Unamerica Thriving; America Jealous
May 13, 2003. In late February of this year, the secession of Unamerica from America was reported in fine publications like The Scallion. Due to America's hostile corporate take-over of Iraq, in which that nation was annexed into the union as the fifty-first state, very little else has appeared in American or Unamerican news. Thus, an update on the situation seemed timely.
A nation now consisting of the top few percent of old-America's most wealthy plus less wealthy and middle-class neoconservatives, completely white and predominantly male, America has begun to face some significant challenges. On the surface, the America left after Unamerica's secession promised to be a formidable foe. While possessing a far smaller population, America boasted by far the greater wealth—orders of magnitude more wealth per capita than any other nation on earth. The very day of the secession, America repealed its Bill of Rights and dismantled the New Deal, creating a federal government consisting solely of a military. Without bothersome social programs like Social Security, Welfare, Medicare/Medicaid, environmental protection, or public education to waste precious tax dollars on, the new American government was free to buy as many tanks, bombs, and military airplanes as it wanted. Except for one small problem: prior to the secession, neither the wealthy corporations nor the wealthy individual citizens in America paid any taxes. So, the laws were changed to levy a modest flat tax on every business and individual: in keeping with old American practices, the tax rate was set inversely proportional to income. The wealthiest Americans threatened to raise Cain but capitulated in the end: since 100% of their tax dollars were to be used for the common good of imperialism—not a penny to the undeserving poor—they realized that to complain would not only be like cutting off their noses to spite their faces, but it would also be treasonous and would result in their executions.
So, it was beginning to look like America would quickly become the military dictatoress of the world, with a virtually unlimited supply of military materiel. Except for one problem: because the Unamerican Constitution provides for a living wage for all working citizens, Americans have been unable to find cheap labor. It is ironic that the neoconservatives—who now have the America they claim they want, free from all dissent from the Orwellian neocon party line—are having a difficult time spending any of the money they so insist on hoarding. After all, Junior can't be bothered to pluck yon silver spoon from out his nostril and toil like a common laborer—certainly not for a farthing less than the six-figure executive salary Daddy has been priming him to condescend to take—just to build tanks and planes and bombs ... or—heaven forfend!—to clean a lowly toilet. So, to fuel the American military, American businesses offered to pay workers a living wage with decent benefits. That ploy failed, however: Unamerican workers, dissatisfied with American business ethics and environmental policies, chose to keep their Unamerican jobs—and migrants and immigrants to North America followed suit. As a result, America has not yet figured out how to build the imperial bombs, tanks, and planes it so lasciviously craves. The resulting shortage in workers at all levels from middle-class professionals to janitors has left America in quite a fix. With no servants to cook or clean or garden, America's extravagant luxury homes are fast becoming the world's most spacious ghettos. The worker shortage is underscored in the American military: while many faithful of the old guard remain at their posts, the vast majority of rank and file defected to Unamerica for living wages, decent veterans' benefits, and the security of knowing that, by declaration in Unamerica's Constitution, they can only be called to fight just wars of defense and will never be called to fight unjust wars to capture money or oil for the rich without receiving their fair share of the spoils. Observers are reminded of the anti-war posters of the Viet Nam era: what if they threw a war and nobody came? The once all-powerful giant has now become a toothless midget.
Meanwhile, Unamerica is thriving and prospering under provisional Unamerican President Ralph Nader, who will be eligible for reelection in 2004. Boasting the world's healthiest organic foods, best-taught public school children, and most happy citizenry, Unamerica is well on its way toward becoming a benevolent, non-polluting citizen of the world. When asked about America, President Nader smiled and shrugged: “I think they're finally beginning to get it: they need us far more than we need them. Come to think of it, we don't need them at all!”