At New York's Kennedy airport today, an individual later discovered to
be a school teacher was arrested trying to board a  flight while in
possession of a ruler, a protractor, a setsquare, a slide rule, and a
calculator.

At a morning press conference, Attorney general John Ashcroft said he
believes the man is a member of the notorious al-gebra movement. He is
being charged by the FBI with carrying weapons of math instruction.

"Al-gebra is a fearsome cult,", Ashcroft said. "They desire average
solutions by means and extremes, and sometimes go off on tangents in a
search of absolute value. They use secret code names like "x" and "y"
and refer to themselves as "unknowns", but we have determined they
belong to a common denominator of the axis of medieval with coordinates
in every country.

"As the Greek philanderer Isosceles used to say, there are 3 sides to
every triangle," Ashcroft declared.

When asked to comment on the arrest, President Bush said, "If God had
wanted us to have better weapons of math instruction, He would have
given us more fingers and toes."

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