To Hell With The Chief

I'll have to say that things aren't looking so rosy for Bush right now. These wacky Iraqi wars just don't quite pan out for the Bush family. Junior's version of Desert Storm is going to hell in a sand-basket, gas is going for about the same price as Johnny Walker Red, and the swarthy masses are lining up to join Al Queda like there's no tomorrow. It's true, I saw a deal on CNN - everybody and their goat wants to join up. These guys have got nothing better to do? Supposedly for every one Al Queda guy that we nail - seven more show up, talkin' about "Show me how to kill America." I guess there's so many of them they're having to turn 'em away. It's like, "People, people people - of course we appreciate the loyalty, but we really haven't got anything for you right now. Tell you what - put together a resumé and check back with us in 6 months - okay now move it along. Go blow something up if you want, but you're gonna have to move it along - thanks a bunch - Next."

I hate to admit it, but I'm changing my tune on the war. It was all well and good there for a while. The Caissons were Rollin' we were kickin' ass - in fact things were going so remarkably smooth that it was almost as though we had a plan. But let's face it, there hasn't been five words of good news come out of Iraq since Saddam crawled out of his spider hole. And Bush, I don't know - once a man's lost your trust and respect, it's a hard thing to win back. He just seems goofy now - I'm having alot of trouble taking him seriously. To me, Bush seems more and more like that alcoholic uncle who you still poke fun at for that one Christmas-time when he puked all over the Nativity scene. Every day the news is all about "5 soldiers killed here, 5 killed there," and now we got Bush's 5-step plan to turn Iraq back over to the Iraqis. Gimme a break - it's never gonna work? I think I have a good plan: Step 1. Get everybody the hell out of the desert, (2.) Leave those knuckleheaded prison guards locked up in Abu Graib, (3.) Nuke every country that even seems the least bit shifty and (5.) Plead Insanity and/or blame it on France?

You'll have to excuse what may simply turn out to be a temporary lapse in my better judgment, but I'm just so pissed-off at those lousy friggin' prison guards right now that I can't type straight. I apologize for the insanity, but that Abu Graib deal has just ruined the whole war for me.

I mean how inspiring was it to hear the story of the Pro Football player who put aside his lucrative career and laid down his life for what he thought was good and right and worth defending? It brought tears to my eyes - the war felt good again for a few days. What a slap in the face it was when a few days later we had to hear about the freakin' "Odd Squad" at Abu Graib. It's just such a drag. I mean why did we take over Iraq in the first place? If you subtract the Weapons of Mass Destruction bullshit from the equation; our reason for going over there and blowing up a country, was to stop bad-guys from torturing and terrorizing and killing innocent people? For the love of God - did those Abu Grabass freaks not get the memo?

To be honest, for a while there I wasn't all that clear about what happened, because I couldn't bear to watch or listen to it. I just saw brief glimpses of naked, hairy bodies in a pile that looked like maybe Ron Jeremy, Jeraldo Rivera, a couple Belly Dancers and a Koala Bear. I couldn't make out what was going on in that Gomer Pile and quite honestly I didn't want to know. I was hoping maybe it was just a hairy little game of naked twister, that got outta hand? I try not to watch too much news. But I had to research it so I'd know what I was talking about and sadly it turns out that the Perverted Persian Pile and the proud thumbs up was the least of the torment, weirdness and humiliation.

When I first fired-up the search engine I honestly hoped I was just going to find reports of a few goofy shenanigans, "okay so the Girls Went Wild one night - hell they deserve to let off a little steam have a Frat party?" Unfortunately, the fact is the "Odd Squad" committed all kinds of reprehensible violations of human rights. There was no end to it - torture, all kind of awful sexual business, trust me you don't want the details. It was enough to fill this jaded journalist's heart with Shock and Awe. It was just heartbreaking to see these idiots offer the Muslim people all the evidence they'll ever need to reinforce and validate their inherent opinion of the West. "The Great Satan. The Infidel, Imperialist Pig-Dogs." Sing along if you know the words. Complete with image after image of photographic proof that anyone with a computer can access.

