Page Title

“Welcome to Lucha Libre Night at the Taco Bell Arena in Chihuahua,
Mexico. I’m Edificio Del Huevo, your color commentator, and I’ll be
assisted by six-time Mexican female mud wrestling champion, Rosita
La Chingada.”

“¡Hola amigos!”

“We’ll be reporting on the hugely anticipated grudge match tonight
between Mexican champion Comandante Marco and his American
rival, El Grande Bush. There’s a lot at stake in this battle for North
American supremacy, wouldn’t you say, Rosie?”

“¡Ooooh sííííí! Mexico has been pushing for a rematch since 1846,
when the malditos gringos cabrones put a gun to our heads and
made us sign over Texas and California. Now if we want to go there
for a vacation we have to swim through rat-infested sewer pipes, and
mutherfuckers telling us ‘Speak English! Speak English!’ I like English.
I luv it! But I don’t need no gringo mutherfucker breathin’ down my
neck.

“Anyway, if Comandante Marco wins the match tonight, we gonna get
back all our land and then we be telling you cocksuckers to speak
Spanish.

“I know the first thing I’m gonna do when we take over is to move into
the Presidential Suite at the Venetian Hotel in Las Vegas and go
skinny-dipping in the Grand Canal. Show the mutherfuckers what a
real Mexican chocha looks like!”

“Sounds good to me, Rosie, but as they say ‘Don’t count your huevos
rancheros before they’re hatched.’ Remember, the norteamericanos
are not going to give up all that loot without a fight.

“And as we speak, El Grande Bush is entering the ring. He’s wearing
his trademark pink tu-tu, dunce cap and glitter mask, and they’re
playing his music, ‘Cheeseburger in Paradise.’”

“Hey, Bushie, Bushie! Can we get a word from you for our studio
audience?”

“Waal, I’d like to address my remarks to the brave men and women
fighting in Eye-Rack for the forty-second consecutive year. I honor the
sacrifice you are making in the war on terror, and I want you to know
that I plan to win tonight so that when you come home you’ll have a
home to come home to.

“The threat we are facing in this arena here tonight is whether our
western states will remain The Home of The Free And The Brave, or
are allowed to become an open-air taco stand like the one on
Alvarado Street in downtown LA, where the crackheads and stray
dogs hang out, behind the convention center.”

“How inspiring! What’s your strategy for fighting Comandante Marco?"

“I plan to shock and awe him with my lightning speed, twist his head in
the ropes and bite his knuckles.”

“Excuse me, Ed, cut out that shit. Here comes Mexico’s national hero,
Comandante Marco of the Zapatista Revolutionary Army of Chiapas.
He looks ready for battle with his headdress of quetzal feathers,
jaguar-skin tights and crocodile nose mask. His musical
accompaniment is the Mexico City rock band Molotov singing their
anthem ''Viva México Cabrones.' Every time I hear that song it brings
tears of pride to my eyes, especially the part where they sing ‘No Me
Llames Cerdo.’ When I was a leetle girl in the shantytown overlooking
the security wall separating Nuevo Laredo from Brownsville, Texas,
my mother used to lull me to sleep by singing to me from Molotov’s
romantic love song ‘Chinga Tu Madre’, where they sing:

Nos vemos Acapulco a la fin de semana
Mientras yo cuido à tu hermana
Chinga tú chinga tu madre
[Ed. See you in Acapulco
But first I fuck your sister]

“Hey, big boy! You got something to say to your fans?”

“Hola, Rosie. I dedicate my life to the glory of Mexico. After I win, not
only are we going to reconquer our lost territories, but we are going to
sacrifice El Grande Bush on the ancient Mayan altar at Chichen Itzà
by ripping out his still beating heart and feeding it to the pirhana fish
that swim in the holy cenote. The whole ceremony is going to be
filmed by Mel Gibson for his upcoming movie “Jews of The Jungle.”

“Sounds great, sweetie. Only how do you plan to vanquish such a
great warrior like El Grande Bush?”

“I plan to shoot him with a curare-tipped blow dart and then, when he’s
paralyzed, I’m going to stomp on his balls.”

