Useless Invasion Sketch
Kip Williams
---
USELESS INVASION SKETCH (by Kip Williams, age 46)
THE AMERICAN PEOPLE (played by John Cleese) walks down the street
carrying THE IRAQUI INVASION (played by an empty parrot cage). He
walks into THE WHITE HOUSE (played by a cheesy storefront) and
addresses COLIN POWELL (played by Michael Palin).
AP:
Excuse me... boy!
CP:
(turns around and stands up) What d'you mean, 'boy?'
AP:
I'm sorry; I have contact lenses. At any rate, I wish to register a
complaint!
CP:
Sorry, squire, I can't talk to you now. It's Code Orange! (he
hastily starts to put up a sign)
AP:
Never mind that now, my fine fellow. I wish to register a
complain about this military action, which you sold me just a couple
of months ago.
CP:
Oh yes, the Iraqui invasion. Lovely little war, that was. What...
uh, what seems to be wrong with it?
AP:
I'll tell you what's wrong with it. It's empty, that's what's
wrong with it.
CP:
Oh, no, no, no. It's not empty at all. It's served its purpose,
it has. Freed the oppressed people of Iraq, fed the homeless,
brought everlasting fame and glory to our bulging leader.
AP:
But when I purchased this dreary little police action from you, you
assured me that the whole and entire purpose was to disarm Saddam
Hussein and take away, quote, his vast stockpiles of ready-to-use
weapons of mass destruction, end quote.
CP:
Oh, there's some mistake. We went in to liberate the poor oppressed
people of...
AP:
Listen, mate. I took the liberty of recording your voice when
you sold me that thing, and here's what it says. (produces tape
recorder)
Tape: (CP's voice)
"We know just where they are. We know just what they've got. They're
buried in these bunkers right here, which our surveillance
satellites have photographed not more than twenty minutes ago. They
could not possibly be used for any purpose other than the storage of
hideous, slime-dripping nuclear anthrax chemical weapons of mass
destruction. Say, are you recording me?"
AP:
Right. And when we "liberated" those poor bastards, the bunker
was found to contain little more than a twenty-year collection of
Penthouse and Hustler magazines, plus a dozen lava lamps and a mini-bar.
CP:
Well...
AP:
Well?
CP:
Well, of course they'd cleaned it out before they left. Sold it
all to their chums in the Taliban, they did.
AP:
I happen to know that their 'chums,' as you so colorfully put
it, hate their guts and have referred to them repeatedly as
"scabrous lackeys of the internationalist secular state," end quotation.
CP:
Well, they have to say that, don't they? I mean, it's all part
of the grand scheme. Lovely little war, wa'nit? Liberated all them
poor...
AP:
Stoppit! All you've done is make their lives worse than before.
That's why they keep killing our soldiers.
CP:
Oh no, squire. They're grateful. That's why they pulled down that
statue.
AP:
I've seen the footage of the event, and the only Iraquis in the
picture appear to have had their feet nailed there.
CP:
Well, of course they were nailed there. If we hadn't nailed them,
they'd've been crushed by the falling statue, wouldn't they? It was
for their own safety. That's why we liberated the...
AP:
Shut up. Did you or did you not allege on several different
occasions that we had found the weapons of mass destruction and that
therefore the entire ill-advised escapade was a rousing success?
CP:
What, them trailers? Well, of course they was weapons of mass
destruction. They could've used them for germs, or chemicals, or...
AP:
In fact, they were used for hydrogen, and precious little of
that. They didn't even have walls, for pity's sake.
CP:
Well, hydrogen's pretty dangerous, isn't it, Squire? It could power
tanks or jets or... and what about that Hindenberry thing? Let's see
you stand in a room full of liquid hydrogen with nothing but a ripe
boysenberry to defend yourself with, and you'll soon see mass
destructive. Wouldn't want to be in your shoes then! And anyway, we
liberated the...
AP:
Liberation don't enter into it, mate. It was a bleeding sham.
CP:
No, it was liberation!
AP:
Sham, sham, sham! And you didn't find any weapons of mass
destruction!
CP:
Well, of course we didn't, Squire. They was... they was looted.
AP:
Looted? LOOTED?
CP:
Yeah. When our boys was busy not looking at the museum, they
looted all them weapons out from under their noses. And anyway, we
liberated...
AP:
You're saying that starving peasants with no resources of their own
simply looted vast stores of nuclear, chemical, and biological
weapons? With What??
CP:
They carried them off on their bicycles.
AP:
But a missile weighs several tons, and a bicycle can only carry, at
most, a couple of hundred pounds.
