BREAKING NEWS: BASHAR AL-ASSAD EDITION

White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest faced reporters to explain Barack Obama's repeated yet ineffectual assertions over the past three years that Syrian President's Bashar al-Assad's days were numbered.

"President Obama wasn't being feckless, nor did he misspeak," Earnest said. "Al-Assad's days are numbered. We just don't know how many days are left. As you know, times are tough all over, and nobody keeps a job forever. Even when Bill Clinton was president, people died eventually. Look, al-Assad's 48 years old, right? Figure he lives to be, oh, 78. That's 10,950 days he's got left. Because you know he's going to get re-elected every time -- he's really popular, gets, what 97% of the vote. So, yeah, his days are numbered. Ten-thousand nine hundred and fifty."

Continuing on this topic, Earnest added, "He's not the only one. President Obama, his days are numbered. He's got something like 820 days left in the job. That's not something he likes to think about it, but he's facing up to it. My days here are numbered, too, come to think of it. Again, 820 days, give or take." 

Pointing to reporter Chuck Todd, Earnest said, "Your days as host of Meet the Press are numbered, and you haven't even started the job yet. Because someday you'll leave, either by your own accord, keel over like Tim Russert, or get thrown under the bus like David Gregory -- most likely the latter, seeing that you work for NBC. Hey, Lawrence Spivak hosted Meet the Press for 28 years. If you just count the Sundays when it aired, that was 1,344 days. So I don't know what the problem is here."

In unrelated news, American U.N. Ambassador Samantha Power reassured reporters that her recent comments -- "It has manipulated. It has obfuscated. It has outright lied" -- were about Russia's invasion of Ukraine, and not about the Administration's roll-out of Obamacare.

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