Q: Before we get into the cultural questions, can you tell us why you’re selling wheat to traditional Australian markets?
A: It’s a free taste of free trade. The first one’s always free.
Q: Can you explain your destabilization of the Gough Whitlam government in the Seventies?
A: Well, we found out Mr. Whitlam was about to sell our military bases to someone else. I assume he was, otherwise why would he want us out—just to have them for himself? No. So we were forced, with a heavy heart, to assist in a structural adjustment of Mr. Whitlam and rescue Australia from its better judgment.
Q: In your view, was there a culture in Australia in the first place, before the one you’re now Coca-Colonizing?
A: Yes, but of course the immigrants took care of that. They brought their own cultures with them, in case there was not sufficient culture there when they arrived. So they should be no strangers to cultural invasion, although we prefer to think of it as a cultural rescue, just as Columbus rescued the Western Hemisphere from the Red Empire.
But I think Australia has a lot to offer, with its many different ethnic groups all, shall we say, full of ideas about each other. I think of it as a beacon to the world, in this day of increased contact with so many cultures. It’s critical that we develop critiques of each other’s cultures so we can decide which one to keep. And which ones to abridge. A Readers Digest of culture, that’s the goal. For people who don’t have the time or patience to plough through the whole gamut of cultures.
Q: Is it a question of cultural bombardment, or are people lapping it up?
A: To re-spin the question: Does the cultural rescue take the form of a bombardment, through superior financial firepower, aircraft carriers loaded with the latest products made fashionable by the infantry squads of advertisers? Or are we just giving the people what they’ve been informed they want? We’re going to help you out with your archaic expressions by standardizing the International American language. No more of this gooday and goodag nonsense. We’ll teach you to say “Hi, how ya doin?” and “Gee, sure, wow, gosh” and other useful greetings.
And of course, you’ll all buy American, for instance, cars made in America, like Toyota. You already use the dollar, that’s good, though it’s got some funny pictures of foreigners and foreign animals on it, so we’ll have to straighten that out.
You see, traditionally, culture is handed down. It’s not genetic, but it’s in your jeans, so why settle for hand-me-down culture when you can buy new jeans, a new culture, being invented as we speak in the cultural meccas of Wall Street and Disneyland. Yes: Euro-Disney promises to open new vistas of culture to the backward peoples of Europe, mired in traditions that no longer strengthen the cultures there, and steel them for expansion and, well, stealing.
With all the recent divorces in the Royal Family, the question has been raised whether Australia shouldn’t perhaps seek a divorce from the entire family—nay, from the Union Jack itself. And as an American, I think I can say without accusation of conflict of interest that it would be a splendid step forward to see the Stars and Stripes in your flag.
Great Britain is not, after all, so Great as it once was. In fact, it is a little known fact that the sun does now occasionally set on the British Empire. Do you want to be set on? Of course not. So get with it, that is, us. You already get so many benefits from your fortunate geographic position within our cultural orbit (we are neighbors, after all, sharing the same ocean). You have McDonalds, the Today Show—really, how did you ever get along before?
Some have questioned whether our cultural relations are not simply a bombardment. Well, the free market often looks that way, and no one knows why. Look, so you suffer a few losses—Janet Jackson replaces your indigenous Janets with her superior videopower, Kentucky Fried Chicken replaces prawns on the barbie or your local special wombat stew recipe. If people didn’t want their old, worn-out culture replaced with a shiny new one, they could simply refuse to buy. In other words, it’s a freely imposed culture. The markup of the magic place. Pirate Enterprise.
And McDonald’s and Kentucky Fried are just New World Hors D’oeuvres. Don’t get all excited, it could take a while, but we’re looking at renaming all your streets and cities. Well, just the ones that aren’t in English, so you’ve got a head start on some of the other countries around you that are still using outmoded foreign languages. Radical? No—just a modest proposal from a moderate free marketeer. But we’re not talking hegemony here. There’s room for lots of diversity: McDonald’s and Burger King. Levi’s and Guess. Time and Newsweek. There’s room for everyone, just as there was room for the Native Americans right alongside the free marketeers from Spain for at least three or four days in October, 1492.
Look at the former Soviets, tearing down statues of Lenin and putting up statues of Madonna. When you think about it, it’s one planet, we’re one species, so I figure, one culture should just about do it.
A major factor in the election this year is Voter Discontent, or VD. Luckily, all the candidates represent change, including President Bush, who is campaigning against the policies of the present government, saying he will not raise taxes. Ross Perot is widely, grass-rootsly admired for his efficiency. While traditional politicians dither over the use of closed army bases, Perot is expected to move within his first term in office to convert them to concentration camps. Of course, his first term will last 12 years.
The Perot phenomenon continues to amaze the pundits. It appears to be a completely spontaneously orchestrated ground swell. It’s clear that people feel a need for a charismatic leader who can sum up our complex problems with simple, straightforward, understandable scapegoats. Of course he doesn’t have a platform yet—he’s still shopping. And here’s a new statistic on Perot supporters: there’s one born every minute.
Bill Clinton has been accused of shady business deals and conflicts of interest, so at least no one can fault him for lack of political experience.
Confronted with a choice between three evils, many are expected to vote for Clinton, but not inhale.
January 18, 1991 The battle has been joined in the struggle to restore the legitimate government of Kuwait and stop appeasement of the new Hitler. The battle against the recession, that is, the Iraqi forces, went well in its first hours, with no people being killed, only Arabs. As stocks and F15’s soared, victory was quickly declared by McDonnell-Douglas. President Bush, the commander-in-chief of the Coalition forces, which incidentally include some US troops, addressed the nation and declared that Kuwait will once again be free, that is to say, its oil will be cheap.
Demonstrations against the Rescue of Kuwait continue in San Francisco and throughout the world. The crowds have brandished 60s-style placards and sported long hair and outlandish clothing. Police worked overtime to extricate a number of priests, housewives and other sensibly-attired Middle Americans who appear to have wandered into the demonstrations by accident.
There are counter-demonstrators too. At Columbia University, a student from “Students for a Free Kuwait” explained patiently to a network reporter that the 25 pro-Desert Storm demonstrators rather than the 2,000 antiwar activists represented the majority of students because “patriotic students are studying.”
Public reaction to the President’s Meddle East policy has been favorable. Eighty-one percent approve of the President’s handling of the war, although 60% said they would turn against the operation if it affected them personally.
January 24, 1991 Terror rained down on Israel this week after a series of kind and gentle surgical sorties against the Butcher Shop in Baghdad. The Pentagon has announced that it will withhold body counts in order to avoid getting bogged down in controversy. Polls show 82% of Americans think controversy during wartime is a bad thing. A Savannah, Georgia psychologist adds that watching too much war coverage on TV is emotionally unhealthy and advised people who are anxious about the war to “turn off the news.” He added that they should also stay out of the streets and avoid writing letters to the press and politicians.
The media will not be allowed to cover the arrival in the United States of human remains pouches from the war front, according to a spokesman at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware, since people who are not reported to have died should not be reported to have been buried, and since such collateral damage has in the past caused controversy, that is, lower ratings, that is electoral shifts, that is, the end of a war.
President Bush, visibly angered by Iraq’s treatment of kind and gentle American fighter pilots, declared that the whole world is sickened by Saddam’s war crimes, with the possible exception of that part of the world that is sickened by ours. As the war moves towards the phase of ground war, in which actual people with pronounceable names might become casualized, Joint Chiefs Chairman Colin Powell assured the press that America had “brought all the tools in the tool box to the party,” just as we had brought party favors and a cake when relations with Iran were in need of repairs.
The Iraqis have apparently become very skilled at concealing their military hardware, disguising common buildings and even rocks as strategic military targets. As a result, the US has destroyed a number of cardboard tanks and avoided bombing runways that had painted bomb craters on them. An army spokesman said the Iraqi tactic of using $29 worth of camouflage fabric to cover a rock and lure in a $1 million missile was “inscrutable and probably a war crime.”
In the Soviet Union, a new form of apartheid has arisen based on whether an individual possesses rubles or dollars. Those with dollars are called “white people,” an apparent reference to a recent report on the average net worth of white households in the United States—$43,000, as opposed to black households at $4,000 and Hispanics at $5,500. Some civil rights leaders have charged that not much has changed in recent decades, but other analysts counter that the US social order is stable.
