Right in the Oval Office

Script by Gene Mirabelli with additional material by Larry Stallman. Puppets, drums, and direction by Ed Atkeson.
Starring: Larry Stallman as "W," G. C. Haymes as Cheney, Paul Jossman as Rumsfeld, Don Paul Shannon as Ashcroft, Rachelle Smith-Stallman as Condi, and Production assistance by Cathy Frank. Everyone joined in on the kazoo chorus, and Gene handled the confetti explosions.
Gene was good enough to write the script for us, it was just before the election. I showed the script to Larry and he wrote a script too. The script we finally used was mostly Gene's, but had the seance scene and showtune from Larry's script inserted.

I made rod puppets with the heads fixed, so it's a pretty stiff crew. Everyone loved the likenesses. The heads were made by sculpting in plasticine clay then covering with marine epoxy and cloth strips. When the glue sets up, you hacksaw them in two, dig the clay out, and glue the half shells back together. A lot of trouble, but they're light weight and durable, and take the paint just fine. I use West System epoxy.

RIGHT IN THE OVAL OFFICE

A script for puppets by Gene Mirabelli with adtl material by Larry Stallman

The scene is the Oval Office of the White House. On stage are President George W. BUSH, Vice President Dick Cheney (dollar bills sticking out from every pocket), Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld (a sheet of paper in his hand), Attorney John Ashcroft (a big police badge on his suit jacket). BUSH, standing beside his desk, greets each one by title and name as they enter from the right.

BUSH
Men, this is the most important time ever in history and this is the most important meeting we’re ever going to have. Today we have to figure out how to get me re-elected.

CHENEY, RUMSFELD, ASHCROFT (speaking more or less at the same time)
Right, right, right, most important, most important.

BUSH
OK. Now who remembers how many votes we won by last time? Just a couple of hundred, right?

CHENEY
Actually, it was only one vote, Mr President. It was five to four. There are only nine voters on the Supreme Court and we won by one vote.

BUSH
OK, Mr smarty pants, so it was one vote. So what should we do this time to get more votes?

CHENEY
We could add some more judges to the Supreme Court. A couple more like Thomas and Scalia. That would fix it.

BUSH
Great idea, Dick. Glad we thought of that.

ASHCROFT
We’d have to change another part of the Constitution.

BUSH (to ASHCROFT)
That’s why I made you Attorney General, John. How soon can you start work on it?

ASHCROFT
I’ve already started, Mr President. I’ve got the Bill of Rights out of the way, but these things take time. I don’t think I can get the Supreme Court part done by November.

BUSH
Oh, boy, this election business is a real pain. I have this buddy, Prince Bandar. He’s like real close to us. His family runs Arabia and he doesn’t go through all this election business.

CHENEY
You’ll get reelected, Mr President. It’s a done deal.

BUSH
His folks have a whole country named after them. House of Saud. Saudi Arabia. Get it? Saudi Arabia. Maybe we should do that. House of Bush. That sounds good, doesn’t it? I’m not suggesting we change the name of the whole country to, say, Bushy America. But we could do it with Texas.

RUMSFELD
You’ll get reelected, Mr President. Sure as shooting.

BUSH
We could call it Bushy Texas. After that we could rename Oklahoma. Call it Bushy Oklahoma. And then – (BUSH goes on talking to himself about the states to be renamed Bushy etc...)

ASHCROFT (very irritated, to RUMSFELD)
Listen, Rumsfeld, there was this guy Clarke in my office talking my ear off about terrorists. He just wouldn’t stop. I had to throw him out. I’m busy rewriting the Constitution. You were supposed to take care of terrorists by knocking over Afghan. Remember?

RUMSFELD
I did knock over Afghanistan. I’m tough. I’ll tell it to you like it is. We’ve got 20,000 troops there, keeping it peaceful. I’m tough, but peaceful. There’s no terrorists running around in Afghanistan. We’ve got them all bottled up in caves and in mountains valleys and in crummy villages and in Pakistan.

ASHCROFT
I’m as tough as you and I’m busy. I’m busy cracking down on gay marriages and flag burners and radical librarians. And I’m cracking down on those sickos who smoke marijuana for so-called medical reasons. They’re going to die anyway, but will they obey my laws? Oh, NO! They’ve got to make my life difficult! Where are all these terrorists coming from? There’s more now than before. And you were supposed to take care of them when you liberated those oil fields. Remember?

