From the July 2004 Idaho Observer:

Truth or satire?

66 Percent of U.S. Citizens Object To Torture In Nonetheless Frightening Poll

En route to Denver to support our friend Rick Stanley, Ingri and I spent the night with our nephew in Boulder. Having never been there, Isaac took us on foot for a field trip of his culturally vivid town. During our travels, we encountered the office of “The Onion.” It was Sunday and The Onion was closed, which was a momentary disappointment for two big reasons: First, all independent publishers love to talk to each other and, secondly, because I never knew The Onion was a weekly hardcopy publication from Boulder, Colorado. For the last eight years we have been periodically publishing examples of The Onion's brilliantly on-point satire when one crosses our electronic media path, but it never occurred to us that The Onion was a real newspaper printed on real paper. (DWH)

From the June 17-23, 2004 edition of The Onion:

CAMBRIDGE, MA -- The results of a USA Today-CNN-Gallup poll released Monday shows that 66 percent of Americans object to the use of torture during times of war. “We can be proud that the majority of citizens stand against our military personnel's use of torture,” Harvard statistician William Dover said. “And it's somewhat comforting that, of the 34 percent of Americans who advocate torture, 72 percent said it should be used only when other methods of discipline have failed.”

Reassuringly, 97 percent of Americans were against the torture of U.S. soldiers or citizens by non-Americans. (Emphasis added).

You can find more examples of The Onion's superb satire online at www.theonion.com. To receive a free sample copy, send a SASE 9 x 12 envelope with $1.50 postage to: The Onion, 700 N. Colorado Blvd. #314, Denver, CO 80206.