The DuPont company has announced the introduction of a line of refrigerants that do not attack the ozone, thus saving the world. A spokesman said the development could have come years earlier but the company was too busy with the cold war to worry about refrigeration. That according to a high company official who declined to state what he was high on.
March 15, 1991 Army officials have revealedthat the biggest battle of the Gulf re-election campaign came after the cease-fire was declared. As American forces prepared to wax some of Iraq’s Apache helicopters, one soldier was recorded as saying “Say ‘hello’ to Allah,” demonstrating the acceptance of diverse cultures so integral to the New World Order.
In Great Britain, the so-called Birmingham Six, who were alleged to have perpetrated a series of pub bombings in that city, have been released after sixteen years in prison, proving once again that the system works.
President Bush is moving to curtail the extensive appeal process in death penalty cases. Opponents of the change argue that death row inmates often had incompetent counsel due to underprivileged backgrounds, but supporters counter that if their lives are underprivileged, they won’t be losing that much.
Secretary of State Baker has told Israel that West Bank settlement is the main obstacle to a peace settlement. Israel claims it is the other way around.
Doctors report they have traced President Bush’s heart problems to Graves’ Disease, which tends to act up if the patient over-exerts himself—for example, by digging more than 100,000 graves.
April 4, 1991 The moderately extreme beating by Los Angeles police officers of motorist and convicted bank robber Rodney King, who danced, smirked and held his buttocks prior to his arrest, has prompted Chief Daryl Gates to issue a warning to officers not to use extreme force on civilians unless they have used the taser gun on the camcorder operator first.
US District Judge Kenneth Ryskamp, President Bush’s nominee for the US Court of Appeals, says that the mauling of several young black men by police dogs may provide a negative reinforcement. “If their only remembrance of the crime was the pain of being bitten,” he said, “they may never steal again.” And one can only hope that if Rodney King’s only remembrance of being stopped is eleven broken bones in his head, he may never hold his buttocks and smirk in front of police again.
The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation has asked the government for permission to borrow an additional $70 billion, but FDIC Chair. L. William Seidman denies the move presages a coming bank collapse. Seidman noted that while it is highly unusual to use a credit line as equity for securing loans, the new funds would be fully collateralized and would not attrit the taxpayer except in the case of a possible though highly speculative full-scale S&L-configured debacle. Or, in lay terms: trust us.
April 18, 1991 Iran has made overtures to Iraq to cooperate in the postwar Gulf. President Bush noted in response that the New World Order is based on cooperation of former enemies with the United States, not with each other. The President said “No one will work harder for a stable peace in the region than we will,” and promised to make sure of it.
The task of reconstructing the Kuwaiti oil fields will fall to San Francisco’s Bechtel Corporation, which has accepted the $100 billion job with a heavy heart. Bechtel has a history of patriotic endeavor in Kuwait going back 40 years, or 10 years longer than the history of Kuwait.
The Kuwaiti rumor pipeline is flowing with stories of assassination attempts on pro-democracy forces. But a spokesman for His Legitimacy the Emir said the situation is under control, adding that he will bring in experts on democracy from El Salvador to consult.
Education Governor PeteWilson has announced cuts of $2 billion from the schools’ budget, commenting, “Education isn’t free—Kuwait is.” The Governor said the debts of beleaguered school districts could not be forgiven because the year’s forgiveness quotient has already been fulfilled in Egypt and Poland. The quick finish to the Gulf War could free up resources to address domestic problems, but the Governor has declined to say whether he will use the tanks against student protesters.
The United States says thatJapan is dragging its feet in assuming responsibility for defense of its own air space and sea lanes, but the Japanese say they fully intend to fulfill their obligations as soon as they find out who they are defending themselves against.
June 7, 1991 The Bureau of Labor Statistics has announced that unemployment remains unchanged at 3.3%. Taking into account the figures on unemployment for black youth, the actual unemployment for most Americans is about 1.1%. The figures are not adjusted for seasonal variation, but unemployment is always in season, so Season’s Greetings!
The Emir of Kuwait is facing widespread public disillusionment with his government and has asked the United States to keep troops in his country as long as Saddam Hussein remains in power in Iraq—that is, as long as widespread public disillusionment remains in Kuwait. The Emir has promised to consider granting the vote to women in order to re-illusion the populace.
The US Supreme Court has instructed family planning clinics not to talk about abortion to their clients if the clinics receive government funds. The decision does not specify whether they must post signs stating “We do not talk about abortion—it does not exist.” The majority said in its decision that the nation must have free speech, but the government cannot pay for it—it must be free. Critics contend that poor women may now not be able to afford free speech, but the decision does not muzzle poor women—only their doctors.
The House Armed Services Committee, chaired by Rep. Ron Dellums, has killed funding for Star Wars Jr., also known as Brilliant Pebbles. The project was the personal pet rock of Vice President Quayle.
Former Iranian President Abolhassan Bani-Sadr is in the US to promote his new book, a spy thriller in which a Conservative American President arranges with an Iranian terrorist regime to keep 52 hostages out of the clutches of a dangerous madman, outgoing US President Jimmy Malaise. The story is described by reviewers as a sleeper that refuses to die. On being informed that the noted fiction writer had been granted a US visa, President Bush’s heart skipped a beat. Vice President Quayle reassured the nation, telling reporters “I am not in charge.”
A new poll reveals that 96% of the American people are euphoric over the Defense of Freedom in the Gulf, while only 44% are euphoric over the successful demonstrations of America’s ability to dictate events and punish small misbehaving nations while maintaining control over vital strategic resources. The poll has a margin of error of plus or minus 52 percentage points, to allow for those respondents who are euphoric about US world domination but are not yet prepared to say so publicly.
Numerous rioters in Washington DC have been found to be illegally alienated El Salvadoreans who had hoped for a better life in the United States. But research shows they are treated just as well as previous minorities.
The Oregon Citizens Alliance has launched a campaign to amend Oregon’s constitution to outlaw bestiality, sadomasochism, sex with children and corpses, and—excuse the language—homosexuality. The group is operating as the “No Special Rights Committee,” a new subgroup of the No Rights Committee. Executive Director Lon Mabon denied the amendment is intended as a witch-hunt, saying he will press for a separate amendment against lesbianism. The bill would also mandate penalties for public schoolteachers who wear lavender ribbons instead of yellow ones.
And speaking of witchcraft, the Trailblazers’ Buck Williams’ practice of double-teaming has been hailed by basketball pundit Lon Mabon as the most effective way to stop Magic.
July 20, 1991 A noted neurologist has confirmed that the program “Entertainment Tonight” caused a viewer to suffer epileptic seizures. The woman experienced an upset feeling in the pit of her stomach, a sense of pressure in her head, and mental confusion. The case is unusual in that most “E.T.” viewers suffer the same symptoms but do not notice them. An epilepsy expert at the University of Pennsylvania came to the defense of the show, saying it is “probably the quality of the voice that caused the seizures, rather than what she’s actually saying.”
In other medical news, scientists are looking at a new treatment for heart disease that uses the saliva of vampire bats and the juices of bloodsucking leeches, but the team warns that the treatment could lead to shortages in the field of corporate law.
The United States is holding out against other industrial powers on global warming and endangered rain forests. The US is the largest producer of carbon dioxide, the chief cause of global warming, and US officials say they cannot be expected to shoulder the responsibility of solving the problem while they are occupied with creating it.
Former CIA Central America Task Force Chief Allan Fiers now says he was lying when he testified under oath to the Senate Iran-Contra panel. If what he now says is now true, other Iran-Contra witnesses could have been lying as well, or even better. That could mean the hearings were actually a cover-up, the 1980 election was stolen, the Contras illegally financed, and arms traded for hostages. But a poll released this week shows that sixty-two percent of Americans are tired of the scandal, and forty-eight percent are more interested in bread and butter issues, except when there is a new Hitler to be dealt with.
In the continuing CIA Chief Gates-gate affair, Robert Gates maintains he didn’t know about illegal Contra funding because he was not at the center of intelligence, but if he were appointed Director of Central Intelligence, he would know more of what is going on. President Bush has confirmed that Gates is a man of honor, and says he should be confirmed as CIA Director in spite of that.
