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broompire 2.0

(The World) In a surprisingly swift stroke, the eminent editors of noxious newbroom, marvellous Mike Flatley and brilliant Brian Cullen, announced they were about to really rule the whole world.
Being avidly aware of fierce feelings against anyone announcing the rulership of the world lying in their hands, they decided to go by duly democratic election and just made sure they were the

only cool candidates on the list – or, more precisely, the only candidates.
Now they want to find a way to have elections on the same day in every state in the world, even in the few non-democratic ones, and take over rule of the world. It might stop all these personnel merry-go-rounds. Who knows.
(MF)

Fine Flowers for Friends

(The World) The flower-sellers from all over the whole world worry about selling fewer flowers than ever before for Valentine’s Day.
The evil economic crisis came at a very bad point in time for flower-sellers. Now countless couples are counting their cents to find out which flowers are the cheapest and still pretty, eh, pretty. Roses are rarely cheap, thus the red roses usually given

in big bunches will probably stay in shops. Maybe some specimen will be sold, but certainly fewer than ever. Many people might resort to reliable spring flowers like lily of the valley (not in bloom yet, but you can dig them out and put them in a pot) or crocuses (ditto) or snowdrops (ditto). It might seem strangely bleak to give a brown pot of soil, but it is the thought that counts! (MF)

 

newbroom-e-gram

February 1 – By incident, we realized that February is a very short month, in fact three days shorter than January. AND we realized it’s the month of Valentine’s Day… How could we forget about that?
February 4 – It might be a shorter month, but we get all involved in our plans to take over the world.
February 7 – Old Wives’ Carnival, as they say in the Rhineland. Which means that women go wild and cut off every man’s ties. Sounds fun.
February 9 – Another minister in Germany resigns. See below for more.
February 10 – Carnival Sunday, and a lot of parades take place. It is VERY cold but sunny, so that’s fine. We have our own parade of ink pots wandering across the desks. Looks great and they are screaming “Go broompire, go!”
February 11 – Rose Monday. Another of those carnival traditions involves getting drunk as a skunk and attend several

supposedly funny meetings of people all dressed up and ordered to laugh. We don’t quite see the point, but then, Muggles are weird anyway.
FEBRUARY 11 – THE POPE RESIGNED! At first we thought it was another misplaced Muggle joke, but apparently he feels too old for his job. We wonder if we are eligible for pope-ship. Cf. below for more.
February 13 – It’s Ash Wednesday, by the way, and the last day Mike has to buy a gift for Miranda. Luckily he can order flowers just as well as choose them himself.
February 14 – Valentine’s Day. Widely ignored, because we have more important matters on our hands. Pope-ship etc.
February 20 – Another week to go. We will manage. We will be dead on our feet, but we’ll manage.
February 28 – Hm, we did finish, but we did not get to any agreement on elections held everywhere at the same time. Wonder why…

 

The Muggle Camp: I’m not a Muggle - Get me out of here!

(Bury St. Dorothy) What is done here seems to be ‘en vogue’ in the world at large: Whenever you realize that something is too much for you to bear, you say the magical words ‘I’m not a Muggle – Get me out of here!’ Although the Pope certainly did not use this phrase (but don’t quote us on this as our Latin is not too good), he must have thought it when he announced his withdrawal from his office as Pope.
However, back to our worldly candidates here: please do remember that you had to make a choice namely to vote for the candidate to leave the show. We had asked you to send in owls telling us which one you want to see go home again. Besides the couple of requests asking us to send some of them to the moon, there were some earnest owls, too.
It’s only natural that you will want to know who won this sort of election. As a matter of fact, you decided that Madam Malkin has to leave again. Let’s pass the microphone on to Leslie and Harriet.
“Hi you out there! And hi Leslie.” “Hi Harriet, so here we are again. Yes, we are here again but unfortunately, one candidate is no longer here.” “That is true, Leslie. Madam Malkin was voted for.” “And believe it or not we have the honour to be the first to talk to her.” “Madam Malkin, naturally we think that it is a pity that you already have to leave the show, but how do you feel about it?” “Well, I’m quite taken aback by this voting. I had thought that I had more fans as I have so many customers.” “Possibly, they want to make sure that you return to your shop and provide all the Magical world with your latest fashion.”
”You saved her day, definitely, Harriet. Good job!” “Thanks Leslie, could you tell us how our show will continue?” “Certainly, once our candidates have moved into the house they will have to put up Ikea cases for their clothes. Still, before they have to take care of the task, we’ll have a look at the house.” “The house, yes, how could we best describe it.” “First of all, from the outside it looks a little bit smallish.” “That’s true, however, from the inside there is loads of room.” “Enough space for all candidates to have their own room plus bathroom.” “The kitchen, on the other hand, must be shared by all.” “In the house you also find a cosy common room evoking good or bad moments of those good old days back at Hogwarts.” “Attached to the house is a garden which has to be taken care of, too.” “Yes, I would say, that’s basically it.”
”Now, let’s have a look how our candidates fare.” “There are 11 individual rooms with 11 individual cases.” “The only problem is that these cases are not put up yet.” “Well, we’ll see whether it really is a problem…”

