Not in My State!

That other Eden, demi-paradise; that precious stone set in the silver sea: Gitmo. The place hailed as "a loooot of fun!" by Miss Universe is a sun-drenched paradise, where many lucky men from the Middle East and elsewhere were violently disappeared into a life of leisurely hanging around, intramural recreation and water sports.

Immediately upon seizing power, Barack Hussein Obama* decided to shutter this involuntary tourist hot-spot. One question lingers: what do we do with the detainees? A bipartisan consensus is forming in Washington, D.C. that the American justice/prison system is insufficient to hold and process these detainees. Cries of "Not in my state!" resound from that shining city upon a hill.

At first I found this lack of faith in our prison system disturbing. Have we not spent decades and billions of dollars building the most extensive, pervasive and complete prison system in the world, just by the numbers? But as I listened to the impassioned pleas of the Beltway insiders, I confess I was swayed by their reasoning: 

Reasons Why the American Justice System is Insufficient for Gitmo Detainees

• Gitmo is protected by a powerful charm that prevents Apparation. Having this charm applied to domestic prisons would be a shameful waste of taxpayer money.**
• Detainees will be caught in customs with Cuban stamps in their passports, denied entry into United States.
• One of the detainees was deliberately captured as part of an elaborate scheme to gain entry into Fox River State Penitentiary and free his wrongfully-convicted brother.
• Newly declassified plot revealed from the interrogation of KSM: "We will infiltrate their prisons. We will endure brutal and repeated rape until we have been infected with the scourge they call 'HIV virus'. We shall then escape from these places into the countryside, where we will set about seducing their women and bringing this plague upon them."
• Say what you want about convicted mass-murderers and kids caught with an ounce of pot, but at least they're all good American Christians.
• Detainees determined to be "not black enough".
• Incarceration of detainees in American prisons would be too cruel.

Can I get my phone call?

NFK

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*Noted far-left celebrity, totalitarian-socialist-redistributionist-fascist-royalist, terrorist sympathizer and admitted drug user. 

**Under-reported fact: Muslims are all powerful wizards.

Top 10 Successes of the Bush Administration

Okay, I couldn't find 10. So I'm going to do the failures instead. Because it's funnier. And this is Unfair Friday.

Top 10 Failures of the Bush Administration

11. The 2000 Election. A lot of shenanigans if not outright fraud. And the indecisive result followed by the horrific decision of Bush v. Gore reminded us just how democratic our democracy really is. I know, I know...this all technically happened before the Bush administration, which is why I'm putting it up front as the 11th failure. Yes, it's completely unfair. Just like me.

10. The 2004 Election. The only good follow-up to a shenanigans-fraught election? More shenanigans! Forget about the fact that the voting machine industry was in the tank for the Bush administration (it was!) or the voter suppression or all the rest of it. These are all fine by me; I don't actually believe in democracy anyhow. This one's on the list for exactly one reason in approximately three words: Motherfucking Swiftboat Veterans.

9. No Happy Ending for Merkel. In just over 60 years we've gone from this to this. Progress in America always contains a big, fat nugget of stupid.

8. No Childrens Left Behind. Rarely is the question asked, is our children learning? I mean, you teach a child to read and he or her will be able to pass a literacy test.

7. Clear Skies Initiative. You'll remember this as the definitive proof that the Bush administration was tough on polluters and a friend to the environment. Don't read the text of the bill! You don't have to read what it actually says or anything--I mean, how can you oppose something called "Clear Skies"?

6. Mission Accomplished! Break out the flight suit! From the logic of Sun Tzu to the successes of Colin Powell and Daddy Bush, we know the right approach to war: Go in hard and get out fast. Which is exactly what Bush did.*

5. The Iraq....Everything. This war was well-justified. In fact, members of the Bush administration came out with new justifications for it all the time. Sometimes two in a sentence. How can something with so many justifications not be justified? And at long last we have unquestionable proof that Iraq was a huge supporter of al Qaeda: even after years of gloomy detention and/or torture, a lot of people still won't confess to the connection. This just shows what a huge, juicy secret it is.