RUMSFELD
We’ve got the terrorists bottled up in Iraq, too. Hundreds of them. Thousands. Every day we get more of them bottled up over there. Hell, we’ve got a whole city full of them bottled up in Falluja.

CHENEY (to RUMSFELD)
Iraq? Did I hear you say Iraq? Listen, Rumsfeld, why the hell is it taking you so long to find those Weapons of Mass Destruction? You’ve had Saddam a long time now. Can’t you get him to tell you where he put them? Can’t you hold his head under water or strip him naked and set dogs on him or make him do you-know-what in front of those girl soldiers of yours?

RUMSFELD
We can’t do that kind of thing! We signed on to the Geneva Convention. It’s forbidden! Our hands are tied!

CHENEY
Get Ashcroft over here. He’s a lawyer and he’s got lots of lawyers working for him. From what I hear, the President of the United States is above all that Geneva stuff. Hey, Ashcroft!

ASHCROFT (Irritable)
I’m busy, damnit! I can’t be frisking every God-forsaken Muslim to see if he’s wearing a bomb. It would take too long. That’s what we have Guantanamo for. Does anyone know what a mess those old lefties stuck us with when they wrote the Constitution? No! Does anyone understand what it’s like to edit that thing! No! I had to blow away five guards at the National Archives building just to get to this thing. Thank God I’m a member of the NRA. No one knows how hard I work except Jesus.

CHENEY
I like your style, Ashcroft, even with all that Armageddon and Israel crap! (Turns to Rumsfeld) Now what kind of a weak-willed Defense Department are you running?

RUMSFELD
I can tell you we have the mightiest military machine the world has ever seen. We spend more on the military than all the other nations of the world combined. We’re invincible. I’ll give it to you straight: we have a hundred and thirty thousand troops in Iraq. Plus the COW Forces.

CHENEY
The COW forces? What COW forces?

RUMSFELD
Coalition Of the Willing. C.O.W. The COW Forces

CHENEY
Finish the job! Send some more troops! Our troops! BIG GUYS! BIG GUYS! Not those little malnourished light-weights from those little countries. Cow forces.

RUMSFELD
I haven’t got any more troops. I’ve called up the National Guard. I’ve called up the Reserves. I’m calling our troops from Germany and Korea. We haven’t got any more troops. Life is tough. Get used to it.

CHENEY
Ever hear of the Boy Scouts? Ever hear of the Girl Scouts? Call up the scouts! Call them up! Do I have to do your thinking for you, too?

BUSH
Hey, guys, guys, guys! We have a mission here. We have a calling to answer. We have to get me re-elected. It’s God’s plan and we don’t want to let Him down. So let’s get thinking. What about you, John.

ASHCROFT
I’m busy correcting the Constitution!

BUSH
Yeah, how you coming with that?

ASHCROFT
I got it going like this...We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union...and so on and so on.... Ah, here we go. (Clears his throat) Article One: The right of the people to bear arms shall not be infringed, and that means weapons of any kind or caliber, including but not limited to pistols, assault rifles, 35-caliber machine guns, grenade launchers, mortars, howitzers and stinger missiles. Article Two: Marriage shall consist of one man and one woman joined by a U.S. licensed Christian pastor, preferably a fundamentalist ...

BUSH (interrupting)
Great! You’re doing great, John. But now we’ve got to think about me and God’s plan for America. We need some ideas on how to get me re-elected. (Turns to RUMSFELD.) What about you, Rummy? Got any ideas on how to defeat the Democrats?

RUMSFELD
We should tough it out, Mr President. I notice they’ve been trying to take our flag. Who knows what they’ll try next? A little military justice can go a long way. So I say we postpone the election and declare martial law. That puts me in charge. I can settle their hash. And we should do it right away.

BUSH
Hey, that sounds good! (Jumps up and down.) Yeah, let’s postpone the election! (Suddenly stops jumping.) But wait a minute. Don’t we need some kind of big emergency before we can do that? Something really big and dangerous, like a terrorist attack?

RUMSFELD
Right!

BUSH (Turns to Cheney)
How do I tell the public I have to postpone the election because there’s a terrorist attack coming on election day? I mean, how do I know the terrorists are going to attack that day?

