The tradition here at MCM is to honor all the important holidays, with none so important as April 1. In the five and a half years I've been publishing this blog, the April 1 post has become a challenge - how can we top the previous year?

Last year's post about Coventry acquiring UnitedHealthGroup was reportedly the cause of some consternation at the afore-mentioned firm, which was forced to issue a press release denying the deal (I'm kidding).

This year's effort generated much good cheer among many readers, as even a few who take issue with some of my opinions got a good laugh (Allen you weren't alone).

Unfortunately, there's always someone who doesn't think before passing on the post as truth, resulting in a bit of embarrassment. The adults are a bit chagrined, and a bit wiser, and take the heat in good spirit, realizing the spoof is all in good fun.

But there's always someone without a sense of humor. Late on the fateful day, a senior policy person at a conservative-group-that-shall-remain-nameless sent me an email which read in part "Is this really true? If so, it is extremely explosive and could quickly become a national story. Can you cite the specific language in the law just signed by Obama and the relevant NHS language that leads you to your conclusion? Thank you."

I responded back that no, it wasn't true.

Evidently my correspondent is afflicted with a serious case of SOHDS (sense of humor deficit syndrome), as he (yep, it was a male) shot back "That is extremely unfortunate and not at all funny. I had run it past several very senior people who were looking forward to confirmation of its veracity."

I'll bet.

(In retrospect, maybe I should've come up with some wild story about how this was in a Presidential signing statement that had not yet been made public, and quoted actual verbiage...)