News Item (2010): Congressional Republicans cut $512 million from funds to control wildfires.
News Item (2010): Fire experts warn that funding cuts could hamper firefighting.
News Item (2012): Massive wildfire in Colorado still out of control after four days.
News Item (2012): Largest wildfire in New Mexico history is 30 percent contained after being out of control for more than a month.
News Item (2012): Canada lends help as shortages of manpower and equipment continue to hinder firefighting.
Republican leaders have offered no comment on their latest success in cutting the size of government.

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News Headline: “Canadian Immigration Union has concerns about cuts to border security.”
Lest we forget that the United States is Canada’s Mexico.

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QT XXX Summer Olympics Games UpdVIII:
It is estimated that that the Olympic athletes in London will require at least 25,000 loaves of bread, 232 tons of potatoes, 31 tons of poultry, 100 tons of meat, 10,000 gallons of milk, 21 tons of cheese, 330 tons of fruit and vegetables, 19 tons of eggs and 150,000 condoms.

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News Headline: “Church groups sue Philadelphia over ban on feeding the homeless.”
News Headline: “City issues excessive-heart warning.”
This is either a typo or Philadelphia’s response to the churches.

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News Item: “A Ku Klux Klan group is attempting to join Georgia’s ‘Adopt-a-Highway’ program for litter removal, creating a quandary for state officials.”
Quandary is right.
It isn’t every day you see trash picking up litter.

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News Headline: “Obama on Republicans: ‘You can pretty much put their campaign on a tweet.’ “
Which is a nifty little put-down.
And, also, why the Republicans might win.

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QT News Presented Without Comment:
The new Saudi Arabian TV reality show Buraydah’s Got Talent does not allow women to perform and forbids music, singing and dancing.

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QT News You Can Use:
M.B., a Chicago reader, wants you to know, as long as we are on the subject of Saudi Arabia, that “because a camel processes water so efficiently, its urine is the consistency of syrup and its dung is so dry that it can be gathered as soon as it falls and used as fuel for campfires.”

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News Headline: “Peed into the win?”
QT again apologizes in behalf of the nation’s headline writers.
In the race for a San Diego, Calif., judgeship between prosecutor Garland Peed and birther Republican Gary Kreep:
Peed continues to hold a lead of a few hundred votes, but as the count of absentee ballots continues, it could still be Kreep up from behind.

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The Case for Zero Tolerance of Modern School Administrators:
The principal of P.S. 90 Edna Cohen School in New York City banned the song “God Bless the USA” from a children’s show because, according to parents, she worried it might “offend other cultures.”

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News Headline: “Man attacks girlfriend with wasabi-covered pants.”
There is probably an interesting story behind that.

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QT Summer Travel Advisory:
Seventy-one days remain until the Finnish World Air Guitar Championships in Oulu.

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News Headline: “Despite victory, Cubs could be headed for franchise-worst mark.”
R.J. McIntyre, a Las Vegas reader, writes:
“Is there any known cure for being afflicted with Cub fever – 60 (plus a few) years of it?”
No.
Just be thankful it’s a low-grade fever.

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From the QT Archive of Knowledge:
+ Thor’s hammer was named Mjolnir.
+ Every fifth person you see on the street is thinking of revenge.

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News Headline:  “Scientists stunned by vast arctic bloom.”
News Headline:  “Mayan calendar stuns scientists.”
News Headline:  “Possum find stuns scientists”
Do our scientists stun too easily?

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Beware the ides of National Fresh Fruit and Vegetable Month.

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QT Grammar R Us Seminar on the English Language:
News Item: ”… Obama’s neutral stance contrasts with his fulsome praise of Cameron… ."
News Item: ”… Cameron offered such fulsome praise of the president that…"
QT’s dictionaries define “fulsome” as “offensively flattering or insincere” or “excessively or insincerely lavish.”
Things must be a trickier with Great Britain than we thought.
There should never be a “from” in front of “whence,” by the way.

Write to QT at qt@wbez.org
QT appears Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays.