Tag Archives: Dramatization

Survey

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SCENE:  Mitch BERG is at work in his home office.  His phone rings.  

BERG:  Hello?

POLLSTER:  Hello.  I’m Kandi, a pollster working on a combined study commissioned by Harvard University, Northeastern University, the Trace and the Guardian, four organizations dedicated to disarming Americans by any means, fair or foul.  If you have a few moments to spare, I’d like to ask you some questions about gun ownership.

BERG:  Go ahead.

POLLSTER:   How many guns do you own?

BERG:  How many guns am I going to admit I own to an anonymyous rep for  four organizations that are dedicated to ensuring that Americans are disarmed, docile sheep,?

POLLSTER:   That’s correct!

BERG:  None!  Guns are scary!

POLLSTER:  So that’s no guns, then?

BERG:  As far as you know.

POLLSTER:  Wow. It’s amazing how the number of gun owners is dropping, according to our Fact-Based Research ®.

BERG:  It is, isn’t it?  Absolutely astounding.

SURVEY:  We’re also finding three percent of American adults own 50% of the guns!

BERG:  Huh.  I’m also gonna guess 3% of American adults own 50% of the iPhone 7s, and roughly .000001 of all Americans own 90% of all newspapers.

SURVEY:  No comment!

BERG:  Naturally.

SURVEY:  Now, if you did buy a gun, why would you buy one?  Are you a hunter, a target shooter, or would you buy a gun due to fear?

BERG:  If I did have a gun, which I don’t, as I already told you, it’d be for self-defense.

POLLSTER:  OK.  “Fear”.

BERG:  No, self-defense.  A prudent response to the vicissitudes of human nature.

POLLSTER:  Right.  Fear.

BERG:  Nope.  A rational, prudent assessment of and response to life’s actual risks, based on data, ability and experience.

POLLSTER:  Right.  We call that “fear”.  It’s just a category.

BERG:  Naturally.  Hey, someone’s calling…

POLLSTER:  I didn’t hear a click…

(But BERG has already hung up the phone).

And SCENE.

 

Remora

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SCENE:  Mitch BERG is has just picked up a pound of coffee beans from the neighborhood coffee shop.  As he leaves, he notices Avery LIBRELLE sitting at a table.  BERG tries to look smaller, and starts to slink past to get to the door – but LIBRELLE notices him.

LIBRELLE:   Merg!

BERG:  Oh…hey, Avery.  What’s up?

LIBRELLE:   I’m leaving comments on your blog.

BERG:  Uh…OK.

LIBRELLE:   They call you out for being the amoral conservative scumbag you really are!

BERG:  Huh.  Just like my  mom always says.

LIBRELLE:   Hah!  I bet!  And I do it under a pseudonym, so nothing I say will ever get back to me!

BERG:  Huh.

LIBRELLE:  Because conservatives, being shriveled emotional husks of people, will track me down and attack me if they find out who is speaking truth to them!

BERG:  Hmmm.   Seems a little…hyper dramatic?

LIBRELLE:   And my comments are really, really long, because I have a lot to say!  Stuff that will enlighten the mouth-breathing morons that read your blog!

BERG:  And I’m sure we’ll all appreciate it.

LIBRELLE:   You should!  I’m brilliant!

BERG:   Huh.  And then you’ll discuss the response to your comments?  Because that is not only the purpose of my comment section, but really the entire benefit of having online comments; to have a conversation, something from which everyone learns.

LIBRELLE:   Discussion?  Are you kidding me?  What do I, someone with thirty years experience as a liberal activist, have to learn from the brain-dead impotent fat bald hate-filled pieces of shit that read your garbage blog?

BERG:  Huh.   Well, I mean, among my regular commenters we have an M.D, a couple of engineers, a couple of scientists, some accountants, a lawyer or two, some writers – people who actually have to work with fact, logic and argumentation for a living.  You might learn something.

LIBRELLE:  From who?

BERG:  Er…right.

Hey – just a suggestion, here.  Don’t you have  a blog of your own?  “The LIbrelle Point Of View?” One where you are perfectly free to write anything you want, and have the discussions…

LIBRELLE:   …no “discussions” on my blog.  Any fat, bald, white, brain-dead pieces of crap who comment on my blog get blocked.  Life’s too short for idiots and scumbags.

