Neil Shakespeare

SO LONG

2008-11-03T02:00:00.002-06:00

Dear Friends,

I just wanted to let you know that I am giving up this blogging, this time for good. I am tired of paying attention to politics. I only started doing it because I, like many of you I'm sure, wanted to raise my tiny little voice against the fascism of the Bush/Cheney years. Hopefully, in the election tomorrow, things will change and the country and the world will recover and endure. This is my fervent wish.

But I am getting too old to waste my remaining time listening to the self-righteous blather of the 300 million egomaniacal yaketyyaks that make up this country. Everyone is entitled to their opinion, of course, but I am entitled to put on my ear protectors, rev up the chainsaw and drown the bastards out. It's nothing but hatred and nonsense and I'm sick to death of it.

I've been spending most of my time "out in the nature" as they say around here and I much prefer it to politics and punditry. A week ago a friend helped me take down a 100-year-old ash tree in the back yard. Many, many years ago, at least back to the 70's, someone had girdled this tree with clothesline wire. The wire was embedded deep in the wood now, literally choking the tree and depriving it of it's needed water and nutrients. It was dying, so down it came.

I was out stacking the wood from this tree this afternoon. There were a dozen huge cross-sectional chunks, two-and-a-half to three feet in diameter. I couldn't lift them, but I managed to roll them to the spot where I was going to stack. It was a gentle downslope all the way and I rolled them with my foot. It was much fun, like playing. They smelled beautiful too. Then the dusk came on quickly and surprised me because of the return to "standard time". A beautiful waxing crescent of a moon grew brighter in the south as the light died and, above it, there was the evening star, which is not a star at all, of course, but a planet. The planet of love was trailing the liberal crescent. The air grew crisp and the moon was bathed in a misty aura. It was too cool for school.

I was tired and there were scratches all over my forearms from manhandling these beastly chunks of ash. I went into the house and got a beer and came back outside and sat on one of the chunks that was only there to sit on now because someone, back in the 70's, had washed their clothes and needed a place to hang them to dry and had no thoughts to what their clothesline would be doing to the tree. I sat and watched the sky in the south, gazing at the beautiful Moon and the beautiful Venus.

Perhaps there was hope yet for our own planet. After bailing out all of the incompetent, lying, usurious, greedy shitholes who have dishonored our world but don't have the grace to fall on their own swords maybe, just maybe, there is enough left of the shattered spirit of human decency and kindness to rebuild on.

There is an old willow here, below the line of oaks on the edge of the swampland, that looks like it was leftover from the set of "Lord of the Rings" or "Harry Potter". Three of its main branches had broken and fallen over so that their tips touch the ground and it is now supported at four points forming three triangles. The tree is, literally, rotten to the core. The base of the trunk is hollow, big enough to hold most of the seven dwarfs plus some rabbits, squirrels and woodchucks. It should be completely dead, this willow, but it's not. It has new shoots coming out of its rotting carcass everywhere, with leaves still on them due to the mild fall. Beautiful, delicate, yellow-green leaves that just won't give up, it seems. The same, I suppose, could be said of this nation.

Let's hope so.

So I am back to art and nature and I leave you with this little collage (which I've used here before) called "Fed Up Yet?"

My thanks and very best wishes to you all, and to this world we all share.

Sweet dreams.

Love, Neil

SLEAZY STREET

2008-10-19T02:49:00.003-05:00

"Country First".

This is the slogan, if I read their podiums correctly, of the Republican Party.

My question is: What Country?

I have a hard time remembering what country I belong to these days. Are we China now? Saudi Arabia? Qatar? Am I a Russian now? An Alaskan? A Swede?

Does "America" even exist anymore?

I don't think the Republicans know exactly who they've sold us out to either. That's why it says "Country First" on their podiums instead of "America First". They're playing it safe. If they should happen to win they'll tally up all our debts and find out who owns us. Then they can change the messages on their podiums from "Country First" to "China First", or "Russia First" or "Alaska First" or whatever. (Chances are it won't be "Iceland First" from what I've been hearing.)

Maybe the Republican podiums should read, "Usurious Credit Industry First". The Democrats should put that on their podiums too. Never have so few sold out so many so fast.

Still, this is MY country, whatever it is. This is "The Ownership Society", so they tell me. I own it. I now own all the banks and the insurance companies and the auto makers. I have yet to see a dime from my investment, but what's a dime? I'm holding out for a billion dollars. Then I'm going to bailout Tommy Chong and corner the bong market.

"Country First!" You betcha. And I am super patriotic too! I love being Chinese! I have pictures of Chairman George all over the house. I plaster them over the chinks in the siding to keep out the cold winter winds. My motto is "Buy Chinese!" I check every label and if it doesn't say "Made in China" I don't buy it. That's how patriotic I am! Luckily, I don't run across too many labels saying "Made in America". I don't think they make anything in America anymore. Except for bullshit. And that's only for domestic consumption. The rest of the world won't buy it.

*Neil Shakespeare has recovered from his migraine problems, having spent the summer clearing brush in an attempt to become as "crisp" as his hero, George W. Bush. He cleared the brush from the west side of the house completely, exposing the trunks of the oaks. His reward was to roll out of bed the other morning and look out the window and see four young deer munching on the acorns carpeting the new grass. Hard physical work has its drawbacks, however, and Neil has torn the rotator cuff in his right shoulder, which is why he is not pitching in the World Series this year.

LAST TRAIN TO KOOKSVILLE

2008-03-15T02:50:00.003-05:00

"The president squinched his face and bit his lip and seemed too antsy to stand still. As he searched for the name of King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia (“the king, uh, the king of Saudi”) and made guy-fun of one of the questioners (“Who picked Gigot?”), you had to wonder what the international financial community makes of a country whose president could show up to talk economics in the middle of a liquidity crisis and kind of flop around the stage as if he was emcee at the Iowa Republican Pig Roast." -Gail Collins, NYT

Nero reportedly fiddled while Rome burned. But George isn't much of a violinist, so he has taken to tapdancing on the steps of the White House, doing his best Gene Kelly impression...

"...I'm singin' in the pain/I'm singin' in the pain/What a glorious feeling/I'm craaaaaazy again!

...and serenading the press corps with an extraordinary rendition of "The Brown Brown Grass of Home" (which most closely resembles that of a stone-drunk Japanese businessman during last call at Karaoke Night at the Kooksville Bar & Grill) all while the United States of America goes down in gas fumes, which is all we can afford anymore.

Pity the poor bastard who has to clean up when the fool finally falls off the stage. He has clearly cracked up, and I, for one, am seriously wondering if he can make it to the end of his term.

There must be concerned whispering going on at the cocktail parties of mental health care professionals in this country. Those folks are trained to see the signs. And yet no one has stepped up to help. No one has done a thing.

Doesn't he have doctors? Doesn't the president's annual physical include a mental health check-up? Or is the psychiatric staff at Walter Reed too busy with the PTSDs and the young men and women with the sides of their heads blown off from - as George in another recent verbal proof of his insanity described them - their "romantic" tours of duty in Iraq?

Isn't there ANYONE in this country concerned about our poor, pathetic idiot of a president?

I guess not. That's why I have decided, even if I am the only one, to hold a fundraising event for President Bush to buy him that much-needed ticket on the Last Train to Kooksville and offset the costs of his long upcoming stay in the Crawford Institute for the Criminally Insane.

I, along with the children from our local elementary school (who, in their innocence and wisdom, can see the signs clearly and feel sorry for the nitwitted narrator of "My Pet Goat") am organizing "Bowling for Nitwits" to be held here at the "Lutheran Lanes" the day after tomorrow.

It's short notice, I know, but we're going to try to squeeze it in before Doomsday.

APOLOGY: Once again I apologize for my long absence to the few friends who still check in here from time to time. The one thing that seems to help these recent headaches of mine is to avoid staring at this computer screen.

SUPERBAMA

2008-02-16T10:13:00.003-06:00

Ole talked me into going mountain climbing with him again, but I might have overdone it this time. I've had these blazing headaches ever since my return. Snowblindness. So I've been in the dark, sleeping as much as I can, and I've missed most of this Obama crush that's been going on. I see he's now the frontrunner.

I was at my stockbroker friend's for supper the other night. You might remember him. He's one of those "Independents" who has never voted Democratic in his life but that's just because he hasn't found one worth voting for. So I was surprised to hear, from his own lips, that he is for Barack Obama.

"What?" a crumb of meatball slid out the side of my mouth.

"Yup," he nods, head down, forking his mashed potatoes. "I think I'm gonna finally vote for a Democrat.

I was stunned. I set down my fork and dabbed the corner of my mouth with my napkin. I didn't know what to say. I was in shock. He continued:

"I suppose you're wondering why.

I nodded. This was big. This was very big. Him even thinking about voting Democratic would be like...would be like...

"It's the fundrasing. The organization. The organization and the fundraising. I mean look at the guy! He starts with nothing, pitting himself against the most formidable political machine ever assembled: the Clintons! The Clintons, for goddsakes! And somehow, some way, he has assembled a machine that is light years ahead of the Clintons! He's putting them to shame! He's leavin' 'em in the dust! He's so far ahead that Hillary has to borrow money from herself! How did he do that? Any business person, Republican or Democrat, looks at that and they say, 'That's genius!'

"Genius?" I mumbled. "Not a word you hear too much when discussing politicians.

"So," my friend said, leaning over his peas, "if he can do THAT,...," he tapped his head with his fork, "...if he can do that...", he shook his fork at me, "...if he can do that, well,...," he shoved a forkful of potatoes and peas in his mouth and nodded and chewed, as if I could finish his sentence myself.

"So," he said with food in his mouth. "Who you fo'?

That was easy. "Well, ever since I heard he got the endorsement of Scarlett Johannson I've been for Obama.

"Oprah not good enough for you? I mean, that's like getting the endorsement from God.

"God is one thing. I'm talkin' about Scarlett Johannson.

"Ah! Well, it's nice to see you're still as stupid as you used to be, Neil.

"I try not to change. It confuses people.

MR. CRISP GOES TO BETHLEHEM

2008-01-11T03:17:00.000-06:00

BETHLEHEM, West Bank, Jan 10 (Reuters) - Passing through a tiny "Door of Humility", U.S. President George W. Bush made a pilgrimage to the traditional birthplace of Jesus on Thursday in the occupied West Bank.

"Door of Humility", huh? Geez, that must have been a bit of a stretch for Mr. Crisp.

I hadn't heard much about my hero of late. I guess I assumed he must be out mountain biking or cutting brush or masturbating in the Lincoln bedroom to naked pictures of Karl, but here he was showing up in Bethlehem to visit the Baby Jesus. Alas, the Baby Jesus wasn't there. I happen to know where the Baby Jesus is. He's hanging out with Roger Clemens in an undisclosed location until this steroid thing blows over. He is unequivocally denying everything, hoping to buy time so those needle marks in his ass have time to heal.

But Mr. Crisp didn't know that, of course. Too bad. I could have saved him a trip.

Then again maybe it's good for Mr. Crisp that he didn't know. Maybe it's good for him to get out for awhile, to get away, to try to put a shine on that badly tarnished legacy. Nixon did the same thing and look what it did for his.

And Mr. Crisp had arrived in The Holy Land just in time, just when Iran was attacking our mighty warships with speedboats. It gave Mr. Crisp an opportunity to hammer home his point of what a danger Iran posed to world security, what with all those powerful speedboats of theirs.

Next summer I think I'm going to buy a couple of speedboats and take over the Great Lakes. I probably won't even have to fire a shot.

The U.S. Coast Guard, I'm sure, will cower in my wake, afraid of all those "Born to be Crisp" bumper stickers plastered all over my stern.

But wait! I'm letting my pride get carried away with me. No, that sounds like something Mr. Crisp would say, like that time he was campaigning in Wisconsin and he said, "Wisconsin: Where Wings Take Dream!". I like that one. That's always been one of my favorites from "Little Visits With Mr. Crisp". That and the time he was disparaging the laziness of the French and said, "The French have no word for entrepreneur."

True, "I'm letting my pride get carried away with me" isn't nearly as crisp as the wise and pithy sayings of Mr. Crisp, but at least I'm starting to get a bit of a crackle going. And I'm starting to have some good, crisp ideas, like that conquering the Great Lakes with a few speedboats thing.

Other crisp ideas I've had lately are 1) PICTURELESS POSTCARDS (I think they'll be a big hit), and 2) CHILDPROOF SANDWICHES.

Ah, but it's good to hear some news about Mr. Crisp again!

He so inspires me.

I am so inspired right now, in fact, that I can't wait for the sun to come up so I can go out and buy a new door, a "Door of Humility", so I can go through it, just like Mr. Crisp.

Do they carry those at Home Depot, do you suppose?

NEIL SHAKESPEARE Cosmic Eye

2008-01-09T05:09:00.000-06:00

Six months ago the media Nostradamii were predicting it was all but over. It was going to be Rudy vs. Hillary. Book it, Danno.

Last week, after Iowa, the all-seeing, all-knowing David Brooks opined in The New York Times that it was all but over. It was going to be Barack vs. Huck. Cue the Fat Lady.

So imagine my surprise when I woke this morning to find that, after consulting the Oracle of New Hampshire, the press had now divined that it shall be Mama Hillary vs. Grandpa John. Slam dunk.

Youth and Change, the two goddesses that had so fired the imaginations of Americans a scant five days previously, had been replaced by Same Old and Same Even Older.

I predict a furious battle. Ah, what a race it shall be, she with her cane and he with his walker, she in tears and he grumbling about his arthritic war wounds, leading us all hobbling towards the nursing home of democracy.

CHANGE

2008-01-07T02:43:00.000-06:00

PROFILES IN SEWAGE: William Kristol

2008-01-05T07:11:00.000-06:00

No sooner had I landed in Hell on my shopping expedition to choose a destination for the afterlife than I heard a small, distant voice crying out:

"Extra! Extra! Read all about it!

Now what? I wondered. Curiously, there was a newsboy hawking his wares under a stoplight frozen eternally on 'caution'. I turned away. I hadn't even had time to properly assess my surroundings. It was a bleak place, stark even, but that I had expected. The fact that there was water here was a surprise. Then again, without water I suppose you couldn't have golf courses.

"Extra! Extra!

Well, at least they had newspapers here. That would give me something to do on Sunday mornings, since I assumed there were no church services. Then again, maybe there were. Also, if I was going to spend the afterlife here I'd have to check out the real estate section.