Representative Lee Hamilton has called for a congressional investigation of the Reagan campaign’s alleged 1980 attempt to save 52 hostages in Iran from falling into the hands of Jimmy Carter.
HUD Secretary Jack Kemp has denied his proposal to build low-income housing on formerly protected wetlands is Machiavellian, saying it is a positive step to get environmental extremists to stop fighting developers and start fighting the homeless problem. President Bush has hailed the new guidelines as the most enlightened housing policy this side of the West Bank.
A sort of “Gulf War Syndrome” has surfaced in some soldiers, with one private calling for an end to celebrations because “We killed sheep-herders who wanted to give up.” But other vets disagreed, saying they lost good friends in the war. As always, two sides to every question.
The recession is over, according to the experts who had originally announced the first signs of the recession last week. Polls show 46% of Americans believe the recession is still on, but this minority’s judgment may be clouded by their temporary and cyclical cash flow impairment.
Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas is opposed to affirmative action and says he will fight his nomination. Judge Thomas avoided taking civil rights courses in law school, since he would learn all about that field later as Chairman of the Equal Opportunity Employment Commission. Thomas brings to the high court 15 months experience as an appellate court judge. His status as a non-traditional nominee makes him well-qualified to fill the non-quota seat.
IBM and Apple have announced a joint venture to produce the next generation of personal computers, which will be faster and more up-to-date. The MacPC will incorporate a new version of spell-check, called PC-check, that will catch pre-multicultural word usage and criticize the user in front of the whole class.
The televangelist battle continues, with Jimmy Swaggart accusing Marvin Gorman of having told a woman he was counseling she must have sex with him or he would expose her as a lesbian. Gorman counters that since the woman had sex with him, she could not have been a lesbian; the woman is launching a counter-suit against Swaggart for ruining her reputation in the lesbian community. We’ll keep you posted.
August 7, 1991 The Democrats have decidedto launch a political investigation of the Republicans for their role in preventing Jimmy Carter and the Ayatollah Khomeini from stealing the 1980 election. Republican Robert Michel of Illinois says “people back home don’t give two hoots about what happened 10 years ago.” Constitutional scholars agree the statute of limitations on election theft thwarting is nine years.
A team of U.C. Berkeley researchers has issued a report claiming that the best social solution to homelessness is volleyball. Meanwhile, Berkeley City Manager Michael Brown has lamented the disturbances at People’s Park, criticizing “a group of people who think they can use violence to force their will on the community.” Brown has not said whether he will fire all the police involved.
In the Bank of Credit and Commerce International scandal, Attorney General Richard Thornburgh says he will issue federal damage control indictments shortly. Thornburgh says there is no information indicating any wrongdoing by the CIA in the case, adding “trust me.” President Bush explained to a group of schoolchildren that the government had done nothing wrong, saying that using a bank that launders drug money in order to track drug dealers is no different from using drug dealers to launder arms money.
The Senate has endorsed the President’s request for Star Wars funds to stop small non-white nations from attacking the United States with their one missile in retaliation against the New World Order. Critics have said the US is more vulnerable to a terrorist carrying a nuclear bomb in a suitcase, but 16 experts say it will soon be possible to target that suitcase from outer space.
August 16, 1991 California Insurance Commissioner John Garamendi has announced insurance roll-backs that will refund $100 per car to every policyholder. The insurance industry has sprung to the defense of its customers, saying they will be hurt by the rules.
In Kansas, a group of average Americans has defended the right of poor and minority women to have babies. Inspired by the Holy Spirit, “Operation Rescue” says it will save 1,000 babies in California in the coming weeks. Every baby will be cherished, said Randall Terry, including the gay babies, who will have the chance to be saved twice.
The attorney for Pee Wee Herman has asked the judge to dismiss his client’s indecent exposure case, saying the evidence won’t stand up in court. Children across the nation want to know why Pee Wee can play children’s parts on TV but can’t play with his own parts in a dark theater. Parents are advised to tell their kids that intelligent people don’t do that sort of thing in Florida.
Minorities, saying they are victimized by such environmental hazards as lead poisoning and factory pollution, are clamoring for a voice in environmental policy, but President Bush says he will veto the clamor, since linkage is unconstitutional. The President said he was aware that green issues had been addressed primarily by white organizations, but said he had always been against colorization, and that he had learned from the classics that lead is the great equalizer. He noted that in America even the Vice President has a toxic household.
Our culture desk notes that American culture is big in Moscow, now that the Soviets are free to express themselves. Said Nikolai A. Buyanov, who affects the Elvis Presley look, “I’m trying to dress like him because he thought for himself.”
The gulf between rich and poor in the US is widening, says the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, with the top one percent doubling their after-tax income during the 1980s while the poor saw their income fall more than 10 percent. Unfortunately, little can be done about it, since class struggle is now officially out of style.
Illegal immigrants now include white people, if you count the Irish. Many Irish workers have joined the “under” “class” of undocumented workers. One Boston construction worker says he is “forced to take the crummiest jobs at the lowest wages. I don’t think I can go on like this too much longer,” said the man. A black woman standing nearby smiled sympathetically and assured him it would be over in three or four generations.
Consumer groups are insisting on mandatory seat belts for children on buses and planes in the wake of yet another fatal bus accident. But the schools cannot afford belts on their buses due to budget constraints caused by the educational system’s status as a big government imposition instead of a freely competing enterprise, and the airlines insist they cannot require children to be secured, since children are after all not carry-on luggage.
August 27, 1991 The coup flew this week after Mikhail Gorbachev caught the coup flu, then gave it to some visitors who took it back to the Gang of Eight. Gorbachev had been very tired—too tired to call a press conference; in fact, too tired to call. Gorbachev was told by his visitors that he would be sick for a long time,
but he responded that it was they who made him sick, that it was in fact they who were illin’.
The coup, which was undertaken to continue the reforms Gorbachev was too ill to carry out himself, was derailed by its own lack of finesse. Coup-watchers say the plotters lacked the support of an outside superpower that had helped General Pinochet assure the continued health of Chile’s society—that is to say, its investment climate. Lacking such support, it would have been advisable to transfer blame for Gorbachev’s illness to a virus, acting alone, and to cover any connections between the virus and the plotters. This advice from a highly-placed bum interviewed at his home on a grassy knoll in Dallas.
On his return to Moscow, Gorbachev found a society transformed, if not a country disappearing from the map. The power being gathered by Boris Yeltsin and the rapid dissolution of the Union made some wonder what American officials had whispered in Yeltsin’s liquor-lubricated ears during his visit to the United States. But any suggestion that the Americans may have had a hand in recent Soviet developments was discounted by unnamed officials at an unnamed, much-misunderstood government agency some-where in Virginia.
The various Republics proceeded to declare independence in quick succession, confident in their new-found freedom. From Estonia to Kazakhstan, people are anxious to join the free world. Scoffing at suggestions that they will become like Mexico, a pool of cheap labor enriching distant bankers, they hope to become like the United States, with the constitutional right to three cars per family and lots of appliances made by Mexicans. “We learned about freedom from Radio Free Europe,” said a group of smiling Russians waving a McDonald’s flag.
President Bush cautioned that although history is indeed ended, we still need nuclear weapons to stop Khadafy from attacking our Ukrainian friends, and that a national health care system will have to wait until we are sure Boris Yeltsin is not going to fall ill.
September 1, 1991 The Republic of Azerbaijanhas declared its independence from the Soviet Union, but the new state will not ban the Communist Party. This shows that their goal is not really democracy, said a spokesman for the International Monetary Fund. Russia, on the other hand, is moving forward toward full freedom for its people, granting permission for Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty, the American people’s voice of democracy, to broadcast in Moscow. Russians will now have direct and legal access to objective information about the superiority of free enterprise.
A crowd in the Ukrainewatched with glee as workers dismantled a statue of Lenin and replaced it with a statue of Milton Friedman.
Throughout the republics, people are celebrating the end of their status as a Soviet colony and the beginning of their new life as a Russian colony. Farmers are celebrating the end of the tyranny of collective farming, having finally won the right to sell their land to Western banks.
The White House has expressed concern about disputes over borders and relative powers among the Soviet republics, but a spokesman said progress is being made: they’re fighting each other instead of us. The Soviet Republics are not alone in their up-heavals—in Yugoslavia, historic antagonisms are in free play as the old state breaks down. As the civil war there heats up, US officials are being asked whether the West will intervene to stop the bloodshed. In response, a State Department spokesman denied that Yugoslavia has any oil.