CHENEY
That’s why you have Tom Ridge at Homeland Security, Mr President. He can tell the public.

BUSH
But how does Tom Ridge know the terrorists are planning to attack on election day?

CHENEY
That’s why you have John Ashcroft, Mr President. Ashcroft can tell Tom Ridge and Tom Ridge will tell the public.

BUSH
Oh, that’s good. God works in mysterious ways.(Going to Ashcroft) Hey, John, I want you to write out a little speech for Tom Ridge over in Homeland Security. My vice president will tell you what to write.

ASHCROFT
Damn it all, Mr President, I’m busy re-writing the Constitution!

CHENEY (Speaking confidentially to BUSH)
Mr President, you’ve got to make sure Ashcroft doesn’t mess up the Electoral College. If he cuts that out, we’re done for. It’s a wonderful part of the Constitution. If it wasn’t for that, Gore would be in the Oval Office. I can’t bear thinking what this country would be like with no war in Iraq, no tax break for the rich, no wonderful deficit...I shudder when I think about it.

BUSH (Confused)
Deficit? Oh, that word. Explain to me about the deficit again. I think I almost got it last time. The deficit is the same as the debt, right?

CHENEY (Chuckling)
Almost, Mr President. The deficit is how much the government spends over what it takes in. This year it’s going to be around four or five hundred billion dollars.

BUSH
Oh, wow, that’s a big number! And what’s the debt?

CHENEY
The national debt is all those old unpaid deficits added together. It’s around seven trillion dollars.

BUSH
Wowser! That’s a really great big, big number! Why do those people keep saying it’s bad?

CHENEY
Because they don’t get any benefit from it, Mr President. Deficits are good for us. And by us, I mean you and me and other really nice people. Remember this. When a government taxes you, it’s the same as stealing. A well run government runs by borrowing—not taxing, borrowing.

BUSH
I used to do that. You’d be surprised who loaned me money.

CHENEY
The government borrows money from rich people and pays them interest on it. It’s a beautiful system, probably divine in origin – the rich get richer, and everyone else gets poorer – but it’s much too complicated to explain to the masses. Treasury bills and treasury bonds are too hard for your average worker to understand. That’s why God made lottery tickets. Let the them buy lottery tickets.

BUSH
Let’s go back to figuring out how we’re going to postpone the election. We need a big emergency. We need something big, something scary, something like, like, like.... c’mon Dick, think of something.

CHENEY
It’s always me isn’t it George? This time, I have to tell you, I just don’t know.

BUSH
Well what are we going to do? What are we going to do? What are we going to do? What are we going to do?

CHENEY
We can ask ...you ...know ...who.

Curtain

BUSH, CHENEY, RUMSFELD and ASHCROFT are sitting around in special seance robes and headgear.

(Chanting together)
No weapons of mass destruction;
No weapons of mass destruction;
We’re turning the corner, we’ve got Hussain;
We’re in charge and we’re all insane;
Halliburton owns our brain;
No weapons of mass destruction;
No weapons of mass destruction;
Let’s celebrate again and again and again and again and again and again;
With a giant tax deduction.
A giant tax deduction..
A giant tax deduction.

(There’s an explosion and a giant puff of smoke, and CONDI appears)

CONDI (sexy voice)
Hi boys,

All together
Hi Condi, What’s new?

CONDI
Weeeellllll, boys (starts to sing intro to Everything's Comin' Up Roses)
I had a dream, a dream about you, baby.
It's gonna come true, baby.
They think that we're through, but baby,

You'll be swell! You'll be great!
Gonna have the whole world on the plate!
Starting here, starting now,
honey, everything's coming up roses!

Clear the decks! Clear the tracks!
You've got nothing to do but relax.
Blow a kiss. Take a bow.
Honey, everything's coming up roses!

(Boys join backup for chorus, doo wha, doo wha)
Now's your inning. Stand the world on it's ear!
Set it spinning! That'll be just the beginning!
Curtain up! Light the lights!
You got nothing to hit but the heights!
You'll be swell. You'll be great.
I can tell. Just you wait.
That lucky star I talk about is due!
(If you don’t screw it up then babe it’s true,)
Honey, everything's coming up roses for me and for you

ALL
Heh, heh. Gonna have the whole world on a plate, heh, heh.

BUSH and CHENEY
But Condi, what about, what about..

