The Two Speeches

The following is currently making the rounds on the net and email...

The Speech George Bush Should Give Next ... (but won't)

My Fellow Americans: As you all know, the defeat of Iraq regime has been completed.

Since congress does not want to spend any more money on this war, our mission in Iraq is complete.

This morning I gave the order for a complete removal of all American forces from Iraq. This action will be complete within 30 days. It is now time to begin the reckoning.

Before me, I have two lists. One list contains the names of countries which have stood by our side during the Iraq conflict. This list is short The United Kingdom, Spain, Bulgaria, Australia, and Poland are some of the countries listed there.

The other list contains everyone not on the first list. Most of the world's nations are on that list. My press secretary will be distributing copies of both lists later this evening.

Let me start by saying that effective immediately, foreign aid to those nations on List 2 ceases immediately and indefinitely. The money saved during the first year alone will pretty much pay for the costs of the Iraqi war.

The American people are no longer going to pour money into third world Hell-holes and watch those government leaders grow fat on corruption.

Need help with a famine? Wrestling with an epidemic? Call France.

In the future, together with Congress, I will work to redirect this money toward solving the vexing social problems we still have at home. On that note, a word to terrorist organizations. Screw with us and we will hunt you down and eliminate you and all your friends from the face of the earth.

Thirsting for a gutsy country to terrorize? Try France, or maybe China.

I am ordering the immediate severing of diplomatic relations with France, Germany, and Russia. Thanks for all your help, comrades. We are retiring from NATO as well. Bon chance, mes amis.

I have instructed the Mayor of New York City to begin towing the many UN diplomatic vehicles located in Manhattan with more than two unpaid parking tickets to sites where those vehicles will be stripped, shredded and crushed. I don't care about whatever treaty pertains to this. You creeps have tens of thousands of unpaid tickets. Pay those tickets tomorrow or watch your precious Benzes, Beamers and limos be turned over to some of the finest chop shops in the world. I love New York.

A special note to our neighbors. Canada is on List 2. Since we are likely to be seeing a lot more of each other, you folks might want to try not pissing us off for a change.

Mexico is also on List 2. President Fox and his entire corrupt government need an attitude adjustment. I will have a couple extra tank and infantry divisions sitting around. Guess where I am going to put 'em? Yep, border security. So start doing something with your oil. Oh, by the way, the United States is abrogating the NAFTA treaty - starting now. We are tired of the one-way highway. Immediately, we'll be drilling for oil in Alaska - which will take care of this country's oil needs for decades to come. If you're an environmentalist who opposes this decision, I refer you to List 2 above: pick a country and move there. They care.

It is time for America to focus on its own welfare and its own citizens. Some will accuse us of isolationism. I answer them by saying, "darn tootin." Nearly a century of trying to help folks live a decent life around the world has only earned us the undying enmity of just about everyone on the planet. It is time to eliminate hunger in America. It is time to eliminate homelessness in America. It is time to eliminate World Cup Soccer from America. To the nations on List 1, a final thought. Thanks guys. We owe you and we won't forget.

To the nations on List 2, a final thought: You might want to learn to speak Arabic. God bless America. Thank you and good night.


The Speech We Wish the Rest of Mankind Would Make (and Probably Will, Soon)

My fellow human beings:

The United Nations has decided to leave New York and re-establish itself in civilization... somewhere like Stockholm, Geneva, or maybe Sydney... it's warm there. We realize it was brave to establish our headquarters beyond the fringe of human decency, but we were idealistic in those days and trying to make a point. It's time we admitted the experiment has failed and aim a little lower. We will, of course, gladly pay off our hundreds of thousands of... ahem... "dollars" of New York City parking tickets... just as soon as the United States pays off its $1.3 billion in United Nations dues arrears. We would prefer this payment to be made in real money... any currency capable of holding at least a decent share of its value over time will do. That's €950 million, if you please (yes, the currency of Germany, the country currently doing more export trade than any other on Earth). We know that will be hard for you to scratch up as you have little of value to actually sell the rest of humanity anymore, but do please give it a try. You'll be better for it.

Also, China and Japan, among others, would like to announce that they're finally fed up handing you two billion dollars worth of goods and services each and every single day in exchange for A) your promise to use your overflowing military toybox to "protect" them in case the Martians show up and B) the increasingly worthless scrip you crank out with all the self-restraint of a drunken hurdy-gurdry man with a monkey grinding out Tunes from the Big Top. Hope you won't be too nervous when the lights go out; good luck finding your triggers. Please call "Who's there?" before shooting the neighbours passing by your door. It's only good manners.

Everyone in NATO would like to thank you for finally packing your carpet bags and going home after supposing that pitching in to save democracy (and ultimately your own skins) sixty years ago somehow entitled you to a permanent say in how Europeans ought to live and manage their internal and international affairs. They're looking forward to enjoying the peace and prosperity they've forged — largely in spite of your objections over the past 35 years.

Your former NAFTA partners, Canada and Mexico, would like to take this opportunity to thank you for patronage over the past many decades, and greatly regret that the oncoming massive economic infarction bearing inexorably down on you like a freight train will presently render you incapable of affording their services much longer, requiring them to sell their oil, raw materials, and manufactured goods to less conveniently located customers. For its part, Canada looks forward with little joy to the day that ballooning unemployment in the sweltering, arid, Greenhouse Effect-inspired desert you worked so blithely to create sends your millions pressing up against its frontiers, requiring the construction of the Windsor Wall (and probably just enough hydrogen bombs to make you think twice), but accepts this as the way you want things. Mexico is grateful for your quasi-institutional policy of unburdening them of their excess labour over many generations, all the while enriching yourselves by paying them starvation wages, denying them most of the human dignities of civil services and rights, and coercing them into illegalities by threatening them at every turn with the INS at the first hint of backbone. They are, however, somewhat more dubious about your insistence on hypocritically whining about it at every chance and blatantly portraying their people as vermin while you grew fat on the cheap labour they furnished. They look forward to returning the favour as trends reverse. You will be every bit as welcome! You might want to learn to speak Spanish.

Your friendly neighbourhood "terrorists" — usually people you encounter on their own soil — are sorry to see you go. Without you around to pick on, they'll have to get on with having jobs, families, houses and infrastructure that don't blow up and fall down on top of them, and, gosh darn it, having to acquire democracy the old fashioned way — evolving it and shaping it by consensus — instead of having it neatly fired into their bodies in the form of copper-jacketed steel. They will miss you, and wish you well in your future endeavors in your isolationist home.

Finally, the world would like to announce the publication of two lists. List 1 is all the countries in the world that, whatever their political stripe, prejudices, or aspirations, realize that they simply can't be assholes who go around the world taking whatever they want, murdering at will and expecting it not to result in any ill will or consequences, that there are limits to what power can and should be used to achieve and that the rights of others demand respect, accommodation, and negotiated settlements. List 2 includes the United States. The world finds this unfortunate, but wishes to earnestly assure Americans that mechanisms are already in place that promise to swiftly and humbly convert you to a solid List 1 country anytime now. O happy day!

My goodness! My Guinness! Thank you and good night.