You would’ve thought they’d save it for Super Bowl halftime, with Jessica Simpson dressed as Martha Washington giving him a final lapdance before they throw the switch. Or you’d think the administration would kick off the State of the Union with it, Bush addressing the nation whilst standing on his smoldering, electrocuted corpse. But no, it looks like Saddam Hussein is scheduled to die tonight. Before FOX could get the pay-per-view rights, no less. Well, like Rumsfeld said, democracies are free to make those sort of mistakes.
Where’s Bush? I’ll be flabbergasted if he’s not in Iraq. This is his white whale, the man that tried to Kill his Daddy, his ultimate limp-dick Oedipal boogeyman and reason our military is stretched to its breaking point halfway around the world.
Bizarre, to say the very least. Uh, Happy New Year?
UPDATE: And he’s dead.
UPDATE 2: “This thing is a sham, of a piece with the whole corrupt, disastrous sham that the war and occupation have been… This whole endeavor, from the very start, has been about taking tawdry, cheap acts and dressing them up in a papier-mache grandeur — phony victory celebrations, ersatz democratization, reconstruction headed up by toadies, con artists and grifters. And this is no different. Hanging Saddam is easy. It’s a job, for once, that these folks can actually see through to completion. So this execution, ironically and pathetically, becomes a stand-in for the failures, incompetence and general betrayal of country on every other front that President Bush has brought us.”
This article appears in December 29 • 2006.