“And there’s the bell! The two fighters are circling each other warily,
looking for an opening, and they are being watched by the masked
referee, El Misterioso, who is also wearing a mask. Ed, what do we
know about El Misterioso?”

“Only that he gained fame as the fiercest lucha libre fighter in South
America.”

“Wow! Now El Grande Bush leaps forward and head butts
Comandante Marco in the chest, but instead of falling onto the mat El
Comandante does a backflip, kicking Bush in the face. Bush goes
down and Comandante Marco sits on his face, locking him in a French
Butt Hold, squeezing the air out of Bush like an Anaconda python
between the steel vise grip of his powerful glutes.”

“With his last, dying breath Bush reaches between Marco’s legs and
manages to insert his two fingers in the man’s nostrils and flip him
across the ring like a slingshot. Bush jumps to his feet and delivers a
shattering roundkick to the head of El Comandante, who goes flying
into El Misterioso who, enraged, punches him in the face. Hey, he’s
not supposed to do that. He’s the ref!”

“Wait a minute! Now El Misterioso grabs a folding chair and breaks it
over the head of El Grande Bush.”

“The audience is going berserk. The mariachi band Los Tigres Del
Norte has started playing the romantic sentimental love song ‘Volver’,
I suppose expressing their wish for a return of Mexico’s northern
territories. Meantime, on the American side, Ted Nugent is shooting
off machine gun riffs from his guitar. Oh no, that’s not his guitar, it’s a
real machine gun! Now gunfire is breaking out all over the place and
bullets are flying.”

“Comandante Marco and El Grande Bush have recovered from the
surprise attack by El Misterioso, and they’re punching the shit out of
him in the corner of the ring. They rip off his mask.”

“Omigod, it’s Hugo Chavez, the president of Venezuela, and he’s got
an oil gusher shooting out of his butt!”

“Well, let’s get out of here before the whole place explodes. Reporting
to you from Taco Bell Arena, I’m Edificio Del Huevo.”

“And I’m Rosita La Chingada…”

“Wishing you a big cuevo en el culo, cabrones!”

CHUCHA LIBRE

200motels POLITICS

Comedy

Tragedy

Nonsense

Bullshit

Recently it was revealed that a defense contractor, The
Lincoln Group, was paid $25 million to develop propaganda to
be disseminated in Iraq. One of the themes they proposed, a
terrorist version of “The Three Stooges,” was rejected by the
Pentagon. Using the Freedom of Information Act, this writer
was able to obtain a copy of the script.

SCENARIO: Curly Sayyed is at the kitchen table stuffing
explosives in the body of a dead dog.

CURLEY: Let’s see. An artillery shell, three hand grenades,
two sticks of dynamite, a box of bullets. [Reaches for pepper
shaker] Don’t forget the gunpowder, nyuk nyuk! And one cup
of napalm. Now all it needs is a timer.
[Winds up an egg timer and throws it in] Thatsa’ spicy
meatball!
[Starts sewing the dog up, singing]
I’m singing in Bahrain
I’m friends with Hussein

Mohammed calls from the other room:

MOE: Saddam! Here boy, come to papa! Where is that damned
dog? Curley, have you seen my dog Saddam?

CURLEY: [Frightened] No, Moe!

MOE: What are you doing in there?

CURLEY: Nothing, Moe! [To dog] I gotta’ put you away. I’ll get
back to you later!

Curley grabs dog off table, runs over to the closet and opens
the door. Closet is filled with bound and gagged hostages.

HOSTAGES: Mmmph! Mmmph!

CURLEY: Sorry, folks! [Slams door]

Curley runs over to the microwave oven, throws dead dog in
microwave and closes door just as Mohammed walks in the
room.

MOE: I said, What are you doing in here?

CURLEY: I was just getting ready to make a bomb.

MOE: Well, that can wait. Come into the living room. I want to
show you my latest invention.

They walk into the living room.

MOE: Well, how do you like it?

CURLEY: What is it?

/>MOE: What do you mean, what is it, you stinking offspring of
an imperialist pig? It’s an Osama Bin Laden doll for the kids to
play with. Do I gotta’ explain you everything, you moron?

CURLEY: Oh, it’s so cute! It’s even got the little beard and
everything!