CONDI
Oh that, the WMDs... are in the heartland.

CONDI exits,

BUSH
Ooooo, The WMDs

RUMSFELD, ASHCROFT, and CHENEY
in the heartland
in the heartland

BUSH
The WMDs

RUMSFELD, ASHCROFT, and CHENEY
in the heartland
in the heartland

BUSH
The WMDs

RUMSFELD, ASHCROFT, and CHENEY
in the heartland
in the heartland

curtain

RUMSFELD, ASHCROFT,
Wait a minute, what’s that all about? What WMDs are in the heartland?

BUSH
Our WMDs? We got lots of those.

CHENEY
No you moron, Saddams WMDs. Didn’t you hear what Condi said?

BUSH
Hey I’m getting it! (Jumps up and down excitedly.) Oh, that’s good, good, good. (Suddenly stops jumping.) But where could they be hiding? maybe Idaho, ah, Bushy Idaho or maybe Bushy Kansas.

CHENEY
That’s where Saddam’s loyalists hid them. That’s why dummy Rummy Rumsfeld can’t find them in Iraq.

BUSH (Amazed and delighted)
Wow! That IS scary. Should we tell Tom Ridge about this? I mean, him being Homeland Security and all that stuff? Code Red! Man oh man oh man oh man. I can’t wait.

CHENEY
With Ridge it’s strictly on a need-to-know basis —he doesn’t need to know. You can tell him when you announce it to the American people, the day before your election. Of course, you can tell Ashcroft and Rummy.

BUSH (To ASHCROFT and RUMSFELD)
Yahoo! We’ve found the Weapons of Mass Destruction. And guess where we found them. Right in the Bushy U. of S. A!

CHENEY (Whispering to BUSH.)
U.S. of A., Mr President.

BUSH (To RUMSFELD and ASHCROFT.)
Saddam hid his weapons in U.S. of A!

CHENEY
They’re set to go off in November, they say!

RUMSFELD
That’s shocking!

ASHCROFT
That’s awesome!

BUSH
Start up the siren! (Siren begins.) Sound the alarm! (Fire alarm begins.)

CHENEY
Talk about terror! Talk about harm!

BUSH
Tell them to worry!

RUMSFELD
But never to fear!

ASHCROFT
For God’s on our side!

BUSH
And George Bush is here.

(End with confetti explosion.)