BERG:  Anyway, why don’t you write these earth-shaking nuggets of truth on your own blog, since you don’t really intend to actually discuss your comments?

LIBRELLE:    But I get like five readers a day on my blog.  I can get the truth out to hundreds of people in your comment section.

BERG:  Huh.

LIBRELLE:   Hey, grab me a large latte, skim, extra syrup, organic only, while you’re up.

(And SCENE)

From Thin Air

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SCENE:  Mitch BERG is ordering a cup of coffee and a bagel.

Brian FURIOUS, liberal opionblogger for “”MinnesotaLIberalAlliance.blogspot.com”, walks into the coffee shop.

FURIOUS:  Merg!

BERG:  Oh, hey, Brian…

FURIOUS:  I am Brian Furious, defender of fact, crusader of truth!

BERG:  Right.  Or…hey, Brian.

FURIOUS:  Don’t you deny it!  You’ve been writing about Ilhan Omar!

BERG:  Well, mostly I’ve been doing a combination of writing about people writing about Ilhan Omar, and writing about people writing about people writing about Ilhan Omar.  There’s a bit of a difference.

FURIOUS:  What you did was engage in race-baiting, saying that if someone comes to the US they should learn our laws and abide by them,

BERG:  We’ll come back to the “race-baiting” red herring in a bit.  But as re the other bit – you mean, like “learn and abide by our laws” like everyone who comes to the US – or, for that matter, goes to other countries – is supposed to do?

FURIOUS:  That’s not news!

BERG:  Not sure what you mean.  It’s not news that immigrants, like citizens, are supposed to follow the law?

Or do you mean the Ilhan Omar story?   Because it seems like there just might be some news there.  Even the mainstream liberal media seems to think so.

FURIOUS:  But you admitted you probably wouldn’t adhere to laws requiring a marriage license!

BERG:  Well, yeah – like Ms. Omar, I believe that marriages in one’s faith tradition that ignore state licensing are perfectly legitimate.   And, by the way, it’s not “illegal” to eschew the state license.

Anyway, let me repeat the important part; I defended Ilhan Omar’s “marriage in her faith tradition“, while noting that her explanation still left some questions.

You seem to have trouble recognizing that fact.  Perhaps you’re racist?

FURIOUS:  You’re just saying it’s about being “foreign” is just taking a change to stoke anti-immigrant fears and is, yes, race-baiting!   You’re demeaning her, and with her other Somalis for whom she’s an emblem because of her ethnicity.  You’re claiming it’s her “foreign-ness” which is the problem. 

BERG:  Er, yeah – I’d heard you wrote that.  The thing is,  I’ve never mentioned Ilhan’s “foreign-ness”, never alluded to it in anything I’ve ever written or said, never even hinted about it.  It’s a fabrication.

FURIOUS:  No, it’s not!

BERG:  Well, given that I’m supporting Abimalik Askar – a Somali immigrant – in the race for the seat, let’s just say it’s kinda weird.   So – if Ms. Omar’s “foreign-ness” is a problem, wouldn’t that of Mr. Askar – who is from the exact same place – also be a problem?

FURIOUS:  Clearly, Askar is not Somali!

BERG:  He was born in Somalia, and immigrated to the US in 1993.

FURIOUS:  Then it stands to reason you hate him too!

BERG:  Er, no – I’ve interviewed him on my show, and I’ll do it again.  He’s a very sharp guy and is quite clearly the best candidate for the job of any ethnic origin.

FURIOUS:  But he’s a ReTHUGliican!  Clearly he must hate Somalis!

BERG:  Huh.  Hey – look!  A shiny object!

[BERG slips quietly away as FURIOUS furiously whips his head around]

[And SCENE]

A Rhetorical Question

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MINNESOTA CONSERVATIVE:  If a conservative, libertarian or Republican gets hit, spit on and otherwise attacked, and no media reports on it, did it really happen?

MINNESOTA LIBERAL:  If what happened to who?  Huh?

MINNESOTA CONSERVATIVE:  I said, if a conservative, libertarian or Republican gets hit, spit on and otherwise attacked, and no media reports on it, did it really happen?

MINNESOTA LIBERAL:  If what happened to who?  Again, I have no idea what you’re talking about.

MINNESOTA CONSERVATIVE:  Well, you got that part right…

Welfare!

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SCENE:  Mitch BERG is driving down a rural two-lane road near Rapid City, South Dakota. 

