Comedy

What am I, some sorta wise guy?

By Bryan Zepp Jamieson

7/31/01

At the suggestion of one of the Weasels, I’ve been talking to an outfit that is hiring columnists. It seemed reasonable enough. I write columns, and they want people who write columns. Sounds like a match made in heaven.

What? Of course I’ll get the job. Hell, if Putsch can be President, then I can do anything I want!

That left only the question of what sort of writing I should do.

"Write badly", a Republican friend suggested. "After all, that’s what you’re already doing."

OK. ‘Write what you know’ is always good advice. So I resolved to write about politics.

Except, as noted, I’m already doing that. If I expect this outfit to lay money on me for doing this, I shouldn’t be giving the same thing away for free on my webpage. So it would have to be a little bit different.

Unbidden, a line from an old comic book crossed my mind. "Knowing baseball pitchers to be a cowardly and superstitious lot, I resolved to become a bat!"

I would write a humorous political column. I write some pieces now that set out to be humorous, and there’s usually at least some humor in the rest of the pieces I write, so how hard could it be? I filled out the application with a flourish, something that’s damned difficult to do with a mouse.

But now my dream lies, shattered and ruined, a pipe dream, washed up on the shores of mixed metaphors and gasping its last trite syllogisms.

First came the announcement from Condoleezza Rice that "nobody is more internationalist than this administration." That was pretty jarring, but later in the same morning, Putsch managed to top her. Responding to the report issued today by the National Commission on Federal Election Reform, Putsch said, "The Federal Government must continue to respect the role of state, county and local governments in elections."

How am I supposed to compete with that?

Humor has to appeal to the sense of the ridiculous, the macabre, the inane. In the name of parody, what could I possibly put in the mouths of these administration officials that could do more to provoke disbelieving guffaws and roars of laughter?

Putsch is beyond parody. How can you make him look inane? How can you use fatuous stupidity to burlesque this man? The comedy show "That’s My Bush" struggles, not for lack of talent by the writers and actors, but because people look at the real thing, and then look at the TV show, and don’t see much difference.

But of course, I can always pretend.

Let’s pretend, for example, that our mainstream media was still free and unfettered, and reporters were still allowed by their bosses to try and fluster the President.

Imagine the fun we can all have imagining the answer to the question, "Mr. President, do your remarks about the Federal Government having to respect the role of state, county and local governments in elections mean that you are repudiating the Supreme Court decision, Bush vs. Gore, which stopped the recounting process halfway through and gave you the decision on an incomplete and contested count?"

Man, wouldn’t it be nice to live in a free country where reporters could ask questions like that, and Der Leader would have to come up with some sort of answer? Wow!

WWPS? What Would Putsch Say?

"Um.

"Well, Mr. Limbaugh [since we’re engaging in fantasy anyway...], in answer to your question which you have asked me, I would have to say that this, um, decision, um, Gore against whoever, didn’t infringe on the counting process. I would, of course, oppose any decision that interfered with the constitutional doctrine of state sovereignty. Um, you, the heavyset fellow in back. Um, Mr. Moore, is it?

"Yes. Mr. President. Nearly every legal scholar and expert in the land agrees that Bush vs. Gore did impinge rather massively on the rights of states to control the manner, method and timing of how they run their elections. It essentially stopped a perfectly legal and proper recount dead in its tracks, and many people believe that the conservative members of the court abrogated the law and their duties to hand you the election."

"What? No, that can’t be!" Putsch rounds around furiously on Dick Cheney and Karl Rove, and the three, shielded from microphones, gesticulate furiously for a few minutes. Putsch turns back to the mike, his composure restored.

"I’ve been advised that in fact, the deadline for turning in the votes was later that day, and if they weren’t turned in, none of Florida’s votes would have counted." Behind W, Karl Rove is seen rolling his eyes and pantomiming shooting himself in the temple. Dick clutches his chest, turns grey, and slides down. Everyone on the podium just figures he’s screwing around again and ignores him.

"Mr. Thomas?"

"That’s Missus Thomas, you dork. Now, Mr. President, you made a series of vague generalizations and a few truly idiotic remarks here, but what do you really think about the specifics of the commission’s report?

"Well, Dick . . .Dick? Say, where’d he go? Anyway, Dick was telling me that we want to be sure that we get the very best quality voter we can making the incredibly important decision of who gets to be President, and so we should discourage these socialist notions that large amounts of taxpayer dollars – that’s your money, folks – should be spent on trying to make voting so easy that anyone can do it. That’s just not what America is all about. We want an intelligent and informed electorate."

"What about making election day a national holiday?"

"Out of the question. It would be an unfair burden on employers, who already have to give employees the whole day off at Christmas."

"Allowing felons to vote?"

"I’m for that."

"You’re FOR it?"

"Sure. Most of my White House staff are always telling me they would have voted for me in the last election if they could."

OK. So it’s pointless to make fun of Putsch.

But I’m sure going to have fun making fun of the people who are furiously pretending that he’s some sort of real president.