News Flash: The Scallion Merges with The Onion

We of The Scallion hereby happily announce to our faithful readers that we will shortly be merging with another familiar and even more famous satire magazine: The Onion.

As chief editor of The Scallion, I was stunned and delighted by the invitation to join the ranks of such a respected, high-quality publication. I can't tell my faithful readers how gratified I am for such recognition of my writing. Who knows how far having The Onion on my resume will advance my status in the field?

I'll never forget the moment that the editors of The Onion asked me whether I'd like to sign on as a paid freelance writer and editor: I choked back a joyous whoop and replied, “April Fools!” >:}

Bush Pleased with War for Oil

March 31, 2003. According to aides, Bush reportedly is extremely pleased with progress in the war for oil in Iraq. Mr. Bush himself addressed reporters by remote video from his bunkers several hundred feet below the Oval Office.

When asked how the war is going, Mr. Bush replied, “Swimmingly! We've got them little brown A-rabs on the run, oh yes we do. They don't know what's hit 'em, and, I tell you what, we got a whole lot more where that good stuff come from! Whizzzzzzz, ka-boom! Bang, ker-POW!!! Tat-tat-tat-tat-tat-tat, doodle-oodle-oodle-oodle ... ka-BLOOEY!! Heh, heh! Twelve glorious wonderful days down, and I don't know how many more to go. Baghdad going up in flames as we speak! I haven't had this much gosh-dang fun since I were a li'l tadpole an' Jeb 'n' 'em usedta peg me in the mug with mud pies with rocks in 'em and Mama usedta bribe me with shots of whiskey to get me to stop bawlin'. Brother, it's like Christmas! Woo-HOOO!”

An independent reporter from Pacifica radio asked, “Mr. Bush, how can you justify taking so many lives—civilian and military—on both sides for oil?” Bush replied, “First of all, somebody get that wiseacre out of here—hog tie 'er, and dump 'er in John-boy Ass-croft's office. Let him deal with that crap in the morning. And don't let 'er back in my face until she's been properly ... re-educated. Or else!”

Mr. Bush paused and continued, “O.K., then, Miz Smarty-pants, I'll tell you before I let my minions drag you away by the heels. Just so's you and 'em like you know that this president's got nothin'-no-nada to hide from the bleeding-heart liberal likes of you.

“If you're so c-a-t curious, I'll tell ya how this little party works. It's really quite simple—even I understood it once Karl and Paul explained it to me a few times each and Rummy drew me a few pictures and let me connect the dots. Heck, he even let me color them in once I was done. But, that's aside the point. The point is the American people, that's what. We can tell the American people anything we want—and why not, since we got them newspaper boys by the short 'n' curlies? First, we tell 'em 9/11 is due to Osama. Then, we come up with al Qaeda. Then, we tell 'em that this war has nothing to do with oil—and ignore that little man behind the curtain. We tell 'em that we're attacking Iraq to liberate the people from Saddam. And we tell 'em that Saddam and Osama are in cahoots to terrorize and destroy this great American country of ours. We fabricate some evidence between me and Toady Blair until we get everybody on board for the war; then, when somebody discovered that our so-called evidence was phony, it was too late—we had as many people on board as we needed. The kicker is that we're telling everybody that every all of us Americans is for this war 110%--everybody unanimously supports me, the God-appointed president, except for a measly few straggler tree-hugging tofu-eating neo-hippies, which nobody'd believe anyway, especially since we're also telling everyone that these neo-hippies are pro-Saddam, anti-troop commies. And what sane, self-respecting, red-blooded American would eat tofu anyway when they can have a great big juicy slab of cow? But the main thing is that we can sell the American people on regime change in Iraq because of two reasons. One is that the American people are sheep and will believe whatever propaganda pablum we dish out. But it's the other reason that's really sneaky.

“O.K., now listen real close 'cause the sneaky part is kinda tricky to follow. Ya with me? Good, 'cause here goes. You already know that Americans are sheep and therefore as stupid as me—they'll believe anything we tell 'em. Well, the other reason we can justify taking over Iraq for oil is that, even though Americans are basically stupid, they're also basically generous and goodhearted—unlike me, of course.

“You see, that there's the two-fork prong. Americans are stupid and gullible and also goodhearted and generous. This means that they actually want to believe that we are attacking Iraq for the good of both countries—to protect our own butts and be all altruistic-like and defend the helpless Iraqi people from bad ol' Saddam. Get it? It's so completely blame irrationally unreasonable—not to mention greedy—to murder hundreds and thousands of Iraqis and let our own good boys die over there in the middle of the desert that the good-if-gullible people of this great country of ours can't stand to believe that we actually would in a million years attack another country for oil because that's the last thing on God' green earth that they'd do themself. So, the average American what supports this war is basically just projecting their own goodness onto me ... and God knows I need it.

