The net that shall enmesh them all
Edited, Written, and Published by Josh Nossiter
Monday, July 14th, 2008
“Y’all remember when I said the proudest ‘ccomplishment of my presidency was catchin’ that bass down in Crawford? Well that weren’t strictly speaking the whole truth. Sure I was right proud of that fish. But what I was really most pleased with is how I turned the tables on two old boys who set out to do me down, but got done theirselves. See, my daddy used his connections to get me a cushy stateside gig during ‘Nam. Then I went AWOL from my unit ‘cause I was doin’ drugs and couldn’t pass the urine tests. And nothin’ happened to me cause of daddy’s connections. Which is about as disgraceful a war record as a man could have, no doubt ‘bout that. So when Dan Rather went on TV about it, I fixed things so’s not only did he not hurt me, he plum lost his job! At the same time that old Kerry tried to take MY job on the strength of his perfectly ‘spectable war record. I fixed it so’s not only did he lose the ‘lection but got branded a liar and a coward and a shirker hisself. Now that’s about as artistic as politics ever gets and just one heckuva ‘ccomplishment, wouldn’t you agree?
Oh, and by the way? I don’ really talk like this. Ya know? Broke lingo with a Texas twang? Because I spent as many of my formative years at Andover and Yale and Harvard as I did in Texas, and I’m capable of speaking perfectly sound, clear English. The Texan patois and stumbling diction I simply adopted to camouflage my aristocratic roots. Much like the snakeskin boots I affect. Also the way I’ve succeeded in having my Crawford estate always referred to as my ‘ranch,’ even though I do absolutely no ranching there whatsoever. I hate ranching. I hate Crawford too, a hellhole if ever there was one. I only bought the place in 1999, in time for the 2000 election, and I’ve used it as a prop ever since. Am I ever called out on any of this? Not at all. And they call me dumb!
Since we’re speaking frankly, let me clear up a few of the other little misunderstanding I’ve encouraged to spring up about my administration. Before 9/11 we were asleep at the wheel. That moron Ashcroft at Justice had his hair on fire, but about porn. Condi was worried about Chinese missile attacks, mostly because she’d studied the cold war all her life and couldn’t face the fact it was over. Cheney? Who knows what he was up to, but no good enters into it I can assure you. I was devoted to my usual pursuits, namely various forms of indolence and recreation. After 9/11 of course we used the attacks to amass power, destroy opponents, infringe on civil liberties. Why? Partly for fun. Partly for command and control. Partly to advance my agenda.
You see, my economic policies were designed to benefit the rich and big business at the expense of everybody else. The Iraq war was fought to enrich oil companies and defense contractors. My stewardship of regulatory agencies like FDA, EPA, SEC and so on was calculated to neuter them and allow big ag, big food, big pharma, and big finance to ride roughshod over the country, doing whatever they pleased in the interests of profit making, not to say profiteering. No Child Left Behind was crafted to fatally undermine the public school system, enabling the rise of charter schools and home schooling. My war on science, like my posturing on religion, was designed to distract attention from real issues and cloud actual debate with meaningless side arguments.
And here’s the thing: my excellent deceptions and untruths have succeeded so utterly well for over seven years that all you poor suckers out there in little people land are calling my presidency a failure! I’ve fooled just about everybody the entire time I’ve been in office. Which, you poor saps, makes me a greater president than Lincoln ever was – even if I never get the credit for it.
©Joshua C. Nossiter, 2008
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A NOTE TO READERS ***Update***
Another three week plus hiatus, from April 30th until May 23rd, again due to Yahoo Geocities dismal service.
There was nothing new at The Nossiter Net between March 3rd and April 26th, 2007, nearly eight weeks. The reason: tech sabotage. Yahoo Geocities, the host for this site, denied access for the entire period. At one point, they even managed to lose all the files. In many discussions with Yahoo staff, no clear explanation was forthcoming. No one seemed able to fix the problem. Ruling out the possibility of Dubbya’s revenge, I finally wrote to Mr. Terry Semel, Chairman and CEO of Yahoo! Inc and described the ordeal the page had undergone since the beginning of March. A week later, a helpful Yahooo engineer named Jason called. He had my letter before him. Though he couldn’t do the repairs on on the spot, he promised a fix by the next day. That was April 26th, nearly two months after shutting me down in the first place.
The Nossiter Net apologizes, which is more than I can say for Yahoo Geocities.