CP:
They used two bicycles, with a bungee cord between 'em. They're
a nasty lot, Squire. Not like the ones that sang songs to us when we
liberated...
AP:
Will you shut up? Since when is it liberation to leave a people
destitute, without food, water, electricity, or law enforcement?
CP:
Those things was all shackles on them. We freed 'em, I tell you!
They're grateful to us. They're singin' songs...
AP:
Those aren't songs, you parsimonious prevaricator, they're
protesting in the streets, and shooting at our soldiers.
CP:
They're just exuberant. Like to fire off their guns a lot, now
they're free and all. They don't mean nuffin' by it. They're just so
happy to be liberated, with Hussein gone. You mark my words; he was
the real weapon of mass destruction his own self, why, he...
AP:
That's another thing. You didn't even get him, did you?
CP:
Well...
AP:
You don't even know where he is, do you?
CP:
We got a tip...
AP:
You've been blowing up caravans and bombing cities and striking
about blindly, because your yahoo cowboy boss refused to listen to
any intelligence that contradicted his beliefs. Which, when you come
down to it, precluded the use of any intelligence whatsoever.
CP:
I see. Quite. (pause) Well, then, we'd better replace it, hadn't we?
AP:
With what?
CP:
Well, them Iranis are gettin' pretty swaggery, ain't they?
AP:
I thought you were encouraging them to rise up against their
religious leaders, now that they aren't accepting any more cakes
from your lot.
CP:
Fair enough. How about something in a nice little Afghanistan?
AP:
You've already done that one. Worse than Iraq, if I recall.
CP:
How about... coming up to my place and re-electing my boss?
AP:
Why in the world would I want to do that? Why wouldn't I just
vote for the Democrats and chase you idiots out of office, once for all?
AP:
Oh, no, Squire! No, no, no, no! You wouldn't want to do that,
trust me on this one.
AP:
And why not, if I may be so brash as to query?
CP:
Well, they're a bunch of psychopathic liars, they are, always
Whitewaterin', 'aving sex in the Oval Office, taking' expensive
haircuts on Air Force One, trashing the White House, murderin' poor
ol' Vince Foster, and claiming they invented the Internet.
AP:
Point taken! Well, then, I'll have a North Korea to go, please.
CP:
You won't regret it, Squire! I'll just wrap it up. (tears an
American flag off of a roll and clumsily wraps up the same cage the
AP carried in.) Come again!
--
--Kip (Williams) ...at members.cox.net/kipw
"When I go in-to the wood / I see the lit-tle bun-nies, eat-ing
por-ridge as they should. / Those clev-er lit-tle rab-bits!"
--Mother Goosery Rinds
Priscilla H Ballou
Priscilla
--
Minutus cantorum, minutus balorum,
minutus carborata descendum pantorum.
(from topfive.com)
Randolph Fritz
> I've been sick lately, and, well, I wrote a sketch.
>
> ---
> USELESS INVASION SKETCH (by Kip Williams, age 46)
>
Useless RASFF award!
Randolph
Kip Williams
> I've been sick lately, and, well, I wrote a sketch.
>
ADDENDA...
after the line:
AP:
You've been blowing up caravans and bombing cities and striking
about blindly, because your yahoo cowboy boss refused to listen to
any intelligence that contradicted his beliefs. Which, when you come
down to it, precluded the use of any intelligence whatsoever.
please insert:
CP:
I'm afraid we must agree to disagree, Squire. You say the glass is
half empty, but I say it's half full...
AP:
Half empty? HALF empty? You're off by fifty percent: There's not
even a bloody glass! You've got zero, zilch, nix, nada, nothing!
You've found the number of weapons by which division is technically
impossible! You could put everything you've found into a thimble and
have room enough inside for another thimble! You've found as little
as possible short of the negative numbers. You've blown our nation's
goodwill, and spent money, time, and lives doing exactly as much to
safeguard our country as my grandmother's cat Eric -- who, quite
incidentally, has been dead since 1998.
CP:
I see. Quite. (pause) Well, then, we'd better replace it, hadn't we?
AP:
Oh, I see. With what, pray tell?
and after that, it goes on as before. It occurred to me as I was
convalescing that I had missed out on the big peroration. Carry on.
(Wait: wrong series.) Back to bed.
Nancy Lebovitz
>I've been sick lately, and, well, I wrote a sketch.
Beautiful!
--
Nancy Lebovitz na...@netaxs.com www.nancybuttons.com
Now, with bumper stickers
Using your turn signal is not "giving information to the enemy"
Sheila Strickland
Kip Williams <ki...@cox.net> wrote in article <3F045F6D...@cox.net>...
