Bush 1 & Bush 2 - Closer Than You Might Think
Back in the fall of 1992 Peter Sagal wrote a column in the Minneapolis Star Tribune titled "Justice for the GOP: Put Bush to work bagging burritos. It was an amusing cry for justice once the Democrats took over the White House from Bush #1. There are bits & pieces I'd like to share here with folks - if you find eerie parallels to the present Bush & Co., you're not alone.
"I say that it's not too early to close the Gloating Gap, to start evening the score with the smirking supply-siders and conservative demagogues who have spent the last 12 years whipping up crowds with ringing denunciations of everything we hold dear, fair play, the milk of human kindness, progressive pop music, etc.
Older readers will remember the simple pleasures that war crime trials offer to the spectator. The pageantry, the sage judges in their robes high above, the serious demeanor of the correspondents ("This is Brit Hume, reporting to you live from the Republican Holding Cell"), the translators (for Bush), the glass booths. It'll be Alan Dershowitz for the defense, with Peggy Noonan writing the testimony ("But your honor, I had the best interests of the working people at heart"), and the nation for the prosecution, and let the healing process begin!
For ex-President George Bush, after trying for years to mask your New England Ivy-league patrician, elitist soul with the mask of the good ol' boy, permanent banishment to Odessa, Texas, where you claim to be from when it can score you points. Your prison food would be broccoli, Frito-pies, and of course, pork rinds, your entertainment, country music. And your occupation; filling one of those 'new jobs' you so often brag about creating during the 80s; a counterman at the Taco Bell out on Highway 302. Read our lips, George. We want a bean burrito and a Mexi-Melt and we want it now!
For former Attorney General Edwin Meese and current AG William Barr, appointment as assistant public defenders in inner-city Detroit, with pay pegged to performance. Let's see how you like those evidence rules now.
For Labor Secretary Lynn Martin, and trade representative Carla Hill, both GOP political hacks who have been pushing administrative policy at the expense of your own supposed constituencies, we're holding 2 places for you on the assembly line in a maguiladora making remote control garage door openers in northern Mexico. And well throw in the corrugated steel shack for nothing, although it's right next to the factory's waste dump. Sorry.
For Education Secretary Lamar Alexander, progenitor of the president's plan to further gut the public schools by transferring funds to private schools, there's 50 kids in a classroom down in the south side of Chicago who are waiting for someone to come by and teach them how to read with no textbooks. Good luck, Mr. Bell, and watch out for Show and Tell.
We'll confiscate Pat Buchanan's mercedes and put him to work at a community center in Compton. Orrin Hatch, Arlen Specter and Alan Simpson will be assigned to the secretarial pool at ACT-UP. Pat Robertson and Jerry Fallwell will be assigned ministries to the poor in South and Central America where the fun never stops.
For a long time I used to have an idle fantasy of kidnapping Reagan and dumping him alone, with no Secret Service protection or advisers or Nancy to tell him where to stand, in say, Flint, Michigan, or Allentown, Pa., and say to him, 'It's morning in America, Ron, now find your way home before it gets dark.'"
"I say that it's not too early to close the Gloating Gap, to start evening the score with the smirking supply-siders and conservative demagogues who have spent the last 12 years whipping up crowds with ringing denunciations of everything we hold dear, fair play, the milk of human kindness, progressive pop music, etc.
Older readers will remember the simple pleasures that war crime trials offer to the spectator. The pageantry, the sage judges in their robes high above, the serious demeanor of the correspondents ("This is Brit Hume, reporting to you live from the Republican Holding Cell"), the translators (for Bush), the glass booths. It'll be Alan Dershowitz for the defense, with Peggy Noonan writing the testimony ("But your honor, I had the best interests of the working people at heart"), and the nation for the prosecution, and let the healing process begin!
For ex-President George Bush, after trying for years to mask your New England Ivy-league patrician, elitist soul with the mask of the good ol' boy, permanent banishment to Odessa, Texas, where you claim to be from when it can score you points. Your prison food would be broccoli, Frito-pies, and of course, pork rinds, your entertainment, country music. And your occupation; filling one of those 'new jobs' you so often brag about creating during the 80s; a counterman at the Taco Bell out on Highway 302. Read our lips, George. We want a bean burrito and a Mexi-Melt and we want it now!
For former Attorney General Edwin Meese and current AG William Barr, appointment as assistant public defenders in inner-city Detroit, with pay pegged to performance. Let's see how you like those evidence rules now.
For Labor Secretary Lynn Martin, and trade representative Carla Hill, both GOP political hacks who have been pushing administrative policy at the expense of your own supposed constituencies, we're holding 2 places for you on the assembly line in a maguiladora making remote control garage door openers in northern Mexico. And well throw in the corrugated steel shack for nothing, although it's right next to the factory's waste dump. Sorry.
For Education Secretary Lamar Alexander, progenitor of the president's plan to further gut the public schools by transferring funds to private schools, there's 50 kids in a classroom down in the south side of Chicago who are waiting for someone to come by and teach them how to read with no textbooks. Good luck, Mr. Bell, and watch out for Show and Tell.
We'll confiscate Pat Buchanan's mercedes and put him to work at a community center in Compton. Orrin Hatch, Arlen Specter and Alan Simpson will be assigned to the secretarial pool at ACT-UP. Pat Robertson and Jerry Fallwell will be assigned ministries to the poor in South and Central America where the fun never stops.
For a long time I used to have an idle fantasy of kidnapping Reagan and dumping him alone, with no Secret Service protection or advisers or Nancy to tell him where to stand, in say, Flint, Michigan, or Allentown, Pa., and say to him, 'It's morning in America, Ron, now find your way home before it gets dark.'"
posted by Anonymous at 6:12 PM
2 Comments:
lapopessa, I would not have remembered all this for a nickel, but thanks, I think. You are right with the parallels!
BTW, did you see that William Barr's name was floated for the soon-to-be-vacant AG position?
Good one LP. The only difference is degree. For W, how about dropping him off in a gay biker bar? :-)
Post a Comment
<< Home