	Condi, W, Rummy, Ashcroft, and Cheney from "Right in the Oval Office," a production of Firlefanz Gallery. It played three times during the September performance series. Here's a shot of the puppets in the front window of the gallery. Script by Gene Mirabelli with additional material by Larry Stallman. Puppets, drums, and direction by Ed Atkeson. Starring: Larry Stallman as "W," G. C. Haymes as Cheney, Paul Jossman as Rumsfeld, Don Paul Shannon as Ashcroft, Rachelle Smith-Stallman as Condi, and Production assistance by Cathy Frank. Everyone joined in on the kazoo chorus, and Gene handled the confetti explosions. Gene was good enough to write the script for us, it was just before the election. I showed the script to Larry and he wrote a script too. The script we finally used was mostly Gene's, but had the seance scene and showtune from Larry's script inserted. I made rod puppets with the heads fixed, so it's a pretty stiff crew. Everyone loved the likenesses. The heads were made by sculpting in plasticine clay then covering with marine epoxy and cloth strips. When the glue sets up, you hacksaw them in two, dig the clay out, and glue the half shells back together. A lot of trouble, but they're light weight and durable, and take the paint just fine. I use West System epoxy. RIGHT IN THE OVAL OFFICE A script for puppets by Gene Mirabelli with adtl material by Larry Stallman The scene is the Oval Office of the White House. On stage are President George W. BUSH, Vice President Dick Cheney (dollar bills sticking out from every pocket), Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld (a sheet of paper in his hand), Attorney John Ashcroft (a big police badge on his suit jacket). BUSH, standing beside his desk, greets each one by title and name as they enter from the right. BUSH Men, this is the most important time ever in history and this is the most important meeting we’re ever going to have. Today we have to figure out how to get me re-elected. CHENEY, RUMSFELD, ASHCROFT (speaking more or less at the same time) Right, right, right, most important, most important. BUSH OK. Now who remembers how many votes we won by last time? Just a couple of hundred, right? CHENEY Actually, it was only one vote, Mr President. It was five to four. There are only nine voters on the Supreme Court and we won by one vote. BUSH OK, Mr smarty pants, so it was one vote. So what should we do this time to get more votes? CHENEY We could add some more judges to the Supreme Court. A couple more like Thomas and Scalia. That would fix it. BUSH Great idea, Dick. Glad we thought of that. ASHCROFT We’d have to change another part of the Constitution. BUSH (to ASHCROFT) That’s why I made you Attorney General, John. How soon can you start work on it? ASHCROFT I’ve already started, Mr President. I’ve got the Bill of Rights out of the way, but these things take time. I don’t think I can get the Supreme Court part done by November. BUSH Oh, boy, this election business is a real pain. I have this buddy, Prince Bandar. He’s like real close to us. His family runs Arabia and he doesn’t go through all this election business. CHENEY You’ll get reelected, Mr President. It’s a done deal. BUSH His folks have a whole country named after them. House of Saud. Saudi Arabia. Get it? Saudi Arabia. Maybe we should do that. House of Bush. That sounds good, doesn’t it? I’m not suggesting we change the name of the whole country to, say, Bushy America. But we could do it with Texas. RUMSFELD You’ll get reelected, Mr President. Sure as shooting. BUSH We could call it Bushy Texas. After that we could rename Oklahoma. Call it Bushy Oklahoma. And then – (BUSH goes on talking to himself about the states to be renamed Bushy etc...) ASHCROFT (very irritated, to RUMSFELD) Listen, Rumsfeld, there was this guy Clarke in my office talking my ear off about terrorists. He just wouldn’t stop. I had to throw him out. I’m busy rewriting the Constitution. You were supposed to take care of terrorists by knocking over Afghan. Remember? RUMSFELD I did knock over Afghanistan. I’m tough. I’ll tell it to you like it is. We’ve got 20,000 troops there, keeping it peaceful. I’m tough, but peaceful. There’s no terrorists running around in Afghanistan. We’ve got them all bottled up in caves and in mountains valleys and in crummy villages and in Pakistan. ASHCROFT I’m as tough as you and I’m busy. I’m busy cracking down on gay marriages and flag burners and radical librarians. And I’m cracking down on those sickos who smoke marijuana for so-called medical reasons. They’re going to die anyway, but will they obey my laws? Oh, NO! They’ve got to make my life difficult! Where are all these terrorists coming from? There’s more now than before. And you were supposed to take care of them when you liberated those oil fields. Remember? RUMSFELD We’ve got the terrorists bottled up in Iraq, too. Hundreds of them. Thousands. Every day we get more of them bottled up over there. Hell, we’ve got a whole city full of them bottled up in Falluja. CHENEY (to RUMSFELD) Iraq? Did I hear you say Iraq? Listen, Rumsfeld, why the hell is it taking you so long to find those Weapons