He notices a plume of smoke up ahead, so he steps on it to get closer.  Presently, he notices the burning car is a 12-year-old Subaru.  Standing by the side of the road, looking away from the car, is Avery LIBRELLE.  

BERG pulls over, pops his trunk, jumps out, and grabs a fire extinguisher.  He runs over to the car.  As he pulls the pin and points the extinguisher, LIBRELLE notices him. 

LIBRELLE:   Merg!   I’m driving among the red-state welfare queens!

BERG:   Avery, your car is burning! (Directs fire extinguisher towards engine compartment)

LIBRELLE:   Oh, yeah.  Don’t change the subject. Paul Krugman says that Red States get more money from taxpayers than they pay in…

BERG:   (distracted, as he extinguishes fire) Uh huh

LIBRELLE:   …while Blue states pay in more than they get back!

BERG:  (Coughing as cloud of smoky steam engulfs him, as the fire dies down).

LIBRELLE:   Red staters are welfare queens!

BERG:    (Finishing a bout of coughing).  Look, Avery.  See over there?  (BERG points over to Ellsworth Air Force Base).  See those planes over there?  Probably close to two dozen B1B bombers, which rolled off the dealer floor at $300,000,000 a piece and probably cost $30,000,000 a year apiece in fuel, maintenance, aircrew and ground crew salary, benefits and maintenance, not to mention the cost of the base itself in terms of people, supplies, and the cost of the very valuable farmland it and its associated training areas are built on?  Not to nThat’s tens of billions of dollars, just at this one red-state military base – which, divided among the sparse population.

Now – are you saying those planes, those personnel costs, all this physical infrastructure, is a transfer to the people of South Dakota?

LIBRELLE: (Idly stares at nearby prairie dogs).

BERG:  Then look over there (points at nearly Black Hills mountains).  That’s a huge national park.  Hundreds of thousands of acres, along with lots of other federal land.  Is that a transfer payment?

By the way – while there’s a ton of military spending and federal land, there’s a very tiny population with very low cost of living.  Blue staters pay lots of taxes because their cost of living, and income, are higher.  So – progressive taxation is suddenly bad?

LIBRELLE:   Yeah, you’re a racist, and why do you advocate killing Hillary Clinton?

BERG:  Naturally.

LIBRELLE:   Hey  (pointing at prairie dogs) – are they regstered to vote for their best interests?

BERG:  Not yet.  So – why did your car catch fire?

LIBRELLE:   Oh, yeah.  The oil light was on for like a month.

BERG:  Well, why didn’t you add oil?

LIBRELLE:   I didn’t want to enrich Big Oil.

(And SCENE)

Wolf!

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SCENE:  Mitch BERG steps out of the rest room at City Hall as Avery LIBRELLE steps around the corner.

Distracted, visibly in distress, LIBRELLE walks into BERG.

BERG:  (Stepping back)  Oh … (a little nonplussed, as LIBRELLE doesn’t react, lost in  anxiety)…er, sorry…?

LIBRELLE:   Oh, Merg.  Right.  I’m just worried about this country.

BERG:  After eight years of Obama, join the club.

LIBRELLE:   Har di har.  No, serious.  The GOP has nominated a candidate who is the worst human being in the world.  A genuine Nazi.  A man who is the biggest racist in American politics, and who is so clogged with hate that he can barely sit down.

BERG:  Is that so?

LIBRELLE:  Yes.  And yet, his poll numbers remain a challenge to Herself.

BERG:  Huh.  Why do you suppose that is?

LIBRELLE:  The American people have lost their ability to reason.

BERG:  Huh.

LIBRELLE:  We’re pointing out what a horrible human he is, and the American people are ignoring it.

BERG:  Huh.  What – again?

LIBRELLE:  (Nonplussed)  What do you mean by that?

BERG:   What did you all say about Ronald Reagan?

LIBRELLE:  That his presidency would lead to a nuclear war, that he was a racist, that he was going to draft all teenagers to go to war for Exxon, that he was a stooge of big business, that he wanted to create a nuclear armageddon to enhance his power…

BERG:  Huh.  And Bush Senior?

LIBRELLE:  That he was a stooge of Big Oil, that he’d inherited his father’s Nazi sympathies, that he was a warmonger…

BERG:  Right.  And Dubya?

