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SOME OF YOU REGULAR READERS MAY RECALL MY PREVIOUS ITEM DISCUSSING A RUNNING GAG OF STAN FREBERG'S on his 1957 summer-replacement series over CBS Radio as referred to any and all foreigners as "Swiss" so as not to offend anybody, or so the thinking went--and imagining its possibilities as a way to deflate xenophobic egos here in a "morally superior" United States when it comes to immigration and racial issues.

(And speaking of The Stan Freberg Show, all 15 episodes' worth can be heard online thanks to The Old-Time Radio Network @ OTR.net, in case you're interested.

(IMHO, perhaps the best examples of the gag were in episode 11, where, in the opening routine, Our Host referred to his having "Swiss flu" as explained his feeling a bit poorly ... and in a parody of the Western dramas then popular on TV entitled "Bang Gunleigh, U.S. Marshall Fields," where a Mexican-sounding character named Pedro, as "materialises at the end of every episode" without any running story line, explains where he's Swiss when asked if he's Mexican.)

In any case, Your Correspondent has to wonder if this makes such targets of the gag honorary residents of "the Fifth Switzerland," as the Swiss themselves are fond of referring to Swiss Abroad; i.e., the Swiss diaspora, as opposed to to the traditional geolinguistic divisions of Switzerland based on the four official languages thereof (French, German, Italian and Romanch).