of Mass Destruction? You’ve had Saddam a long time now. Can’t you get him to tell you where he put them? Can’t you hold his head under water or strip him naked and set dogs on him or make him do you-know-what in front of those girl soldiers of yours? RUMSFELD We can’t do that kind of thing! We signed on to the Geneva Convention. It’s forbidden! Our hands are tied! CHENEY Get Ashcroft over here. He’s a lawyer and he’s got lots of lawyers working for him. From what I hear, the President of the United States is above all that Geneva stuff. Hey, Ashcroft! ASHCROFT (Irritable) I’m busy, damnit! I can’t be frisking every God-forsaken Muslim to see if he’s wearing a bomb. It would take too long. That’s what we have Guantanamo for. Does anyone know what a mess those old lefties stuck us with when they wrote the Constitution? No! Does anyone understand what it’s like to edit that thing! No! I had to blow away five guards at the National Archives building just to get to this thing. Thank God I’m a member of the NRA. No one knows how hard I work except Jesus. CHENEY I like your style, Ashcroft, even with all that Armageddon and Israel crap! (Turns to Rumsfeld) Now what kind of a weak-willed Defense Department are you running? RUMSFELD I can tell you we have the mightiest military machine the world has ever seen. We spend more on the military than all the other nations of the world combined. We’re invincible. I’ll give it to you straight: we have a hundred and thirty thousand troops in Iraq. Plus the COW Forces. CHENEY The COW forces? What COW forces? RUMSFELD Coalition Of the Willing. C.O.W. The COW Forces CHENEY Finish the job! Send some more troops! Our troops! BIG GUYS! BIG GUYS! Not those little malnourished light-weights from those little countries. Cow forces. RUMSFELD I haven’t got any more troops. I’ve called up the National Guard. I’ve called up the Reserves. I’m calling our troops from Germany and Korea. We haven’t got any more troops. Life is tough. Get used to it. CHENEY Ever hear of the Boy Scouts? Ever hear of the Girl Scouts? Call up the scouts! Call them up! Do I have to do your thinking for you, too? BUSH Hey, guys, guys, guys! We have a mission here. We have a calling to answer. We have to get me re-elected. It’s God’s plan and we don’t want to let Him down. So let’s get thinking. What about you, John. ASHCROFT I’m busy correcting the Constitution! BUSH Yeah, how you coming with that? ASHCROFT I got it going like this...We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union...and so on and so on.... Ah, here we go. (Clears his throat) Article One: The right of the people to bear arms shall not be infringed, and that means weapons of any kind or caliber, including but not limited to pistols, assault rifles, 35-caliber machine guns, grenade launchers, mortars, howitzers and stinger missiles. Article Two: Marriage shall consist of one man and one woman joined by a U.S. licensed Christian pastor, preferably a fundamentalist ... BUSH (interrupting) Great! You’re doing great, John. But now we’ve got to think about me and God’s plan for America. We need some ideas on how to get me re-elected. (Turns to RUMSFELD.) What about you, Rummy? Got any ideas on how to defeat the Democrats? RUMSFELD We should tough it out, Mr President. I notice they’ve been trying to take our flag. Who knows what they’ll try next? A little military justice can go a long way. So I say we postpone the election and declare martial law. That puts me in charge. I can settle their hash. And we should do it right away. BUSH Hey, that sounds good! (Jumps up and down.) Yeah, let’s postpone the election! (Suddenly stops jumping.) But wait a minute. Don’t we need some kind of big emergency before we can do that? Something really big and dangerous, like a terrorist attack? RUMSFELD Right! BUSH (Turns to Cheney) How do I tell the public I have to postpone the election because there’s a terrorist attack coming on election day? I mean, how do I know the terrorists are going to attack that day? CHENEY That’s why you have Tom Ridge at Homeland Security, Mr President. He can tell the public. BUSH But how does Tom Ridge know the terrorists are planning to attack on election day? CHENEY That’s why you have John Ashcroft, Mr President. Ashcroft can tell Tom Ridge and Tom Ridge will tell the public. BUSH Oh, that’s good. God works in mysterious ways.(Going to Ashcroft) Hey, John, I want you to write out a little speech for Tom Ridge over in Homeland Security. My vice president will tell you what to write. ASHCROFT Damn it all, Mr President, I’m busy re-writing the Constitution! CHENEY (Speaking confidentially to BUSH) Mr President, you’ve got to make sure Ashcroft doesn’t mess up the Electoral College. If he cuts that out, we’re done for. It’s a wonderful part of the Constitution. If it wasn’t for that, Gore would be in the Oval Office. I can’t bear thinking what this country would be like with no war in Iraq, no tax break for the rich, no wonderful deficit...I shudder when I think about it. BUSH (Confused) Deficit? Oh, that word. Explain to me about the deficit again. I think I almost got it last time. The