The Miss California USA pageant has been attacked by femino-Stalinists who claim the contest is a meat rack. “Our contestants aren’t airheads,” replied the pageant director, “but we’re working on it.”
The EPA has been ordered to deregulate wetlands. President Bush says existing protections deny landowners their private property rights, especially the right to flood other people’s lands by drying up their own. Ecologists immediately complained, saying that wetlands are an essential part of the environment and that the plan is like proposing to trade one of your lungs because you’d rather have two hearts. Vice President Quayle responded that in America, you have that choice.
Three California utilities planto build a major solar power plant in the Mojave Desert, hoping to prove that the sun is a cost-effective source of power when trapped by hundreds of large mirrors and sold to customers who don’t have their own sun.
Researchers say homosexualshave a cluster of brain cells that is a different size from the same cluster in straight males. Senator Jesse Helms is working on a bill that would outlaw different size cell clusters among public school teachers and artists with NEA grants.
Arista Records will give refunds to Milli Vanilli fans, or ex-fans: one dollar to those who bought their lip-synched single, $2 for tape or album, $3 for CD, and $2.50 for a concert ticket stub. The Disgruntled Fans Union is jubilant, but industry executives worry that the settlement, approved by a circuit court judge, could set a bad precedent. Some execs fear fans could demand that performers appear without swirling lights and with instruments before offering their records for sale.
One extremist group has already demanded an end to advertising, false or otherwise, of all popular music products. A spokesman for the Committee Opposed to Monolithic Mega-Industry Excess, or COMMIE, appeared at a press conference in a seedy loud noise club, where he was asked by a well-dressed and objective reporter, “If you don’t like our system, why don’t you go to Iraq?” Supporters of the radical group responded to the incisive question with a volley of safety pins and spit. The police later closed the club, calling it a mental health hazard.
September 11, 1991 The Republic of Tadzhikistan has declared its independence from the Soviet Union, but has been informed that there is no Soviet Union, so they must remain dependent.
The Salomon Brothers trading firm has issued a defense of its highly unusual practices, saying they had strict rules about who could approve illegal activity.
Former CIA Covert Operations Chief Clair George has been indicted on charges of lying to Congress and obstructing investigations into the Iran-Contra affair. George told reporters, “I was just doing my job.”
The federal judge presiding at the Noriega trial has ruled that records of a 1983 meeting between Noriega and then Vice President Bush are inadmissible as evidence. The judge said the trial is about Noriega’s drug trafficking, not Bush’s.
President Bush has proposed a compromise on loans to Israel for settling Jewish refugees from Russia who hope to rescue the West Bank desert from Palestinian dupes of Saddam Hussein. The President has proposed to delay the loans, then give them more. The move has been hailed as an historic step in the Mideast quagmire, guaranteeing the needs of both Israel and the Congress. Meanwhile, Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir has said that Jews were justified in using terrorism to win statehood, but that Palestinians are not. The Palestinians, he explained, are fighting for a land that is not theirs. The Jews, on the other hand, had been fighting for a land that would become theirs.
In the continuing Politically Correct assault on traditional values, leftists are trying to rewrite school textbooks to say that Columbus didn’t discover America, but rather, invaded it. The National Council of Social Studies has countered that saying Columbus didn’t discover America is like saying there’s no Santa Claus.
September 24, 1991 The Parliament of Tadzhikistan has declared a state of emergency and forced the President to resign, in moves aimed at shoring up Communist rule in the southernmost former Soviet republic. The State Department says Tadzhikistan has been the center of Communist aggression ever since the CIA unraveled its spelling. As the hard-liners’ troops guarded the University of State Terrorism and occupied their upper chamber, the House of Drug Lords, the White House warned that any discussion of changes in the mandate of the CIA would have to wait until the Tadzhik parlio-junta stops threatening our Uzbek friends.
President Bush has informed the United Nations that Zionism is not racism, but rather a bold new type of land reform. The President singled out Cuba as a holdout against the tide of democracy, but exempted China, which is big. New World President George Bush has declared himself “plenty fed up” with unruly child Saddam Hussein and has launched Operation Determined Resolve or ODR. The President once again demonstrated his ability to quickly change the terms of political discourse, according to reports published coincidentally in major media throughout the nation.
National Hero Oliver North has been totally exonerated of all charges in the Arms for Ayatollahs-Cash for Contras-Sting Caper Crisis Affair. This leaves only Robert Gates and the BCCI to be persecuted for their patriotism, along with Manuel Noriega, who turned Panama into a centralized drug operation before the US stepped in to restore free competition.
Deputy CIA Director Robert Gates said at his confirmation hearing that he wanted to speak about the misjudgements he made and the lessons he learned from Iran-Contra, but he could not recall them. He also said he had done a lot of soul-searching, but had not yet found it.
Prosecutor Michael Sullivan has derided Manuel Noriega as a “small man in a general’s uniform.” The defense is expected to mount a case portraying President Bush as a “thin man in a business suit,” but that evidence is expected to be ruled inadmissible. The two sides agree Noriega accepted payments to overlook drug trafficking; the only dispute is about which traffickers he was supposed to overlook: the Medellin Cartel or the Contra-CIA Enterprise. One possible solution would be to overlook both overlooks, but as long as the strongman claims to have the thin man by the balls, no compromise is likely.
September 27, 1991 The warring parties in El Salvador have signed a preliminary agreement agreeing in principle to continue to talk about what they may be able to agree to talk about. But both sides have much to learn before democracy is possible. The right must continue its progress from being a party with ties to death squads, and the left must renounce its association with Cuba and stop killing innocent, unarmed American soldiers in violation of their freedom to associate with parties with ties to death squads. The two sides are still far apart. Both want to better the lives of their people, but the left wants to redistribute land to the peasants while the right wants to redistribute investment return to foreign investors.
The United States has a special responsibility in this struggle, having occasionally supported the somewhat brutal army there in the past, that is, until yesterday. But the US now encourages democratic instincts in Latin America, and former dictators and assassins from Chile to El Salvador are now facing trial. The government of Costa Rica has even appealed for the extradition of American citizen John Hull, charged with gun and drug-running in that country, but they do not appear prepared to invade the United States to capture him.
October 3, 1991 President Bush has orderedthe unilateral destruction of a host of nuclear weapons, something that would have been unthinkable during the years when only the fringe disarmament movement was calling for it. Such a move would have been highly dangerous then, with the Soviet threat so thoroughly documented at the time by Robert Gates.
Liberals were quick to criticize the President’s continued support of the B-2 bomber and Star Wars. Radicals and church figures have also weighed in, saying the real threat to National Security is the poverty suffered by 34 million Americans. But a White House aide says new design improvements will soon make it possible for Star Wars to target not just poor countries, but individual poor Americans as well. And Defense Secretary Dick Cheney says Brazil could shoot a nuclear missile at Key West by the end of the century. Critics say Brazil has scrapped its nuclear weapons program, but Cheney maintains that could change if there is a coup in Brazil, which could be arranged.
A new poll reveals the Soviet people believe that anyone who makes a profit is probably doing something illegal. Analysts for the Times-Mirror Company, which conducted the poll, concluded that the people there are not yet prepared for capitalism.
In Michigan, a deep breathing exercise to relieve stress has been shelved by school authorities after opponents charged that deep breathing could promote devil worship. Scientific studies so far are mixed.
With continuing bank scandals, crumbling schools, skyrocketing deficits, increased homelessness and persistent economic instability, President Bush’s popularity is at an all-time high. In a poll just released, however, 41% of respondents said they will probably take a dimmer view of President Bush two years after he leaves the White House, with 30% of these saying they hope to benefit from the hindsight of post-Bush era press reports, while another 40% said they plan to change their views based on new opinion polls they will be reading, and the remaining 30% say that while the press tends to reveal more Presidential malfeasances after the fact, they feel the President is doing a good job, as President Reagan will continue to have been doing for a few more years. One twentieth of one percent responded extemporaneously, saying “Of course they’re lying—it’s their job!”
October 6, 1991 Confirmation hearings for Judge Clarence Thomas have drawn to a close. Thomas won over Senators with his forthright refusal to discuss his opinions, which he maintained are not relevant to his work as a judge. Thomas claims affirmative action has often put people into jobs they are unqualified for, but he showed his flexibility by accepting the President’s nomination.
