Answer the Questions, Mr. President!

Iowahawk Guest Analysis

by Blurnk Van Chadheusen
Award-Winning Senior White House Correspondolyst
MSNC-NCBCN NewsNightNow!

As an award-winning professionally trained field journalist and a veteran of over three dozen tours of Columbia Journalism School ethics seminars, I must say I was frankly embarrassed by the performance of the press gallery at the presidential press conference last night. The appalling inability of the assembled journalists to extract the feeblest, inarticulate apology from the president was a stain on our profession, and only provided ammunition to the millions of everyday Americans, like Eric Alterman, who, according to many university studies, increasingly see us as the dainty court stenographers of the inept Bush regime.

If we are to regain any credibility with the viewing public, we -- as professional award-winning trained journalists -- must demand straight talk and straight answers from this administration. Answer the questions, Mr. President!

Mr. President! In your mind, on those occasions when you may have accidentally lapsed into thinking back over the dozens of horrific missteps and fatal bumblings that have occurred under your watch, would it not be unfair to say that you should not have failed to reconsidered your moral duty to take responsibility for your administration's direct culpability for 9-11?

Mr. President! Among the hundreds of US soldiers that have died in your what polls show to be an increasingly unpopular and meaningless quagmire in Iraq, can you tell us which ones would you say are the least apology-needing?

Mr. President! As a fundamentalist Christian, do you think Jesus would have gone into Baghdad with both guns blazing?

Mr. President! Would you be willing to play me in a quick game of rock-scissors-paper, the loser of which will apologize to the American people for the ongoing debacle in Iraq, or are you chi-i-icken? Bukkbukk Buh-quawk!

Mr. President! I was just thinking, do you ever sit in the Oval Office in introspection, saying to yourself, "perhaps I was wrong, wrong on Iraq, wrong on WMDs, I didn't do everything possible to prevent 9-11, it might as well have been me flying those jets into the buildings," or would you say you're more like, "screw that introspection shit, I'm never wrong," and wander off to the Blue Room to play the Xbox?

Mr. President! It is said that it takes a big man to admit he made a mistake. Let's say this big mistake-admitting man is roughly the size of Shaquille O'Neal. Would you say the degree of your personal reluctance to apologize to the 9-11 widows would shrink you down to a size more like (a) Muggsy Bogues, (b) Billy Barty, or (c) the still-at-large Osama Bin Laden?

Mr. President! Could I get an autograph for my niece? She's a huge fan. Great! Please sign here, at the bottom of this random "scrap document."

Mr. President! Many people have strongly and convincingly argued that you are directly responsible for the bloody military disaster of Iraq, while others, like Chris Matthews, counter that you were merely following the orders of a secretive cabal of puppetmasters. Who would you say is is correct in this debate?

Mr. President! Suppose Mrs. Bush knew the whole secret truth about 9-11 and tired of your stubborn refusals to apologize, and said "that's it Mister, no more pokey-pokey until you go on TV and come clean about what you knew." Are you really saying that evading your official responsibility is more important than sex?

Mr. President! There are reports circulating from the Kerry campaign that his staff is deeply worried that you will begin to go on an 9-11 apology spree, because they have internal polls showing that American public really eat that apology stuff up, bigtime, and that they are planning an all-out apology offensive of their own. Hey man, I'm just saying.

Until we professionals in the award-winning journalism community start demanding answers to these, and other critically important foreign policy questions, we will have failed in our public trust as professional award-winning journalists. On behalf of the president, I apologize.

Comments

[rick]

Oh. Wow. that was just...too funny.I am so glad I laughed out loud tonight; thanks.

[person of choler]

Damn good. Keep it up.

[spongeworthy]

I'm trying to laugh, I really am. I can't help but think of all the questions we ought to be asking, like What's up with Saddam? What are you guys doing with him, and what kind of deals are you making so he'll ix-nay on the uts-gay illing-spay?

How about those Pakis? Do you really trust them, or are they just more Iraqi policemen types?

Is your Dad really pissed at you? Are you grounded or anything?

How could you let Daschle select 9-11 Committee members? His wife's the top airline lobbyist ever! If anyone's responsible for making sure those jihadis had the run of those planes, it's the airlines. Think the Daschles'd like to keep that one off the table?

Whattr'ya, stupid? Geez.

Okay, I feel better now.

[Ken Hall]

Mr. Decaf Earl Grey, meet Mr. Monitor. And Mr. Keyboard. And Mr. Speaker and his twin brother, also Mr. Speaker.