deficit is the same as the debt, right? CHENEY (Chuckling) Almost, Mr President. The deficit is how much the government spends over what it takes in. This year it’s going to be around four or five hundred billion dollars. BUSH Oh, wow, that’s a big number! And what’s the debt? CHENEY The national debt is all those old unpaid deficits added together. It’s around seven trillion dollars. BUSH Wowser! That’s a really great big, big number! Why do those people keep saying it’s bad? CHENEY Because they don’t get any benefit from it, Mr President. Deficits are good for us. And by us, I mean you and me and other really nice people. Remember this. When a government taxes you, it’s the same as stealing. A well run government runs by borrowing—not taxing, borrowing. BUSH I used to do that. You’d be surprised who loaned me money. CHENEY The government borrows money from rich people and pays them interest on it. It’s a beautiful system, probably divine in origin – the rich get richer, and everyone else gets poorer – but it’s much too complicated to explain to the masses. Treasury bills and treasury bonds are too hard for your average worker to understand. That’s why God made lottery tickets. Let the them buy lottery tickets. BUSH Let’s go back to figuring out how we’re going to postpone the election. We need a big emergency. We need something big, something scary, something like, like, like.... c’mon Dick, think of something. CHENEY It’s always me isn’t it George? This time, I have to tell you, I just don’t know. BUSH Well what are we going to do? What are we going to do? What are we going to do? What are we going to do? CHENEY We can ask ...you ...know ...who. Curtain BUSH, CHENEY, RUMSFELD and ASHCROFT are sitting around in special seance robes and headgear. (Chanting together) No weapons of mass destruction; No weapons of mass destruction; We’re turning the corner, we’ve got Hussain; We’re in charge and we’re all insane; Halliburton owns our brain; No weapons of mass destruction; No weapons of mass destruction; Let’s celebrate again and again and again and again and again and again; With a giant tax deduction. A giant tax deduction.. A giant tax deduction. (There’s an explosion and a giant puff of smoke, and CONDI appears) CONDI (sexy voice) Hi boys, All together Hi Condi, What’s new? CONDI Weeeellllll, boys (starts to sing intro to Everything's Comin' Up Roses) I had a dream, a dream about you, baby. It's gonna come true, baby. They think that we're through, but baby, You'll be swell! You'll be great! Gonna have the whole world on the plate! Starting here, starting now, honey, everything's coming up roses! Clear the decks! Clear the tracks! You've got nothing to do but relax. Blow a kiss. Take a bow. Honey, everything's coming up roses! (Boys join backup for chorus, doo wha, doo wha) Now's your inning. Stand the world on it's ear! Set it spinning! That'll be just the beginning! Curtain up! Light the lights! You got nothing to hit but the heights! You'll be swell. You'll be great. I can tell. Just you wait. That lucky star I talk about is due! (If you don’t screw it up then babe it’s true,) Honey, everything's coming up roses for me and for you ALL Heh, heh. Gonna have the whole world on a plate, heh, heh. BUSH and CHENEY But Condi, what about, what about.. CONDI Oh that, the WMDs... are in the heartland. CONDI exits, BUSH Ooooo, The WMDs RUMSFELD, ASHCROFT, and CHENEY in the heartland in the heartland BUSH The WMDs RUMSFELD, ASHCROFT, and CHENEY in the heartland in the heartland BUSH The WMDs RUMSFELD, ASHCROFT, and CHENEY in the heartland in the heartland curtain RUMSFELD, ASHCROFT, Wait a minute, what’s that all about? What WMDs are in the heartland? BUSH Our WMDs? We got lots of those. CHENEY No you moron, Saddams WMDs. Didn’t you hear what Condi said? BUSH Hey I’m getting it! (Jumps up and down excitedly.) Oh, that’s good, good, good. (Suddenly stops jumping.) But where could they be hiding? maybe Idaho, ah, Bushy Idaho or maybe Bushy Kansas. CHENEY That’s where Saddam’s loyalists hid them. That’s why dummy Rummy Rumsfeld can’t find them in Iraq. BUSH (Amazed and delighted) Wow! That IS scary. Should we tell Tom Ridge about this? I mean, him being Homeland Security and all that stuff? Code Red! Man oh man oh man oh man. I can’t wait. CHENEY With Ridge it’s strictly on a need-to-know basis —he doesn’t need to know. You can tell him when you announce it to the American people, the day before your election. Of course, you can tell Ashcroft and Rummy. BUSH (To ASHCROFT and RUMSFELD) Yahoo! We’ve found the Weapons of Mass Destruction. And guess where we found them. Right in the Bushy U. of S. A! CHENEY (Whispering to BUSH.) U.S. of A., Mr President. BUSH (To RUMSFELD and ASHCROFT.) Saddam hid his weapons in U.S. of A! CHENEY They’re set to go off in November, they say! RUMSFELD That’s shocking! ASHCROFT That’s awesome! BUSH Start up the siren! (Siren begins.) Sound the alarm! (Fire alarm begins.) CHENEY Talk about terror! Talk about harm! BUSH Tell them to worry! RUMSFELD But never to fear! ASHCROFT For God’s on our side! BUSH And George Bush is here. (End with confetti explosion.)