"I'll take one, young fellow," I cried. He handed me the top rag on his stack. "Oh God no," I said, "not the Wall Street Journal! I can't read that crap. 'All The S**t That Fits': that's their motto. What else you got?

"We have The Weekly Standard, sir," he replied. Polite young fellow. I liked him.

"The Weekly Standard? That's another Rupert Murdoch paper! He set that up just so that neocon boob, Bill Kristol, could have some place to blather other than on FOX News. Don't you have anything else?

"No, sir. I'm sorry, sir.

"Lemme guess: I bet the only TV station you got down here is FOX, right? Murdoch owns Hell, doesn't he?

"Yes, sir. But I do have some good news for you, sir. Starting Monday I'll be carrying The New York Times.

"The New York Times? Ah, now yer talkin', kid! But wait a minute! I don't get it. Why The New York Times?

"Because starting Monday The New York Times introduces its new op-ed contributor, Mr. William Kristol.

"What?!" I was in shock. "Jesus! Did Rupert buy The New York Times, too? God, kid! Bill Kristol is the second or third biggest idiot on the planet, if he's not number one! Remember his 'Project for the New American Century', a century that lasted all of six years?

"Oh yes, sir. All of us here in Hell are big fans of Mr. Kristol. We love 'Dan Quayles' Brain' down here.

"That's right! Among all his other idiocies I forgot all about that. He was Dan Quayles' Brain! He gave poor Dan his spelling lessons.

"Yes, sir. He was Dan Quayle's Brain just like Karl Rove was 'Bush's Brain'. Are you starting to notice a trend amongst Republican leaders, sir?

"That they don't have brains? That's old news, kid. I couldn't believe they could out-dumb Bush, but you should see the crop they got up there now. I still don't get it, though. Why would The New York Times hire Kristol? They already have that boob Brooks who thinks they have earthquakes in Iowa. Didn't they learn their lesson when they helped Kristol & Company sell the Iraq War? Now they're going to help him sell the Iran War?

"The truth is, sir...and I shouldn't be telling you this...The New York Times is having revenue problems. Their ads aren't selling, especially the luxury goods ads which make up half of their advertising income. They need money, and since the poor are no help in that area they need someone to help them drag the rich neocons back into the fold by presenting themselves as fair and balanced, just like FOX News.

"They're selling out!

"Yes, sir. But this should come as no surprise. As you say, sir, they've done it before.

I was stunned. Hell was falling quickly to the bottom of the list as my chosen destination for the afterlife.

"OK, kid. Gimme one of those WSJ's. Might as well check out the real estate market while I'm here, just to be thorough." I reached into my pocket. "How much you need?

"Ten dollars, sir.

"Ten dollars?! For The Wall Street Journal?! That damn rag ain't worth ten cents!

"Delivery costs are high, sir. The price of gas and so on.

"Gas? You want gas? Why don't you get Bill Kristol to open his mouth, that'll give you plenty of gas. Better yet, you could take it out of his a....

"Be careful there, sir!" the newsboy cautioned me, pointing at my feet. I noticed now that the rock I had landed on was covered with sewing needles. "The permanent residents here keep trying to squeeze through those things...

THE UNIVERSE NEXT DOOR

2008-01-02T06:12:00.000-06:00

SHOPPING THE AFTERLIFE

2008-01-01T02:56:00.000-06:00

Today I mounted the new calendar. I got it free at the bank. Each month has a pithy saying. January's words of wisdom are from that ancient Greek philosopher, Andrew Carnegie:

"Think of yourself as on the threshold of unparalleled success."

Nice thought, Andrew. Thank you very much. Is that what you told all your steel mill workers as they entered the blast furnace each morning?

Ancient Andrew is not the only one who can dispense great wisdom. My neighbor lady does the same thing. I ran into her the other day and she says:

"So, Neil, what church do you belong to?

"Mabel," I replied. "You know I don't belong to any church.

"Well, I thought maybe you'd changed your mind. It's getting closer every day, you know.

"My mind?

"No! Death, silly!

"Oh, that. I don't worry about that too much, Mabel, because I am on the threshold of unparalleled success!

"Are you now? What idiot told you that? Say, I'd like to introduce you to our new pastor. He's a girl pastor.

"He is?

"Well, SHE is a girl pastor.

"Are you sure?

"Oh, stop!" she said, whacking me over the head with her Lutheran Hymnal. "I'm worried that you're going to Hell!

It got me thinking. Perhaps I should be thinking more about my destination in the afterlife. Maybe I should, like, check it out beforehand. You know, like, do some afterlife shopping or something. Coincidentally, I needed a good New Year's Resolution. And the thing about any good New Year's Resolution is that you have to start right away, at the stroke of midnight.

I figured I'd start with the least popular afterlife destination. I called up my travel agent.

"Round trip to Hell!" I demanded.

"Sorry, we have only one-way tickets to Hell. The closest thing we have would be Iowa. You'll need a major credit card...

"Iowa? I've been to Iowa. Didn't seem like such a bad place to me.

"You obviously haven't been there during Caucus Season.

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

2007-12-23T21:31:00.000-06:00

SATELLITE DISH

2007-12-10T23:35:00.000-06:00

Hello again, everyone, and here's hoping you're having a happy holiday season and best to you and yours.

Sorry I've been out of touch. Two minutes after my last post there was a knock on my door and it was Ole, wanting to go mountain climbing. I never could refuse Ole anything, because it was he who raised me, more than any single person, and so off we went and I forgot to bring my satellite dish. (Luckily, she was still here when I got home.)

Then when I got back the dog was pregnant and I've spent the last two weeks getting the nursery ready. Painting, decorating, hanging appropriate puppy pictures, and reading "Puppy Midwifery" and "Puppies Take Precedent Over Everything" and "Puppies Make The World Go Round" and similar heavy tomes. You know the routine.

And there was a wedding reception somewhere in there too, on the dark side of St. Paul. There were pictures on the walls, I remember, and the bride wore white. There was a full moon, and a car pulled up across the street and a bunch of drunken animals jumped out and started howling.

Also, I bought an old "rusty but trusty" pickup truck to haul brush around the farm, but the right front tire blew moments after I arrived home. I drove around on the rim for a few days but then it snowed, and thank God for that! Now I won't have to deal with that flat tire till next spring.

So now I'm home for the next eight weeks at least, midwifing puppies.

I don't know what kind of puppies they will be. The mother will once again be a "Heinz 57", and the father? Who knows. Maybe a "Baskin-Robbins". But I'm sure they'll be...

"One of a Kind!!! MUST SEE!!! God only made ONE of these!!!! L@@K!!!! L@@K!!!!!"

...which is how I'll advertise them on eBay.

PICTURE: Satellite Dish from the series The Golden Age of the Brassiere Collage 2007 Neil Shakespeare

KEEPING TABS ON THE SLAVEGIRLS

2007-11-01T02:03:00.000-05:00

Here's another picture of me from my youth, hard at work at my first job. The day after I graduated from Harvard Business School my father put me to work on his plantation in France. My job was to keep tabs on the slavegirls and make sure that not a single kernel of grain was lost.

It was hard work, but I was good at it, and it signaled my rapid rise in the corporate world. Here I learned all about the value of margins, and I have been living in the margins ever since.

After several decades of such work I have, in fact, become an extremely marginal fellow.

NAPPING IN A MONET

2007-10-29T03:37:00.000-05:00

Here's a picture of me in my youth, napping in a Monet landscape. The older I get the more I realize that I've never really awakened. I used to feel guilty about napping. You know, wasting time and all that. Now I love napping. I look forward to it.

Isn't it strange how the less time you have left the more you want to nap off the remainder?

GOOD TIMES IN ARGENTINA

2007-10-28T05:25:00.000-05:00

"I don't know what Bush and Cheney are going to do with all that oil money they made on their wars in Iraq and Afghanistan," said my lawyer friend over some Irish whiskey the other night. "Go have some good times in Argentina, I suppose. Like Mengele, Eichmann, those guys.

"Argentina?" I responded. "I thought that was Brazil.

"Brazil, Argentina...whatever. What's the favorite Nazi hideaway these days? Jesus Christ. Tell me this: what was the price of oil when Bush/Cheney took office?

"In '01? I don't know. $30 a barrel? Something like that?

"Exactomundo! And what did it hit the other day? $88 bucks a barrel. Triple! In six years! Triple!! Jesus, those oil buddies of theirs must think George W. Bush is the second coming of Jesus H. Christ and Dick Cheney is God himself.

"And what must the Saudis be thinking?" I replied. "I mean, George and Dick are the two bestest friends they've ever got. But they're Muslims.

"So George must be Mohammed and Dick must be Allah?

"I suppose.

"Another pair of Nazi bastards. I bet Jesus, Mohammed, God and Allah are all holed up in Argentina just waitin' for George and Dick to join 'em. Say, you know what my fellow lawyers down at 'Dipshit, Dipshit, Dipshit & Dipshit' are calling Bush these days?

"Lemme guess: 'Dipshit'?

"Naw. They're calling him 'Four War George'.

"Four War George?

"Yup. He's already got wars goin' in Iraq and Afghanistan but he needs a little meat for that sandwich and that's Iran.

"OK," I said. "So that's three. So how do you get 'Four War George'?

"Cuba.

"Cuba? Is Bush going to commit war on Cuba? But...I don't get it. Cuba doesn't have much oil, does it?

"No, but it'll make a good retirement home for all the old oil Nazis to sit and count their war profits.

AMERICAN D.N.A.

2007-10-20T22:55:00.000-05:00

"Now, in terms of whether or not it's possible to reprogram the kind of basic Russian D.N.A., which is a centralized authority, that's hard to do. That would be like me trying to reprogram myself to take my foot out of my mouth and shove it up my ass. You see, I'm used to having my foot in my mouth. It's in my D.N.A. , my American D.N.A. It's in the American D.N.A. to be just plain old batshit crazy. It's easy to get people to go along with you when you're batshit crazy, because they're batshit crazy too. It's in their D.N.A. too. They're Americans!

"You see, when God gave us our D.N.A. for breakfast that morning instead 'Cuckoo Puffs' or 'Fruit Poops' he gave us Americans a bowl of 'Batshit Crazy', along with a couple slices of 'Toast of Stupidity'. The Russians, he give to them a bowl of 'Centralized Authority'. You get it? The French got...lemme see...what was it...oh yeah, the French got 'Snobbyfrogitis'...which sounds like a disease but I assure you it's a breakfast cereal containing French D.N.A. Once again here I am trying to explain all this to you. D.N.A. is scientific. It's somethin' 'scientific'. That means it has somethin' to do with science, which is somethin' I don't perfectly understand, but I come pretty close just by lookin' it straight in the eye. I am not a scientist, but I know what science is, and what it looks like and what it smells like. The same with D.N.A. It's just like Sweden, for example. Now, I'm not a Swedener, but I can recognize a Swedener when I see one in Sweden. When Laura and I were in Stockpond that time I turned to Laura and I said, 'Look! There's another Swede!' It's a gift I have. Just like how I know all about D.N.A.

"What's that?...Question over here?...OK, go ahead. Uh-huh...uh-huh...oh yeah, sure. In answer to your question, the Sweden D.N.A. is cold. It's a cold country up there and that's why God gave the Swedishers the cold D.N.A., so they could stand, you know, how cold it is. But then again, I'm from Texas. It gets pretty hot in Texas. Not everybody knows that. What's that?...The Texas D.N.A.?...Well, Texas is the same as the American D.N.A. In fact, I'm pretty sure that's where God got it. From the D.N.A. mines in Texas. I know there's one over there just outside of El Paso. They got these big trucks. I mean big, big trucks! A lot of demand for D.N.A. these days.

"Next question?...Dubya Dubya Three? Sure, step right up! I'll tell y'all about it.

JIM LAURA TO THE RESCUE

2007-10-15T22:15:00.000-05:00

Once again it was a misty night. Cold and raining. There was a knock on the door. It was her.

"Laura!

"Hello, Neil. Short time no see.

"I thought you were in the Middle East!

"On my way, Neil. May I come in?

"Certainly! Certainly!

Once again I showed her into the Gerald Ford Room. I apologized for the mess. I had several of my larger collages laid out on the couch cushions.

"Oooo!" she said. "'The Last Judgment'! So you know?

"Know?" I said. "Know what?

"Don't play innocent with me, Neil," said Laura, tut-tutting me in her best schoolmarmish tone. "You know exactly why I'm going to the Middle East, don't you?

"Um," I responded, "because your husband is a supreme dipshit so you're going to try to save his ass?

She laughed. "Oh, Neil! You are such a duplicitous bastard! That Middle East Peace Conference of his is such a joke. It's just a cover. Condi's over there right now trying to distract the world from my true ambitions.

"So," I said, after a long pause. "So you ARE the Antichrist?

"Of course!" she giggled. "And now that my armies are in place I'm going over there to take charge.

"Of Armagaeddon?

"Absolutely. It's time for the world to end, don't you think, Neil?

Hmmmm. I wasn't sure. Was it truly time for the world to end? Was there no longer any possible good that could come from it? I withheld my opinion.

"So all of this has been your doing, Laura?

"Oh, for heavenssakes, Neil!" she scoffed. "You of all people! You've known it from the beginning!

"Well, let's just say I 'suspected' it. So you're gonna go over there and...what exactly?

"Well, I'm programmed to do what's expected of me, of course. Just read your John of Patmos. You must have a copy of 'Revelation' around here somewhere, don't you?

"Oh sure. Oh sure. I like to read that every night before I go to bed. But what about the 'Rapture'?

"We'll do that in a couple of weeks. We'll get the real nitwits out of here before we start the shooting.

"So...Halloween for the 'Rapture'?

"Seemed appropriate.

She stood, walked around the Gerald Ford Room with that mistical air of hers that is so, so charming.

"Are you sure you don't want to join me, Neil? To rule the Earth?" she queried, coquettishly.

"No, no," I responded firmly. "You just do what you have to do, but don't expect the God of the Swedish Lutherans to take this lying down.

"Why not? He takes everything else lying down.

"Yeah, OK, so he likes His opium, but this time he's gonna send Jesus to smote you!

She laughed. "Jesus?!" she cried. "I can seduce him in heartbeat!

"No you can't!" I cried back. "Because he's gay!

"Jesus is gay?" She seemed genuinely dumbfounded for a moment, even though she knew that all the evidence pointed to Jesus being gay: 33, single, hung around with 12 men and a couple of faghags. But then she caught herself and laughed. "Oh, Neil! You're such a card! Well, I'd better be going. Armagaeddon waits for no man...or woman.

