Pink slips in God's marketing department

It seems a safe bet that God ranks up there with Coca-Cola and Anheuser Busch for brand market saturation. So many churches, so many customizable flexi-letter signs offering insight and encouragement to passing drivers as they head to the bar or wherever it is they're going. Sometimes witty, occasionally poignant, often groan-worthy, and always with one goal: Getting people to think about God.

I'm pretty sure that if the pastor at the Westboro Baptist Church had run this sign by God prior to posting, it would not have gotten the thumbs-up. Reasons include (but may not be limited to):

• First, and obvious to anyone with corporate experience: Don't associate your CEO with abject cruelty to innocent victims as retaliation for the actions of others. (Canceling the free coffee in the break room because one of the salespeople consistently botches his Power Point presentations is no way to build team morale.) Even if God is a killer, you people to think of God vanquishing evil, or at least something annoying like mosquito. Snuffing fuzzy little synonyms for joy isn't the kind of press God wants.
• Next, there's the spelling. The word is "masturbate", and if they'd spelled it correctly, they would have been able to use the saved E to finish the last word of the message. However, I'm willing to forgive this one because it subliminally demonstrates that the folks at this church know so little about self-satisfaction that they don't even know how to spell it. (Though the cynic on the committee in my brain thinks that exactly what they WANT me to think. Yeah, nice try.)
• Finally, they need an editor, as this seems to imply that people should wait until marriage before masturbating. If you really want people to abstain until marriage, then you need to up the ante on the reward system to include other people's genitalia. (Though on the other hand, this might stand up as written---they may not know much about auto-eroticism, but they seem to know a thing or two about marriage.)

All in all, the fine folks at the Westboro Baptist Church ought to put a little note in the Sunday bulletin: "Wanted: copywriter. One clever line per week that reflects well on the congregation, the clergy, and God. Immediate opening."

(This photo came from CNN's iReport. I prefer to think it wasn't photoshopped.)

The Art of the Handwritten Note

By now, you probably heard about Sarah Palin's Tea Party cheat sheet -- notes scribbled on her hand to help her get through a grueling Q&A session with the world's friendliest audience. (At least if you're a gorgeous Republican.) The markings on the hand seemed to read:

Energy
Budget Tax cuts
Lift American Spirits

I'm not passing judgment on the necessity of writing notes to one's self. We all fear public speaking, and it's helpful to have a prompt in case we find ourselves struggling for a starting point. No, I'm simply offering Mrs. Palin some tips on effective flesh scribbling to help her avoid the unnecessary ado that accompanied her recent event. I'm convinced the media swirl surrounding her ink-stained hand could have been avoided had she simple followed these simple tips:

1. If you need to write notes on your hands, do not mock your enemy for using a teleprompter. The teleprompter is a fixture in modern politics, so there's little cache in ridiculing someone's use of them. There's even less cache when you deliver the line while you yourself are reading from a printed speech, and your hand looks like you've been struggling to compose a valentines haiku. Maybe next time the hand-scribble should include, "avoid hypocrisy".
   
2. The note should be about something challenging to recall. For instance, if you expected to have to handle a question about the economic bailout, you might write, "Toxic Asset Recovery Program" on your hand so that you don't mistakenly name the R word as "relocation", changing the meaning considerably. But "Lift American Spirits"? Isn't that an essential part of your political raison d'etre? Do you need to remind yourself to talk about the American people? Apparently.
   
3. Don't write your cheat sheet until you know exactly what you plan to cheat with. By all appearances, the former Governor wrote "Budget cuts", then crossed out "budget" and replaced it with "tax". Seven words on the hand, and one of them had to be crossed out. That's a 14% failure rate on a note to yourself. A little prep can go a long way.

I suspect Sarah Palin has a few public speaking engagements scheduled in the next few years, so hopefully this advice will help her keep the media focusing on what's in her head, not what's on her hands. (Assuming that's what she wants them to focus on.)