A White House source says it is unlikely the United States will send troops to rescue Haiti from its army, because it is an internal affair— that is, no medical school.
Mutinous soldiers in the African nation of Zaire have precipitated a crisis likely to end with the removal from power of President Mobutu Sese Seko, who for 26 years has ruled his nation in an aloof, distant manner. General Mobutu came to power in a coup that the CIA was aware of, replacing the new nation’s first Prime Minister, Patrice Lumumba, who turned out to be a Communist and shortly thereafter died from that. Mobutu is credited with legalizing opposition parties during the first quarter-century of his tenure.
The White House has promised to eventually make available $10 billion to tackle the problem of homelessness among Russian Jewish émigrés. While the program has been faulted for perhaps creating a new class of homeless persons in the West Bank, Israeli Prime Minister Yitzak Shamir says that the United States had relocated Indians from their land to settle European refugees, and without doing so the US could never have become a world power capable of helping small nations relocate their Indians.
October 8, 1991 The former personal assistant to Clarence Thomas has charged the Supreme Court nominee with sexual harassment. Anita Hill says Thomas pressured her to date him and talked with her about pornographic films. Thomas has denied the allegations, saying that as chief enforcement officer for job discrimination he had only been doing his job.
November 1, 1991 The Middle East peace conference is underway, but all parties are thus far sticking to their guns. “Palestinians” continue to maintain that they are, and Israel refuses to discuss its sovereignty over Jerusalem, though the rest of the world challenges it. Said one right-wing party activist, “It’s not we who are crazy. It’s the rest of the world.” The rest of the world did not return press calls.
The death toll in the Northern India earthquake has risen to 1,600. Five of the dead were Westerners, and the rest were not.
President Bush has attacked Congress over its treatment of Clarence Thomas, calling it a “privileged class” and adding “we don’t need two.” He said the “piranha tactics of smearing the individual and ignoring the issue serve no public purpose,” since Thomas had already taken care of that. Although in this case no FBI reports were leaked, the committee having leaked Anita Hill’s testimony to itself, the President said henceforth FBI reports will be provided only to selected members of Congress, and that in the future all members of Congress will be selected by the FBI, instead of by PACs.
Two former federal regulators have accused a Reagan administration official of ordering a cover-up of the S&L scandal until after the 1988 election. A Reagan spokesman denied there had been a November Surprise, calling the accusations “political.” But President Bush has been careful to distance himself from the affair. Asked about the actions of former White House official Edward Rogers Jr., who went from the White House to a position as adviser to a major Saudi figure in the BCCI scandal, Bush declined to know anything about Rogers’ activities but said he is a free citizen and added that his concern was that the White House be beyond “any perception of impropriety” so that Rogers could get on with the impropriety.
Tens of thousands of African-Americanshave registered to vote in Louisiana, having finally found someone they can get excited about voting against.
A New York Times/CBS News poll shows 60 percent of Americans feel “things have pretty seriously gotten off on the wrong track,” while 67 percent approve of President Bush’s handling of his job. The poll shows that either the 60 percent feel it is good to be off the track, or they feel things would be worse if Bush were impeached.
The Honorable Elliot Abrams has pleaded guilty to two counts of withholding information from Congress in the Iran-Contra affair. Critics of the process say Abrams misled the Congress in good faith and thus should not be treated as if he had lied. Abrams, known for his confident style, told the court remorsefully, “I am proud to have given 12 years serving the US government and of the contrabution I made in those years.
The movement to limit Congressional terms is a grass-roots fight against government bureaucracy and corruption, according to two leading backers, brothers David and Charles Koch, listed by Fortune Magazine as among the 20 richest men in the world. The Koch brothers had no comment on whether the next step would be term limits for the Fortune 500.
Jerry Brown continues his drive for the Presidency in his 1964 Plymouth. On the stump, Brown tends to speak in Zen riddles, saying, for example, “We must put patriotism before profits. We the people must rise up and take back our democracy.” But polls show 62% of Americans prefer sitting, think democracy is fine where it is, and don’t think of themselves as We.
An Indiana teenager who bludgeoned his foster parents to death had just come from a Bible study class. State authorities deny the Book contains hidden Satanic messages.
December 29, 1991 Tonight’s top story: the people of Cuba are growing restless under the yoke of Fidel Castro’s increasingly isolated regime, according to a study issued by a group of scholars in the White House press office. We’ll keep you posted on that story as the details are made up.
Former racist David Duke, now a concerned white citizen, continues his run for the Presidency with attacks on the party of Jesse Jackson and Ron Brown. He has established his non-Nazi credentials by attacking Hitler’s allies, the Japanese, in their native tongue, broken English.
The AIDEX arms exhibition of peace-keeping hardware has ended in Canberra, Australia. The gathering was marred by violent anti-arms protesters who came for kicks and were obliged by police. Some had their arms broken but spares were near at hand.
The Federal Government’s chief nuclear waste disposer is trying to sell the waste to Indian tribes. Noting Native Americans’ reverence for the land, David LeRoy said the next best thing to leaving uranium in the ground was putting part of it back. The Feds wish to make up for shabby treatment of Indians in the past by sharing, much as Chiefs, Seminoles, Illini and Braves have shared their names and fighting prowess with other Americans.
The last American hostageshave been released in Lebanon. That leaves only two German hostages and an unknown number of Palestinians who are being held in the West Bank, Gaza Strip and various countries around the world.
The latest Pan Am crash has resulted in many casualties. Ten thousand people have lost their jobs. It’s the final segment in a 12-chapter story, following Chapter 11, which was filed in January 1991.
President Bush says that Libyais responsible for state terrorism, and that he will seek to extradite Libya to stand trial. Libya has offered to arbitrate the dispute in the World Court, but President Bush feels it would be better handled at a higher level. A poll conducted after the announcement showed 53% of Americans are receptive to the use of recycled enemies, while 38% feel re-runs are boring.
January 8, 1992 The high-level government mission to the Far Eastcontinues, with top automobile industry executives visiting Japan. (President Bush is also in the group.) Bush aides deny Japanese charges that his presence makes the trade mission into a campaign road show, saying that if that were the case he wouldn’t have brought along Secretary of Commerce Robert Mosbacher, and the trip would have been coordinated instead by campaign manager-designate Robert Mosbacher.
Iran has been buying billionsof dollars of arms from the Soviet Union, according to a non-planted article not designed to shift attention gradually to the next line on the Enemies List.
The 15-year old Kuwaiti girlwho testified before Congress in 1990 about Iraqi atrocities has been revealed to be the daughter of the Kuwaiti ambassador to the United States. Her testimony was later called into question by Amnesty International, and Harper’s Magazine has alleged Congress and the nation may have been duped into going to war. But Hill and Knowlton, the public relations firm that arranged the girl’s appearance, said her identity had to be protected to protect her family, if not 100,000 other families. The firm denied any involvement in the Gulf of Tonkin incident, but said they were very proud of the Remember the Maine campaign.
Rep. Les Aspin wants the Pentagon restructured, saying that in the wake of the Soviet Union’s demise there must be changes in the Pentagon’s size, shape and missions. Army brass are not expected to respond favorably to being called Square officials.
A woman in Queens is the first person to have 150 TV channels to choose from. The couch potato au gratin commented, “It’s better than the video store. I don’t know what to watch!” An official of Quantum Cable exulted, “The system works!” The White House added that the development is a beacon to the emerging democracies of Eastern Europe.
President Bush has legally avoided paying taxes by maintaining a residence in a Texas hotel suite that he keeps for sentimental reasons. This would appear to be the trickle down version of No New Taxes, starting at the top with No Taxes, Nu?
A Chicago pulp fiber corporation and a Taiwanese timber firm plan to log two million acres of rain forest in Nicaragua and Honduras in return for building a pulp mill on site and employing more than a thousand Hondurans. “We’re not going to destroy your country,” advised a company representative, “We’re going to help you do it yourself.”
Congress has passed a landmark rights billfor the alternately-abled. Transit operators, among many others, must now provide expensive additional services, but Congress appropriated no funds for the changes, so the companies must either raise fares or cut schedules. This could cause a backlash, with citizens demanding internment of the transit-challenged in small remote villages near Nevada, if not work camps; but sources say such extreme measures are not likely in America because Congress would refuse to fund them.