MOE: Yeah, and it’s got the little kalashnikov. And when you
press the re-dial button on your cell phone it blows up, and
you got the little puddles of fake plastic blood and everything!

CURLEY: Moe, you’re a genius!

MOE: Well, I didn’t get a Masters Degree in Engineering from
The University of Riyadh for nothing!

Abdul walks in.

ABDUL: Sorry I’m late, boys. My bus got run over by a tank.
Look what I got for us.

CURLEY: Matching suicide belts! I want the green one!

MOE: Just hold on, there. I get the green one ‘cause I’m the
boss.

CURLEY: Who made you the boss?

MOE: Oh, a wiseguy, eh!

Mohammed pulls out a rocket launcher and fires it at Curley,
who goes flying out the window. Explosion is heard. Curley
crawls back in the window, all messed up.

MOE: Now who’s the boss!?

CURLEY and ABDUL: You are, Moe.

MOE: All right! Now, where’s my dog Saddam? [Walks back in
kitchen] Saddam, boy! Saddam!

Curley rushes in and gets between Mohammed and the
microwave oven.

MOE: Hey, what’s going on here? What have you got in the
microwave?

CURLEY: [Frantic] It’s a surprise! I was just getting ready to fix
it.

MOE: Oh, a surprise, eh! Well, let’s cook it and find out what it
is.

CURLEY: Moe, no!

Mohammed reaches around Curley and pushes the button on
the microwave. The whole place explodes, with rockets and
bullets whizzing around. When the smoke clears, the place is
a shambles. The Three Jihadis are standing in the rubble with
their clothes torn to shreds and soot all over their faces.

MOE: [To Curley] What was in that oven?

THEY GOT GAMES!

200motels BEIJING OLYMPICS

Comedy

Tragedy

Nonsense

Bullshit

SCENARIO: Curly Sayyed is at the kitchen table stuffing explosives in the body of a dead dog.

CURLEY: Let’s see. An artillery shell, three hand grenades, two sticks of dynamite, a box of bullets.
[Reaches for pepper shaker] Don’t forget the gunpowder, nyuk nyuk! And one cup of napalm. Now all it
needs is a timer.
[Winds up an egg timer and throws it in] Thatsa’ spicy meatball!
[Starts sewing the dog up, singing]
I’m singing in Bahrain
I’m friends with Hussein

Mohammed calls from the other room:

MOE: Saddam! Here boy, come to papa! Where is that damned dog? Curley, have you seen my dog
Saddam?

CURLEY: [Frightened] No, Moe!

MOE: What are you doing in there?

CURLEY: Nothing, Moe! [To dog] I gotta’ put you away. I’ll get back to you later!

Curley grabs dog off table, runs over to the closet and opens the door. Closet is filled with bound and
gagged hostages.

HOSTAGES: Mmmph! Mmmph!

CURLEY: Sorry, folks! [Slams door]

Curley runs over to the microwave oven, throws dead dog in microwave and closes door just as
Mohammed walks in the room.

MOE: I said, What are you doing in here?

CURLEY: I was just getting ready to make a bomb.

MOE: Well, that can wait. Come into the living room. I want to show you my latest invention.

They walk into the living room.

MOE: Well, how do you like it?

CURLEY: What is it?

/>MOE: What do you mean, what is it, you stinking offspring of an imperialist pig? It’s an Osama Bin
Laden doll for the kids to play with. Do I gotta’ explain you everything, you moron?

CURLEY: Oh, it’s so cute! It’s even got the little beard and everything!

MOE: Yeah, and it’s got the little kalashnikov. And when you press the re-dial button on your cell
phone it blows up, and you got the little puddles of fake plastic blood and everything!

CURLEY: Moe, you’re a genius!

MOE: Well, I didn’t get a Masters Degree in Engineering from The University of Riyadh for nothing!

Abdul walks in.

ABDUL: Sorry I’m late, boys. My bus got run over by a tank. Look what I got for us.

CURLEY: Matching suicide belts! I want the green one!

MOE: Just hold on, there. I get the green one ‘cause I’m the boss.

CURLEY: Who made you the boss?

MOE: Oh, a wiseguy, eh!

Mohammed pulls out a rocket launcher and fires it at Curley, who goes flying out the window.
Explosion is heard. Curley crawls back in the window, all messed up.