 ”These d**n screws. There must be at least half a dozen in all shapes and sizes!” “Uoh, Former Minister of Magic Fudge seems to have a small problem, there, what about his good friend Dolores?” “Ouch, you cursed case that was my toe!” “Doesn’t sound too good there, either, Leslie, what do you say?” “Well, I’m pretty impressed by her astounding alliteration: cursed case! Wonderful.”
”A manual, that is nice. Where are the instructions? Only pictures. Maybe Muggles aren’t able to read. Interesting thought…” “Arthur hasn’t even started yet.” “But at least he understood in which way Muggles work!” “Stubby, on the other hand has already finished.” “Well, it’s not exactly according to the instructions.” “Creativity rules!” “Do you think it will last till the end of the show?” “Who knows how long the show will be for Stubby!”
”Haste, Mobby, haste. You’re the slowest house elf I’ve ever seen!” “I wonder whether Lucius’ method is going conform with the rules?” “No magic is allowed. Well, we’ll see what the audience writes about it!” “Talking about writing, let’s have a look at Rita’s room.” “A must be put into B, but D must be connected with E and C goes somewhere in the middle and all at the same time or is it the other way round?”
”I can feel a slight confusion there.” “Me too.” “Magical Me too.” “Honestly, this is worse than fight a fully grown giant. But I won’t give up, I will show this case who is the best wizard in the world.” “From the best wizard to the best Quidditch player.” “Finished.” “That was quick!”
”The Lady of the books is next.” “I wish you were a shelf. I’ve put up loads of them already, but a case and then this illiterate manual. Horrible, simply horrible. Where has all the culture gone?” “If you refer to Ludo next implying that he has some sort of connection to culture, I’m gonna scream.” “Big jump to Ludo.” “Fixed connections are no good. In times like these you must be flexible and a case should always represent the attitude of its own so most flexible is the word, is the two words, actually.”
”Finally, Miranda.” “What was I supposed to do again? And what are all these boxes here fore. Funny there should be no case for my clothes. Strange place. I wonder where I am. And who are all these people in this house?” “Well, may she will have to make do without a case for the next couple of months.”
“Dear audience, now is your turn. Please send in owls – no cases please, we will make sure they have something to put their clothes in…” “…and if it’s just Muggle carrier bags.” “It’s your turn now. Enjoy!” “See you next month!”
Make sure not to miss the next episode! (HKS&LPG)

Pope Benedict XVI about to Withdraw from His Office

(The world, however, in particular the Christian respectively the Catholic one, you could also refer to this place simply as Rome) Monday before Lent, Pope Benedict XVI announced his retirement just when all important Monday before Lent processions had started and no last minute changes were possible.
The reason for this choice of date seems obvious, hwoever, the reason for this retreat seems to lie in the mist as it is claimed be for reasons of health or rather absence of health. The big question now is what happens to a retired Pope.
Naturally, there is more than one possibility for someone like Josef Ratzinger formerly known as the Pope: The choice we would like best is the following, the former Pope and his former secretary get married in San Francisco. This is, of course, impossible as the Pope is not allowed to do any transatlantic flights. As there were some retreats from higher political offices during the past months we wonder whether the former Pope will have the right to get an office and a secretary as well as a car and a chauffeur not to forget the bodyguards.