A forensic anthropologist from Texas, working to identify remains left by free-lance government consultant casualizers in Guatemala, says that if some of the serial killers in the United States had come to Guatemala, they would have been generals by now. Left cult groups dedicated to giving Guatemala a bum rap have seized on the comment, saying US aid is the cause of serial killings, but a White House aide said the aid is used to maintain leverage, pursue quiet diplomacy, and prevent the coalescence of voodoo drug traffickers with Shining Path-inspired pre-Christian village terrorists and Willie Horton.
Some Desert Storm veterans are already homeless, according to complainers. California Governor Pete Wilson has moved quickly, signing a bill to provide for a new memorial to the veterans, and blocking another law that would have embarrassed the veterans by allowing taxpayers to check a box on their returns designating money for homeless veterans services.
March 1, 1992 As Campaign ’92 bores on, President Bush has seized the High Moderate Ground, or had it thrust upon him, by challenger Pat Buchanan, who has seized the mantle of Reagan heir by declaring that he is not anti-gay and that AIDS is nature’s retribution for violating the laws of nature. A spokesman clarified that the Bible says a man should not lay down with another Haitian. Buchanan has taken on the main issues plaguing Americans, such as blasphemous art. A poll of Buchanan supporters showed 68% believe gays should not be attacked, only gay art, while 36% said gay artists would look fashionable in brightly colored triangles.
Fifteen people were arrested in San Francisco as President Bush told an audience that Democrats have moved from being soft on defense to being soft on the poor. Democrats want to throw people “out of work and onto welfare,” he charged, instead of out of work and out of the country. The President also took time to greet local leaders of agencies cited in the White House’s “1,000 Points of Light” program, thanking one AIDS prevention volunteer for helping to keep Big Government off the backs of AIDS patients.
The Supreme Court has ruled that beatings of prisoners may constitute cruel and unusual punishment even if they do not result in serious injury. In a dissenting opinion, Justice Clarence Thomas said the protection of prisoners was an unwarranted expansion of the cruel and unusual clause, since the beatings may be cruel but are hardly unusual.
Controversy continues to swirl over the President’s use of the sleep aid Halcion, which he takes to relieve stress after a hard day of fighting drugs. The pill has several side effects but White House aides say the use of Halcion has not led to hallucinations for Bush, who sees himself as the Education President, the Health Care President, and the Kinder and Gentler President. On rare occasions the drug also leads to violence, but not in the case of the Liberator of Kuwait.
The latest voter poll shows persistent disapproval of President Bush, along with continued skepticism that the Democrats could do any better. As a result, voters are faced with two choices: vote for one of the two candidates, or vote for the other one.
The President continues to defend his budget proposal. The healthcare section promises to make coverage more affordable while maintaining individual choice not to afford it. Critics charge that apparent tax cuts are only a temporary, political measure, but the Budget Office promises they will become a permanent feature of the deficit. The President also called for continued funding for Star Wars, to protect the US from Libya, Cuba, North Korea and other nations ending in “uh.”
April 1, 1992 Perceived Democratic winner Bill Clinton is a good fund-raiser and therefore people give him money. But the nomination is not yet in the bank. He still faces a test in the New York primary, which costs $1 million, and if he makes it to the nomination he must come up with $100 million, the total ticket price of the Presidency. One candidate has that much lying around the house: People’s Billionaire H. Ross Perot. “The guys in Washington work for us,” says Perot, “but we own this country. Or at least I do.” There are other aspiring independent candidates but they have failed to catch fire because no one knows about them, so they will not be named here.
Bill Clinton smoked pot twice years ago, says the candidate. While he is technically still eligible for the Presidency, his statement that he didn’t enjoy it is expected to cost him votes in the hippie sector, and the fact that he didn’t inhale before not enjoying it may lose him the Mensa vote as well.
Sanctions may be necessary after all, as the extradition of the terrorists charged with responsibility for the deaths of innocent people has hit an unexpected snag: Union Carbide has turned down the request by an Indian court.
Boulder resident Kim Walker walked into a 7-11 to pick up some icing for her boyfriend’s cake and walked out with a lottery ticket worth $27 million. Lottery officials called off a study on whether money can buy happiness when Ms. Walker said she was already happy.
April 24, 1992 Pre-empting the efforts of the Sender() Luminoso, the government of Peru has overthrown itself.
The Conservative Party of Britain has pulled off an upset victory over Labour. Critics charge that the Conservatives tampered with the vote by engineering a stock decline as a warning against voting for Labour; but in fact, the stock decline was in reaction to the prospect of a Labour victory.
General Manuel Noriega has been convicted of dealing drugs. Noriega had turned Panama into a drug-trading free-for-all until the US stepped in to restore order in the market. The current government can now get on with the business of democracy, that is, drugs. The defense attorney, Frank Rubino, said the verdict showed foreign leaders they must kneel once a day facing Washington and give praise to George Bush. The President immediately decried the comment as a slur on Islam and promised to rescue Rubino’s homeland from terrorist Islam-slurrers.
A picture of a pretty young female Israeli soldier leading a handsome white horse has appeared in American newspapers, demonstrating the media’s commitment to fill the public demand for subtle symbolism. PC professors have charged such pictures are designed to bias the public in favor of the Israeli military, but highly-placed government-friendly journalists say you could just as easily charge bias in favor of horses.
Bill Clinton has come in third in a two-man race in Vermont. Of all the Democrats running this year, Clinton has received the warmest support rating: Luke. He has been criticized for draft dodging and golfing in segregated clubs by Vice President Quayle.
President Bush meanwhile has come forward as the candidate of change, campaigning to replace the present administration with the one that will succeed it. “We will change America as we have changed the world,” he said, promising to start by bombing Berkeley back into the American age. Bush is also pushing for welfare reform, encouraging the chronically indigent to get off the dole and get out there with the rest of the working populace and cross picket lines with the best of them.
A new wrinkle in the Caterpillar strike: one young woman is considering applying for a job at CAT even though her father is out on strike from the plant. Not so new, say experts. Children are, after all, the original replacement workers.
President Bush is under pressure to normalize relations with Vietnam, but is also receiving pressure from veterans groups against normalization until some 750 Americans missing in action are accounted for. There is also some pressure against normalization from veterans groups in Vietnam; they oppose any change in relations until some one million missing Vietnamese are accounted for. But White House business adviser Heinz Prechter said “We cannot watch from the tailgate as other nations get their fair share of Vietnam—that is, of trade with Vietnam.” The adviser explained that the Vietnamese don’t want to be dominated by the Chinese or the Japanese, so it’s natural for them to look to the United States.
May 12, 1992 Election ’92: As President Bush and Bill Clinton bore down on their party’s nominations, the high vote getter for the season, placing just ahead of “undecided,” remains the Old Elvis.
A new report says 42% of young black men in Washington DC are in the criminal justice system. Some say that figure is too high, while others do not.
In the aftermath of the King riots of ’92, President Bush has called for a climate of tolerance, saying we must end the intolerance of police brutality. He also expressed concern about excessive police violence, saying any police violence that shows up on videotape is excessive. The President stressed the importance of getting to the root of the problem: welfare programs of the sixties.
The trial of the four officers had been moved to Simi Valley, a neutral venue that is home to many Los Angeles police officers as well as many non-police officers—that is, retired ones. The jury pool there had little in common with the people of South Central Los Angeles, which helped them to maintain their objectivity, a cause that was further aided by the removal from the jury pool of all those who said they found the video of the alleged beating outrageous.
And of course Jesse Jackson has weighed in, saying society spends more money to put people in jail than to put people in jobs. Others argue that’s simply not true, especially in the case of police.
The ranking Republican on the House Appropriations Committee has been indicted for racketeering and accepting bribes. Pennsylvania Congressman Joseph McDade says he has done nothing wrong and has given the money back.
In a new abortion case in Ireland, a woman is attempting to go to Britain for an abortion, against the wishes of her ex-lover. Judges say the situation is clearly extreme, but they are willing to let the woman plead her case. One Irish writer has made a modest proposal: let the baby come to term and emigrate immediately upon birth.