LIBRELLE:  That he was a bigger Nazi than Hitler, than he was a stooge of big oil, that he was a racist, than he hated children, that he’d never relinquish power, that he was stupid, that he wanted a nuclear war to hasten his fundamentalist faith’s version of Armageddon…

BERG:   None of which turned out to be true.

LIBRELLE:  Er…it’s all true!

BERG:   No, I mean, none of the claims turned out to be factual.  And yet every time a Republican runs for office, you get the same chatter.

LIBRELLE:   What do you mean?

BERG:   How would you describe Republican Senate candidate Al Franken?

LIBRELLE:   He’s a racist and a Nazi and a Klansman who’d send our children to war for Big Oil because he’s in the pocket of the Koch brothers and ALEC and the NRA, he hates children and would drive elderly widows into the street to satisfy Big Power, that he wants to launch a war to satisfy his toxic fundamentalist Christianity..,

BERG:   Right. Al Franken is a Democrat, a secular Jew.  But once I said “Republican”, you switched to autopilot . Just the way the media does.

This is the eventual result of decades of liberal media bias; it’s like the Little Boy who Cried Wolf; people have tuned out the propaganda, just in time for you to face a candidate who actually is troublesome – not to mention a Democrat.

LIBRELLE:  (Stands, stunned)

BERG:  See ya, Avery.

LIBRELLE:  (Slowly turns) But…But…

And SCENE

 

Scenarios

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SCENE:  Mitch BERG is working on the potato boxes in his backyard.    Avery LIBRELLE walks through the back gate into BERG’s back yard.

LIBRELLE:  Hey, Merg!  The case of workplace violence in Orlando proves that it’s time for America to get serious about guns.

BERG:    We did.  Or at least parts of the country did; the parts that ratcheted up the penalties for gun crimes, and seriously prosecuted straw buyers, saw a marked decrease in gun crimes.   Of course, that wasn’t “sexy” enough for the Democrat-run governments of most major cities – so while the rest of the nation’s crime rate plummets, in major Democrat-run cities it’s rising…

LIBRELLE:  I’m already bored.   The Orlando workplace violence episode proves that guns are no defense.

BERG:   It showed that a cop working security was in the wrong place at the wrong time, and that Mateen, unlike most mass shooters, didn’t fold up when he ran into resistance.   As might befit someone who was carrying out a terror attack, as opposed to someone just seeking immortality as a spree killer.  That’s just a theory…

LIBRELLE:  …I’m still bored.

BERG:  Well, bore yourself with this; had a any person in that club had a legal, permitted firearm, they could have stopped the shooting.

LIBRELLE:  Can you guarantee that?

BERG:   There are no guarantees in life.  But I’d like to talk you through three hypothetical scenarios.

LIBRELLE:  Don’t make me bored!

BERG:   What’s with the boredo…oh, never mind .

Scenario 1:  You’re out at a bar.  Someone starts shooting.   People around you are getting hit left and right.

Suddenly, a schlub nearby sees an opportunity while the shooter is shooting the other way; they draw their legal handgun, and they kill the attacker.

LIBRELLE:  That’s unrealistic.

BERG:  Why?

LIBRELLE:  The attacker would shoot them first.    They’d sense they were about to be attacked, and turn and kill them.  Which would just make it worse for everyone else in the club.

BERG:  What, you think mass shooters are superman ninja warriors or something?

LIBRELLE:  Doesn’t matter.  That never happens.

BERG:   By my count, it’s happened at least sixteen times in recent years.

But that  brings us to the second scenario.  Let’s say a citizen draws, and misses, or doesn’t kill the shooter, and the shooter kills the citizen.  That’d be tragic – but it’d throw the shooter’s plan off, and give people time to escape in the confusion, and probably safe at least a few lives.

LIBRELLE:  You’re dreaming.

BERG:   Well, it’s happened.  But it probably beats the third scenario.

LIBRELLE:  Which is?