“So that's it—the American public believes what we spoon-feed tell 'em along with what they so desperately want to believe. So every last all of them support me and this war—gung-ho, G.I. Joe!

“That's all there is, folks. Can I go now? Rummy says it's time to move around my toy tanks. I been lookin' forward to this all day.”

Bush Unveils New Welfare Program

March 27, 2003. Amidst public outcry that the war on Iraq is distracting the Bush administration from domestic issues, Mr. Bush unveiled his new version of Welfare and other programs to relieve financial burden on the nation's lowest income earners. He addressed an enthusiastic throng of his admirers from the Oval Office earlier today.

“Everybody knows that it's gonna take a whole lot of tax money to pay for my happy little war. And that's not just for the million-dollar bombs that we're currently using to spank Saddam's brown little heinie. Yessiree, folks, we're also gonna need a buttload of tax money to pay Dickey-boy's buds over at Halliburton, not to mention Bechtel, ABB, and all them good ol' boys that Uncle Sam will be hiring to put out all them oil well fires and rebuild Iraq.

“Now, where do that tax money come from, and where do it go? Well, everybody knows that them poor people don't got enough money to pay for all the great good fun we're having in the Middle East right now with our tanks and our bombs and our guns and our thingies that go ka-pow and ka-boom. Everybody also knows that them poor people suck up ungodly amounts of tax money in Welfare and free school lunches and whatnot. So, it's probably a safe bet that them poor people are hurting my happy little war effort twice-over: one, they don't got enough money to pay a lot of taxes for it and, two, they end up needing tax money themselves. So, me and Dickey-boy and boy-genius Karl Rove were all trying to figger out what to do.

“And everybody knows that this-here president is all for equality. That's why we graciously allow people of all colors and minorities and low income levels, no matter how little education they may have, to come fight in our armed services at the front lines of our happy little war. Yes, friends, we'll let anybody's youngsters sign up for Uncle Sam's B&B and fight and die in our happy little war if they're old enough and able enough to say 'Yes, sir' and fire a gun. Yessiree bob, we don't discriminate at all when it comes to manning our guns and our tanks at the front lines.

“'But, Mister President,' you ask, 'Where at does all that tax money come from to pay for all this neato stuff what goes “boom” and these highly trained warfighters?' Well, I'm glad you asked. The bad news is that, yes, it takes a lot of tax money to pay the guys and gals out there risking their butts in the name of good ol' American freedom. But the good news is that it's taking less than it used to, I tell you what. For one thing, my Republican buddies in the Congress just approved a bill reducing veterans' pension benefits. Ain't that just ducky? And that ain't all: we're also working on taking away the overtime hazard pay we'd otherwise hafta give the boys and girls out there in the field what with the gunfire and the bombs going off around their ears. Nifty, huh? Yea, buddy, Dickey-boy and turd-blossom Rove and Condi and me are all hugging ourselves over all the money we're saving by not paying our troops and veterans what we really owe them. Not to mention all the other social services we're gonna cut so we can give some badly needed tax breaks to my poor starving multi-gazillionaire big business buddies.

“But that still ain't the all of it. Ya wanna hear the rest of it? Good, cuz I'm gonna tell ya. The rest of it is that them poor plebs who sign up for the military and go to fight for home and glory in Iraq may end up coming home in bodybags. And guess what that means: no more tax money to pay for their bed and breakfast at the red-white-and-blue Hilton. So, you see, we're also reducing our tax outgo by reducing the number of im-poverished people in the armed services what need paid.

“So, folks, that's the plan: round up all the poor and send 'em all out to fight in my happy little war. The lucky ones will come home in body bags, and the rest can look forward to having all their benefits cut so that me and my oil buds can line our own pockets at their expense. Then, at the end of the day, we take all that good tax money what we saved by stiffing the troops and the veterans and the Medicare people and the free lunch kids in the schools and we use all that lovely green money to pay for our new version of Welfare—yup, you guessed it, white collar version of Welfare what benefits our oil buds at Halliburton and them.

“Between finally getting to spank Saddam and cutting taxes for the rich and cutting social services for the poor and decimating civil rights, I'm happier than a pig in slop—and I'm actually getting paid to have all this fun. Is it great to be president or what? Yessiree bob, being president is just hot-diggity!”