The Speech the President Should Give - SARAH VOWELL

[kliljedahl]

A couple of weeks ago, on this very page of this here newspaper, Senator John Kerry wrote an Op-Ed article imagining "The Speech the President Should Give," about that night's televised presidential address on the war in Iraq. Of course, Kerry had about as much chance of George W. Bush's following his advice as the producers of "MTV Cribs" have of getting the president's mother to show them around Kennebunkport.

Still, Kerry stunned me, not because his ideas were sane, but because he was actually able to fantasize that President Bush would give a speech offering just and concrete solutions for that black hole. Because I don't even remember being able to dream that big.

The only possible presidential speech fantasy in my wildest of daydreams, my oratorical castle in the air, is that one day, for just one measly speech, the president - the man of "mission accomplished," the man who was once asked at a press conference to discuss one of his mistakes and couldn't think of any, the man who is surely the sunniest looker-on-the-bright-side east of Drew Barrymore - would sit behind his Oval Office desk, stare into a TV camera and say: "My fellow Americans, good evening. As if that's possible."

He continues, "We are a divided people, but let us celebrate what we have in common. We don't all worship the same god. Some of us do not believe in a god at all. But the good news is that, thanks to me, we all now believe in the Apocalypse. You're welcome."

Link: http://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/13/opinion/13vowell.html


Keith’s Barbeque Central

[second edition]

1. Very said state of affairs President Bush has gotten us into,

and frightening because he doesn't realize it or he lives in a state of denial. I appreciate the kind references to John Kerry.