by Dave Tomar

G21 Satire Columnist

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CAMDEN, NJ, USA - This week, UN weapons inspectors finally uncovered what the Bush administration has excitedly characterized as "several smoking guns," all of which have illustrated the incontrovertible need for immediate military action in Iraq. After two months of fruitless investigation in Baghdad, a newly dispatched corps of inspectors bearing the name Team Alabama made the startling discovery in the home of Iraqi scrap-metal salvager Raqi Mareidi, just south of Baghdad.

Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld spoke of the revelation in a Friday press conference, explaining that "Mareidi's involvement in a plot to destroy freedom became apparent beyond a reasonable doubt yesterday when inspectors found an egg-beater in his kitchen sink. It is clear, according to the same American forensics experts that worked on the O.J. Simpson prosecution team, that this utensil was used to mix a fluid of some sort. So there you have it. Chemical warfare." Rumsfeld went on to reiterate the promise to Americans that "Iraq's civilians will pay for this terrorism with their lives."

Mareidi, who was subsequently taken into U.S. custody in a series of plastic shopping bags, commented only that "my family and I saved up for six years to buy that egg-beater."

An unidentified American military official present at the time of his apprehension responded to the claim by indicating that "even if the egg-beater had indeed only been used to make a Denver omelet, UN sanctions imposed upon Iraq following the first Gulf War state clearly - and in no uncertain terms - that Iraqi consumption of eggs, waffles, pancakes, the Denny's Grand Slam Value Meal or any other food commonly associated with the hearty American-style breakfast is strictly forbidden under penalty of total annihilation. It's the only way Saddam Hussein will learn."

The Mareidi discovery was not the only undeniable material breach of the American-drafted U.N. resolution seeking full Iraqi disarmament. According to a report on the matter, released by the White House late Friday, independent American reconnaissance revealed an Iraqi orphanage containing upwards of forty "bed-shaped items that we believe to be nuclear warheads." The report credited the information to "a series of grainy, unintelligible, still-frame photographs taken from the inside of an ice-cream truck hidden behind a mattress store in Oakland, California." As a pre-emptive response to the aggression implied by the photographs, American B-2 bombers already stationed in the region dropped 13 kilotons of explosives on the building.

As to an international allegation that the structure may have actually contained orphans, Armed Forces General Tommy Franks assured that, "if we hadn't killed them yesterday, they would have starved to death anyway."

This new cache of evidence that Saddam Hussein is beginning to orchestrate a major global coup comes at a most crucial time, according to Bush administration officials. The President spoke on the matter just after the discovery on Thursday afternoon, asserting that "this could not have come at a better time. We were this close to admitting we were only in it for the oil. But now we can get back to pretending it has something to do with weapons or terrorists or something."

Bush went on to detail his anger with Hussein, proclaiming to be "sick and tired of Iraqi deception." The President followed up his strong words by succumbing to a crying fit in front of forty reporters. He was quickly ushered from his dais, spoon-fed a bowl of pudding and put down for his daily afternoon nap.

White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer closed the day's comments by discounting a U.N. request for a new timeline on completing weapons inspections. As to an extension that would exceed the January 27th deadline for a full U.N. report, Fleischer explained that "the president can't even read a bus schedule, so a weapons inspection timeline is meaningless to him. And we don't see the need for such delays. I mean, how hard can it be to find some missiles? This isn't rocket science here."

And as the White House waits patiently for a legitimate go-ahead for military action, the 250,000-plus American troops that have already been planted on the ground in surrounding nations such as Yemen, Qatar, Kuwait and Turkey, are operating under conditions of heightened readiness. All military personnel have been instructed to practice common urban combat procedural techniques on the indigenous peoples of their temporary residences in preparation for the coming war.

Stated Joint Chief of Staff Richard Myers during a Wednesday briefing, "we like to keep our men limber and focused. Fortunately, in most of the countries where our forces currently occupy ground, the inhabitants look exactly like Iraqis. It makes raids and bombings on the unarmed civilians here seem just like the real thing."

Most Bush administration officials are confident that the recently uncovered breaches of the inspection process will constitute necessary mobilization, and CNN has substantiated this assumption by repeatedly airing a two-second clip from a 1998 file in which U.N. inspections chief Hans Blix is heard to state, "um . . . yes."

As U.N. inspectors have grappled to interpret the new discovery in Iraq, tens of thousands of protestors gathered this past Saturday in Washington D.C. and San Francisco to rally for a peaceful solution to the Iraqi situation. Vice President Dick Cheney spoke disparagingly of the resistance to White House policy during a weekend press conference, explaining that "this small group of dissenters does not represent the opinion of most Americans. Most Americans have no opinion."

The Vice President died and was resuscitated three separate times during that sentence. Shortly thereafter, his body was returned to the massive latex chamber where he hibernates for three and a half weeks out of every month. One aide who demanded anonymity said of the Vice President's health condition and consequent public scarcity, "you can't prosecute somebody you can't find."

Finally, this week, the Bush administration announced plans to honor the birthday of Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., whose life was celebrated this Monday, with a historical reenactment. The White House released a statement extolling the virtues of "this great and cherished American," promising to pay tribute to the memory of his heroic struggle for racial equality by turning fire hoses on unsuspecting affirmative action lobbyists.

So remember: the monkey goes where the wind blows.

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DAVE TOMAR is a Rutgers University Graduate with Bachelor's Degrees in Communication and Planning and Public Policy. As a freelance writer, he has published music reviews and editorials with Chorus and Verse, Propeller Magazine, Nefarious Entertainment Magazine, Synthesis.net and Uwire.com. He has also completed a satirical novel on the topic of popular music entitled "Easily Amused." As a political activist, he has published over 60 installments of his column "The Monkey Goes Where The Wind Blows" with the campus publication The Outside World. The column can also be found at juryfury.com. This is his first article for The World's Magazine.