Raelian Membership Drive

Friday's claim by the Quebec-based Raelian sect that it has produced the first human clone read more like a National Enquirer headline than a legitimate claim of scientific fact.

According to the claim by resident nutcase spokesmodel, Brigitte Boisselier, chief executive of Clonaid, the 3.2-kilogram baby girl, named Eve, was born somewhere outside the United States at 11:55 a.m. on Thursday by Caesarean section. Yes, that's right sportsfans, born right here on Earth, not Krypton or some other galaxy far, far away. My first hope upon hearing the news was that maybe the Mets could get to work on cloning a Babe Ruth or two before spring training and if not the Babe, at least Ted Williams might still be unfrozen and made available.

Of course, this outrageous claim did not come provided with its own evidence. No two-headed baby, no arthritic sheep, no nuttin'. Just this weird-looking woman with her off-kilter French-born accented English telling the world that her psycho ward crew of alien-abducted publicity zealots have created a human clone by removing the nucleus from an egg of the woman -- a 31-year-old American -- and merged the altered egg with one of her skin cells. The DNA from the mother's skin cell took over direction of the egg. According to Dr. Screwball, the baby is an identical copy of the mother. No immediate word on when "Eve" will be released to assume control of planet Earth and begin turning us all into glassy-eyed robots but then again, a cheap gimmick designed to garner maximum publicity for an outlandish cult will need at least 8 or 9 days of intense world media speculation before everyone begins to realize this is just a rewrite of The Matrix where the majority of unborn humans are bred as a food supply for the elect few whose destiny it is to be born. Vast fields of human embryos and unborn children hang from tree-like structures waiting to be 'juiced' and liquefied. The resulting 'drinks' are then pumped intravenously into the veins of the chosen few.

''These are totally irresponsible experiments, and these people are totally without scientific credibility,'' said Rudolf Jaenisch, a professor of biology and an internationally reknowned transgenic researcher at MIT's Whitehead Institute. ''Their tales are fantastic.''

Fantastic is right. Based in Valcourt, Quebec, where the sect operates a sort of space alien theme park called UFOland, the Raelians advocate free love and believe that extraterrestials hatched humanity in a laboratory 25,000 years ago and then transplanted the new race to earth. According to Raelian teaching, the aliens explained that humanity had been created through DNA technology and then whisked super-freak and Rael founder, Claude Vorilhon to their planet, where his sexual needs were serviced by female robots and where he met Jesus, Mohammed, and Buddha. When you've gone this crazy, a few unsubstantiated claims about cloning human babies is really just a drop in the bucket.

Not surprisingly, even though the proverbial placenta isn't even dry yet, there is already a clone right's activist group that has popped up like an unclaimed headache, demanding the right of every other nutjob and petty thief on earth to start cloning themselves.

If these Raelians really want us to take them seriously, they're going to have to get the ATF and Janet Reno to storm their compound and kill everyone. Until then, I'm not buying it.