Following rumors that the United Nations tapped astrophysicist Mazlan Othman to be the official Ambassador of Earth should we come in contact with intelligent extraterrestrials, the web went into speculation overdrive pondering just what international powers-that-be might know. (Ms. Othman has denied the space promotion.)

The diplomat-to-the-stars story broke at the same time that a group of retired US airmen held a press conference to announce that they all had experiences with giant flying “cigar-shaped” objects that would regularly hover over military bases to observe and mess with US nuke silos.

Following these extraordinary announcements, the human species took a moment to meditate on its place in the vast cosmos. But that was boring so then we went back to what we do best: makin’ movies about internet billionaires, gossipin’ about Lindsay’s latest stab at staying off the sauce, and placin’ bets. Crazy bets! British odds-makers are taking bets that there will be an official announcement from either Barack Obama or David Cameron on the existence of extraterrestrial life within the next year–100-to-1 odds. Bookmaker William Hills has announced he has taken “multiple bets” that mankind will come into contact with real-life E.T.s and K-Paxes.

The odds were even better back in August (80-to-1) when it was revealed that Winston
Churchill covered
up a run-in a RAF aircraft had with a UFO during WWII fearing that the
incident might cause a national panic.

So, do the bookies and UN know something we don’t? Or are they just greedy and an unwieldy bureaucracy respectively? I hope for the former, but I’m betting on the latter.