BERG:  (Very, very quietly, with an air of fervent, quiet concentration).  You’re at a bar.  (LIBRELLE listens intently; BERG continues, quietly).  Shooting rings out.  People are dying left and right.  But the bar is a gun-free zone, and everyone in the bar followed the law tonight.  So there’s exactly one armed person in the joint – the mass shooter, motivated by hate, or desire for immortality, or on a terror mission.  And the shooter keeps on going, blasting away, killing defenseless person after defenseless person (BERG grows quieter, leaning toward LIBRELLE, who leans closer as well), killing everyone around you until…

(BERG stops)

LIBRELLE:  Until wha…

BERG:  (At a whisper) he lifts his gun, and (BERG yells at the top of his lungs) BOOM!  RIGHT AFTER YOU PROJECTILE CRAP YOURSELF WITH FEAR, HE BLOWS YOUR F****NG HEAD INTO A MILLION F****NG PIECES ALL OVER THE WALL!

LIBRELLE:  (Leaps backward eyes, wide  with fear, transfixed, hyperventilating).

BERG:  Your choice.

LIBRELLE:  (Quickly shuffles out of BERG’s back yard).

BERG:  Seriously, Avery.  It is your choice.

(And SCENE).

Bigotry And Phobia!

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SCENE:  Mitch BERG is trimming weeds by his driveway with a grass whip.  

Before he can react, Avery LIBRELLE – who is walking through the alley making notes about people who aren’t separating their recycling – surprises him.  

LIBRELLE:  Hey, Merg!   Why are you people so panicky about transgenders picking their own restrooms?

BERG:  I’m not.  The whole thing is a tempest in a teapot – except of course for the Feds stepping in to make, literally, a federal issue about something that is really no issue at all.

LIBRELLE:  But you Republicans are all angry and scared!

BERG:  Enh.  Not me.  I’ve worked around some transgendered people.  It’s really no big deal.

LIBRELLE:   Ha ha ha ha ha!  Hah!  You should know that transgender people are very very unlikely to commit any crime at all!

BERG:  Right.  I know that.  But let me ask you, Avery – since transgendered people have a very very very low crime rate, we shouldn’t be imposing all sorts of pointless regulations on who goes into what restroom?

LIBRELLE:   Right!  That would be bigoted and transphobic!

BERG:  Bigotry and a design-your-own phobia!  Exactly!  Being mortally afraid of, and imposing pointless regulations that will have absolutely no affect on crime, on populations that have essentially negligible offense rates, is bigotry and phobia!

LIBRELLE:  Exactly!

BERG:  (Getting excited)  In fact, we should never impose pointless rules and regulations on people who commit vastly fewer crimes than the general population, because such regulations are rooted in bigotry and fear!

LIBRELLE:  Yes!  Absolutely!

BERG:  All of them!

LIBRELLE:  All of them! (LIBRELLE leaps up, kicks heels in glee)

BERG:  So background checks for law-abiding citizens transferring guns are…

LIBRELLE:  (Not quite realizing the change in subject) Phobic and bigo…HEY!

And SCENE. 

Hearings

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Joe Doakes convenes a meeting of the Immigration Integration Advisory Task Force, via email:

C: This session of the Immigration Integration Advisory Task Force will come to order. The Secretary will call the roll:
S: Madam Chairman . . .
C: Excuse me. I find that offensive. I prefer a gender-neutral title.
S: Certainly Madame Chair.
C: I am not a “Chair,” I am a human being. And I am offended by “Madame.” I prefer a gender-neutral title for that, too, in case I change my mind about my gender while we’re in session. You can address me as “Mix.”

Continue reading →

Fear The Walking Dead: Exit 288

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SCENE: The prairie.  It’s the dead of winter.  The sky sweeps above in 180 degrees of piercing blue, studded with a few isolated scudding clouds, pale with the reflections of frozen ice crystals in the air, as the very humidity itself is frozen.  The wind is light – 10 mph – as it sweeps across the plains.   As far as the eye can see, there is snow.  

A squad car rolls up a four lane freeway.  Behind the wheel, Officer Tom CHRISTIANSON, a Barnes County sheriff’s deputy, sails briskly up the road, his whoopie lights turned off.  CHRISTIANSON, a trim, purposeful man in his late thirties, looks tired, even a little haggard, but his eyes are focused and fierce.    The camera briefly focuses on a green freeway sign:  “Fargo 72; Valley City 12”.  And then another:  “Exit 288 – No Services”.

CHRISTIANSON slows and pulls up behind a Ford F150 Club Cab, which is idling on the shoulder of the eastbound lane just east of the exit  He climbs out of his squad car, dons his stetson, and walks up to the pickup, his breath steaming in the bitter cold as it blows away.  