"Wait a minute!" I said. "Aren't you worried that I'm going to tell the whole world that you're the Antichrist?

She laughed again, that wonderful, lilting laugh. "Oh, Neil! WHO is going to believe you?

That was true.

"I mean, c'mon, Neil! First you tell people that you're the 'Chief Lobbyist for the Afghan Opium Growers Association and now you're what? A hedge fund manager? The only thing people know about you for sure is that you're a nitwit!

"Takes one to know one!

"No it doesn't, Neil. Any sane person would realize immediately that you are a nitwit.

"Yeah, well, OK. Well, best of luck then, with the End of the World and everything!" said I, merrily. And with that I showed her the door. I'd had enough of her and her ilk.

She slipped into the mist, into the shadows, into the rain.

Something bothered me, though, about her appearance. And then it hit me. It was raining hard, but there wasn't a drop of water on her. Even her hair was perfect.

Just like that werewolf from London.

THE AMERICAN WAY

2007-10-12T20:01:00.000-05:00

My basement looks like the set of "Silence of the Lambs". At least it used to. Half of it (the old half) has earthen walls that previous owners have attempted to shore up with rocks and a thin skin of concrete, but that hasn't stopped the walls from a' tumblin' down. "Cavin' in" might be a better term. Previous owners have shored it up with all variety of braces, buttresses and, once again, the eternal rock. If all else fails, add more rocks.

Rocks are plentiful hereabouts. Canadian rocks they are, and none of them has a passport. They are all illegal aliens, brought down here and deposited by glaciers.

"Here!" said the glaciers. "Here is a good spot to dump these damn Canadian rocks!

But I decided all that is going to change. I am going to clean up the basement, use bricks and concrete and conquer this Crumbling Wall Syndrome once and for all.

So I started with two buckets and a shovel and manhauled the dirt up the stairs. Damn fine exercise, but after awhile you feel like a mule. Good for nothin' but heavy lifting. Your brain goes numb and you go dumb. They say if you try to lift the front end of a pickup truck into the air, exerting 100% of your strength in the effort, you can't count to ten while you're doing it because all your blood goes to your muscles and your brain is deprived of oxygen. Same thing happens during sex, except that the blood all rushes to one particular muscle, and there is physical evidence of that. So sex and heavy lifting are kinda the same thing in that you can't think. (Of course, if you would have been thinking in the first place...oh, never mind.)

If I was a good American, I could pay some contractor to have sex for me...er, I mean, to do this heavy lifting. Like we do in Iraq. I wondered if Blackwater had any dirt-hauling mercenaries I could hire so I didn't have to do the job myself.

If all else fails, throw money at the problem. If it still doesn't work, throw more money at the problem. Of course, there's a difference between me and the government of the United States of America: I can run out of money, so to save money I have to do some things myself.

Not so the American government. They just take more money from the taxpayers and keep throwing it at the problem.

"Don't throw good money after bad," goes the proverb. At some point all of us, as individuals, have to learn this lesson, but not so the American government.

Normally I don't say too much about taxes. I just mumble "Jesus Christ!" under my breath like everyone else and keep on truckin'. I can't dwell too much on it. I have bills to pay and I have to work extra hard so I can make more money to give to the government. All levels of government. Jesus, that government is expensive!

Maybe we should try anarchy for awhile. It's much cheaper. And the rich would get really, really, really scared. So scared they might even offer to pay their fair share, if they could just return to expensive government! More police!

Who exactly is it that the police protect...that is when they're not shooting their ex-girlfriends with their official police-issued rifles? I'm pretty sure it isn't the poor. The poor don't have anything to protect.

My brother emailed me an interview with Merle Haggard. Merle is still pissed off, but he's pissed off at different folks these days. I think he got out of Muskogee. He's been hangin' out with Willie and smokin' marijuana.

Merle thinks the whole damn country's gone to pot. It ain't the America he knows and loves any more. "It's a police state!" he said in the article. "You look up and you expect to see a helicopter landin' in yer backyard. Either they think yer a terrorist or they're lookin' for dope.

Of course, in the old days, Merle woulda been all too happy to see helicopters landin' in the backyards of all them pot-smokin' anti-war hippies, so's that him and his redneck buddies could cruise around in their pickup trucks and shoot anything that moved or pissed them off in a particular way. Homos wuz even good for somethin' back them. They wuz good for target practice.

But, I'm just all pissed off cuz I been manhaulin' buckets o' dirt up from the "Silence of the Lambs" set down there in my basement. Nothin' like heavy liftin' to piss a feller off. Especially about taxes and that money pit called 'Iraq".

Strange thing about work, though. Soon I got enough o' that dirt manhauled out to start with the bricks and concrete. Then I started thinkin' about the Romans. Arrogant folks, but damn fine concrete artists. Give 'em enough money and they could pave anything.

And as I used an old steel spatula to do the screeding on my little bitty project I found myself thinking:

"Geez. With all the money the government has thrown away in Iraq I betcha they could have paved the whole damn country with a six inch layer of concrete.

But that wouldn't be no good.

Cuz then we'd have to buy a bunch o' jackhammers just to get out all that oil.

THE MIRACLE OF OIL

2007-10-08T10:31:00.000-05:00

SCIENTISTS ANNOUNCE FIRST ARTIFICIAL LIFE FORM CREATED

2007-10-07T04:45:00.000-05:00

Scientists announced today that they had created the first artificial life form known to Earth. They further revealed that this artificial life form has been occupying the White House for the past seven years.

Asked why they had waited so long to inform the world that U.S. President George W. Bush is, in fact, an artificial life form, the scientists explained that they were embarrassed to disclose the information earlier.

"Sad to say, we forgot to give it a brain, a heart, or the sense that God gave a flea.

"Are you going to patent it...er, him?" asked a reporter.

"No, no. If anyone wants him, they can have him.

SALOME WITH THE HEAD OF JOHN THE BASEBALL FANATIC

2007-10-05T21:39:00.000-05:00

"I'm sorry, dear, I know it's the playoffs, but I told you what would happen if you insisted on watching THREE baseball games a day!"

AMERICA, THE OBLIVIOUS

2007-10-02T23:22:00.001-05:00

I'm sure if Nero were around these days he wouldn't fiddle while Rome burned. He would play golf.

"Now watch this drive!" he might say.

Sadly, Nero is gone now, replaced by our current Emperor, Zero.

SCHIP

2007-10-01T01:13:00.000-05:00

This is a piece of "Found Art". I did not do this. I found it inside an old LIFE magazine. Some unknown artist had cut out a couple of cigarettes from elsewhere in the magazine and glued them up the baby's nose. Then they apparently took an eraser to create the smoke and make the baby's eyes look a tad Satanic. It gave me a laugh, so I cut it out and framed it.

It's the perfect illustration for the "S.C.H.I.P" debate.

Those poor smoking babies. Now they'll have to pay for their own medical care looks like.

Sheez! Sixty-one cents a pack?!! How the hell's a baby gonna afford to smoke any more? Much less two at a time.

I suppose someday it'll come down to only one smoker left in the whole world and he or she will have to foot the medical bills for everybody. The tax on a pack of cigarettes will be about ten million dollars by then, or $ 500,000 per cigarette.

Luckily, with my new job as a hedge fund manager, I should be able to afford it.

BABY JESUS & MAMBO SVEN MEET THE ALIENS

2007-09-28T23:35:00.000-05:00

DRUG ST Right Panel

2007-09-27T00:07:00.001-05:00

See below and below below.

DRUG ST (detail Right Panel) Collage 2007 Neil Shakespeare.

DRUG ST Left Panel

2007-09-26T23:12:00.000-05:00

This is the left panel of "DRUG ST", a product of my recent stay in the mental institution in Crazy Creek. "DRUG ST" is a real street in Crazy Creek. It's quite the street. Below is a picture of my new self (I've been reincarnated as a hedge fund manager) in the central panel of this work.

"DRUG ST" (Detail, Left Panel) Collage 2007 Neil Shakespeare.

RETURN FROM CRAZY CREEK

2007-09-25T23:03:00.000-05:00

Well, I am out of treatment, finally. Maybe not finally, but at least for this time. It wasn't so bad. I got to meet Britney Spears and I even did a little art work to commemorate my most recent visit to Crazy Creek. The treatment shrunk my head a little, as you can see, but it probably needed a bit of shrinking anyway.

So how do you like my new look? Yup, it's a new Neil you're looking at. First thing I did was go out and get myself a new set of Wall Street duds, with a red-and-white striped shirt and a navy blue tie with a field of stars, suitable for my new job as a hedge fund manager.

Sad to report, but A.O.G.A. dropped me. They said I was dipping into the product, but that's a false accusation. It was just my normal, run-of-the-mill mental illness, and nothing more. It had nothing to do with opium, but people always think the worst of you, don't they?

They kept me awful busy there in the Crazy Creek asylum, what with the bingo and the electric lawn darts. And, of course, I spent lots and lots of time with Britney. Britney says she's going to become a better person, just like Paris said she was going to become a better person and then the first thing she does when she gets out is sue Hallmark for using 'That's Hot!' in one of their greeting cards.

Yup, rehab changes you...but not for long.

But I think I'll be different. I've seen the light now. It's time for me to go for the green. Some say the 'Green Movement' is growing in America nowadays, but that's nonsense. America has always been, and ever shall be, nothing BUT a 'Green Movement'. We are ALL environmentalists. Just look at our money! Well, true, the Treasury Department has been adding colors to the old 'greenback', but the predominant color on American money is still green. Yet, America doesn't have much time left, so I have to dip my hand as deep into the pot as possible before the world switches to 'Loonies' as it's currency du jour.

Yes, yes, I know, some of you will think I'm selling out, becoming a hedge fund manager and all, but I assure you that's not the case. As the old line goes:

"I'm not selling out, I'm buying in!

Oh, and also, I'll be moving to Canada. Well, I suppose there's always the possibility that they might not let me in, but that's almost as remote as myself.

I wonder sometimes what's to become of America now that Bush and his cronies have all but destroyed it. Well, maybe it'll recover in some form. England is still there, afterall, long after the decline of their empire. From what I hear they've even survived the emigration of David Beckham, although there are doubts that they shall ever recover from the loss of Posh.

I hear Nelson Mandela died while I was in the 'hospital'. Saddam killed him, from what I hear. And from the grave at that.

What else has been happening? Oh, I hear Alan Greenspan said that the Iraq War is 'largely about oil'.

Well, he's getting old. Probably the Alzheimer's talking. Otherwise he never would have said what he was told he was not supposed to say. Luckily, no one paid much attention to him.

I mean, when you have a whole society complicit in a lie, no one's going to pay too much attention to the truth.

That's what makes America great.

PICTURE: Central panel from "DRUG ST", Collage 2007, Neil Shakespeare.

BOY SCOUT MARCH

2007-09-13T20:38:00.000-05:00

"Be Prepared!"

That's what they taught me in the Boy Scouts. Problem is, there is no way to prepare yourself for your own stupidity.

You are supposed to recognize the mistakes of the past and not repeat them. Everybody knows that. And still, we do repeat them.

Hard to explain it. How can we be so dumb? Years and years and years ago we made the same mistake. We vowed we would never do that again, and yet we did. How do you explain that? Anxiety? Too much time on our hands? Despair? Thinking too much? Thinking too little? Thinking not at all?

Too much pressure? Too little? No humility? No perspective? No damn clue?

No excuse.

Of course, we just say that. Our excuse is, in fact, that we have no excuse.

Which makes it God's fault. If He would simply have provided us with an excuse to begin with...

But then, really, how much can we expect of God, eh? He's Mr. Excuse himself. He's Mr. Finger Pointer incarnate.

"It's Man's fault, Goddammit!" He says. "No wait a minute. Make that Woman's fault.

And, of course, he's been talking to George W. Bush.

Did you ever get the feeling that God only talks to people dumb enough to listen to Him?

CRYING ON THE SHOULDER OF GOD

2007-09-06T19:07:00.000-05:00

In response to Mr. Draper’s observance that Mr. Bush had nobody’s “shoulder to cry on,” the president said: “Of course I do, I’ve got God’s shoulder to cry on, and I cry a lot.” (NYT)

Poor God. He's got one wet shirt, that's for sure. For you see I, too, have been crying on the shoulder of God of late. I see George there all the time. In fact, we've joked about it:

"Neil! You here again?

"Yup. You too, huh, George?

"God's got a mighty soft shoulder, Neil. Big shoulder. Plenty of room for both of us. But...pardon me for asking a personal question...but what are you crying about? I mean, you don't exactly have the weight of the world on your shoulders like I do!

"No, but I do have the weight of George W. Bush on my shoulders.

"Oh, sorry about that, but admit it! You were hogging God's shoulder! You were CLINGING to it! Now move over. I got me some cryin' to do!

"Quit kicking me, George! Dammit! Well, alright, I guess I can cry here on God's chest.

"Not as good as the shoulder! And don't cry on His belly button. He gets easily pissed about that.

"Thanks for the tip. Is it OK if I cry on God's diaphragm?

"Sure, sure. But make sure none of your tears falls down on God's nuts, Neil! He gets REALLY pissed when you cry on his nuts!

"Does the salt get into the tip of His pecker?

"Ouch! That would hurt! Heh-heh.

"Listen, George, I don't want to keep you from your crying. Go right ahead and cry on God's shoulder. I'll turn my head the other way.

"Thanks, Neil. It's not easy for me to cry with you watchin' me. In fact, could you go, like, cry on God's thigh or something?

"Sure. Sure.

"OK, that's good, but how about you slide a little further down and cry on God's knee?

"Alright.

"Dammit! I can still see you down there! I can't cry if I can see you. Why don't you go ahead and drop all the way down and cry on God's toes?

"Way down here?

"Yeah, that's it! Cry on God's pinkie there. That's a buddy. OK, I'm goin' to start cryin' now!

"OK, George. Say, George?

"Yeah, Neil, what is it?! Can't you see I'm welling up here?! I was just about to let the floodgates open!

"Sorry, George. But I was just wondering if you could crawl up a little bit and cry on God's moustache?

WHO WON THE COW?