What're y'gonna do? Here's what I'm gonna do! Y'all don't know this, but when I'm not writing my little jokes, I'm actually an up-and-coming star in the rap world - you mighta heard my rap name, "Lil' Bone?" I got an album coming out on an Independent label later this summer called "Motion of the Ocean" and I just wanted to give y'all a little taste - y'know - let the healin' begin. Yo - it comes atcha a little somethin' like this:

Hey Yo Islam bro - That Abu Graib be wack/
Sorry 'bout that nasty ho who piled your homeys in a stack/
I know we look like Infidels/ just like the Great Satan/
How bout we let you keep their ass/ forget about the hatin'/

Whassup with all this bitterness, runs deeper than the Nile/
I say we put some Yanni on and chill-out for a while/
I say we put some Yanni on and chill-out for a while/

(If you sing the last reprise slowly to the closing melody of "Give Said the Little Stream" It might bring a little tear to your eye.)

To be serious again just for a moment, I'd just like to extend my personal thanks to the "Odd Squad" for completely disgracing our country, our mission, every soldier who's risked life and limb over there, and while I'm at it, Christianity in general. Thanks guys. And I'll tell you what - if I was the father of a child who'd lost their life in the Middle East, I believe I'd want to thank you in person. Goodness. The world is turning into a big round rubix cube with no solution. How puzzling it is, to try to arrive at an appropriate punishment for someone who's committed a crime against close to a billion people? All I can say to those of you who are guilty for taking part in the things that happened at Abu Graib is "shame on you disgusting bastards. If you get bored, you play poker."

I'm sure George W. Bush is awful darn proud of 'em - they've pretty much succeeded in doing for his Presidential campaign what Ralph Nader is doing to John Kerry's. For those of you paying attention there's been some pretty nutty stuff going on over here as well. For example, Al Gore has completely lost his marbles. The Right Wing Radioheads have been broadcasting this bizarre speech Gore made a few weeks ago. He must've had one too many diet pills on an empty stomach, because at recent fundraising dinner he went ballistic. Good Lord, he called for the resignation of every member of the Bush Administration from Rumsfeld to Powell to the Whitehouse Custodian - "look at that waxy yellow build-up? It's a disgrace - where's the shine, the luster?" He was serious too, just full of some sort of zany overzealous fervor. In retrospect, no matter how bad G.W turns out to be (which I'll be going over in a moment) I still say we're lucky we wound up with Bush, especially now that Gore has proven that for Ten Thousand Dollars and a hearty slab of Prime Rib, he's willing to go insane.

By way of diverting our attention toward more positive aspects of the war, it's making the news now that we've finally found a weapon of mass destruction! It appears as if they've found a canister of the evil nerve gas Sarin. (I thought we got rid of that stuff at Mount Doom in the Return of the King?) I know I'm running long here, but I'll try to sum up. Bush has taken a nasty beating - Clarke's book, Franken's book, O'Neill's book and all this Condoleezza Rice Baloney, but you're going to be hearing more and more about something that's probably going to prove to be the coupe de grace for Dubya. I think he's doomed to be a one-termer just like Daddy. You know the film maker Michael Moore (you might remember his somewhat inappropriate anti-Bush acceptance speech after winning the Oscar for Bowling For Columbine). Well he's got a new film out called Fahrenheit 9/11 that just won the Palme d'Or (first place) at the Cannes Film Festival. The film is basically a step-by-step indictment of how badly George W. bungled the war on terrorism (even suggesting complicity with Bin Laden) as well as outlining how false and reprehensible his justifications were for attacking and sending troops to Iraq.

I guess one of the most talked-about scenes in the film shows that Bush remained in a Florida school classroom, reading a book to children for seven minutes after learning of the attack on the World Trade Center - until aides finally had physically urge him to leave. I think the deal with this is that you just don't mess with George W when he's showing off his book-learnin'. (Just on a side note - I really do hate to see Bush fall into disgrace - St. George would a made a cool name for a town).

Of course, the first thing that leapt to my mind is that the Cannes Film Festival is held in France and we all know how fond the French are of the U.S. and the war and so forth. Conversely, however only one of the judges on the Cannes panel was French. Not to mention that the film is the first Documentary to ever win (what is probably the second most prestigious award a film can receive) and it's been widely reported that the film received the longest standing ovation in Cannes history. Now it would be nice to just write this off as a bunch of French sour grapes, but it runs deeper. Check it out. Miramax owns the movie, but Disney owns Miramax, and darned if the governor of Florida isn't GW's Brother Jeb. It must be some awfully damning stuff in that movie because Jeb threatened Disney CEO Michael Eisner that it the film ever sees theatrical release in the U.S. the little tax breaks that Florida has historically offered Disneyworld (we're talking tens of millions) will go bye bye. It makes a fella wonder what the hell kind of Mickey Mouse world we live in don't it?