In A Perfect Gehenna or The Emperor’s Diseased Repast (for Neeli)

Where are the stories you want to read? Stories with headlines like, “A Republican Strategist Runs Into Jeff Gannon On The Street and Cums Back With The Whole Story,” or “The Long Decisive Defeat of Karl Rove: The Prison Years, A Time of Exile.” In this new age of Bush, a bush far worse than the first bush, we should be able to expect a new game of deviant behavior stopped at the border of Maryland and booked for vagrancy or at least exposure.
Imagine the scene where a reporter walks into the White House briefing room after flashing his badge and asks the President a question that he can’t ignore, a few questions like, “Why do you owe such a loyalty to the Bin Laden family?” or “Are you afraid of what Bin Laden will say if he gets the chance? Is it true Mr. President that if you were to be placed on the front lines of the war in Iraq you would soil your undergarments and demand a weapon to self-inflict?” Just imagine those questions. Would it take just one of our soldiers in Iraq who are scared and don’t want to fight to slap you like Patton slapped the soldier or would it take several more before they could shame you into fighting like a man? Every rich kid, every spoiled brat should have a poster of George Bush on their wall and it should say to them, if he can make it so can I. Do another line of coke, and wreck another house, why not. Shit, you could be president some day.

Yet as the upside down American flag waves in the breeze
And tortured Iraqi kids are brought to their knees
The Mansel Report ends another day of transmission
So from all the detainees around the world hooked up to electrodes
We say goodnight and pool our money into defense contractor stocks


- Chris Mansel