Video: Chronic Explains Iraq, Austin, in Three Minutes or Less

It was a far simpler time – Harry Potter was on everyone's lips, we didn't cower in fear of falling bridges, there was still doubt as to whether the Attorney General had perjured himself – instead of just how badly. Yeah, last week sure was something, wasn't it?

It was then your humble Chronicle columnist and Chronic overlord appeared on MSNBC to explain the mother-of-all-punchlines: how Austin's city government was serving as model for Iraq – specifically Baghdad. Apparently, Toby Futrell and the gang have been exporting that "terminal democracy" thing of ours overseas by way of teleconferencing with the troops trying to create said local governments, and providing advice on how to set up city services. Here's (somewhat glitchy) video of my two appearances getting more into it (the second segment begins immediately after the first):


Pretty hilarious Freudian slip on my part, saying Austin's got a "city manager-city staff" form of government, eh?

What I tried to make more clear in my second appearance (I was initially scheduled for four, but a bomb scare or somesuch bumped the last two), was the "government-by-bake-sale" aspect of the whole debacle. Bush and his bloodsucking-sycophants have been fighting this war on the cheap ever since it kicked off four years back. Granted, the city's been lending a hand for three years, and our hat is off to them, but the fact Washington didn't have any sort of contingency for this in the first place – the fact it's fallen to our city staff and incredibly overworked, overdriven city manager – really speaks to the facile, incompetent lack of planning behind this entire clusterfuck.

Plus, the city manager's popularity has dropped, but I don't think she has any first-hand experience with sniper-attacks or car bombs.