Study Says 250 Million Americans Are Bots

Wash, DC - (Nov. 13) - Roughly 250 million Americans are actually bots, and pacifying their growing ranks has strained the national entertainment delivery system, researchers said yesterday.

The current yearly cost of property damage and lost lives attributable to bots who have not been kept adequately amused, was put at $666 billion, and will rise as more and more people give up their souls and become bots, the study by researchers at Yale Divinity Law School, said.

People with minds and souls, it turns out, don't need or want "entertainment." But bots must receive a steady flow of mindless, soulless stimulation, or what they have instead of DNA, starts to eat itself. Often resulting in incidents where contraband-stuffed pickup trucks are driven through 12th-story plate-glass windows at top speed, for virtually no discernible reason whatsoever.

Some analysts claim that this is why everything sucks, while other analysts claim that people have chosen to be re-cast as bots because everything sucks.

Whatever the first cause, a spokesman for media giant Disney-Warner-Murdoch confirmed how really tough it is to keep these assholes quiet.

"It's really tough," he said, "To keep these assholes quiet."

However, like many other analysts, Dr. Rebecca Kramer, the Yale Divinity Law professor who directed the study, believes that, because a bot is pure software, it cannot really be called an asshole in any meaningful way.

"Because a bot is pure software," she said, "It can't, you know, really be called an asshole in any meaningful way. You see, I was brought up in the tradition that believes it takes a mind and a soul to be an asshole."

A spokesman for the recently re-elected president of the bots said, "The bots are resting now, and gathering their strength for the final assault. But, when the day comes at last, they will be ready."

When accused of being responsible either for the fact that everything sucks or the fact that 250 million American people are bots, or the fact that these 250 million bots are not being adequately entertained, Bot-Master#1 wannabe, Ted Turner, responded, "Look, asshole, I'm shovelling shit as fast as I can. I'm givin' 'em sports, I'm givin' 'em news, I'm givin' 'em exercise, I'm givin' 'em classics, I'm givin' 'em color, I'm givin' 'em black and white, I'm givin' 'em environmentalism, I'm givin' 'em a show, and me an Rupert's givin' 'em another show. Now how much more do you waaant me to do??"

Study author, Kramer, in the Journal of the Bot Pacification Association, wrote: "The sheer number of American bots and the entertainment costs they incur have reached a threshold whereby both bullshit providers and policymakers are not only facing a time when they run out of bullshit itself, but they must also deal with how to transform more of the same old bullshit spread thinner into a history-wide branded content product-stream that can continue to meet the needs of bots across multiple eternities."

The study, which was supported by a grant from the Hide-the-Salami Foundation, found that bots account for 99 percent of Bruce Willis fans, 99 percent of Der Ahhhnold's fans, and 98 percent of Pavement fans.

By 2028, the study estimated, 106% of the population will be bots and, to keep them entertained, new mega-heroes will need to be created on a daily basis, who will endlessly eat each other and spit each others' bones down the remains of each others' throats.