4. Red Alert! Shields up! We have obtained some specific intelligence: an attack on a major American city may or may not be planned for today. If it does not happen today it may or may not happen at any time during the next month. Also, it may instead be an attack on a suburb or rural area. This potential attack may be enormously devastating. Or not. We urge you: Do not panic.

3. I Would Tap That Wire. From the lovable text of the PATRIOT Act to all that warrantless wiretapping, we know one thing for sure: intercepting phone sex sessions from Americans overseas is a fucking laugh riot and worth every taxpayer dollar. Besides, the most confusing thing about modern American life was all those civil liberties we didn't really need.

2. Operation: Let's Disappear Some Brown People. All brown people are Muslims and all Muslims are insane, suicidal, raving terrorists. Every American can agree with this.** So if we sweep up a bunch of them indiscriminately, hide them away in detention centers for years without trials or even charges, deny some of them sleep, sic dogs on them, force them to see or do things that are humiliating to them, bang them up against walls, periodically drown them, or if some of them just mysteriously disappear...it's all for the greater good: keeping Americans safe.***

1. September 11, 2001. It wasn't their fault. How unfair can I possibly be? It happened on their watch. They couldn't possibly have known about the attacks ahead of time. You know how these things are: your inbox gets full of stuff and you just don't have the time to read every little briefing. Besides, who knows if any of the intel they had available would have been enough to stop the attack? It happened on their watch. You know, I heard a rumor that Clinton had Osama bin Laden "in the crosshairs" but he blinked and missed the opportunity. He could have kept this from ever happening. It happened on their watch. A video of Bush staring at a room full of kids for 7 minutes, slowly realizing that elections have consequences and maybe he'd rather be coaching baseball. It happened on their watch. They didn't have the time or luxury to cooperate fully with the 9/11 Commission. They were fighting a War on Terror! And besides, all that stuff is looking backwards--we need to charge ahead, and getting a full accounting of what missteps may have taken place wouldn't help. Besides, what if some of what they found out turned out to be a little embarrassing? It would just slow them down at a time they needed to act fast. It happened on their watch. They didn't exploit the disaster for political gain. They didn't use 9/11 and fearmongering to win elections. They never used slogans like "A vote for so-and-so is a vote for 9/11", they never used campaign videos or billboard images that conflate 9/11 with their political opponents. But, in all unfairness, I would like to point out that although they may have done everything right before, during and after the attack...it did happen on their watch.

Others have done this more exhaustively elsewhere, sure. But I thought of just a shit-ton of them on my commute home today and figured it would be fun to talk about my most favoritist 10.

So, what are your favorite moments from the Bush administration?

History will vindicate me,
NFK

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*Do you really need any text in this footnote?

**Possible exceptions: Americans who are brown, Muslims and/or have brains.

***Safe from moral standing, respect from other nations, relations with the billion+ Muslims in the world, and, ultimately, safe from the end of the War on Terror. It keeps our soldiers safe from the prospect of running out of enemy combatants to fight. For the Americans who were detained, it keeps them safe from the pursuit of happiness, liberty and/or life.

An Evening with Mr. bin Laden

Terrorism enthusiasts were in for a treat this week as two of the leading figures in the field--Mr. Dick Cheney (R-WY) and Mr. Osama bin Laden (aQ-?)--emerged once more from their undisclosed locations to make demands of and exhortations to the American people. Mr. Cheney sat for a candid tell-all with Bob Schieffer of The View and shared some very saucy advice with his immediate successor: Joe Biden (D-PA/DE). Dick's ever-labored breathing during the chat was a persistent reminder of his hilarious yarns about coming of age as a young Sith Lord from Wyoming.

