“Permission Slips?,” mocks Jim Corrigan, “We don’t need no stinkin’ Permission Slips.” Indeed, in the State of the Union ruminations of the Treasure of Crawford, Texas there does seem to be an effort to reach back to the braggadocio of John Huston and B. Traven. And thus, maybe, to our own Ambrose Bierce. But it is typical of this ill-read, mistuned poor goon of a president, when searching for an apt metaphor for themes of war and peace, that actually he finds his milieu in the slang of elementary school. This president is no Homer, he’s Homer Simpson.
Someone who could use a heavy dose of Bierce is our own Madam Leader (and her Senate counterpart). Where are the Dems? They follow a speech by the Hall-Monitor-in-Chief in which every word that wasn’t a factual lie was a mouthing of pious humbug, with two speeches that are lame and tame. Who writes these empty speeches? The country is being sold down the river, on the blood of nineteen year olds, on the brains and brawn of its people whose dreams daily turn to disappointments, and the best the Gentlewoman from San Francisco can do in a speech of rebuttal is to assure us that she’s, ah, a gentle woman?
No more Nice People please. Come out fighting. Speak for America, Speak for San Francisco, Mrs. Pelosi. …
And could it be the real local fountain of Bush-think is not Condi Rice, but … Jon Carroll? Compare last night’s State of the Steroids speech with this from J. Carroll’s column of Sept 22, 2001:
“We bomb anyone we think needs bombing. We invade anyone we think needs invading. We don't sign treaties, we don't ask permission, we don't plant taters, we don't plant cotton, and we don't need no steenking badges. …”
