Testing...One, Two, Seventeen?

(CLICK IMAGE TO ENLARGE)

No Dana, The S.A.T.'s are not those nights of the month you go out and do your shitty karaoke...

We here at The Group News Blog like to consider this place a variety of things. Sometimes it is a pulpit from which to rage at injustice, and sometimes it is a contemplative oasis where one can ponder the events of the day. It can also be at its best, a place for learning. A school if you will.

And as recent days have informed us, having an education can save your life—or save you from utter embarrassment.

Take White House Press Secretary Dana Perino for example. Now, I fully admit to being a bit harsh on the daft-assed conserva-spokes-bot White House press secretary, as many others have been. But, I'd like to perhaps make this grand-mal gaffe of hers into a positive thing—a teaching moment. So I conferred with my fellow educators and administrators here at GNBU—The Group News Blog University, (“Collegium Ex Cogit Asellus”) and we have decided to help Dana out, showing her the way through the thicket that is Contemporary American History 101.

But before the teaching can begin, Dana's depth (or shallowness—take your pick) of knowledge of the subject must be plumbed, and the best way to do that is through an evaluatory test. The questions were chosen with great care and sensitivity to Ms. Perino's well-documented gaps in historical expertise, but we believe that they are fair, and should give a clear insight into just how hollow-headedly dumb where she appears to need work.

The questions are as follows, in addition to the actual GNBU test paper available for you the reader to peruse above, after you click to enlarge it.

No...no, Dana, if you click your pen, the test paper will not get bigger—that only works on computers. (BEAT) No dear, if you click a pen, the computer won't get any bigger. Working a mouse makes the computer page bigger. (BEAT) Um...no. If you used a rat the page would not get really, really big, I...you know what? Let me see what you put down for Question #1. Let's see here...(BEAT)

Oh Goddamn...

EXAMINATION IN LATE 20TH CENTURY HISTORY 101

1.) Sputnik is:
a.) A famous Soviet defector
b.) The first man-made satellite put into space
c.) The sound President Bush made when he coughed up that chunk of pretzel.

2.) Which of the following best describes “Brown Vs. Board of Education”?:
a.) Plaintiff and defendant in the landmark school desegregation case
b.) Lawsuit for disability access access to public schools
c.) The two fighters involved n the famed “Thrilla in Manila”

3.) “Houston, we've got a problem” refers to:
a.) CB code for “Bad weather up ahead”
b.) The “mayday” phrase used by Apollo 13 astronauts when a
mechanical failure threatened them in space, and Mission
Control needed notification.
c.) What Whitney's crack dealer said when she came up two dollars short on a buy

4.) Complete the following—“James Earl Ray”...
a.) Assassinated Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
b.) Assassinated President John Fitzgerald Kennedy
c.) Was the voice of Darth Vader in “Star Wars“

5.) Saigon is:
a.) The setting for a bad musical about the Vietnam War
b.) The former name of Ho Chi Minh City, and a center
of conflict in the Vietnam War
c.) What Estelle says to anyone who calls looking
for “Sy” after he's left the house.

6.) Which of the following best describes Chappaquiddick?:
a.) The name of a tribe of Native Americans
b.) The location of a scandalous incident involving Sen. Ted Kennedy and a dead female office staffer.
c.) A lip balm used specifically after rigorous oral sex

7.) Complete the following—“The Six-Day War...”
a.) Was a brief, but boundary-changing battle between Israel, Egypt, Syria and Jordan
b.) Took place in the late Spring of 1967
c.) Was just a bit worse than the Five-Day War

8.) The Watergate Crisis was:
a.) A contributing cause of the resignation of President Richard M. Nixon
b.) An early 70's constitution-threatening political scandal involving the President,
many members of his cabinet and their illegal subverting of the law
c.) Really bad, but a couple of cans of Drano™ cleared it right up

9.) Who was Huey P. Newton?
a.) A prominent Reverend in the Civil Rights Movement
b.) The leader of the militant Black Panther Partty
c.) Dewey and Louie Newton's triplet sibling.

10.) “Woodstock” is...
a.) A culture-changing music festival taking place in 1969 in Bethel. New York
b.) A small, yellow bird character from Charles Schulz' reknowned “Peanuts” comic strip
c.) A risky rainforest lumber investment portfolio

A-a-a-annnnnd...PENS DOWN! Pens down, class. Right now. (BEAT) What the? Ohhhh..mannnn...
(Sound of cell phone dialing three numbers)

Hello? 911? Could you send an ambulance, right away? One of our students has stabbed themselves in the leg with a ball-point pen. Yes...her name is Dana. Capital D...a, n, a...