Jake and Donna STADEL, a thirty-something couple, are standing by the tailgate.  Jake is carrying a hunting rifle; Donna, a long-barreled hunting shotgun.   CHRISTIANSON shakes Jake and then Donna’s hands.  

CHRISTIANSON:  Jake.  Donna.

J STADEL:   Deputy.

D STADEL:   Tom.

J STADEL:   So is it true what they’ve been saying?

CHRISTIANSON:  (Shakes head in a way that says “just a little numb from fatigue and confusion”).  No idea.  Last thing anyone knows is that all the TV and cable networks went off the air.

J STADEL:   Did you see that one live newscast where they…

D STADEL:  …overran the news crew live on the air, on camera…

J STADEL:  In the middle of that riot?

(All three go silent, shaking their heads, wincing in horror at the horrid memory).

CHRISTIANSON:   Yep.  I did.

J STADEL:   So they’re saying they (thumb points over shoulder, off-camera to the right) are pretty much everywhere these days?

CHRISTIANSON:   The whole east coast.  All of California.  The whole deep south.  Even the desert southwest.  The last ham-radio transmissions say they’re pretty much the only thing left walking in those parts of the country.   There’s a few survivors, I suppose, but they’re few and far between.

J STADEL:  Jeez.

D STADEL:  God.

CHRISTIANSON:  Yep.

J STADEL:  So we’re…

CHRISTIANSON:  Us and South Dakota, northern Minnesota, Montana, the U.P,. Alaska, Manitoba and Saskatchewan and parts of Alberta, Russia, Finland…

(All three shake their heads as the thought trails off).

CHRISTIANSON:  Well, thanks for calling this in.  Let’s get to it.

(Camera pulls back and pans right, and we see a large herd of zombies trailing off to the east, perhaps two hundred of them – all of them frozen stiff; a few jerk fitfully about and hack and gack feebly; most are utterly frozen.  The three grab machetes and axes, and walk toward group and start hacking).

CHRISTIANSON:  You still doing poker on Friday, Jake?  (Grunts has he hacks off a frozen head)

J STADEL:  Oh, ya.  You betcha. Won’t be there until after Shania’s basketball game.  (Plunges knife into zombie skull)

CHRISTIANSON:  How’s the team doing this year?

D STADEL:  She’s finally getting enough playing time.  Now we just gotta get her chemistry grade up…  (Smashes a head with an axe)

CHRISTIANSON:  I had to take away Ashley’s X-box…

(Fade to black over mundane small talk as the three matter-of-factly go about lopping off frozen zombies).  

(And SCENE)

Virtue Whistles

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SCENE:  Mitch BERG is shopping in the dairy aisle at Target in Roseville.  

Suddenly, Avery LIBRELLE rounds the corner.  With LIBRELLE is Ashley FIGG, a young woman of apparently mixed but minority-ish ethnicity.  

LIBRELLE:   Merg!  It’s time for you to admit your privilege!

BERG:  OK.  I was born into an intact family who made sure I stayed in school, kept my pants zipped until I could support a family, and ensured I grew up knowing that actions had consequences.

LIBRELLE:   No, no, no.  You’re white!  I want to introduce you to Ashley Figg.  She is a student at Macalester College.

BERG:  Ms. Figg.

(FIGG glowers at BERG)

LIBRELLE:  We’re going to have a debate!

BERG:  A debate?

LIBRELLE:  Yes.  First, Ms. Figg.

BERG:  …I”m not really…

FIGG:   You are white.  You have privilege.

LIBRELLE:  Your turn, Merg.

BERG:  Um, OK.  Ms. Figg, what is it you would have us do about this “privilege” you talk about.

FIGG:  The fact that you even ask is racist.

BERG:  Um, how do you figure?

FIGG:  That’s racist, too.

BERG:  Seeking clarity in the discussion is “racist?”

FIGG:   You’re using your power over me.  That’s racist.

BERG:  That’s just bizarre.

FIGG:  F**k you.  I hate you.  I hope you die.

BERG:  (Turns to LIBRELLE):  Er, Avery?  What’s the…

LIBRELLE:  We should stop the debate…

BERG:  …um, yeah?

LIBRELLE:  Because clearly, Merg, you are racist.

BERG:  What, now?  I never mentioned race.

LIBRELLE:   You were using your power, being a racist.   Being a racist, race is endemic in everything you say, and do, and don’t say, and don’t do.  Right, Ashley?

