The Dissociated Press

Patriots Weakened

PALO ALTO, California (The Dissociated Press) -

Last Friday was September 11th, anniversary of
The day the airplane targeted towers tumbled
In four flashes, hundreds perished
Thousands more entombed beneath smoldering rubble
Eager War Machine busted out of his flimsy corral,
No time to ask questions, to reflect, to mourn
To speak of peace was to invite scorn
Constitution shredded, the fourth estate embedded
This is how "Patriot's Day" was born

So, how was your Patriot's Weekend?

Did you ignore the growing death and destruction in Afghanistan?...
The continued mayhem in Iraq?...
News, in this country, of increasing poverty and unemployment?...
Did you crack open a cold Bud in front of the wide-screen HD,
And revel in the opening weekend of the NFL season?

Did you keep your thoughts from the tens of thousands of New Orleans' poor,
Whose houses and schools, wrecked by Katrina, have yet to be rebuilt?...
Who continue, four years hence, to live in decrepit, condemned buildings or cheap government trailers?...
Or cities and towns hundreds of miles from home,
Refugees of the storm,
In a country that couldn't build a levee, or give a damn?..
Did you go shopping?

Did you remain ignorant of the record profits of Chevron and Exxon-Mobil?...
The massive earnings of Pfizer and United Health?...
Did you blame the Arabs for the high price of gasoline?...
And illegal immigrants for the high price of health care?
Did you order Freedom Fries with your burger?

Did you unburden your conscience from the plight of the broken, homeless vet,
You passed begging for money on the sidewalk,
And the tens of thousands like him, or worse,
The ones you don't ever see,
Minds or bodies, or both, destroyed,
Wracked with suicidal depression, or homicidal rage,
Or decaying in the remote, caustic warehouses of a society that starts wars like fifty-cent games in an arcade but is loathe to view their human cost?
Did you say that to bring the troops home now would mean those who died had died in vain?

Did you glibly dismiss scientists' warnings about water shortages, endangered species, and global warming?...
Did you leave the central air on high? Water the lawn midday? Take a 20 minute shower?

Did you remain ignorant of the militarized border walls?...
Secret prisons and torture sites?...
Infiltrated and undermined anti-war protests?...
Omnipresent surveillance cameras?...
Censorship of art, poetry, and music?...
Massive I.C.E. raids?...
Domestic spying, brought to you by AT&T, Verizon, and Comcast?...
Did you think to yourself, "They hate us for our freedom!"?

Were you entertained by the media voices of the political Reich?...
Limbaugh, Beck, O'Reilly, Hannity, North, Liddy ... so many more,
For whom Liberty's verse of freedom is just a torch song?...
Did your thoughts turn once to the likes of Jefferson or Madison or Paine?
Or, were they simply patriots weakened,
In the celebration of Patriot's Weekend?

The Prez Says "Stay in School, Fool!"

ARLINGTON, Virginia (The Dissociated Press) - President Obama delivered his highly anticipated "back-to-school" address to the nation's schoolchildren Tuesday and, contrary to fears by many that he would use the occasion to "indoctrinate our youth to his radical Marxist agenda," he spent most of the time giving students fatherly advice on things like, how to pick up white women, perform African voodoo rituals, and cook human flesh in a way that "locks in the moisture."

For weeks since the White House announced the President's plans to come across the Potomac River, to Wakefield High School, and deliver a speech that would be made simultaneously available to schools all over the country, right-wing politicians and media personalities had been clamoring that Mr. Obama did not intend to speak on education, but rather to promote left-wing, Soviet-style policies. The ensuing uproar had tens of thousands of parents vowing to pull their children from school and "lock them in the basement for the next four years," if that's what it took to keep them safe.

"This president is a black radical communist who hates white people, hates American values, and fashions himself to be the Great African Messiah come to the New World to avenge his slave ancestors!" said Fox News Network commentator Glenn Beck last week on his program "I Have No Brain, and I Hate People Who Are!"

"And now he is trying to turn our children into legions of brainwashed foot soldiers to join him in his messianic quest!" Beck said.

However, Mr. Obama clearly disappointed Beck, and the many others engaged in similar hysterics, with his speech Tuesday, because there was no hint of the kind of politicization they so vehemently warned against. Instead, the President drew on experiences from his own life to try to relate practical "life skills" that he said all children needed to have, such as "being able to communicate within a diverse community."

To that end, speaking in his native Swahili, the President taught students to say, "Samahani rafiki. Mimi nimekula baba mdogo. Nitakunywa maji tu? Nina kiu sana." Which, translated to English, means, "Excuse me, friend. I've just eaten your uncle. Could I please have some water? I'm very thirsty."