Scope

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Bob Patterson, ace columnist for Just Above Sunset, sent me an email mid week.

It was a list of questions I should consider as topics for this web log or the weekly issue of Just Above Sunset.  Are these are issues that should be addressed, and events that should be covered?

Maybe.

I tackled them here.

Question - The Olympic torch goes through Los Angeles today.  Is it really news?  Important?

Answer - NO. IT'S PR BULLSHIT.  UNLESS, WHEN TOM CRUISE IS RUNNING WITH IT, A GERBIL RUNS UP HIS ASS.

Question - What will happen to Saddam when the interim government takes over on June 30?

Answer - I HAVE NO IDEA AND CANNOT PREDICT.  PERHAPS ALIENS FROM THE PLANET CLOROX-2 WILL ABDUCT HIM AND TAKE HIM AWAY IN THE STARSHIP QUAALUDE - AS A CURIOUS SPECIMEN.  NO SADDAM?  NO PROBLEM!  FOLKS WILL BUY ALMOST ANYTHING.

Question - Will that become the "Achilles heel"?  If we can't turn him over to the Iraqis does that mean the interim government can't be trusted.  If we do turn him over...?

Answer - OH HELL. THAT'S EASY TO SOLVE.  WE TURN HIM OVER BUT THEY ASK US TO PROVIDED CUSTODIAL CARE IN OUR IMPRESSIVE LOCAL DETENTION FACILITIES - THEY SIMPLY SUBCONTRACT HIS CARE TO US.  WE GET TO KEEP HIM, AND GET TO BILL THE NEW IRAQI GOVERNMENT MONTHLY FOR HIS CARE.  THE MAJOR CHANGE?  ONE INVOICE.

Question - Special treatment for frequent flyers at airports?

Answer - IN THE WORKS.  AND IT IS SO WILDLY EASY TO FOOL ANY REGISTRATION SYSTEM - FAKE DOCUMENTS AND SUCH - THAT THE LIST WILL PROVIDE NO BENEFITS, OTHER THAN PR FOR ASHCROFT.

Question - The June 30 turn over can't really be delayed now.  Lose face.  But will it work?  Are we "in charge" or is it "hunker in the bunker" time for Americans in Iraq?

Answer - WE SAY IT WORKED FINE.  JUST KEEP MAKING THE ASSERTION.  THEN ALL OUR CIVILIANS LEAVE, QUICKLY. THE 135,000 MILITARY AND 20,000 CONTRACT FOLKS (OUR TITAN DYNCORP BLACKWATER MERCENARIES) CONTINUE AS BEFORE.  CHANGE WORDS AT ALL PRESS CONFERENCES - "WE DID TODAY" BECOMES "WE WERE ASKED TODAY AND DID" - NO PROBLEM.  AND GUARD ALL TECHNICIANS WORKING ON INFRASTRUCTURE - OIL PRODUCTION, ELECTRICAL POWER, WATER TREATMENT - WITH BRIGADE STRENGTH FORCES.  ZONE DEFENSE, AS THEY SAY IN FOOTBALL.

Question - Are we in the "test crash" mode?  I.e. strapped into a vehicle (policy) that is screaming toward a steel wall?

Answer - WE'VE BEEN IN TEST CRASH MODE SINCE DECEMBER 2000 - MAKING IT UP AS WE GO ALONG.  THE REST OF THE WORLD WAS, AND IS, NOT AMUSED.  BUT, HEY, THAT'S WHAT WE DO.  WE ARE A PEOPLE WHO DO THINGS - WE DON'T SIT AROUND AND THINK AND TALK, LIKE THEM FRENCH WIMPS.  WE DO.  APPLICABLE SLOGAN: JUST DO IT.  GOOD THINGS SOMETIMES HAPPEN. AND SOMETIMES THEY DON'T.  BUT SOMETHING HAPPENS.

Question - Will an Iraqi disaster cost Bush the election?

Answer - NO.  SEE ABOVE.  "DOING" TRUMPS ALL ELSE.

Sometimes short comments are best.

Bob shot this back –

Answer - NO.  IT'S PR BULLSHIT.  UNLESS, WHEN TOM CRUISE IS RUNNING WITH IT, A GERBIL RUNS UP HIS ASS. 

Alan: You are confusing Tom Cruise with Richard Gere.  

Answer - IN THE WORKS.  AND IT IS SO WILDLY EASY TO FOOL ANY REGISTRATION SYSTEM - FAKE DOCUMENTS AND SUCH - THAT THE LIST WILL PROVIDE NO BENEFITS, OTHER THAN PR FOR ASHCROFT. 

Alan:  The game consists of the security system fooling the American public, not the terrorists fooling the security system.

WE ARE A PEOPLE WHO DO THINGS - WE DON'T SIT AROUND AND THINK AND TALK, LIKE THEM FRENCH WIMPS.  WE DO.  APPLICABLE SLOGAN: JUST DO IT.  GOOD THINGS SOMETIMES HAPPEN.  AND SOMETIMES THEY DON'T.  BUT SOMETHING HAPPENS. 

Alan:  "Something Happens."  That's a good title for a novel.

Ah, that was Richard Gere, one of the Heidi Fleiss clients as I recall.  I knew that.  I just liked the image.  And I saw in the local paper Tom Cruise was running.  It still fits (so to speak).  These two guys may be the same person.  You ever see them together?  But then again, maybe Charlie Sheen was the gerbil guy.  Odd memories - in the mid-nineties I was dating an ex-hippie sixties type, a divorced vegetarian midwife named Julie, who lived in North Hollywood.  Her medical advisor on difficult births was Heidi Fleiss' father, a prominent Beverly Hills ob-gyn.  Really.  Julie assisted mothers like Pamela Anderson and Bette Midler.  The relationship didn't last and when I was in Canada working at the GM plant I saw that her oldest son had been executed by the FNAC guerrillas in Columbia, where he had been organizing the local tribes against Occidental Petroleum.  Life is always surreal, if you're open to that sort of thing.  Hell, my phone just rang - a canned message from John Kerry urging me to vote against Bush.  John has a nice voice.  Now THAT was surreal.  He said nothing about gerbils.

The novel shall wait until the winter.  Perhaps I begin it then.  But if no one reads blogs or my website, who reads novels anymore?

But I'm used to not being read.  And a web search indicates that title has not been taken yet.