(FIGG glowers)

BERG:  Lavrentiy Beria called.  He said “dial back the kangaroo”.

LIBRELLE:   And now you’re mansplaining.

BERG:  (Looks beyond FIGG and LIBRELLE).  Hey, look – it’s Hillary Clinton!  And she’s giving out suckers!

(LIBRELLE and FIGG wheel around, as BERG slips away)

(And SCENE)

(LIghts fade up in screening room.  BERG is sitting in the middle of the room.  A few rows behind, covered in popcorn debris and spilled soda, are Edmund DUCHEY and CAT SCAT, bloggers with “MinnesotaLiberalAlliance.Blogspot.com” a possibly fictional Minnesota liberal blog.  )

(DUCHEY leaps to his feet, scattering popcorn debris in all directions)

DUCHEY:  Merg!  Unless you can prove every word in that film short was true, you’re a liar!.  (Pauses to wipe drool from his chin).

BERG:  It’s satire.  It’s meant to illustrate larger truths through a caricature of people and events.  In this case, that the left’s social justice warrior class has become simultaneously obsessed with virtue-signaling, McCarthyistic witch-hunting and public shaming of dissenters, while simultaneously becoming less able to state a coherent case.

SCAT:  The fact is, the law says you have to have a degree in satire from an Ivy League school to practice it!

BERG:  You’re making that up.

DUCHEY:  So you’re saying it never happened?  Hah!

BERG:  Actually, of the dozens and dozens of these “dramatization” scenarios I’ve written in recent years, this one may be the least fictional of all.

DEUS (EX MACHINA, via thunderstorm).  You’re kidding?

(Urine stain appears on DUCHEY’s pants)

BERG:  (Looking upward)  Nope.    It pretty much happened.

DEUS EX MACHINA:  Wow.

(And SCENE)

 

In-Kind Contribution

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SCENE:  At the offices of Kornbluth Chadwick Communications – a big Democrat-leaning PR firm in Boston.   A tastefully spare room furnished in the Danish style, with a full-height window overlooking downtown Boston, includes a number of people in just-ahead-of-the-fashion-curve PR-wear.  

Hanna EPSTEIN-FAEGER, director of the firm’s political communications practice, sits at the head of a glass table and calls the meeting to order. 

EPSTEIN-FAEGER:  We’re here to find out what went wrong with the independent expenditure ad we did against Ted Cruz.  Ruth?

Ruth LOWENSTEIN-NEDZVINSKI, an assistant project manager, picks up a sleek, buttonless remote, and presses “play”

EPSTEIN-FAEGER: I think we can all agree it was brilliant.  Joshua?

Joshua-Micah KORN-FLEEBER, the ad’s producer – a slight man in a lumberjack beard wearing a “Feel The Bern” t-shirt under his hemp sports jacket, speaks up.

KORN-FLEEBER:  That’s correct, Hanna.  The ad includes all the things that we believe that the vast majority of voters respond to:  belief in the need to reinterpret the Constitution, the throbbing desire throughout the country to repeal the Second Amendment and the traditional view of marriage and remove all reference to faith from public life – and, of course, Robert Reich himself.

LOWENSTEIN-NEDSVINSKI:  Americans  love Robert Reich!\

(Entire table nods assent)

EPSTEIN-FAEGER:  And yet the focus groups, one after the other, showed that representative voters from west of the Hudson River and east of the Sierra Madre unanimously thought it was an ad for Ted Cruz?

KORN-FLEEBER:  I’m sorry.  I just don’t get it.

LOWESNSTEIN-NEDSVINSKI:  One quote from one focus group said “this is a fiendish parody of the east-coast liberal echo chamber”.

EPSTEIN-FAEGER:  The what?

LOWENSTEIN-NEDSVINSKI:  No idea.

(Muted chuckling)

EPSTAIN-FAEGER:  So – middle-Americans unanimously thought it was a pro-Cruz ad, and some thought it was a parody of how the left thinks?

(General nodding)

EPSTEIN-FAEGER:  I say it’s a blip in the data.  Let’s run it!

(Everyone nods and gathers their notebooks, phones and tablets and moves to their next meeting)

And SCENE

The Slogan-Based Life

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SCENE:  Mitch BERG is at a hardware store, shopping for a chainsaw sharpener, when around the corner steps Bud GUNKEL, chairman of the CD2 chapter of “Former Republicans for Ron Paul”.  