Due to a significant delay in customs, however, America's sweetheart couldn't show up as planned for his spot on The Tyra Banks Show. Of course I'm talking about Osama bin Laden. Word on the street is that Mr. bin Laden really regrets missing the opportunity to meet Ms. Banks, but we all know it's no accident he's been at the top of People magazine's "100 Hardest People to Schedule an Interview With" since 2002.

While no substitute for Ms. Banks, I decided to conduct* a discussion with Mr. bin Laden myself. Although he wasn't available for a face-to-face, I've taken the liberty of channeling Osama through a synopsis/synthesis of some of his thoughts and feelings that he posted on his blog in 2002**. As you'll recall, that blog post contained excerpts from a legal memo penned by political appointees of the al Qaeda party*** as well as from his New York Times bestselling book.****

Here is the transcript of our discussion.

NFK: Mr. bin Laden...

ObL: Please, infidel, call me Osama.

NFK: ...Osama, welcome back to the States. Now that I think about it, it's a funny thing to say, since as far as I know you've never been here but in a very real way you've never left.

ObL: Thank you, dog, but I am not pleased to be here. I despise your country. You have perpetrated great crimes against Muslims in all places for half a century. You have attacked us in Palestine and in Somalia. You have supported attacks on us in Chechnya, Kashmir and Lebanon. Your trade policies have starved over a million Iraqi children. You have established puppet governments in the Middle East that oppress and humiliate us and sell our collective wealth to you for next to nothing. You have--

NFK: Whoa whoa whoa there bucko, you're pointing a long skinny finger at me here but I haven't done any of this stuff. For starters, I was drunk when--

ObL: But, heathen swine, you will agree that the government of the United States has done these things?

NFK: Well, I wasn't there personally and don't really know--

ObL: Scum! Speak truth or be silent! Did your government do these things?

NFK: Well, okay, it's a bit embarrassing, really, but....

ObL: Did your government do these things?

NFK: Yes! All right? Probably! I mean, it's possible. Some of the news I read would suggest....

ObL: And, devil, are your people not in control of your government? Is your country not the shining jewel of democracy that you claim to be?

NFK: Okay, chill on that point a sec, I see where this is going. You see, our form of democracy isn't particularly democratic per se. We, the people of the United States don't actually have much direct input over our laws or actions. We just have some influence over our elected lawyers and actors. Which, to be fair, any of us can become as long as we have sufficiently clean histories and enough fundraising potential. Sorta. We practice a kind of back-door democracy here, where we have dollars that proxy for actual votes through a complicated campaign contribution chain--

ObL: But--

NFK: Hey! Buddy! I'm talking here! Did I interrupt you? What I'm saying is...is that I in particular have no real direct control over my government. Its actors or its actions. So the US may well have done all the things you've said, fine, but I sure as hell didn't. Nor did most of the rest of us. Nor would we have if given the option. In fact, if we knew a bit more about these things as they were happening, and we had the time to make it all a priority, and a thousand other things lined up, we'd have taken the single strongest basic action available to us: writing very stern letters to our elected representatives.

ObL: Do you not believe in your democracy, heretic? Is it not your government that seeks to spread your democracy the world over? Do you not laud yourselves for your democracy and inflict it upon other states?

NFK: Okay, look. We do have a strange need to spread democracy. I'll try to explain. You're a big guy. Probably when you were in high school your dad wanted you to go out for the varsity basketball team and become a star center or something. And you thought this was weird, and you had trouble understanding it because it wasn't what you wanted at all, but you respected him and wanted to make him proud. And probably he didn't care about what you actually wanted either, because when he was your age he wanted to be a star center or something himself, but let's say for sake of argument that he was 5'6". This is what we call "living vicariously".

ObL: Be that as it may, whoreson, but why then does your government also topple democratically-elected governments in other nations and install your own petty dictators instead? Take for example Algeria?

NFK: Um...maybe we're jealous?

ObL: My point stands! Your government created by your people and funded with your wealth has visited a million, million atrocities upon my people! Any righteous attacks we visit upon you are merely payment in kind!