MOE: Now who’s the boss!?

CURLEY and ABDUL: You are, Moe.

MOE: All right! Now, where’s my dog Saddam? [Walks back in kitchen] Saddam, boy! Saddam!

Curley rushes in and gets between Mohammed and the microwave oven.

MOE: Hey, what’s going on here? What have you got in the microwave?

CURLEY: [Frantic] It’s a surprise! I was just getting ready to fix it.

MOE: Oh, a surprise, eh! Well, let’s cook it and find out what it is.

CURLEY: Moe, no!

Mohammed reaches around Curley and pushes the button on the microwave. The whole place
explodes, with rockets and bullets whizzing around. When the smoke clears, the place is a shambles.
The Three Jihadis are standing in the rubble with their clothes torn to shreds and soot all over their
faces.

MOE: [To Curley] What was in that oven?

CURLEY: [Like a moron] I forgggget!

MOE: You forget! Well, here’s something to help you remember! Moe starts chasing Curley around,
firing a machine gun. Curley runs around in circles, jumping up and down to dodge bullets.

CURLEY: Whoop! Whoop!
Scene fades as the theme music plays.

THE END

CHUCHA LIBRE

200motels POLITICS

Comedy

Tragedy

Nonsense

Bullshit

Proposal for a U.S.
Cultural Policy

200motels World Trade

Comedy

Tragedy

Nonsense

Bullshit

Unfortunately, the United States has suffered
from very adverse publicity in recent years. I am
not here to beat a dead horse about the
perversely destructive nature of the last
administration’s moribund social and political
culture that erupted in one last murderous
frenzy, like the final scene in an “Alien” movie. I
only want to point out what every businessman
knows: adverse publicity can kill a commercial
enterprise.

Our commercial rivals have been quick to
capitalize on our missteps. Notably, the French,
whom we instinctively recognize as being the
greatest threat to us in terms of commercial
dominance. A medium-size power of only sixty
million persons, the French, endowed with a
heritage of centralized planning dating back to
Louis XIV and updated by Charles de Gaulle,
have been astute in mobilizing their country’s
resources by consolidating their agricultural,
industrial and economic sectors and applying a
coordinated strategic mobilization with the goal
of asserting French authority in the scientific and
commercial realms.

The election of Nicholas Sarkozy to the French
presidency last year immeasurably enhanced
their commercial prospects. Even though his
Socialist rival, Ségolène Royal was indisputably
charming and qualified, she could never have
brought to the Elysée Palace the qualities of
focus and dynamism that Sarkozy has brought to
bear in promoting French interests.

Sarkozy, with all his female troubles dating from
his frenetic attempts to retain his wife, Cécilia,
whom he chased to New York and retrieved from
her lover like a comic cuckold out of a Molière
stage comedy, to the palace intrigues stemming
from a rivalry between glamorous female cabinet
ministers, reminiscent of the ancien regime, to
his choice of pop singer, fashion model and
notoriously active groupie Carla Bruni as first
lady of France, resembles nothing so much as
the frenetic motor-mouth Energizer Bunny of the
Duracell commercials.

The first year of Sarkozy’s presidency has to this
point been immeasurably successful. He flew to
Libya and succeeded in liberating some doctors
and nurses who were under sentence of death
ostensibly for infecting a children’s hospital word
with AIDS, and while he was there took the time
to seal a nuclear power program worth billions of
euros; negotiated an end to the war in Georgia;
triumphantly succeeded in his role, to the
unanimous praise of all the member nations, in
his role in the rotating presidency of the
European Union, notably over Irish objections to
the establishment of an EU constitution; and is
currently on a state visit to Brazil, where his first
official act was to sign a commercial contract to
sell that country a military program of 4
submarines and 50 transport helicopters worth
six billion euros, with a memorandum of
understanding to sell them a nuclear submarine
and a squadron of Dassault fighter jets, all to be
constructed in Brazil under a transfer of
technology agreement.

An essential component of this trade strategy
has been the official French strategy, first
conceived by De Gaulle’s minister of culture,
Andre Malraux, to use France’s cultural
patrimony as a way to pave the way for the
country’s commercial interests. The government
has been astute in using fashion, art, cinema,
music, sport and literature to create a welcoming
environment for its manufacturing, agricultural
and commercial interests in a way that no other
nation has been able to succeed.

