.
SCOTLAND: City council jobs apparently nonstop fuckfest
Lovely Aberdeen! This third-largest city in Scotland, lying at roughly the same latitude as Juneau and noted (by Wikipedia) “for its biting winds and driving rain, which sweep in from the north,” is a secret lair of government-sponsored overtime orgies! Or so it was claimed at a recent trial in which a city council employee claimed he was fired for reporting the on-the-job doin’ it. Fun quotes from the BBC:
Witness Pat Fraser said she could hear then director of leisure, Brian Woodcock [No, really. --Eds], and a female employee having sex behind a partition screen. She said it was during a bank holiday weekend. Ms Fraser, who worked in Aberdeen City Council’s sports and leisure department, said she was in the council’s offices with Mr. McNeil [No-neck guy who's suing, pictured] in 2004 when they overheard the intercourse. She said: “I heard them having sex. I could hear them moaning and groaning and the screen was moving. There is no doubt in my mind who was behind that screen or what they were doing.”
And because it was a “bank holiday” (which is like the UK’s version of a “holiday that you get off for no good reason, like Presidents Day”), everyone was getting paid double overtime! So you can understand why this McNeil fellow was fired for complaining. This despite the fact that they did their best him feel welcome in this workplace culture of constant sexing:
Earlier in the hearing, Mr. McNeil told the tribunal that on another occasion he had caught the female employee engaged in a sex act with Mr Woodcock. He said: “I came in [his office] and when he turned round and saw me he offered me a cup of tea and a slice of cake.”
O ungrateful whistleblower! How sharper than a serpents tooth! Fie, man, fie!
GHANA: Presidential election to pit druggie against corpse
Ghana’s going to be holding presidential elections in December, but that’s totally months away, so candidate John Evans Atta Mills of the NDC party is spending some “me time” in South Africa. (Hey Americans! Would you like some or all of your presidential candidates to currently be in a country several thousand miles away from here?) What with him being out of the country, naturally some rumors began to spread, thanks to rumor-mongering Websites (yay, technology!), that Atta Mills was actually dead. His phone calls to Ghanian radio stations have so far failed to quell the belief that he died of throat cancer, leaving his already troubled presidential prospects in doubt.
Meanwhile, the NDC has struck back with some unfounded rumors of their own! They’re saying that Atta Mills’ opponent, the NPP party’s Nana Akufo-Addo, has a big lead in the polls only because he’s using performance enhancing drugs. No word yet on what drugs exactly would aid in running for president (feel free to speculate wildly in the comments) but we feel that this is big talk coming from a party that’s trying to run a dead guy for president.
INDIA: New day of organ-selling freedom at hand?
So an organ-sales ring in India was broken up, in which over 500 desperately poor people either sold or were forced at gunpoint to donate various body parts for the illicit enjoyment of rich people in the U.S. and Japan, which, we’d like to emphasize, isn’t funny at all, even though the guy who’s running it, Amit Kumar, has been nicknamed “Dr. Horror.” But we did want to point out this bit from a news story on the subject:
Indian laws stipulate living donors can only provide a kidney to a blood relative or spouse. A donor could also be granted special approval to provide a kidney based on so-called altruistic reasons. Corrupt local authorities, however, often bend the rules for personal gain … Some argue the laws are too strict and have forced organ traders to go underground.
Ah ha, there’s the blame! When organ sales are outlawed, only outlaws well sell organs! Don’t force the Indian poor to go to back-alley organ purchasers! I’m sure a certain libertarian doctor/presidential candidate will have something to say about this. Human kidneys could serve as the basis for a currency if not enough gold is available!
BULGARIA: Government finds government innocent in drug trafficking case
The Bulgarian government’s attempts to foster Bulgarian industry are being questioned by the killjoy opposition party! See, the scenic Balkan country wants in on Eastern Europe’s #1 growth industry: synthetic drugs! (We’re not sure what constitutes “synthetic” — are they not into all-natural coke and weed down there?) And, seeing as you need to accept immigrants to do the jobs that Bulgarians won’t do, they got Serbian national Budimir Kujovic to start up his own little industry with hopes that soon when people think of getting high, they think “Bulgaria!”
Unfortunately, someone didn’t get the memo, and Kujovic got arrested. At that point it came out that he had gotten a hold of a legit Bulgarian passport despite the fact that he had been banned from the country for ten years in 2005. Awkward! But now the state prosecutor has announced that, whoever gave him that passport, it surely wasn’t the government’s fault. Everything’s fine! And kids, if you’re going to do drugs, be sure to do Bulgarian drugs.
Like many proud leaders of the Grand Old Party, Texas Sen. John Cornyn recently said something inappropriate and terrible and damaging to his country while defending something expensive, war-related, and unnecessary. 
Did you know elections and vote-counting happen in places other than Minnesota? It’s true! Take, for example, India, where the monthlong (!) election just came to an end, and the results are coming in at this moment. Approximately a gigabyte of the country’s 700 million eligible voters went to the polls, which all used electronic voting machines, and the potential debacle seems to have gone off without any disasters, civil wars, coups, terrorism, piracy, PUMAs, or any discussion of gay marriage whatsoever. So, score one for Democracy! UPDATE: Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and 
Poor Michael Steele! The media jackals are now well aware of Steele’s tendency to say hilarious things when prodded, and now they’re just using this POOR MAN who is trying to save the Republican party for our children. Such was the case 
Everyone’s favorite Muslims at the Islamic Fiqh Academy in India recently decided that health insurance is not simply a bunch of baloney, but it’s also a sin and immoral. “Representatives from around 300 Madrasas, including Darul Uloom Deoband, Jamiat Islami participated in the three-day meet, where they reached a conclusion that seeking insurance cover was only another form of gambling,” and this is why Barack Obama cannot bring himself to offer a universal plan. [
America’s Princess Diplobot had a busy end of March: She celebrated 4,000 troop deaths in Iraq, reminisced about slavery, and reignited vice presidential rumors all by herself, by doing nothing more than talking to a friendly bear. Way to go, girl! Catch up with Condi after the jump!