Fake news by Andy Borowitz

OTTAWA — Canadian immigration officials have reported a huge increase in the number of requests for Canadian citizenship in the past 24 hours, with more than 55 million such inquiries pouring in since late Tuesday night. Of those 55 million requests, well over 99.99 percent of them came from U.S. citizens, with a particularly large number coming from residents of Florida and Kentucky.

Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister Lawrence Cannon said that he was “flabbergasted” by the 55-million-plus requests for Canadian citizenship, adding that it was difficult to pinpoint the precise reasons for the staggering increase. “My only theory is that after the 2010 winter Olympics, the sport of curling is finally starting to catch on,” he said.

He cautioned, however, that it is impossible to know exactly what is sparking the sudden interest in America’s frozen neighbor to the north: “People answering our immigration hotline say that it is hard to understand many of the American callers because they are sobbing uncontrollably.”

In other news, responding to Tuesday’s election returns, Rep. John Boehner, R-Ohio, told reporters, “I’m so stoked, I just turned the tanning bed up to 11.”

But former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin struck a more somber note, saying that despite several key victories, “it was a tough night for tea party voters because it involved so much math.”

Fox News Estimates Jon Stewart’s Crowd at Seven People

WASHINGTON — The Fox News Channel reported today that the turnout for Jon Stewart’s “Rally to Restore Sanity” was underwhelming at best, with Fox sources estimating the total turnout at seven people.

“Our total count includes Stewart, (Stephen) Colbert, and what appear to be a few of their friends and relatives,” said Fox anchor Shepard Smith. “This has to be a smaller crowd than they were expecting.”

But immediately after Fox broadcast what it described as “live coverage” of the rally showing a nearly deserted National Mall, viewers began to point out irregularities in the images being shown.

First of all, one viewer noticed that the live coverage of the rally was actually being broadcast a full 12 hours before the rally began. Second, an expert identified the supposedly “live footage” of today’s rally as file footage from a Sunday in 1997 when the Mall was completely shut down for reseeding.

Even in the face of such evidence, Fox stood by its story, with Fox host Glenn Beck pointing out that the seven people in attendance were “largely elitists.”

“I was struck by how many correctly spelled signs there were,” Beck said. “That’s not my America.”

Award-winning humorist, television personality and film actor Andy Borowitz is author of “The Republican Playbook.”