NFK: Hold up hold up. I can't argue that our government hasn't done some rotten things. And they were very, desperately wrong. But I have to mention a couple of things here. First off, attacking us is also just wrong. Beyond that, it's horribly naive. Like, if your central message is, "play nice or there's more where that came from", the net result will not be us playing nicer. We've seen it. People in our government will take it all as a sign of and justification for giving themselves a freer hand to act--just in general, really, but they'll say it's all about you. For us here at home, that means they're going to go after our civil liberties for our "enhanced safety". They're going to funnel more of our money into their war efforts, not less. And then they're going to take it all out on people like you--or maybe just near you. Doesn't matter. They'll let the hammer fall and dispense some indiscriminant "justice"*****. I don't want that and I don't think you do either. Secondly, none of us have any real right to go after civilians. And, yes, the people in the Towers were civilians. They were in fact the worst civilians to hit from your perspective. When did it all happen--maybe nine AM or so? Yeah, last I checked the real power brokers in Manhattan aren't the at-work-on-time folks or even the at-work-at-all-on-a-sunny-day folks. I get the feeling you mostly killed secretaries, firefighters and the people who otherwise clean up after wealthier people. These guys have no real power or representation whatsoever. And the tax dollars they all pay combined probably don't cover a fresh coat of paint on a damn bomber. At least, certainly not in a government that has the occasional "$8,000 toilet seat" scandal. Thirdly....I forgot thirdly. Got a little caught up in all that. Um, killing people is wrong. Okay?

ObL: Are you quite finished?

NFK: Sorry, shit like this just makes me crazy. I don't have any good answers for your plight or any real power to fix it. But I know that your approach is the absolute wrong one. Let's try a different tack, here. What can we do to make it all better? How can we fix this?

ObL: You must stop destroying nature. Stop being racists. Respect the international laws and treaties you sign--and so fervently hold others to, yet do not abide by yourselves when they seem inconvenient to you.

NFK: Er, we're kinda on the same page on that one, man.

ObL: You must stop your oppression, lies, immorality and debauchery.

NFK: So...cancel both FOX News and FOX Entertainment?

ObL: You must join us in the shared goal of mercy, honor, defending the oppressed and persecuted. You must work with us for total equality between all people regardless of their color, sex or language.

NFK: See, I'm with you here, but I warn you I won't follow the Greatful Dead around.

ObL: And the only way you can achieve this unity of purpose and stay our further wrath is to convert to the One True Religion. Which is Islaam.

NFK: Hold the fucking phone!

ObL: Demon, you must reject your false laws and accept the True Laws of God! We are appalled by your fornication, homosexuality, intoxicants, gambling and usury!

NFK: Waitwaitwait. You hate us because we write laws, have fun and...bank?

ObL: You must reject all theories and false religions and accept only the Law and Truth of the most Holy and Divine book--

NFK: Mason & Dixon?

ObL: --the Quran.

NFK: Okay, okay, stop right there.

ObL: The Quran is a miracle until the Day of Judgment. No man can even compose ten verses like it.