The President of Nickelodeonhas taken out a full page advertisement in the New York Times asking “What can we tell our children that will help them make sense of the tragedy in Los Angeles?” Answer: Tell them you bought a $16,000 ad to show them that you care.
June 5, 1992 Republicans have lashed outat Democrats for playing politics by investigating the Bush administration’s mild treatment of Saddam Hussein, that is, selling him weapons, prior to the Gulf War. Republicans say the Democrats are trying to “criminalize” flawed decisions. We’re not criminals, said one source, we’re just stupid. For his part, the President said he has no problem with calls for a special prosecutor to investigate, saying it would be a waste of the taxpayers’ money.
The US policy of returning refugees to Haiti is legal, say authorities, because the fleeing Haitians are economic refugees, not political ones. In Port-au-Prince, nighttime shootings by groups of soldiers have become common, and frequent shootings by soldiers in groups are generally considered economical. President Bush has reiterated his feeling that returned Haitians are not persecuted, bolstering his reputation as the Feeling President.
Total property damage from the Los Angeles riots has been estimated at $785 million. That’s 24 times what the Pentagon spends in an entire hour.
President Bush says the economy is on the rebound.The President told an audience at a $1,000-a-basket picnic in New York state, “Ask yourself, are you better off today than other people?”
June 21, 1992 Riding Ross Perot’s considerable coattails, a number of wealthy businessmen are running for Congress using their own money. “Clearly it is the vogue this year,” says one consultant, “to be an independent businessman who is an outsider running for office.” If not buying it.
A new poll shows General Norman Schwarzkopf is as popular as Ross Perot. Experts say the poll means that people are willing to ignore constitutional safeguards to elect a strong leader, that they are desperate enough to look at such a candidate through rose-colored glasses, that they want simple answers, and that this is America in 1992. If not Germany in 1932.
At the Earth Summit, world leaders gave President Bush a warm reception—globally warm. He succeeded in elevating the focus of the meeting from the Greenhouse Effect to the White House Effect.
On his way to Rio, Mr. Bush stopped in Panama, where he noted the triumph of democracy there. Panamanians now have the freedom to riot against their liberator. The President’s reception was rather poor in the sullen neighborhoods—that is, rather sullen in the poor neighborhoods, where some held signs condemning the alleged levelling of the El Chorillo district. Marlin Fitzwater summed up the tour eloquently: “It’s been a very good visit, with the exception of the tear gas.”
In a speech later in the day, President Bush said “To the tiny, tiny handful who are protesting, I say they ought to go up to San Francisco and see what a real protest is like.” He promised an increase in foreign aid to send San Francisco protest consultants to help rebuild Panama’s fragile protest industry. San Francisco, he noted, has a lot of protesters, although they are at heart a tiny, tiny handful. And only in San Francisco.
Vice President Quayle has taken the occasion of a spelling bee to prove that he is not a member of the cultural elit.
January 12, 1991 First of all, Saddam Hussein has a million-man army. Technically, it’s only 500,000, counting the 11-year-olds, but you know, the Sandinites had a million-man army too for a couple of weeks, until I remembered there were only 3 million people in the country. But anyway, I enjoy filling you in on these things because you tend to believe them. Some of them. Some of you.
Now Iraq has long since positioned itself on top of the Ramaila oil fields—that is to say, they are in Iraq. Except for two little fingers of it that stick out into Kuwait, just across the line that is there, that is, the line in the sand. Now a certain corporation has been taking some oil out of those two fingers, a corporation known in business circles as Kuwait. And Saddam doesn’t understand that this is how pirate enterprise works.
Regarding the celebrated Glaspie incident: just prior to the August 2 invasion of Kuwait by Saddam, our ambassador to Iraq, April Glaspie, did tell Saddam that this border dispute was an Arab- Arab matter that the US had no interest in. And Undersecretary of Defense John Kelly said the same thing to Congress, and Margaret Tutweiler passed it to the press. Saddam misunderstood that signal. We have no interest in it, but there is still the principle. Someone had to mediate that dispute, someone objective, and we have an objective there, so it fell to us. Because we are a kinder, gentler world police.
All these so-called signals followed an international meeting at the White House in April 1990 at which it was decided to go for disarmament in the Meddle East—that is, to disarm the powers there, that is, the other powers, that is, not us. We felt that it was superfluous for there to be more than one power in a New World Order. Of course you can only have disarmament after a war, and we couldn’t very well start a war. That would be New World Disorderly. So we passed to the Iraqis the option of starting a war with us. And so we succeeded in getting Saddam into Kuwait, and once he realized that he’d been took, or taken in there, he decided to dig himself an underground shelter and wait us out. Or wait us in.
Why is it so important to put the Sabah family back into the palace in Kuwait City? It’s a question of jobs. And dollars. The Emir and his relations do have just a few hundred billion dollars in our Western banks, and they’ve been sort of keeping us afloat in that sense, and I think we ought to return the favor.
So the new Hitler was actually on his way to take Saudi Arabia. He didn’t know that at the time, but I did. Following which, you did. Later it turned out he wasn’t, but it was a bit too much later.
Above and beyond all these other reasons for us to be there, the most important is to destroy Iraq’s military-industrial complex, because we are opposed to military-industrial proliferation. There is a document called “Iraqi Power and US Security in the Middle East” which says basically that Iraq has become, through its very notable ability to learn from experience, the foremost mechanized warfare machine in the world today.That disturbs the balance of power, especially ours. We need to take them down a peg so somebody else can get a chance to be the best, so we can take them down a peg.
January 3, 1991 The White House has confirmed what everyone already knew: that the current economic downturn will be over by summer. There have been differences among economic advisers over whether the country has entered a slowdown, but all are agreed the worst is over.
The President has issued a new, tougher, more manly and yet flexible ultimatum to the Iraqis, allowing them to choose their own appointment for a meeting with the US, anytime between noon and 8:30 on January 12.
Meanwhile, Iraq has released a document purporting to show that the crisis was deliberately provoked by the CIA in collusion with Emir of Kuwait. The document is an alleged report on meetings between CIA and Kuwaiti officials planning economic warfare against Iraq. The CIA has branded the document a fake, saying “We ought to know.”
And the struggle continues between Congress and the executive branch over who has the power to make war. The President insists he must have the leeway to act quickly in the face of any Iraqi provocation we may luck into.
Meanwhile, the FBI has ordered a close watch on suspected terrorist organizations, students linked to terrorist groups, and significant others of students with ties to organizations that are now or may have ever been sympathetic to the philosophical goals espoused by some terrorists, or anyone with a thick accent.
With the US death toll from crashing copters, steam leaks and misdirected friendly fire approaching 100, hopes have risen that we may not actually have to go to war in the Gulf to get the usual result.
California Governor-elect Pete Wilson has chosen Orange County pal John Seymour to succeed him in the $20 million position of US Senator. The job costs $20 million to procure, but pays considerably less, on the books.
The Bush administration has toned down its proposed national energy plan, eliminating radical provisions such as higher gas mileage requirements. President Bush has been said by insiders to be pro-business.
Vice President Quayle, who recently completed his first military tour of duty overseas, says he will continue to play golf at suburban Washington’s Burning Tree Country Club even though it bars women from its course. Mr. Quayle said he thought the rule might change sometime but he had little influence and that he respected local traditions and would not let his wife drive there or in Saudi Arabia. Reporters declined to question the Vice President on his decision, as a courtesy to the public.
January 11, 1991 As the United Nations secretary-general met with Saddam Hussein, Congress voted to give President Bush permission to destroy Kuwait in order to save it. British Prime Minister John Major says Saddam Hussein still has time to rethink. President Bush, however, is said to have a full schedule. Secretary of State Baker said there had been no movement on the Iraqis’ part, except for their proposal of an “Arab solution,” which no one takes seriously, least of all Mr. Baker.
Monday was Veteran’s Day, but the parade passed with little notice, since people have become accustomed to seeing veterans on the streets.
Louisiana gubernatorial candidate David Duke has repeated that he repudiates his past. He remains active in the National Association for the Advancement of White People, but he has promised to repudiate that as well, as soon as it is in his past.
The volume you hold in your hands—if your hands are holding your screen—is the sequel to, you guessed it, the previous volume, Singing CIA Agent George Shrub Speaks, 1983-90—also available on the pressbooks site, here.
