What's in a name?

Plenty, if you're planning to name something appropriate after Drunky McStagger. In this case, it's a sewage treatment plant in San Francisco.

They're the Presidential Memorial Commission of San Francisco, but don't let the serious name fool you. The group's intentions are in the gutter: They want to rename the Oceanside Water Pollution Control Plant the George W. Bush Sewage Plant come January, when the next president is sworn in.

During the inauguration, the group also wants supporters to participate in a "synchronized flush"- a way to send a gift to the renamed plant, which supporters say, would be a "fitting monument to this president's work."

It sounds like a harmless joke, or maybe a college civics lesson gone awry. But the handful of friends who dreamed this up over beers one night say they have already collected 8,500 signatures in support of the plan - 1,300 more than the minimum needed to put the question to city voters in November. When they submit the signatures in July, election workers will have to verify that at least 7,168 are from registered city voters for the measure to qualify for the ballot.

"It's a very simple yes or no question, and there's no real fiscal impact- just the cost of relettering the sign in front of the plant," said organizer Brian McConnell. "This is the way the democratic process is supposed to work, even though it's a silly idea in some people's eyes."

Silly might be an understatement. Howard Epstein, chair of the San Francisco Republican Party, called the measure an abuse of the system and "loony bin direct democracy." He vowed to "use all means" to defeat the measure if it qualifies for the ballot. That includes those very expensive glossy mailers, he said.

"There's no use other than to make these nutcases feel good," Epstein said. "It's typical San Francisco crazies."

Still, most people approached on a recent Sunday seemed open to the idea, even if they all didn't stop to sign the petition.

Bright Winn, a San Francisco plumber, enthusiastically gave his signature to the cause.

"(Bush) has always done well for the affluent of America, and anyone that does well for the affluent should be named for the effluent," he said.

I don't have a problem with this. I mean, if Condi Rice can have a ship named for her, then why not a sewage treatment plant for Drunky? Oh, and extra points for the affluent/effluent pun ...

According to the article, there's already an elementary school in Stockton, Calif., named for Drunky, and I know that his dad has at least one high school named for him in Texas, plus Houston's Intercontinental Airport. I'm not sure what if anything is named for Bill Clinton ... but we certainly have plenty of stuff named for Ronald Reagan, who himself really only deserved a sewage treatment plant ... I know I for one can't refer to Washington National Airport by its "official" name, and Florida's Turnpike doesn't, for me, carry the name of that addled wingnut figurehead, either.

But the "George W. Bush Sewage Treatment Plant" really does have a nice ring to it. It would be a tad ironic, however, to have something named for Drunky that is designed to clean things up.