NFK: Dear God, protect me from your followers. Look, I get this shit nonstop from Americans in domestic news, I don't need to hear the rest. I know it by rote. Seriously. "There is absolute Right and wrong. What we say is Absolute Right and all else is absolutely wrong. We know this because we have a Book that says so. A Magic Book written thousands of years ago by the One True God. A Magic Book so Magical that it contains all the knowledge you will ever need for all time. A Magic Book that contains all the unchanging True Laws you must follow to Live Right. A Magic Book with such strong Magical God Magic that we can translate and revise it over millennia and still know beyond doubt that we are interpreting its messages exactly correctly. A Magic Book so wise that reading it sneakily gives us the knowledge about which of its Magic Words are Correct and True and which verses are safe to ignore." For real, this is the biggest most divisive thing in our discourse any more. One side of every issue has a copy of God's Magic Manual For Modern Life and everything they argue goes back to that somehow. Sure they're serpent-subtle about it these days, they don't usually drag out the Magic Book to win arguments because it loses them political points with the kiddies. Instead they build all sorts of flimsy rationalizations to support their perspective. They fund slanted research just to add an air of legitimacy to their side. People like me are just stuck. I mean, we don't have a Magic Book. It's probably "unfair" to say this--whatever the hell "unfair" means--but I instead try to think critically about issues and error on the side of credible data. I don't always succeed, but I definitely try. By comparison, from my perspective at least, it seems like the first of the True Laws in every version of the Magic Book goes something like "Thou Shalt Not Ask Too Many Questions or Think for Thyself (see Listing of Approved Thoughts, Section III.C.xxxvi)". It seems like the one thing every religion can agree on is the unquestionable sinfulness of critical thought. ....Actually, wait, I'm not sure, but that might not be true with Judaism--

ObL: The Jews! Of course you would side with them, bastard child of two mothers, for they are the most evil people of all!

NFK: ...and now we move on to the other thing all religions seem to agree on, which I'll summarize as: "Ours is the One Truth, all other religions are false, and by the way especially fuck the Jews."

ObL: The Jews are behind every serious crime in history! They have taken over your government and you are their servent! You do not act but by their bidding!

NFK: But seriously folks, what is it with people hating on the Jews? I mean, I wasn't hanging out 3,000 years ago, but they must have done something pretty fucking serious to just piss off everybody.

ObL: It is you, fellator of Taghut, who have supported and enforced the false claim of the Jews to the land of Palestine! This is the greatest sin of all time! It is known to all that it was the Muslims who recaptured Palestine from the Romans and this land belongs rightfully to us!

NFK: Fuck, dude! Now you're telling me this is all about...about a real estate dispute??

ObL: As long as your hands are dirty with this crime, ten-titted concubine of the Great Satan, you must pay for it with your blood!

NFK: ...a real estate dispute?? There's probably something I'm missing here. Has to be. I mean, it's not even particularly good land, is it? We can settle this one easily I'm sure. Can we sell you a bit of Alaska? It's got crazy resources, fish and game, you name it. And there's just a ton of it to go around. Or Texas? We could probably get you a decent price on Texas, but we'll probably ask that you also keep the rural Texans. Or, Christ I dunno, half the interior of Austrailia? I mean, if you're into land without much going for it, you might as well be fighting for a fuckton of the stuff, right?

ObL: Cease your sacriligious rambling, monosyllabic-word-that-means-shit-wiping-implement. Your people have done great harm and will not accept the True Law of God--there can be no forgiveness until after you have paid heavily for your crimes.

NFK: Hey! Wait a damn minute! You sneaky bastard, how can American civilians be "fair" targets if our government is secretly controlled by the Jews? By your "you are your government" rationale?

ObL: I mentioned that some time ago.

NFK: But I just thought of it now!

ObL: You are immune to reason, diabolic ass-kitten.

NFK: And.....we're going to have to leave it there for now. But many thanks as always to Mr. bin Laden for stopping by. Have a safe flight back!

ObL: Fuck you, asshole.

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Hugz 'n' kittenz,
NFK

*viz. construct

**our more literate readers will note the abundance of misspellings and other grammatical errors in his post. These are almost certainly artifacts of the decryption process employed by the Observer and the fact that they've none of them been fixed in over 6 years is, I'm certain, purely coincidental.

*** "Memorandum for Osama b. Laden, Strong Right Hand of Allah; Standards of Conduct for Mass Slaughter of Infidel Civilians under Sharia Law"

****Osama bin Writin': The Top 10 Demands America Must Meet to Avoid the Further Wrath of Well-Funded, Well-Coordinated and Committed Men with Box-Cutters

*****Many tanks to Blizzard for that one.

Censorship is Antithetical to Freedom

This extends to both the display of uncovered nipples AND ALSO the use of the fuck word.