2007-08-30T02:15:00.000-05:00

When Mr. Stoddard arrived, he walked through the festival surrounded by a three-man British and Australian security team armed with assault rifles. “Who won the cow? Who won the cow?” shouted Mr. Stoddard, 38, a burly former food broker from Provo, Utah. “Was it a girl or a guy?” (NYT 8/26/07)

As Chief Lobbyist for the Afghan Opium Growers Association (A.O.G.A.), I have been delegated to extend thanks from our member farmers to U.S. President George W. Bush for sending us Mr. Loren Stoddard, whose best idea for winning the current Opium War is to raffle off a cow.

On Wednesday, Mr. Stoddard and Rory Donohoe, the director of the American development agency’s Alternative Livelihoods program in southern Afghanistan, attended the first “Helmand Agricultural Festival.” The $300,000 American-financed gathering in Lashkar Gah was an odd cross between a Midwestern county fair and a Central Asian bazaar, devised to show Afghans an alternative to poppies.

Under a scorching sun, thousands of Afghan men meandered among booths describing fish farms, the dairy business and drip-irrigation systems. A generator, cow and goat were raffled off.

OK, yes. AND a goat. AND a generator. A cow and goat generator, I presume. I'm sure that, as soon as they get that cow and goat generator to start generating lots of cows and goats, the member farmers of A.O.G.A. will be giving up opium growing for good.

One of our farmer members asked me, "Where do they find these idiots?"

"Well," I replied, "in this case, Utah. That's Mormon country. Nothing BUT idiots out there.

Of course Mr. Stoddard is probably the best that the Bush team can do. I mean, with the recent departures of Gonzalez and Rove, how many rats do they have left? Still, Mr. Stoddard is eminently qualified, according to the article in the New York Times:

Mr. Stoddard helped Wal-Mart move into Central America in his previous posting.

Yes, just as Brownie was uniquely qualified to run F.E.M.A. because of his vast experience in horse show judging, Mr. Stoddard is obviously the right man to run the War on Opium in Afghanistan, what with bringing Wal-Mart to Central America and all.

But the REAL strategy behind the Bush administration's War on Opium in Afghanistan is far, far trickier than that. Their strategy seems to be to flood the world market with heroin, thus driving prices down and leaving the poor farmers with no alternative but to milk fish.

Mr. Stoddard predicted that poppy production had become so prolific that the opium market was flooded and prices were starting to drop. “It seems likely they’ll have a rough year this year,” he said, referring to the poppy farmers. “Labor prices are up and poppy prices are down. I think they’re going to be looking for new things.”

Now that's 'BUSH LOGIC' at it's finest! I can just hear the conversation in the White House:

"Mr. President, who should we send to Afghanistan to head up the War on Opium?

"Well, who do we have left?

"Well, we do have this fellow from Utah who helped bring Wal-Mart to Central America.

"He did THAT?! Now how in the hell did he do THAT?! If he can bring Wal-Mart to Central America, then he's obviously the right man for ending the opium trade in Afghanistan!

"Yes, Mr. President. He already has some brilliant ideas, like raffling off a cow, for example.

"Raffling off a cow?! Why, that IS brilliant! Sign him up!

And so, once again, on behalf of the member farmers of A.O.G.A., a hearty thank you to the Bush administration for sending us Mr. Stoddard and making all of our dairy cow dreams come true.

VIETIRAQ

2007-08-23T05:30:00.000-05:00

This war has gone on for so long now that I, like most members of the current administration, can't recall specifically exactly how many years ago it was that Junior told us that Iraq was nothing like Vietnam. Four? Five years?

When I heard him say that - and again, I can't recall how long ago this was, where I was exactly, nor with whom...my mind is weak - I thought:

"Yes, that's so true. In Vietnam we had 'escalation'. In Iraq we have 'surge'. Big difference. And although both are extremely warm environments, one is a lot more humid than the other. And one has more trees, and less sand. One is in the Middle East and the other is in the Far East. 'East of what?' you might ask, but that won't do you any good, because I can't recall. And we killed a lot more people in Vietnam, ours and theirs. True, the Iraq War is scheduled to go on forever, so maybe we'll catch up on the killing, but so far they are completely different in that regard.

Junior was right, as always, all those years ago. It was a slam dink. Vietnam and Iraq were as different as night and...geez, I can't recall. What is it that comes between night and night? Oh well. I'm sure it will come to me.

But now, I hear tell, Junior's changed his tune. Now he's been telling the Legionnaires that Iraq IS like Vietnam!

WHAT?!!! Imagine my confusion, although you, yourself, are probably too confused to aid me in my confusion.

But that's no problem, because here in the mental hospital they give us lots of time to think, and it's been raining a lot lately, so that helps the brain too.

I've had to give up all of the ill-conceived notions that Junior gave me all those years ago and turn my attention to the new set of ill-conceived notions he's given me. (He's always having to explain things to me like a child, Junior is.) It's taken me a couple of days, but I've managed to wrassle this hog of thought to the ground and, by golly, I find that Junior is right again. Iraq IS like Vietnam! Exactly like it!

#1 - Iraq is exactly like Vietnam because we got into both of them for the wrong reasons, led astray by dimwitted leaders deep in the pockets of the bankers and the corporations.

#2 - Iraq is like Vietnam because neither one of them attacked us!

#3 - Iraq is exactly like Vietnam because we get to try out our new weapons on live human beings!

#4 - Something about oil.

#5 - It gives our young people something to do! I mean, what better way for young people to let off steam that giving them guns and letting them shoot people? And if they weren't doing it over there, they'd be doing it over here! Some of them DO do it over here, from what I've been reading. Quite a few, in fact. And those people should be sent to Iraq, because they're already skilled at shooting people.

Oh, and there's lots more reasons too. But I'm keeping those a secret, because you don't want to show the enemy your playbook! Junior taught me that, too. So I zealously guard my playbook from the other inmates here, and also from the guards. I'm pretty sure that Johnson is al Qaeda. And the warden here, he kinda looks like Ho Chi Minh.

Well, I've gotta go. The attendants are here now and I guess it's time for Bingo. I'm glad Junior helped me resolve my confusion issues, because you need a sharp, crisp mind for Bingo. The numbers come at you so fast.

Psychiatrist's Note: After several days, and a complete psychological evaluation, Mr. Shakespeare has been found to have a severe case of 'Bush Fatigue'. Luckily, we were able to diagnose the condition before he went utterly mad. He has been placed on appropriate medication and the staff of this hospital has determined that Mr. Shakespeare should be allowed to use a computer, but BY NO MEANS is he to be given a pencil, pen NOR ANY OTHER SHARP OBJECT.

INVISIBLE MAN

2007-08-15T20:49:00.000-05:00

Do you see me in this picture? I bet you don't. Whenever I travel, which is seldom, I like to travel with a hot Asian chick in a bikni. To distract the Aliens.

It works pretty good.

A lot better than "Attempting Not To Be Seen". (You Python fans know what I'm talking about.)

Of late, however, remaining invisible has become a problem. A few days ago I heard the news that Hillary is looking for me.

"Americans from all walks of life across our country may be invisible to this president, but they’re not invisible to me." Hillary

Imagine being "found" by Hillary Clinton, the all-knowing, all-seeing Hillary!

I've been trying to become invisible for years and years, and I thought it was working, until Hillary came looking for me.

A male narrator says, “Hillary Clinton has spent her life standing up for people others don’t see.”

Goddammit! Can't she just fucking leave me alone?!!! I WANT to be invisible!

But no! Hillary is like God. She sees all, even the invisible. Her eye is on the invisible sparrow. And I'm that fucking invisible sparrow.

Oh, and here's a question for you:

If Hillary is God, then who has Bush been talking to?

A COLD WIND UNDER THE DOOR FRIGHTENS BRAD, A YOUNG REPUBLICAN

2007-08-10T20:42:00.000-05:00

Yes, the Log Cabin boys are shivering in their penny loafers out there in the Hamptons, for "the word that shall not be uttered" has been uttered, and uttered by no less than "The War Czar".

Yahoo News - WASHINGTON - Frequent tours for U.S. forces in Iraq and Afghanistan have stressed the all-volunteer force and made it worth considering a return to a military draft, President Bush's new war adviser said Friday.

Cue theme from "Dragnet".

"I think it makes sense to certainly consider it," Army Lt. Gen. Douglas Lute said in an interview with National Public Radio's "All Things Considered."
"And I can tell you, this has always been an option on the table.

When informed of this my Young Republican friend, Bradley, was incensed.

"What?! They want us to fight for ourselves? Well, I'll just have to pay someone to serve my time like they did back in the Civil War," said Bradley, 19-year-old member of the American Ruling Class. "Maybe one of those, what do you call 'em? Mexicans?

"Come to think of it, why don't we just draft ALL the illegal immigrants? As their reward for this service to Young Republicans...er, I mean, 'Our Country'...they should be given instant citizenship in the Republic of Iraq! Then, when their tours are over, and if they are still alive, they can marry some nice Muslim girl and settle down in that brutal heat with no running water and no electricity. They're used to that, you know, from living in Mexico.

"It's like Barbara Bush said about those refugess from Hurricane Katrina in the Astrodome: 'They've never had it so good. This is like Summer Camp for them!' And that's just how it'll be in Baghdad for the Mexicans. And not only that, but...POOF!...there's goes our immigration problem. And it'll bring the Catholics and the Muslims closer together too. We need more mixed-faith marriages anyway. Gawd, I'm brilliant!

IT'S NOT ABOUT THE OIL

2007-08-08T22:31:00.000-05:00

"We're talking about opening up the second largest oil reserves in the entire world to foreign investment," Juhasz said. "It costs about $75 a barrel -- and about 60 cents to get it out of the ground. Do the math." -OneWorldUS

Those damn ungrateful Iraqis are balking at signing "The Oil Law".

A new public opinion poll has found nearly two thirds of Iraqis oppose plans to open the country's oilfields to foreign companies.

After all we've done for them! I mean, holy cow, there they sit every day, a MERE FOUR YEARS AFTER THEIR LIBERATION, in 117 degree heat with no water or electricity because the billions and billions we've sunk into 'rebuilding the infrastructure' of THIER COUNTRY, without ANY HOPE FOR OUR OWN BENEFIT, but simply to bring them THE GIFT OF FREEDOM, have only made matters worse and,...well, OK, they are dying in record numbers but...they have the audacity to suggest that BUSH and CHENEY and THEIR OIL BUDDIES staged the Iraq invasion JUST TO GET AT THEIR OIL? The average Iraqi thinks we're just in it for the oil! Can you believe the ingratitude?

The U.S. government has been pressuring the Iraqi government to pass the oil law by September. Anontia Juhasz of the group Oil Change International told OneWorld that the Bush administration and Congress have made the law's passage one of the "benchmarks" that would indicate the U.S. is making progress in the war.

According to Oil Change International, the oil law sets no minimum standard for the extent to which foreign companies would have to invest their earnings in the Iraqi economy, partner with Iraqi companies, hire Iraqi workers, or share new technologies.
It also would allow multinational oil companies to sign exclusive 30-year contracts with Iraq's current government.

WILLING TO LISTEN, BUT NOT TO HEAR

2007-08-06T22:36:00.000-05:00

I had to go to Washington yesterday, to meet with Karzai. He was in town to have his picture taken with Bush, appear on a few talks shows, and brave the mosquitoes at Camp David. I met him at the A.O.G.A. offices on K Street. He greeted me warmly, with a hearty embrace.

"Neil! Neil, my friend!" he gushed. "My God have you been doing a good job! Another record opium crop again this year! I did not think it possible! How do you do it?

"You flatter me, Mr. President. How was your meeting with Bush?

He sighed, his happy mood gone. "That Bush," he said. "He listens, or at least he says he is 'willing to listen', and at times he even appears to be listening, but obviously he does not hear.

"Maybe he just hears what he wants to hear, which is himself.

Karzi laughed. "Straight to the point, Neil! Straight to the point. No wonder you are such a successful lobbyist for the Afghan Opium Growers Association. Bush does like to listen to himself talk, no question about that. But I wonder if, perhaps, he needs hearing aids.

"Well, he is getting old.

"True. True. As are we all.

"Well, not me.

"No, no. I didn't mean you, Neil. But it is frustrating, trying to communicate with the deaf.

"The deaf, dumb and blind, you mean.

"Yes. It is difficult. But not everyone can be Helen Keller.

Hmmm. That thought intrigued me. Helen Keller as President. Bush as Helen Keller. I could not let that thought stand.

"You demean Ms. Keller, Mr. President.

"Yes, yes. Quite true. And that Pinball Wizard by The Who as well. I apologize. What was his name?

"Tommy?

"Yes, 'Tommy'! That was it. 'That deaf dumb and blind kid sure played a mean pinball!'

"Hamid?

"Yes, Neil?

"We need to talk business. It's been great having the U.S. invade, and now we have NATO, but the future of the Afghan Opium Growers Association depends on their continued presence. And I'm afraid they might pull out if they capture bin Laden.

Hamid laughed. He laughed real hard. "Capture bin Laden?! Bush?!! Are you kidding me?! Not to worry, Neil. Bush couldn't find the finger up his ass, much less bin Laden! No, no. We'll have a continued U.S. presence for several more years, believe me. It's been wonderful for our economy. Which, as you know, is heavily dependent on opium production and U.S. foreign aid. I just want to say 'Thank You' again, Neil, for all you have done for Aghanistan's opium farmers.

"Mr. President, as you know, Afghanistan's opium farmers have been getting the short end of the stick. Even with all these record-breaking opium harvests, the farmers are still getting only one percent of the street value in Hamburg.

"I know, Neil. I know. And I sympathize. But the Iranians are taking such a large cut for turning a blind eye on the trade routes.

"Mr. President, all due respect, but I don't think you can blame this all on the Iranians. I want you to get at least, at LEAST 3% for the farmers or I'm afraid I'm going to have to authorize a strike.

"What? Neil, you can't be serious! The Afghan economy would collapse!

"Take it or leave it.

"Neil, Neil, be reasonable! I can try to get you 2%.

"Not enough, Hamid! Fair is fair!

Karzai sighed deep. "OK. 3% then. Tied to the Hamburg benchmark?

"Yes.

"Done!" he said. We shook hands. I was elated. In one fell swoop I had tripled the income of the Afghan opium farmers.

It was a productive trip.

BUSHFEST '07

2007-08-04T22:31:00.000-05:00

Conceived as a forum to discuss ways to halt the rise in global temperatures and show President Bush's relatively recent embrace of the issue, the summit next month apparently will not signal any change in the administration's policies. -LA Times

(Herewith follows a transcript of the President's press conference on his upcoming 'Climate Forum'.)