> I've been sick lately, and, well, I wrote a sketch.
snip some brilliant dialog
>
> Sham, sham, sham!
Sausage, eggs, and sham?
Lovely bit. Bravo!
--
Sheila
Lucy Kemnitzer
>I've been sick lately, and, well, I wrote a sketch.
>
Well,the sketch isn't useless,anyway: I've printed it out and I'm
taking it to my father's house to be read at the annual fourth of July
barbecue.
Lucy Kemnitzer
Kip Williams
Neato! Wish I could be on hand to hear it.
(And thanks, folks, for your kind responses. Just to be tedious,
here's the whole thing with the addendum... er, addenda... in. Thus
if anyone else is in a printing mood, this might save them some
pasting and cutting, or versa vice.)
AP:
Excuse me... boy!
CP:
Well...
AP:
Well?
AP:
Looted? LOOTED?
CP:
Well...
CP:
I'm afraid we must agree to disagree, Squire. You say the glass is
half empty, but I say it's half full...
AP:
Half empty? HALF empty? You're off by fifty percent: There's not
even a bloody glass! You've got zero, zilch, nix, nada, nothing!
You've found the number of weapons by which division is technically
impossible! You could put everything you've found into a thimble and
have room enough inside for another thimble! You've found as little
as possible short of the negative numbers. You've blown our nation's
goodwill, and spent money, time, and lives doing exactly as much to
safeguard our country as my grandmother's cat Eric -- who, quite
incidentally, has been dead since 1998.
CP:
I see. Quite. (pause) Well, then, we'd better replace it, hadn't we?
AP:
Oh, I see. With what, pray tell?
CP:
Well, them Iranis are gettin' pretty swaggery, ain't they?
AP:
I thought you were encouraging them to rise up against their
religious leaders, now that they aren't accepting any more cakes
from your lot.
CP:
Fair enough. How about something in a nice little Afghanistan?
AP:
You've already done that one. Worse than Iraq, if I recall.
CP:
How about... coming up to my place and re-electing my boss?
AP:
Why in the world would I want to do that? Why wouldn't I just
vote for the Democrats and chase you idiots out of office, once for all?
AP:
Oh, no, Squire! No, no, no, no! You wouldn't want to do that,
trust me on this one.
AP:
And why not, if I may be so brash as to query?
CP:
Well, they're a bunch of psychopathic liars, they are, always
Whitewaterin', 'aving sex in the Oval Office, takin' expensive
haircuts on Air Force One, trashin' the White House, murderin' poor
T. Nielsen Hayden
> I've been sick lately, and, well, I wrote ...
>
> USELESS INVASION SKETCH
Glory, glory!
-t.
Andrew Plotkin
> Glory, glory!
Hey, Kip. There's glory for you.
--Z
"And Aholibamah bare Jeush, and Jaalam, and Korah: these were the borogoves..."
*
* Make your vote count. Get your vote counted.
Cally Soukup
> Glory, glory!
Teresa's back! Yay!!
--
"I may disagree with what you have to say, but I will defend
to the death your right to say it." -- Beatrice Hall
Cally Soukup sou...@pobox.com
David Goldfarb
Cally Soukup <sou...@pobox.com> wrote:
>T. Nielsen Hayden <t...@panix.com> wrote in article <a007368d.03070...@posting.google.com>:
>> Kip Williams <ki...@cox.net> wrote in message news:<3F045F6D...@cox.net>...
>>> I've been sick lately, and, well, I wrote ...
>>>
>>> USELESS INVASION SKETCH
>
>
>> Glory, glory!
>
>Teresa's back! Yay!!
Well, probably not. I emailed her a link to Kip's sketch, guessing
(it would seem correctly) that it was the sort of thing she'd like
to read. Note that her post isn't from newsreading software, but
rather from Google.
--
David Goldfarb <*>| "All love is unrequited."
gold...@ocf.berkeley.edu |
gold...@csua.berkeley.edu | -- Babylon 5, "Rising Star"
Cally Soukup
> In article <be58h2$hma$1...@wheel2.two14.net>,
> Cally Soukup <sou...@pobox.com> wrote:
>>T. Nielsen Hayden <t...@panix.com> wrote in article <a007368d.03070...@posting.google.com>:
>>> Glory, glory!
>>
>>Teresa's back! Yay!!
> Well, probably not. I emailed her a link to Kip's sketch, guessing
> (it would seem correctly) that it was the sort of thing she'd like
> to read. Note that her post isn't from newsreading software, but
> rather from Google.
Oh. Darn.