The current Brazil contract has been negotiated
in a context of several years’ cultural exchanges
culminating in the present Year of France in
Brazil, which includes, notably, a festival of
French opera in the historic Manaus opera house
in that Amazon city.

Surprisingly, or even shockingly, Sarkozy’s
choice of a consort, in Carla Bruni, has been a
pivotal component in enhancing his country’s
glamorous image. Not that his choice of her has
been met by universal acclaim. As one French
blogger wrote, “Does the president have the
right to marry a woman whose butt has been
seen by the whole world, and whom everybody
knows the name of everybody who has had it?”
This guy had a good point, but her universal
exposure notwithstanding, Carla Bruni is a
popular and celebrated first lady, dominating the
social pages the way her husband has totally
monopolized the headlines.

In addition to her innumerable photo coverage
and interviews, Bruni, an accomplished
composer and singer, has released a number
one CD of original songs. This week on the
Internet there is a video of her playing and
singing a duet with French rock icon Johnny
Hallyday. She is the focal point of Sarkozy’s state
visit to Brazil, where she is scheduled to
celebrate New Year’s in the country’s night clubs
and meet with her biological father, who is a
resident of that country. The entanglements of
Carla Bruni’s personal affairs, her various parents
and foster parents and various children and their
various fathers, have the French public
mesmerized in a way that makes “Desperate
Housewives” pale by comparison.

So why did the United States, with all our superb
submarine and helicopter technology, not get a
piece of this Brazil action? As I first pointed out,
the U.S. is a victim of monstrous public relations
engendered by a clique that assumed power in
what amounts to a coup d’état and then
proceeded to practically destroy us internally
and externally. Fortunately, we now have a
chance to recover, but from a promotional point
of view we need some innovative thinking to
regain market share.

Nicholas Sarkozy may or may not be brilliant, but
he has seized the opportunity to profit from our
mistakes, and Carla Bruni is one of his tools. The
incoming U.S. administration may lack the élan of
the French presidency, and cultural factors
ensure that there will never be an American
equivalent of Bruni in the White House (boy, is
that an understatement!), but Barack Obama, who
resembles 99% of the emerging world in
complexion, could be a potent form of public
relations. If he puts on a sombrero, Mexican
public opinion of us will change overnight, and so
on down the line.

But one guy, even if he is the president, cannot
alter our present crashing trajectory. That is
going to require a concerted strategy of
promoting American cultural assets in tandem
with our commercial expertise to recover our
position of dominance. The first thing is to
respect our own culture as something other than
a by-product of marketing and present it as an
organic entity in its own right, giving it the
respect that we ourselves have long denied it.
We then need to consecrate the resources to
impose our own culture on other countries (when
I say impose, I mean it in the French sense of the
word, where it gains authority on the basis of
merit). Then our cultural and marketing arms
have to work together to present a coherent
program to the rest of the world.

Fortunately or unfortunately, the current total
breakdown of our system presents a window of
opportunity to innovate, depending upon the
quality of the talent we are able to bring to bear
on the situation. In my mind it would require not
just a redressment of manufacturing and
mobilization of cultural resources, but an
administrative coordination in the seat of
government involving not only the Departments
of State and Commerce (a particularly knotty
problem, considering that the incoming
Secretaries of State and Commerce are not likely
to want to get along due to past political
considerations), but also the establishment of a
new cabinet post, the Department of Culture, to
coordinate and maximize the impact of our
cultural resources. The French have done a
maximal job with their Ministry of Culture, and
now we have, with the so-called free market
guys out of the way, an opportunity to emulate
their success.

When I say culture, that includes not just Jerry
Lee Lewis and Little Richard, but sport, like the
NBA, NASCAR, jazz, ballet etc. All forms of
American expression. As the French have
proven, taking culture and commerce to their
ultimate expression represents at the ultimate
point a convergence to the vanishing point.
Throw out the previous scorn for central
planning. Coordination of resources has been a
successful technique in times of war and national
emergency, and the current breakdown
represents as much of a crisis as any time in
history.

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