"Please be seated. Please be seated. Yeah, go ahead and squeeze one out before you sit down.

(Laughter)

"As you all know, I have always been a great admirer of 'climate'. Climate. Has a nice ring to it, doesn't it? Climate. I like sayin' that. You know, clouds and wind and rain and El Nino and stuff like that. Weather. Some folks call it 'weather'. You might know it as 'weather'. But I call it 'climate'. Because you got different weather in different climates, you see. In yer hot climates you got hot weather, and in yer cold climates you got cold. It's important that I explain this to the American People.

"Now some have been sayin' that we've been messin' around with the climate, through these outhouse gases and so forth. They say that we've been warmin' up the climate with our gases, and I lay that right at the feet of the Democrats. Everyone knows those Democrats are gassy fellas. I ain't sayin' the Democrat girls are gassy, although that Nancy Pelosi sure is. Stand next to her if you want an olfactory adventure. 'Olfactory'. Did you catch that? Do you all understand that? Or am I using to big o' words for ya?

"Anyway, there's some say this overzealous gassiness on our part...and we're not alone...Europe is pretty gassy, as are the Chinese. It's not all our fault. But it mostly is. The American People are a gassy people, I admit that. But we're a good people. Maybe just a little gassy.

"So to control our gassiness some folks proposed a while back the 'Kyoto Treaty'. That's Ky-o-to. K-Y-O-T-O. Oh, you do know how to spell it? Well, it doesn't matter cuz I refused to sign it, and I was the only one not to sign it, because I'm a man who stands on principle, and that means that sometimes, even if yer the only one in the world with the courage to do so, you gotta stand up for your God-given right to gas.

"God didn't give us gas for no reason. Sure, it might seem to some that God, in his infinite mercy, might have saved us from flatulence while he was savin' us from temptation and sin and death and so forth. But that's not how it works with the Almighty. He's Almighty, so I guess he figures he deserves to play a little joke on us from time to time.

"So now they tell me that, over the centuries, all of our incredible gassiness...and it's not just us, it's the cows too...we got lots of cows and all them cows are gassy...take it from me, I'm from Texas. We got some of the gassiest bossies in the world down there. Where was I?

"Oh, yeah. I rejected Kyoto cuz I got some pretty good ideas of my own. I'm kind of an expert in gassiness. It runs in the family, not to mention the Republican party. And I think with my gut. That's another reason I'm such an expert on gas. And, of course, I was in the oil business.

"My idea is this. I'm gonna convene here in Washington my own private 'Climate Forum'. Condi's gonna chair the event, and I'm gonna give one of my great speeches there. We're sendin' out invitations to all of the G-8's and we're even gonna invite the G-9's through the G-12's. Maybe the G-13's. We should be able to get a Bingo there somewhere. Heh-heh. That's a joke.

"So I've sent out the invitations and they go somethin' like this:

"Say, why don't all you guys and gals come over to my place and after we get our pictures taken holdin' hands and so forth so it looks like we're doin' somethin' we'll all sit down and I'll tell ya what we're gonna do.

"I'm callin' it 'BUSHFEST '07'! We'll all sit around the campfire, cook up some baked beans and contribute to global warming. It's a good cause, and I appreciate y'all's support. With your help we can drive it up another notch or two. Thank you. And now, to show you that I'm not just whistlin' Kyoto here, I'm gonna let one rip.

"Helen, you might wanna put on yer gas mask. I think this one's gonna reach the second row.

I HEREBY LAY CLAIM TO THE BOTTOM OF THE MOON

2007-08-03T23:01:00.000-05:00

...before the Russkies get it.

"...on Thursday August 2nd the Russian Expedition placed the Russian flag (in titanium) on the yellow gravel 4,200 metres below the surface at the site of the North Pole.

Yellow gravel, huh? How uninteresting. The bottom of the North Pole looks like my driveway.

I always assumed...from cartoons...that the North Pole was just a barber's pole stuck in the ice and that Santa Claus lived there and, of course, Superman had his Fortress of Solitude.

Santa Claus and Superman were the only people who lived there, but it was OK because they were both good guys and got along together pretty good. They had some things in common. Both could fly, for example, although Santa Claus did need the help of his magic reindeer. And, of course, they were both rejects from society, shunned and sent into exile to the one place that nobody in the world gave a damn about because it had no value. But something changed all that.

"At stake are the region’s natural riches, until now frozen both in law and in nature. But global warming is making them look more accessible. They may include 10 billion tonnes of oil and gas deposits, tin, manganese, gold, nickel, lead, platinum and diamonds, plus fish and perhaps even lucrative freight routes.

So one day last week Superman and Santa Claus were sitting in the fortress of solitude watching a re-run of an episode of 'Married with Children' for the twelfth or thirteenth time on Superman's satellite dish when first they heard, and then saw, the Russian icebreaker.

"A mighty nuclear-powered icebreaker shepherded a research vessel that launched hi-tech mini-submarines capable of pinpoint navigation under the Arctic ice.

"Damn," muttered Superman. "Looks like we got company.

"What are we gonna do, Superman?" asked Santa Claus of his old friend.

"Well," responded Superman in those super sonorous tones of his, "I could melt the Russian icebreaker with my super laser beam eyes!

"But, Superman," said Santa, "we promised not to interfere in the destiny of planet Earth!

"That's true, Santa," said Superman, looking glum, "but what about Denmark? They have claim to the North Pole too, along with the United States, Canada and Norway!

"Norway, eh?" sighed Santa Claus. "Gee, I'd sure hate to let the Norwegian children down. And the fish! Those could be Norwegian fish down there!

"Well, looks like they're Russian fish now. Let's see what it says in The Economist!" said Superman, opening a copy of his favorite magazine.

“The Arctic is ours and we should manifest our presence,” said Mr Chilingarov, a charismatic figure whom President Vladimir Putin has named as “presidential envoy” to the Arctic. “This is like placing a flag on the moon” said Russia’s Arctic and Antarctic Institute.

"The Moon!" said Santa, excitedly. "That's it! We could transfer our operations to the bottom of the Moon!

"Naw," said Superman. "Neil Shakespeare already has that...

FOUR AND A HALF DAYS IN IRAQ

2007-08-02T21:22:00.000-05:00

When I went to the University of Minnesota I used to play on an enormous sandpile on the north side of the 35W bridge that collapsed in Minneapolis yesterday.

The bridge was in use then, but you could only use it to cross the Mississippi from the University to Downtown or vice-versa. The section of 35W just north of bridge was still under construction and there was this enormous sandpile down on the uncompleted freeway between University Ave and Fourth Street. It was as high as the bottom of the overpass, a perfect cone of sand, like an enormous Hershey's Kiss.

We had some great midnight parties down there, featuring beer and one fearsome game of "King of the Hill". Half...ok, fully...drunk we would try to climb that mountain of sand to become the King of 35W. If you have ever tried, in an inebriated state, to climb a mountain of sand..well, believe me, it ain't easy.

You start out with all the best intentions, of course, but after three steps you realize your bare feet have disappeared and you are up to your ankles in trouble. It is slog, slog, slog from there on up to the top, to achieve your Pyrrhic victory.

I lived less than a block from that sandpile, in an apartment on 8th and University. We knew the cops would bust us if we hauled the keg down to the sandpile, so we kept it back in the apartment and brought the beer down in pitchers and plastic gallon jugs. We would fill our beer cups at the base of that sandpile and head up. By the time you got to the top...if you got to the top...your beer was gone. Spilled, most of it. Wasted.

Actually, it was usually gone about halfway up, at which point you'd say, "Dammit! I'm out of beer!" and tumble back down. You had a choice to make. You could continue on to the summit and face a fight with some other drunken yahoo and possibly become "King of the Sandpile", or you could go back down for more beer. We would generally opt for the beer. We were college kids, and we had our priorities straight.

We don't anymore.

We are in charge now. Today's leaders are of my own generation, which I once thought showed such promise in those days when we played on that sandpile. But somewhere on the climb up that mountain of sand we lost our principles, lost our priorities and failed to live up to our promise.

Our "King of the Hill", who was supposed to be the best one of us, turned out to be George W. Bush, the worst. And the rest of the "leaders" from my generation have turned out to be nearly as bad, Republican and Democrat alike. Lousy. Every one of them.

"Leaders" they call themselves, the ones who have allowed the infrastructure of "The Homeland" to fall into such disrepair and led us to the devastating consequences witnessed yesterday.

And why? So they could sell their souls to lobbyists and play their little 'Earmark Games'?

To chase some Pyrrhic "Victory" in a sandpile in the Middle East, a sandpile that did NOT attack us on September 11, 2001, while allowing the levees in New Orleans to weaken and break? While allowing the arteries and veins which carry the lifeblood of this country to crumble and fall?

I was just reading that the cost to fully repair and modernize the bridges in this country would be around $ 9 billion per year for the next twenty years, or around $ 180 billion dollars.

The War in That Big Sandpile in the Middle East is currently costing, so they tell us (and they usually only tell us the half of it), $ 2 billion per day.

$ 9 billion dollars is four and a half days in Iraq. Four and one half days.

Too bad we already threw a cool trillion or two down the hole in that outhouse over there.

We could have fixed all the bridges, all the dams, and got one helluva good start on the highways.

Nice work there, America's leaders.

You Kings and Queens of The Hill.

"WHY PEOPLE HAVE SEX: IT FEELS GOOD" Headline in Yahoo News

2007-08-01T22:44:00.000-05:00

This is, like, really really big news here folks. Since the beginning of time people have been trying to figure out why it is they have sex, and up until now no one has come up with the answer.

I myself have been trying to figure out why people have sex for many, many years now, but it looks like that crack team of scientists down there at the University of Texas beat me to the answer.

"Researchers at the University of Texas spent five years to study the overlooked why behind sex while others were spending their time on the how."

Well, the 'how' I learned pretty early on in life. There's really not much to the 'how'. They teach you that in Junior High School. They've got charts and everything. The penis goes in the vagina or, if you are a male homosexual, into something else. If you are a female homosexual...well, I'm not sure what goes into what there. They didn't have any charts for that back in Junior High.

But the 'why' has always plagued me, as it has wise folks like Socrates, for example, since the dawn of time. Socrates used to walk around Athens asking himself this very same question day after day after day.

"Why DO people have sex?" Socrates wondered. But even the wisest men and women in the world couldn't figure it out. No one could. Although the great philosophers pondered endlessly, they couldn't come up with any logical explanation. Until, that is, they sent this age-old question down to Texas, birthplace of so many great geniuses.

"...men and women agree on their top reasons for having sex — they were attracted to the person, they wanted to experience physical pleasure and "it feels good," so found the Texas geniuses.

"It feels GOOD?" That was my first reaction when I heard the news that this scientific puzzle had at last been solved. That's the one thing I NEVER would have thought of. God bless those outside-the-brain thinkers down there in Texas.

It feels good, huh?

Gosh. I might have to try it.

THE MAILBOX OF THE KING OF THE WAHABOOBIES

2007-07-31T13:11:00.000-05:00

I was on my way in to town and had stopped at the end of the driveway to pick up yesterday's mail when a beat-up Ford F-150 came over the hill in a cloud of gravel and stopped. It was my neighbor.

"I see you got a new mailbox," he says.

"Well, not new," says I. It was six months old already and I realized I hadn't seen my neighbor since the snowplow clipped the old one off last winter.

"Well anyway," he says, "it's pretty sharp. How much did she cost?

"Oh, I don't know. Maybe forty bucks?

"$ 39.95?

"Yeah, probably $ 39.95. It wasn't one of the really cheap ones, but it wasn't the top-of-the-line mailbox either.

"I know what you mean. You can get some pretty expensive mailboxes these days. I wonder: Who has the most expensive mailbox in the world?

Hmmm. This was something I hadn't thought that much about. "Maybe Bill Gates?" I ventured. "Or maybe the King of Saudi Arabia?

"Saudi Arabia?!" he thundered. "Don't get me started on Saudi Arabia!

I could see he was suddenly quite agitated, so I wasn't about to get him started on Saudi Arabia, but I didn't have to, because he started himself.

"That's where all those hijackers come from! How many of those Iraqi terrorists that flew those planes into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon were from Saudi Arabia? Tell me that!

"Um...I'm not sure...maybe...15?

"Sixteen!" he thundered. "Almost all of 'em! And those Iraqi terrorists that we're fighting now? Those suicide bombers? How many of THEM are Saudi Arabians?

I was ready for him this time. I had just been reading about that. "40%?

"Sixty percent!" he corrected me. "And who's financing those Iraqi terrorists who are 60% from Saudi Arabia?

"Um...the Saudis?

"Exactly! It's the Wahaboobies!

"The Wahaboobies?

"Isn't that what you call 'em? Or is it the Wahaboobists?

"Wahabhuddists?

"Boobists!!

"Oh, you mean the Wahabis? Bin Laden's sect?

"That's right. The Wahaboobies. Seems to me it should be Saudi Arabia we're attacking! But what does Bush do? He decides he's gonna sell 'em $ 20 billion dollars worth of guns and hi-tech airplanes so they can what? Attack us again?!

"I don't think the King of Saudi Arabia is a...is a Wahabooby.

"He's not? Well what the hell are we doing supporting a King anyway? That Saddam, he was a King and we got rid of him!

"Actually, I think he was a 'President'. That's what they called him anyway.

"President, huh?" he laughed. "That's just like us. That's what we call our King over here!

I laughed. "There's some who say the election might have been rigged.

"I heard that," he nodded. "Bush & his cronies stole the damn thing.

"Well, I was talking about Saddam.

"And then he walks around Texas holding hands with the King of the Wahaboobies.

I was confused. I hadn't spoken to my neighbor in a while, but...

"I thought you were a Bush man," I said.

"I am NOT a Bush man!" he thundered. "I am an Republican!!

"But you voted for him, didn't you?

"What choice did I have?!

"Well, there was another name or two on the bal...

"That darn Saudi Arabia!" he said. "I think Bill O'Reilly ought to take his show to Saudi Arabia. They got a REAL 'War on Christmas' goin' on over there! In fact, they don't even HAVE Christmas! Well, gotta go! I got cows to feed!

With that and a wave he was off in a cloud of dust in his F-150.

I was left to contemplate my stack of advertising circulars and wonder how expensive it was, that solid gold, diamond-encrusted mailbox of the King of the Wahaboobies.