Many of the documents declassified here have never been published, even secretly. And most of the video clips of Mr. Shrub in action have never been seen. For those unfamiliar with the Agent in question, we reprint here the various intros from the previous volume.
Please send any questions, comments, or mild recriminations via email by way of david3 at lippnet dot us. If they’re sparkly enough, they’ll be added to this book on this site, on the “dust jacket” page. You can also do so at the Shrub facebook page.
The sequel to this volume (Singing CIA Agent George Shrub Explains the World Away, 1991-2011 – available here) includes many documents never before published.
NB: Use the red bar at the bottom to navigate to next or previous page. Or use the table of contents to jump around.
*FORENOTE TO THE PREFACE
There’s a saying in the wacky world of standup comedy that as a comic, each time you grab the mike, you either kill or die. Now of course there’s nothing remotely humorous about the CIA*, despite the efforts of the singing CIA agent we encounter here. And no one would ever refer to George Shrub as a standup guy. That said, it is often said that in his years of performance tours, he often killed—massacred, even—the truth. And if the audience happened to die laughing, that was just collateral dommage.
It’s a dubious pleasure for me to be able to present Shrub’s collected musings and Anal Isis, collated for the first time with video clips from his Counter-Intelligence Cabarets, at which attendance was of course voluntary, but strongly suggested. Dave Lippman April 2022
*When asked about the similarity between his name and that of a former CIA Director, he brandished a redaction marker and suddenly disappeared.
PREFACE TO THE FOREWARN
by George Shrub
There follows an attempt by a self-styled “anti-interventionist” “songwriter” to ease the reader into my complex but entirely Right presentations of the Committee’s perspective on current events in Our World. Don’t take him too seriously. Not only are his views skewed, but he openly practices a form of international intrigue known as “satire.” (At press time this was still legal, with certain exceptions.)
Mr. Lippman was selected by the Committee to be closely observed over a period of time during his extensive travels. Due to the rigors of the road, we devised a cover: the agent must appear as a singer himself. Thanks to my not inconsiderable talents at verse and oratory (which had not been of much use in more traditional Committee work), I was chosen for this assignment. The rest is history, but I won’t trouble you with that here. After all, those who do not understand their history will have the opportunity to repeat it.
FOREWARN
by Dave Lippman
I’m sorry. I’m sorry that George Shrub has been foisted upon an unwilling world. But as long as he’s here (and it’s already been too long), I may as well tell you a little about him.
George Shrub, M.D. (Monroe Doctorate) first surfaced as a backroom manipulator of the Reagan for Shah Campaign in 1980, working with such groups as the Ladies Against Women, Students United for Apartheid (SUFA) and the Coalition Against Central America (CACA). The result was the coronation of His Affluence Ronald I.
When the agent re-appeared at the time of the Grenada Rescue, it was clear he had been re-assigned to the cultural front. I came to know him all too intimately as he tailed me around the country, demanding equal time at my concerts. As my songs tend to be critical of United States foreign policy, whether implemented abroad or at home, he felt obliged to set the record Right. I was obliged to give way to his peculiar brand of anti-folksongs and interventionary anthems.
As the audiences seemed to be amused, if not enlightened, Dr. Shrub felt emboldened and began speaking out without rhyming—that is, in sentences that ran to the Right margin and thus by definition could not be considered poetry.
Many of the documents collected here were first delivered as addresses at what I still maintain were my concerts. Other articles appeared in the various newspapers around the country that could be strongarmed into printing them. Enjoy, if possible. And learn as little as possible. The more you learn, the less you know.
Your illustrious if not humble author first caught the public eye as a participant in 1980’s Reagan for Shah campaign. I offer pride of place here to reflections from colleagues in that campaign, followed by comments from some of those who were prevailed upon to host my performances, as well as some of the victims of those events. —GS
Mr. Shrub’s uncommonly authoritative briefings bring back memories of when, as the shallowest member of the Deep State, he frequently spoke with members of the Men’s Auxiliary of Ladies Against Women, ultimately keeping all our brains squeaky clean. How astonishing that his words are on your screen. —Mrs. Virginia Cholesterol, Part-time Volunteer Assistant Secretary, Ladies Against Women
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WHO is George Shrub? No one knows. He sprang into existence like the Big Bang spawning galaxies of outrageous postings, writings, songs … WHERE is George Shrub? Everywhere. Also, in this book, which should come with a plain cover. Don’t let anyone see you reading. It’s dangerous. —Peggy Seeger
For decades, I watched in shame at the murderous ploys of CIA agents who subverted democracies and progressive social movements. But then I stumbled across the deliberately bumbling CIA agent George Shrub, who sang the quiet part out loud. A whistleblower with a guitar. I don’t know whether to nominate him for a Grammy Award or the Nobel Peace Prize. —Jeff Cohen, Woodstock NY
From the Halls of Montezuma, to the shores of Tripoli, George Shrub has gone where no folksinger has gone before – and he brought us right along with him to laugh out loud at the things others were too afraid, or too culpable, to say for themselves. To paraphrase Voltaire, if George Shrub did not exist, it would be necessary to invent him. But no worries, the inveterate Dave Lippman has done it for us.” —Norman Stockwell, publisher of The Progressive
As “truthful politicians” become more oxymoronic every day, the art of satire and sarcasm is sadly scarce. The collected works of the anti-folk CIA singer George Shrub remind us that Bush and Reagan were merely opening acts. We need more laughter, more music, and more social change activism which understands the vitality of both. Dave Lippman and his alter-egos provide it all!
—Matt Meyer, Secretary General, International Peace Research Association
Agent Shrub’s deep and prescient anal-isis of the world we intervene (in) has always guided my zest for sticking a sharp garlic pickle into the belly of the American beast. Long may he sing! —Van Gosse, NJ CISPES
Shrub’s contribution to subversive thought cannot be overstated. Under his sagacious inspiration and guidance, mendacity and duplicity have reached new heights. —David Barsamian, Director, Alternative Radio
It has been my pleasure and near duty to repeatedly present the musings of the infamous, renegade CIA agent George Shrub to my community down here in Gainesville, FL. His was and is a corrective lens with which to view the foreign policy of this country, because absurdity can only be fully grasped with insightful (inciteful?) humor. —Joe Courter, Publisher, Gainesville Iguana
Of all the exciting events at the peace studies conferences I attended in the 80s and 90s, George Shrub’s performances were the most exciting of all. Believe me, we academic-peacenik types need to laugh a lot more, and George helped us do that. ‘ —Neil Wollman, Manchester, Indiana
When political events become so bizarre as to be downright unbelievable, the best we can do sometimes is laugh about it. George Shrub has helped thousands do just that, and he’s VERY good at it. —Ingrid Noyes, Marshall, CA
George Shrub is a national treasure! Now for the first time, his prophetic and poetic words of wisdom collected all in one place! You’ll love the video clips, the great music as much as the brilliant lyrics, and the between-songs banter and jokes are even better. This material is not at all dated, as the current era is eerily similar, and everything Shrub has to say (and sing) is more relevant than ever in today’s world. — Kathy Labriola, Berkeley hippie, anarchist, and fangirl
At the Reagan For Shah Rally In New York City In 1980, George Shrub, Ned Shrapnel, Virginia Cholesterol and the others were parading down Fasc…Fashion Avenue and ran into a somewhat skeptic passerby. Shrub tried to explain the Reagan for Shah Platform: “We believe foreign policy should be replaced by domestic policy through the annexation of international trouble spots. We plan to annex Saudi Arabia and Iran so that we will no longer be dependent on foreign oil.” The passerby was startled, but not convinced, and he exclaimed, “You people are fuckin’ serious!!!” Virginia responded, “We are very serious. Politics is no laughing matter!” — Mike Levinson, Boston
Here we have the definitive history of a USO show that always raised morale among the anti-war troops. News Speak: A twisted history that manages to make more sense than the events themselves. —Jenny Brown, Gainesville, FL
Shrub always knocked me into the bushes laughing and crying all at once! —Tom Gogan, New York
When I first heard George Shrub in the 1980’s it was a revelation. I was just learning about the history of CIA interventions and their anti-democratic activities in Central America at the time. I was angry and horrified. Then I saw George Shrub perform his Iran Contra rap. I laughed so hard I cried and I learned even more about what was going on from his show. I saw the value of satire as a political tool and I was hooked. —Anne Schupack, San Diego