Another interesting question is whether the Pope will be cardinal again, some sort of demoting process. Interestingly enough, we were told that he stays Bishop of Rome. Maybe it would be nice to find something new for him. If we think about the Duchess of Cambridge for example, something nice might come to our minds.
One other thing which was already settled is whether he will take part in the next election. The Vatican announced that only cardinals younger than 80 years are allowed to take part in the election and consequently are allowed to be voted for. Unfortunately, this also means that our favourite candidate, Desmond Tutu, is not part of the game, but he would have been Anglican as well. Maybe the catholic church should be more open on this topic....
Obviously the next couple of weeks and months will offer some interesting insight into the doings and not-doings of the Catholic Church. Usually, we would ask you to keep your fingers crossed, but as it is a matter of christian religion we would prefer if you said your prayers. God bless you! (All)

 

Another One Bites The Dust

(Germany) So here we are again, another German minister left office. This is the fourth one to resign since the last election in September 2009, and that’s not counting all the shuffle for office going on. Let us have a look back:
2009, November: The first one to resign was the minister for work and social issues, who left office because of irregularities in his first term of office as minister for the defence just weeks after the last election. The former minister for families became his successor, and a new minister for families stepped in.
2011, March: The next one to leave office was the young minister for the defence who cheated in his PhD-thesis. Consequently, the minister for affairs of the interior stepped in, Germany got a new minister for the interior and that was that – or so they thought.
2011, May: A very short period of relative calm followed, but was cruelly broken up by inner-party struggles of one of the coalition partners. Only eight weeks after the last re-structuring, yet another merry-go-round-like structuring took place which

effectively uprooted the minister for economy, the minister for health issues and not least the vice-chancellor.
2012, May: After a lost election in his home “Bundesland”, the minister for the environment resigned.
2013, February: And now another minister had to resign because of cheating in her PhD-thesis, so a new minister for – now read carefully – science and education (sic!) has to come.
What we have not mentioned so far is that two presidents got lost during the last four years. Which means that, apart from the chancellor herself, only six out of seventeen ministers stayed in their offices. In just one period between elections, mind you! That must be a record number of restructuring.

What we should consider, therefore, is a complete re-structuring of the whole government. We are SICK of all these new faces and always having to regroup our news archives for new names and so on. Just get them all out and get a whole new bunch in, and that’s fine by us. (BC)

 

New broompire show in preparation

(Magical World) broompire’s very successful (and eventful) shows, the award-winning Ministers Got Talent and the highly amusing Muggle Camp, were a sure sign for new ventures to come. And rightly so: Now broompire spokesperson Isandra Convallaria today announced that they were preparing a new show.
nB: Miss Convallaria, you were sent to newbroom to talk to us about the latest show to be aired by broompire. What can you tell us?
IC: Well, first of all, the new show will be very special since it is totally different from its predecessors. Next year, it will be all for love!
nB: How appropriate for a spring edition.
IC: Yes, it is. That is why our bosses,  

 Mr Flatley and Mr Cullen, decided to go public already. Besides, we are in need of participants. For this time, let me tell you, it won’t be celebrities put to the test!
nB: So it is not to be a casting show like MGT?
IC: It is a kind of casting show, but not like MGT, no. We are not looking for a new minister for magic, but for a wife.
nB: Could you please elaborate on this surprising concept?
IC: Of course. You see, Mr Flatley is happily married and has been so for several years. But Mr Cullen stubbornly remains single, and that is why we thought up the concept of “Mr Magic Wants a Wife”.
nB: “Mr Magic Wants a Wife”?		 Honestly?
IC: Yes, honestly. Mr Brian Cullen is looking for a special someone to share his life with, and since he does not seem able to come to grips by himself, we need to help him. So my mission is to ask you out there, single ladies, to apply for the show. 15 of you will be invited to participate. Please send a CV and a photo and make sure not to bewitch either. Please do not bother to send love potions; we have the very best potioneers to detect them.
nB: You read it, dear readers, so if you are interested in dating one of the most famous and definitely one of the wealthiest magical bachelors in England, please contact broompire in Diagon Alley.
(ALL)

 

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Might be too much or too little rather for you, Severus!

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