BYE BYE BERGMAN

2007-07-30T05:45:00.000-05:00

Ingmar Bergman, the leading light of the Swedish Lutheran "Life Is Shit And then You Die" School, apparently lost his chess match with Death yesterday, according to reports filtering out of Sweden this morning.

As a Swedish Lutheran child myself, I identified closely with the Grand Master of the Swedish Malaise. He had the Swedish national pastime down pat, that existential sang-froid, that life must be endured, not enjoyed, that if you suffer enough and resist joy you will be rewarded with the ultimate sweetness of non-existence. Maybe.

So I loved his films, and I especially loved the sweet lilt of the language (the last remnants of which would later earn the Oscar for the Coen brothers for Fargo) even as I squinted at the subtitles. For although the "Old Folks" spoke the native tongue, us kids were never taught it. We were "Americans", and so we had to speak "English". I always thought that was a tragedy and, gosh, I hope that never happens to the Spanish kids.

I could never understand how the rest of the world could watch his films, however. The rest of the world was supposed to be happy, goddammit! Us Swedes were supposed to have a monopoly on bittersweet! But then I heard Woody Allen thought Bergman was the best ever. The Swedish Lutheran and the New York Jew? Could it be that suffering was everywhere?

Apparently 'twas so. 'Twas thus, with the Twin Towers of Man's Inhumanity to Man, and God's Inhumanity to Man to overcome. There was nothing but suffering. A few laughs, a couple of wild strawberries, but that was about it. Suffering, suffering, misery and then a little more suffering for dessert.

Yes, sir. You wake up and start your day off with another episode of 'Breakfast in Hell'.

"May I have another slice of masochism, please? Perhaps another dollop of self-flagellation? Mommy! Mommy! This toast isn't dry enough!

It sure looked glum when I headed off to college. Luckily, there I discovered another Lutheran, named Henry Miller.

"My parents were Lutherans," wrote Henry, "which is to say, idiots.

That perked me up.

"Always merry and brite!" wrote Henry. He was quoting someone.

I don't think it was Ingmar Bergman.

But, then again, maybe it was, in a way.

"Ingmar, Ingmar, the whallopin' Swede,/
Never had nothin' but a left hand lead."

No, wait a minute. That was another 'Ingmar'...

A CHILD'S PRAYER

2007-07-29T16:00:00.001-05:00

"Dear Lord,

Save us from this mad orangutang with the big stick.

Amen."

PREACHING FROM A BARSTOOL

2007-07-28T00:24:00.001-05:00

“If you make an exception for India, we will be preaching from a barstool to the rest of the world.” -Rep. Edward J. Markey (D) Mass.

I've done a lot of barstool preaching in my time. Back in the day. I gave it up because no one listened to The Gospel According to Neil. But I may have to take up the calling again if Bush's sweetheart nuke deal with India goes through. And if no one listens to me this time, well at least I'll be drunk for Armageddon. Stinkin' drunk. Like an astronaut.

"Though India would be prohibited from using the fuel it purchases from the United States for nuclear weapons, the ability to reprocess the fuel means Indias other supplies would be freed up to expand its arsenal." (NYT)

And there was some good stuff in The Gospel According to Neil too, like The Sermon on the Pool Table and Neil's Third Epistle to the Urinal. (That urinal was my best audience, come to think of it.)

Mr. Bush, eager to place relations with India on a new footing, waived many of the restrictions in order to sign the initial deal. It was heavily supported by Indian-Americans and American nuclear equipment companies, which see a huge potential market for their reactors and expertise.

Oh! And there was my "DUANE FOR POPE" campaign that I ran from my barstool that one summer. That didn't go so well either. I did sell that one t-shirt to myself, but I was stuck with the other eleven. Duane didn't even want one. So I lost some good drinkin' money there.

Three years after President Bush urged global rules to stop additional nations from making nuclear fuel, the State Department today announced that the administration is carving out an exception for India, in a last-ditch effort to seal a civilian nuclear deal between the countries.

So let's see: Bush is gonna sell nuclear fuel to India, which has not signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, so his friends and campaign contributors in the nuke industry can make mushroom clouds full of money. India can then enrich its own spent fuel from its current reactors to make more nuclear weapons and 'stockpile' them.

Right next door is nuclear Pakistan, which hates India, has also not signed the NPT and has as its most famous son Dr. 'Kill Em All' Kahn himself, who sells nuclear secrets to the highest bidder hoping to start World War Three somewhere.

And, in the "tribal areas" of Pakistan sits none other than Osama bin Laden. Well, at least according to the best guesses of this dimwitted administration who couldn't find their own codpiece in their own pants, even with the help of the Navy SEALS.

But those arguing that the administration has not made good on its promises to clamp down on the trade in nuclear fuel argue that Mr. Bush could be setting a precedent that will undercut his nonproliferation initiative.
Mr. Burns said he disagreed because “this agreement is so very much in our national interest.”
“It will further our nonproliferation efforts globally” by gradually bringing India into the nuclear fold, he said.

Mr. Burns? Not THAT Mr. Burns, surely!

Therefore "non-proliferation" in the Bush administration means selling India nuclear fuel so it can reprocess its own spent fuel so it can make more bombs! Brilliant! That, ladies and gentlemen, is "non-proliferation" at its finest!

Now, some of you might think that sounds more like "pro-proliferation", that the Bush administration has fallen down the donut hole and landed in Springfield and hired THAT Mr. Burns to be its Nuclear Policy Czar. (Homer was unavailable because Bush had tapped him to run NASA due his expertise in the consumption of alcoholic beverages.)

Sure, you might think that, but that just means that you haven't read the final chapter in The Gospel According to Neil, which would be, of course, The Revelation of St. Neil of The Barstool.

That's the one where The Four Whores of the Apoca.....

[EDITOR'S NOTE: Mr. Shakespeare seems to have fallen off his barstool.]

LAURA IN THE ROSE GARDEN

2007-07-27T00:54:00.000-05:00

BUSH 'LEGACY PORTRAIT' MOVED TO NATIONAL GALLERY

2007-07-26T07:53:00.000-05:00

The famous George W. Bush "Legacy Portrait" has been moved to the special "Failure Niche" at the National Gallery in Washington.

"Look darling! It's the famous George W. Bush 'Legacy Portrait' by the late Norman Rockwell! What do you think of it?

"That man's ugly!

"Shhh! Quiet, dear! There might be hidden microphones in the picture frame.

"I don't care! He's ugly and he scares me!

"He scares all of us, dear, but why don't you pipe down now because I'm almost certain that there are hidden cameras recording every precious little word that comes out of your...

"He scares me, Mommy! I wanna go home! And, Mommy?

"Yes, dear?

"I think he's peeking down your dress.

The Bush "Legacy Portrait" will remain on display at the National Gallery through September - also known as "The Moon When Something is Finally Supposed to Happen" - at which time it will be transferred to its permanent home in The Green Zone in Baghdad...if The Green Zone is still there by then.

LITTLE KNOWN BIBLE STORIES Jesus Raises Keith Richards from the Dead

2007-07-25T00:22:00.000-05:00

But what THE BIBLE doesn't tell you is that it didn't work.

Some things are beyond even the powers of Jesus.

So Satan had to step in and finish the job.

WHORRO

2007-07-24T00:54:00.001-05:00

THE THINK-FREE ZONE

2007-07-22T23:21:00.000-05:00

I was out walking in the woods today, lost in thought, when who should I happen to run into but my old friends, Baby Jesus and Mambo Sven.

I was overjoyed! I hadn't seen them in many a moon. I had many questions.

While Mambo Sven and my little dog, Osama, ran around and around and then ran off to do what dogs do, which I think is to run around and around mostly, Baby Jesus and I went into the kitchen for a setdown and a little chat. We had some catching up to do.

"Where have you been?" I asked.

"France," said Baby Jesus, lethargically.

He looked depressed. Something was obviously troubling him. "What is it?" I asked.

"It's the French," he mumbled half-heartedly.

"The French?

"Yes," he sighed. "They're thinking too much.

"They are?

"Yes. Haven't you read Le Monde or the New York Times?" Baby Jesus snapped his fingers and a copy of the New York Times materialized on the kitchen table.

"Wow!" I said, impressed. "Say, can you do that water into wine thing again for me? That's my favorite.

"Read!" he said, pointing out the article. "Read!

PARIS, July 21 — France is the country that produced the Enlightenment, Descartes’s one-liner, “I think, therefore I am,” and the solemn pontifications of Jean-Paul Sartre and other celebrity philosophers.

"Yeah, so?" I said, looking up.

"Read further!

But in the government of President Nicolas Sarkozy, thinking has lost its cachet.
In proposing a tax-cut law last week, Finance Minister Christine Lagarde bluntly advised the French people to abandon their “old national habit.”
“France is a country that thinks,” she told the National Assembly. “There is hardly an ideology that we haven’t turned into a theory. We have in our libraries enough to talk about for centuries to come. This is why I would like to tell you: Enough thinking, already. Roll up your sleeves.”

"Boy. This IS serious!" I said. "The French are giving up thinking? C'est tragique!

"Oui oui," said Baby Jesus. "I blame Bush. He has made thinking unpopular! Even in France! The Dark Ages are upon us once again! But you should read Levy's comment. Here!" He pointed it out to me.

Bernard-Henri Lévy, the philosopher-journalist, is appalled by Ms. Lagarde’s comments.
“This is the sort of thing you can hear in cafe conversations from morons who drink too much,” said Mr. Lévy.

"Well, this is good news!" I said, trying to raise Baby Jesus' spirits.

"GOOD news? How so?

"They may have given up thinking, but at least they haven't given up drinking!

"Hmmm," said Baby Jesus, rubbing his chubby chin, "I guess that's true. But I'd rather not think about it, if that's OK with you.

"Think nothing of it," I said. "This is America. This is one big Think-Free Zone over here.

QUOTE OF THE WEEK

2007-07-22T10:24:00.000-05:00

"So here we have a gynecologist who can't find his wife's vagina. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the Bush administration." -Bill Maher

TAPDANCING CHRIST

2007-07-22T00:07:00.000-05:00

Time.

It measures itself by itself

and finds no limit,

and yet it's most perfect treasures

are moments.

OPERATION: MY PET GUT

2007-07-21T00:05:00.000-05:00

President Bush's personal proctologist, former X-Man Fast Eddie Asspicker (pictured here with the president's personal anesthesiologist who asked not to be identified because he is not authorized to be out of prison), says he is well prepared for today's scheduled presidential colonoscopy.

"It's a dream job," said Dr. Asspicker. "I mean, who hasn't dreamed of shoving something up Bush's ass? Of course, people's dreams vary. One person might dream of shoving a baseball bat up there, another a rotisserie broiler and still another a Boeing 787. But I'm just gonna use a flashlight. Oh, and by the way, I prefer the term 'colorectal surgeon', not 'proctologist'.

The surgery, dubbed 'Operation: My Pet Gut', is scheduled for shortly after 7 a.m. EST, and was described by White House spokesperson Tony Snow as 'routine', a statement with which Dr. Asspicker took issue.

"Routine?" He said, visibly agitated. "Routine?!! Let me tell you this: there is nothing routine about Bush's colon! He THINKS with that damn thing! That means that, besides working around the polyps, we are going to have to work our way around all of President Bush's deepest thoughts! And those things are small! They are tiny, tiny little thoughts! I mean, what if I stab one accidentally when I'm pinchin' off one of them polyps? That thought will be permanently lost, to the deteriment, no doubt, of freedom around the globe! So there's a lot more pressure than in just a 'routine' asspicking!

While the president is under anesthesia and for a short time afterward to allow for the anesthesia to wear off (approximately 2 1/2 hours) Vice-president Dick Cheney will assume the powers of the president, including the powers to talk with God and to think with his intestines.

The Iranian military has been put on 'gut alert' from 7-10 a.m. EST, anticipating a possible attack.

"Two and a half hours? Is that all?" the Vice-president was heard to mutter. "Christ, I'm gonna have to bomb fast!

Nevertheless, all is expected to go well with 'Operation: My Pet Gut'.

"Oh yeah," Dr. Asspicker assured reporters gathered at Camp David, "shouldn't be any problems. Bush is a big ass, so he should be able to take it. If there's time we're gonna install a microphone in his rectum so he can not only think with his gut, but talk out his ass. I know there are those who say he does that already, but this should help clarify his words for the hard of hearing.

[EDITOR'S NOTE: The hand entering the picture from the viewer's left with the finger indicating the area of insertion into the president's anus is rumored to be that of the actor Sean Penn, who will be narrating a documentary of the procedure for PBS, to be shown at a later date. The choice of the middle digit to indicate said point of insertion has been criticized by leading Republicans, who have accused Mr. Penn of 'editorializing'.]

THE LITTLE AL QAEDA WHO WASN'T THERE

2007-07-20T05:23:00.000-05:00

"Last night I saw upon the stairs/
A little man who wasn't there./
He wasn't there again today./
Gee, I wish he'd go away!"

I loved that absurd little nursery rhyme as a child. It still makes me smile today.

Over the years I've often wondered about the little man who wasn't there. What did he look like? Was he married? Did he have a family? Did he work for Enron?

So imagine my joy the other day when I read in the New York Times that they had found him! In - of all places - Iraq.

BAGHDAD, July 18 — For more than a year, the leader of one the most notorious insurgent groups in Iraq was said to be a mysterious Iraqi called Abu Omar al-Baghdadi.

As the titular head of the Islamic State in Iraq, Mr. Baghdadi issued incendiary pronouncements. Despite claims by an Iraqi Interior Ministry official in May that Mr. Baghdadi had been killed, he appeared to have persevered unscathed.
On Wednesday, the chief United States military spokesman here, Brig. Gen. Kevin J. Bergner, provided a new explanation for Mr. Baghdadi’s ability to escape attack: he never existed.

Ah, what a perfect absurdity for a perfectly absurd war!

Bruce Riedel, a former C.I.A official and Middle East expert, acknowledged that experts had long wondered whether Mr. Baghdadi actually existed.
“They say we have killed him,” Mr. Riedel said, referring to earlier statements by Iraqi government officials. “Then we heard him after his death, and now they are saying he never existed.”

"Last night I saw upon the stairs/
A little Al Qaeda who wasn't there./
He wasn't there again today./
Gee, I wish he'd go away!

THE HEARTBREAK OF THE LANDING ON THE MOON

2007-07-20T01:55:00.000-05:00

"I'm sorry, Mr. Spaceman, but my heart belongs to another."

A NOTE OF THANKS from A.O.G.A.

2007-07-18T22:54:00.000-05:00

"KABUL, Afghanistan - (AP) Afghanistan's heroin-producing poppy crop set another record this season, despite intensified eradication efforts, the American ambassador said Tuesday.

Ambassador William Wood said preliminary data show that Afghan farmers harvested 457,135 acres of opium poppies this year, compared to 407,715 acres last year. The growing industry fuels the Taliban, crime, addiction and government corruption."

As the Chief Lobbyist for the Afghan Opium Growers Association (A.O.G.A.) I have been authorized to extend our deepest thanks to President George W. Bush (P.O.T.U.S.), The United States of America (U.S.A.) and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (N.A.T.O.) for making possible another record breaking year for our farmer-members.

And to think it has been only six years since the invasion.

The year 2001 had been a dark year indeed for Afghanistan's oppressed opium farmers. Afghanistan in 2001 was a theocracy run by a bunch of Muslim kooks. Opium production had been all but eradicated, reduced to a virtual zero by these fundamentalist cretins. But then came the Americans and, later, N.A.T.O. who have restored opium production to levels undreamed of even by our most optimistic farmers.

I suppose I should tell the truth. I should 'fess up' as you cowboys in America say, but never do. When the tragedy of September 11, 2001 occurred I, as Chief Lobbyist for A.O.G.A. saw an opportunity and siezed upon it.

Perhaps it was wrong of me to trick the Americans into coming to Afghanistan like that. Perhaps I should not have called up my old friend and drinking compadre, President Bush, and told him:

"George! George! Bin Laden's in Tora Bora!

"Bora Bora?" he replied. "Is that near Fiji?

"No, 'Tora Bora'. It's a mountainous region of northeastern Afghanistan.

"Afghanistan, huh? I heard of that place. I saw it in a movie once. This funny little guy with these big black glasses was runnin' a banana stand over there.

"That's right!" I said excitedly. "That was bin Laden! And if you hurry, maybe you can catch him!

"I'll smoke him out his hole, run him down and shoot him!" said George, as cowboys in America often say, but never do.

And with that he sent a whole army over to Afghanistan and they bombed the hell out of the mountains but they never did smoke him out, run him down and shoot him. But they did manage to kick out the Muslim kooks and restore opium production to Afghanistan, and for that we at A.O.G.A. extend our sincere thanks.

We are a landlocked country, and yet my friend President Bush has somehow managed to get the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (N.A.T.O.) to come guard our shores. Some of my friends in A.O.G.A. remain confused about this.

"Where are they gonna put all the ships?" they ask me. "We don't have any harbors! We think they should change the name of that organization to 'N.U.T.T.O.'!

"Shut up!" I tell them. "Don't look a gift acronym in the mouth!"

As a gesture of our gratitude A.O.G.A. is offering all citizens of the countries of our friends in N.A.T.O. 10% off on pure Afghan opium products. Please present your N.A.T.O. card at your local heroin distribution center to receive the 10% discount. As always, look for the "A.O.G.A." label. Don't settle for that Chinese crap.

So once again, thanks! And, of course, we don't expect you to stay forever.

The Russians were here for ten years and they never did find the ocean.

AMERICAN SUICIDE

2007-07-17T23:06:00.000-05:00

NEW YORK The Pittsburgh newspaper owned by conservative billionaire Richard Mellon Scaife yesterday called the Bush administration's plans to stay the course in Iraq a "prescription for American suicide."

The editorial in the Tribune-Review added, "And quite frankly, during last Thursday's news conference, when George Bush started blathering about 'sometimes the decisions you make and the consequences don't enable you to be loved,' we had to question his mental stability." - Editor & Publisher 7/16/07

I'm no cook. As a child I had a hard time making Kool-Aid. I preferred Popsicles, because they were pre-cooked. But my mother knew how to make it, so Kool-Aid was a big part of my youth.

Well, I have a confession to make. It was not 'Kool-Aid', actually. We were poor, so mom used to go for the cheap stuff: 'Fla-Vor-Aid'. She would stint on the sugar, too, to save a few pennies.

Sometimes for big family gatherings she might spring for the good stuff, might even use enough sugar. To impress the relatives, you know. She didn't want the relatives to know we were too poor to afford Kool-Aid, because Kool-Aid itself was a poor man's substitute for soda-pop.

Still, I adored 'Kool-Aid'...OK, 'Fla-Vor-Aid'...right up until...

Around 909 followers of Jim Jones committed cult suicide/murder by drinking and/or being forced to drink cyanide-laced grape Flavor Aid in 1978.^[2] Erroneous references to the mass suicide, in combination with existing references to The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test of the Merry Pranksters, gave rise to the saying "to drink the Kool-Aid" as a reference to those who blindly follow an authority even if it leads to serious harm or death. -Wikipedia

A lot of people didn't understand how 909 people could do that, could 'blindly follow an authority even if it leads to serious harm or death'. But I understood only too well. It was pride. They would rather commit suicide than admit that they couldn't even afford Kool-Aid.

The Jonestown Massacre kinda put me off the powdered drinks for awhile, but by then I had moved on to stronger stuff, like milk, which came already pre-mixed by the cow. And then there was beer, which was like this miracle drink and which, I was surprised to find out, had been around a lot longer than Kool-Aid. Why my mother never told me about beer puzzles me to this day.

I drink a lot of beer now, mostly because it is my cruel fate to be living during the Bush administration. I have to drink beer. I'm afraid to go anywhere near the Kool-Aid.

Not so The American People, apparently.

They'll drink whatever George puts down in front of them, even if it's blood.

INSIDE WOMAN

2007-07-16T13:31:00.000-05:00

I was home watching THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA when the doorbell rang. I padded down the hall in my robe and slippers and opened the door. There, through the screen, was a face in the misty light.

"Hello, Neil," the face said. "Long time no see.

I showed her into the Gerald Ford Room at La Casa Shakespeare.

"Ah! The Gerald Ford Room," she said. "Still trying to scare away visitors?

"C'mon, Laura," I said, "what's with the idle chit-chat? Do you have information for me or not?

She gave me the evil eye. "Don't I always? You know, Neil, I must tell you, there was rejoicing at the White House when they got reports that you were dead.

"Sorry to disappoint. Now, what's the scoop?

"May I smoke?

I fetched her one of my Star Wars ashtrays and she lit up. I waited for my 'scoop'.

"It's the 'boost'," she exhaled. "When September rolls around George is going to 'explain' to the Congress and The American People that the 'surge' needs a 'boost'.

"A 'boost'? You mean as in further 'escalation'?

"Shhhh! We don't use that word. Echoes of Vietnam and all that. We successfully managed to bully the press into using the word 'surge' and now we're going to talk them into using the word 'boost'.

"So he's sending in more troops?

"Yes. A 'surge', followed by a 'boost'. I told George that I thought the boost should come before the surge but we haven't had sex in so long he hardly remembers.

She smiled.

I didn't. This was strictly business.

"Yes," she continued, "we need the 'boost' to protect the 'surge'. After that we plan a 'swell' to protect the boost. I told Karl that the 'swell' should be followed by the 'boost' and then the 'surge', but he's never had sex, so...

"Stop it, Laura!" I cried. "Enough with the sex talk! So tell me, how is George going to try to pass this one off on The American People?

"The usual. 'Freedom', 'al Qaeda', total balls-to-the-wall bullshit.

"And the real reason?

"Why, the hydrocarbon law, of course. Fuck all the other 'benchmarks'. We can't leave. You know that, don't you, Neil? We can't leave till we get that oil out of there. I mean, that's the whole reason we're there in the first place. We managed to bilk the American People into paying for everything, but now those ungrateful Iraqis are balking. They won't sign the hydrocarbon law. At least not the one we drew up for them. Dick is having a shitfit. He already moved Halliburton over there, you know. Did you know that Halliburton trades on the NYSE as 'HAL'? You know, like that computer in '2001'? Ironic, isn't it? 'Open the petroleum bay doors, Hal!'" She laughed.

"Yes, I know. Get on with it!

"So we need to expand our presence there to the point where we can never leave. That's why we built that billion dollar embassy and the permanent bases, brought another carrier to the Gulf, and now we're expanding the Air Force so we can bomb them back to the Stone Age if need be if they don't pass that oil law.

"What happens when Hillary's elected?

"Oh, she'll never leave. She's already said she favors a 'limited presence' there forever. Besides, she won't be able to. The American People have too much invested over there now, we made sure of that. Too much blood and money, so whoever succeeds George will have to buy into the myth we've built up. You know, it's all about 'freedom', right, Neil?" She winked. "Absolutely nothing to do with the 'oil'...and shame on anyone who even suggests that!." She giggled.

So that was it. That was the info I was getting from my 'Inside Woman'. Come September the 'surge' was going to be followed by the 'boost' and then, probably on the fifth anniversary of 'Mission Accomplished', the 'swell'.

"May I offer you a drink?" I queried.

"Oh, no no," she replied quickly, snubbing out her cigarette in my Star Wars ashtray there in the Gerald Ford Room. "I just thought I'd stop by for a quick visit after Lady Bird's funeral.

She rose and I escorted her down the hall to the entrance. She stopped, turned.

"Say," she said innocently, "you don't have any of that medical marijuana around, do you?

"Sorry.

"Too bad. The boys in my Secret Service detail are looking for some.

"The Secret Service boys? Come now, Laura...

"OK, OK! It's for George. He qualifies, you know! He has this...um...serious mental disorder.

"You'll have to see Schwarzenegger for that. Goodbye, Laura!" I pushed her gently back into that misty goodnight.

NIGHTMARE ON PENNSYLVANIA AVENUE

2007-07-15T22:38:00.000-05:00

A NUT FEELING

2007-07-14T01:37:00.000-05:00

Homeland Insecurity Chief Michael Chertoff said this week that he had a 'gut feeling'. His 'gut feeling' was that there was going to be a terrorist attack somewhere in the U.S. this summer.

Of course Chertoff isn't the only one in this administration that has these gut feelings. Gut feelings are something of a point of honor in the Bush camp. The President has gut feelings all the time. His whole foreign policy is based on gut feelings. Why bother to use your brain when you have such wise, wonderful, deep-feeling guts?

Back in the old days, back in ancient Greece, guts were taken very seriously. Back then the charlatans of the day could actually read guts, or so they told the common folks. They would cut open a dove and read its guts. And the ancient Greeks actually believed they could do this; slit open a dove's guts and read it like the New York Times. They went to war over what those charlatans told them they read on the front page of 'The Dove's Guts', just as The American People were talked into going to war over a 'gut feeling'.

I sure hope when Bush dies they cut him open and read his guts, because his bowels seem to be the only part of his brain that he's using, and I'm sure he's keeping secrets down there.

Still, I don't quite understand this thing about making decisions with your guts.

I, too, have a 'gut feeling' from time to time, usually in the morning, right after my first cup of coffee. Whenever I have one of these gut feelings my first thought is: "I must invade Iraq!". But one must be careful not to jump to conclusions with your guts. It might, just might, be something else. Hmmm. Yes, it could mean that a terrorist attack is imminent! Yes, that's it! I must tell the nation!!

But my gut feeling just keeps getting worse and worse the longer I keep trying to comprehend what it's telling me! The pressure in my gut becomes so intense that I feel I'm about to explode! Finally, I can contain my gut feeling no longer and must go, as my father used to say, "Where even the Emperor must go on foot."

There, in that place, I let my guts do the talking. My deepest gut feelings surge out of me! Ah! What a relief!

I believe I shall recommend this practice to the President.

"Dear Mr. Bush," I shall begin, using the closest available piece of paper, a sheet of Super Absorbent Quilted Northern 4-ply, "I believe I have found an ancient remedy for your gut feelings. Perhaps you can also pass this valuable piece of intelligence on to your Cabinet officers.

Of course, I have feelings other than gut feelings, too. Occasionally I'll have a 'nut feeling'. Sometimes this feeling is in both of my nuts. My nut feeling tells me:

"Piss on this scheisskopf!

CONDI TO LEAD NEW "GOLF BRIGADE" TO IRAQ

2007-07-13T00:16:00.000-05:00

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice plans to combine her newfound passion for golf with her oldfound passion for foreign affairs as she leads the Swedish Bikini Team into the Triangle of Death to promote golf in Iraq.

"What Iraq needs is not diplomacy," said Ms. Rice as she modeled her new Donna Karan Civil War retro ensemble that she plans to wear to lead the Swedish Bikini Team into combat. "It needs golf. If we can just get the Sunnis and Shiites together on a golf course for a friendly round they will soon realize that neither side is Evil Incarnate.

She paused for effect.

"Evil Incarnate is that little round white fucking ball.

CHENEY'S "SECRET LOCATION" EXPOSED

2007-07-12T00:13:00.000-05:00

The Republican Party is facing more fallout from the "D.C. Madam" scandal. On the heels of the exposure of Louisiana Republican Senator David 'Family Values' Vitter as a client of Deborah Jeane Palfrey, comes the release of a compact disc filled with images of Vice-President Richard Cheney 'in flagrante delecto' with one of Ms. Palfrey's paid 'escorts'.

The 'escort' pictured in this image from the CD has been identified by some news sources as former White House political director Sara Taylor, who cited 'executive privilege' while refusing to answer questions at Congressional hearings yesterday into the Bush administration's firing of eight U.S. attorneys.

"This is outrageous!" cried Senator Patrick Leahy (D-Vermont) when shown the CD images. "No wonder those Google Earth photos of the Naval Observatory (the official residence of the Vice-President) have been pixilated! I demand answers!"

A female spokesperson for the Vice-President responded: "Tell Leahy to go fuck himself.

Editor's Note: The 'escort' in the photo in question was later determined NOT to be Sara Taylor, although all of us boys on Capitol Hill who have seen Sara naked can understand how such a mistake could be made.

BUSH AVOIDS PARDON CONTROVERSY, HAS LIBBY EXECUTED

2007-07-11T08:06:00.000-05:00

Avoiding any possible controversy that might come with a pardon, U.S. President George W. Bush had convicted perjurer "Scooter" Libby executed this morning by "The Exterminator" Tom DeLay.

At a hastily called news conference in the Rose Garden, Bush explained his decision.

"It was the Chinese that give me the idea," he stated. "I mean, here I was, worried about all the political fallout I was gettin' just from the computation...um, is that the right word?...no? What is it?...'communatation'? OK. From the com-you-na-tay-shun of Scooter's sentence and then I read in the paper this mornin'...well, OK, I didn't read it but somebody told me...that the Chinese, when they have a problem of this type, just execute their agency heads! And I thought, 'Wow! What a great idea!'

"I was worried, you know, about Scooter talkin' too much in prison, but this execution business solves that problem in a heartbeat. I mean, you can't talk without a head, right? It's hard to make your lips move when you're dead. So I thought, 'What psycho killer do I know personally who isn't doin' much of anything at the moment?' And then it hit me: who better for the job than "The Bug Man", "The Exterminator" himself, Tom DeLay?

"So we called in Tom last night and he got the job done right quick. And I would like to insure the American People...is that the wrong word too? What is it? 'Assure'? OK. I would like to assure the American People that these executions will not stop here. Brownie will be next and then Rumsfeld. After that I have a whole list of 'Candidates for Execution' that I had Alberto draw up for me. And then I added one more: Alberto Gonzalez.

"Ya see, the whole point of this is to have an open mind. To learn, even from your enemies. Just because they're Chinese doesn't mean you can't learn from 'em. And that's the secret to my success as an executioner. I'm an executive, you see, and that means I have the power to execute. It's important that I explain these things to the American People.

"Instead of a 'surge', which don't seem to be workin', I'm goin' for the 'purge'. Also, in this way, my historical legacy will remain intact, largely because them historians won't have anyone left to talk to.

BUSH "LEGACY PORTRAIT" UNVEILED

2007-07-10T06:32:00.001-05:00

Famed American artist Norman Rockwell, called back from the dead by vice-president Richard Cheney, today unveiled his long-awaited "Legacy Portrait" of U.S. president George W. Bush.

Rockwell, sometimes criticized during his long career for hiding the truth in overly sentimental and sanitized portraits of American life, stated that he had striven for "unflinching realism" in the Bush portrait.

"I believe I have captured his soul," said Rockwell.

Public reaction was mixed, ranging from "horror" to "revulsion", mirroring public reaction to Bush in real life.

Asked if he would also be painting the 'Legacy Portrait' of the Vice-president before returning to the Underworld, Rockwell responded, "No. I used up my black on this one."

THE PRESIDENT'S ANALYST

2007-07-09T00:58:00.000-05:00

Saturday July 7, 2007
The Guardian

President George Bush turned 61 yesterday but he had little to celebrate at the end of a week in which his isolation has been exposed as never before.

The Washington Post reported this week on academics invited to the White House to discuss with him his legacy, including Sir Neil Shakespeare, author of A HISTORY OF THE NORWEGIAN REVOLT, which has parallels with Iraq. They, as well as former staffers and friends, spoke of his loneliness, his agonising over how history will portray him.

Editor's Note: Sir Neil Shakespeare has agreed to speak with us on condition of anonymity. "I was never there and I don't know what the hell you're talking about," he said as he told us everything that happened in his private session with the president in a secret room at a Motel 6 outside of Kennebunkport.

GUARDIAN: First of all, Sir Neil, could you tell us how it is you know the president?

SIR NEIL: We're old drinking buddies. We go way back. I was a little bit surprised, however, when I received the call from the White House. I hadn't seen him since we woke up drunk together in the parking lot of Tom's Topless Titty Bar in St. Louis back in '73.

GUARDIAN: And you've since gone on to pen such classics as THE HISTORY OF THE NORWEGIAN REVOLT.

SIR NEIL: Yes, the Norwegians put out a jihad on me for that one.

GUARDIAN: A Norwegian jihad?

SIR NEIL: That's the worst kind.

GUARDIAN: Well, apparently you survived this Norwegian jihad.

SIR NEIL: Just barely.

GUARDIAN: Could you describe for us, please, the state of the president's mind?

SIR NEIL: Disarray. Complete disarray. A shambles. Nothing new in that, of course. When I came into the motel room he was lying on the bed, clutching his favorite feather pillow, 'Slumber', and sucking on the stem of a small American flag. I managed to get him to sit up and told him to stop sucking that flag or he'd get slivers in his tongue.

GUARDIAN: And what did you talk about?

SIR NEIL: Well, mostly he was concerned about his legacy. He was very concerned that Norman Rockwell was dead and he didn't know who was going to paint his picture. And then he fell into a full-blown self-pity mode, crying about how nobody loved him anymore, blah blah blah, nobody understood him, you know, that kind of stuff. And then he started talking about how if people didn't start being nicer to him he was going to be the first American president to commit suicide and so I punched him.

GUARDIAN: The president was contemplating suicide? You punched him?

SIR NEIL: Yes, I gave him the old five-fingered Freudian treatment. "Snap out of it!" I cried. "You still have 18 months to save your legacy!

GUARDIAN: Did he respond to the treatment?

SIR NEIL: Not really. He just kept blubbering.

GUARDIAN: So what did you do then?

SIR NEIL: I poured myself a drink and let him cry it out.

GUARDIAN: And did he stop?

SIR NEIL: Crying? Yes, he eventually stopped crying and went into his whining mode.

GUARDIAN: Whining mode? What about?

SIR NEIL: Everything. All of his failures. Iraq, Scooter, immigration, the prosecutor firings, Katrina, warrentless wiretapping, torture, secret prisons, Harriet Miers, Cheney, Rumsfeld, you name it. He has so many failures it took him several hours to list them all, whining all the time. Nothing was his fault. He was just a victim. He was the most persecuted person in the history of the planet since Jesus. That sort of stuff. He's really nothing but a spoiled brat, you know. A cowardly bully. And a nincompoop to boot. Not a happy combination.

GUARDIAN: So how did you respond to that?

SIR NEIL: I employed another of the classic Freudian techniques.

GUARDIAN: Which was?

SIR NEIL: I told him to go fuck himself.

GUARDIAN: And how did the president respond?

SIR NEIL: He started fucking himself.

GUARDIAN: What?!

SIR NEIL: With that small American flag he had. He started shoving it in and out of his ass. He seemed to be enjoying that. It seemed to calm him down a bit.

GUARDIAN: That's...that's...that's...

SIR NEIL: Let's see Norman Rockwell paint that picture.

GUARDIAN: So,...so what did you do?

SIR NEIL: I told him he better stop doing that or he'd get slivers up his ass.

GUARDIAN: And did he stop?

SIR NEIL: No, no. Like I said, it seemed to be the only thing that gave him comfort.

GUARDIAN: So what did you do then?

SIR NEIL: What do you think I did? I left! You don't think I was gonna sit there in that room with the president shoving a flag up his ass, do you?

GUARDIAN: No. I suppose that would be a bit frightening.

SIR NEIL: Disgusting, I think, is the word you're looking for.

GUARDIAN: So, in your expert opinion, what is the president's prognosis?

SIR NEIL: He's doomed.

GUARDIAN: And there's nothing you can do for him?

SIR NEIL: Well, I suppose I could pull those slivers out of his ass, but I think I'll let Laura handle that.

GUARDIAN: Well, thank you, Sir Neil, for sharing your expert opinion with us.

SIR NEIL: Don't mention it. Always happy to serve my country. And remember: I was never there and I don't know what the hell you're talking about.

GUARDIAN: Yes, of course. You don't know what the hell you're talking about.

SIR NEIL: That too.

eMISSION IMPOSSIBLE

2007-07-08T15:14:00.001-05:00

I am at a loss. Larry at "Lydia Cornell" has tagged me with the "Thinking Blog" meme.

Thinking is difficult for me, always has been. That's me, deep in thought, there in the front row on the left, so you can sorta see for yourself my problem.

The other fellas there, these were the great philosophers I hung out with as a youth. As you can see, not exactly a bunch of Einsteins either.

So sorry, Larry & Lydia, I'm afraid I can't, in all good conscience, participate in your meme.

The ignorance of youth is the only thing I have left from my childhood.

THE OILY CRUCIFIXION REDUX REDUX REDUX

2007-07-07T15:25:00.000-05:00

The Australian minister of defence really let the dingo out of the bag this past week, admitting that the Iraq War had something to do with oil.

Australian Prime Minister John Howard responded that his goddamn stupid defence minister ought to have his tongue cut out of his fuckin' head. To utter such a montrous notion was tantamount to treason.

Everybody knows that this war is about nothing but freedom. The powers-that-be took applications from all of the nations and peoples around the world longing to be free and said:

"Hey, how about those people in the sand down there?

But the American president said, "No, no, no. There's too much oil down there under that sand. Dick and I, you know, are oil men, as are most of the people in my administration. It might look like a conflict of interest if we chose to liberate those people of the sand. How's about we liberate those people being slaughtered in Darfur instead?

But the other leaders of the world said, "Don't worry, George. All the peoples of the world will understand that, even if you are nothing but a bunch of oil men, your motives have nothing to do with those 109 billion barrels of oil under the sand. Besides, if we told them it was about the oil, they wouldn't let us spill their children's blood and spend all their hard-earned tax money to 'free' (wink-wink nudge-nudge) the Iraqi people. If we told them that we'd have to pay out a trillion dollars of our own money in order to get our hands on the oil under that sand, not to mention all the mercenaries we'd have to hire, assassins and so forth. That would not be cost-effective.

"That's true, George," said the vice-president. "We can't let such a hateful rumor get started. I say we go with the 'freedom' thing.

And so it came to pass. All the peoples of the world believed them and the powers-that-be were able to use all of their combined military might - at taxpayers' expense, not their own - to blow the shit out of Baghdad and take over the country.

Now, more than four years later, we still haven't secured that oil...er, I mean, 'Iraqi freedom'. Worse, those goddamn Iraqi politicians are balking at signing that sweetheart deal we drew up for them that would greatly benefit western oil companies...er, I mean 'freedom companies'.

In fact, Iraqi oil production is down! Jesus Christ! Aren't those fuckin' bastards just the least fuckin' bit thankful for the fucking freedom we gave them?!!!

Halliburton already moved its corporate headquarters to Dubai, for Chrissakes! What do they expect us to do? Move it back? Where's the fuckin' cost-effectiveness in that?!

As you can see, I'm getting a little bit worked up here.

Fuckin' Australian defence minister!

Spreading goddamn lies like that...

THE LAST TIME I SAW PARIS...

2007-07-06T21:26:00.001-05:00

...she was in the hoosegow. But now she's out, and I caught up with her on The Oregon Trail where she was filming another charming episode for "The Really, Really Simple Life".

Hi, Neil! I thought you were dead.

I was, but I've been resurrected.

Like Jesus? That's hot!

Well, kinda like Jesus. Anyway, how's it feel to be an "ex-con"? Does it mean you can walk into any biker bar in America and have instant 'cred'?

Yeah, but I could do that anyway.

True, true. So what did you learn during your time as 'The Virgin of L.A. County"?

Don't drink and drive. Well, maybe it's cool on these wagon trains. I mean, what's the worst you could do? Crash into a cow at two miles an hour? But don't drink and drive in a Mercedes. Go ahead and drink, but let your chauffeur drive. Jail is yucky.

Speaking of jail, I'd like to get your perspective on the Scooter Libby commutation.

Who? I thought we defeated communism.

Scooter Libby. You know, the guy from the leak trial.

That was the worst part of jail: taking a leak. And pooping was even worse. I was so afraid the guards would watch me that I didn't poop or pee for days.

So, as an experienced veteran of the penal system, do you think George W. Bush should have spared Scooter Libby the embarrassment of having to poop and pee in front of the guards?

Who? Is that the 'Aspen Clumps' guy? Yes, I am a little it cheesed about that. I mean, didn't he commit reason or something?

Treason?

Yes, that's it. Treason. Well, I don't know. I think treason is a little more serious than driving with a suspended license. Was he drinking at the time? If so, then he should be behind bars. Never drink and commit treason. That's what I say. That's my advice to young people.

And excellent advice it is. One final question: Do you think President Bush should have commuted YOUR sentence?

Who?

GEORGE BUSHINGTON, THE FUCKER OF HIS COUNTRY

2007-07-06T00:36:00.000-05:00

Today we celebrate the tragic afterbirth of George W. Bushington, The Fucker of His Country.

So let's all stick a firecracker up a frog's ass, shall we?

NEIL SHAKESPEARE IS NOT DEAD

2007-07-05T18:20:00.000-05:00

...but I see some guy in Thailand has boosted my corpse and stolen my name, so I have returned from the Undead to set the record straight.

I was a bit surprised when a friend emailed me under the title "WTF?!!", informing me of the theft of my persona, that Google would just let someone steal my blog like that, but apparently Google is a bit too busy saving everyone's data and giving it to the government. Of course now I can't get my old handle back because The Thief of Thailand stole it, so I had to settle for nshakespeare.blogspot.com.

I do apologize for leaving abruptly without so much as a goodbye to anyone, but I was so disgusted when the spineless Democrats caved in to Bush on ending the Iraq War that I figured, "What's the fuckin' point?".

So I had a few shots of "Isle of Jura" single-malt Scotch whiskey, deleted my blog with a quick click of my mouse down my shaky whiskey finger, and turned my full energies to my important work as Chief Lobbyist for the Afghan Opium Growers Association (AOGA). I've been spreading lots of money around Washington and I must be doing a good job for once again opium production is up, setting another new all-time record this spring after shattering the record in '06! And to think that as recently as '01 opium production had been all but eradicated in Afghanistan. Much thanks to the Bush/Cheney Cartel, NATO and all of the congresspersons whose palms I have greased for kicking out the Taliban and restoring free market capitalism!

Of course it's become much, much more dangerous over there now, with NATO bombing civilians left and right (but still, somehow, not managing to capture or kill bin Laden), so I have had to confine my lobbying activities to the U.S. Most recently I was down in Iowa, where I managed to slip a fiver into Bill's hand while Hillary was distracted by a conversation with Mutt "The Mormon" Romney and his fifth wife.

"Have a cheeseburger on AOGA," I said to Bill. "And remember us upon your return to the White House.

"Well geez, thanks," said Bill. "Darn Hillary's got me on a no-fat diet. By the way, what is AOGA? I'm not familiar with that organization.

"You will be.

"And what was your name again?

"Neil," I whispered. "Neil Shakespeare.

"Neil Shakespeare?" Bill gasped in astonishment. "But I heard you were dead!

At that moment the surging corn-fed and ethanol-fueled Iowa mob swarmed the ex-president and swept him away, but I knew that fiver for a cheeseburger was gonna go a long way in '09 when the Clintons resumed residency in the White House.

And who knows? I might need a pardon someday.

Or at least clemency.