GUNKEL:  Hey, Merg.  The only way to fix the system is…

BERG:  …yeah, I heard it.  To “withhold your consent from it“.   Feel free to tell the IRS, the BATFE and the Minnesota Department of Revenue you’ve “withheld your consent”; I’m sure everyone will get a good laugh but you.

GUNKEL:  He who would trade freedom for security…

BERG:  …deserves neither.  Good Lord, Bill, do you people ever communicate in anything but the form of clichés?   I mean, do you even know what that means?

GUNKEL:  It means he who would trade liberty for security deserves…

BERG:  …neither.  Yep, I got that.  Again.  I mean, have you thought through what it means?

GUNKEL:   What are you talking about?  What else could there be?

BERG:  Here’s another quote for you; without order, prosperity is impossible.  Without prosperity, liberty is pointless.

GUNKEL:  So you’d give up…

BERG:  …no, no, no, stop right there.   Here’s a quote back atcha; without order, prosperity is impossible.

GUNKEL:  So you want to be like a herd animal…

BERG:  No.  “Order” is a very broad term!   It just means that there’s a general understanding that everyone is playing by the same rules, and that if you bring you product to market, there’ll be consequences for people who try to steal it on the way to the market, or swindle you when they get there.

“Order” can mean “a voluntary agreement that whose end of, everyone holds up”, like the anarchists say; that’s perfectly legitimate.  And it can mean full-blown Danish bureaucracy regulating the transaction, or a medieval baron making sure everyone upholds their end of the bargain for the good of his fiefdom.   And the whole American experiement was built around the idea that order should be maintained with the minimum amount of government and force possible – while allowing for the inevitability, given human nature, that some was likely to be needed at some point.

GUNKEL:  So you mean government!  Government is theft!  Nothing but!

BERG:  Sure, if you let it get out of control.  And we in the US largely have, and that’s a very valid discussion to have.  But the fact is, human nature being what it is, it’s inevitable that if the means of keeping order disappear, while 99% of the people will be just fine, there’s that 1% who’ll decide that what they want is what you got.  It can be a mugger, it can be those accursed Methodists, it can be that whole group of people over the ridge that think your ancestors stole from their ancestors, whatever.

GUNKEL:  So you’re a warvangelical?

BERG:  No – I merely observe human nature.  As I observed in my book, while the vast majority of humans are perfectly content to live and work and produce and interact peacefully, there are some that prefer to take what others produce.  It’s just easier.

GUNKEL: So  you’d give up freedom for thirteen pieces of silver?

BERG:  Wow – way to mix milieus.  Here’s another quote for you:  without prosperity, freedom is irrelevant.  If you don’t have prosperity – if you’re a hunter-gatherer or a subsistence farmer – “freedom” is a very relative thing.  You’re free to speak and worship and assemble – but you’re busy seeing to your survival from dawn to dusk, year-round, like a medieval fyrd.  Which means not only are your more abstruse freedoms irrelevant, but you have neither the time nor the energy to see to things like prosperity and order – making you ripe pickings for anyone who wants to take what you’ve worked for.  And this time you’ll have no surplus to see to your very survival!   Which is, by the way, a condition that also makes you ripe pickings for whomever would call himself your king, either against your will or, as tired and close to starvation as you are by this point, with your full consent.

GUNKEL:  So you will trade freedom for security!  Hah!

BERG:  You make it sound like a binary, black or white thing.

GUNKEL:  It is!    If you don’t have all the freedom, you have none of it!

BERG:   That’s just madness.  You say because the American people have given up some freedom, we’re no different than North Korea?

And no.  I won’t trade my freedom, all or nothing, for security – not while I have anything to say about it.   I will, as a constituent of a limited government that has a few carefully-enumerated jobs, engage some agents to keep the order we all need.  And no more.

GUNKEL:  That’s not how government works today!

BERG:  You’re telling me!  Y’see, that’s the problem with “libertarians”; they take poli-sci class absolutes and try to apply them to the real world.   So I’ll do it back atcha:  without prosperity, freedom is academic; without order, prosperity is impossible.  Therefore, without order, paradoxically, freedom is impossible.

GUNKEL:  So you say freedom is impossible?

BERG:   Nope.  I am saying that while absolute tyranny is very possible, absolute freedom cannot exist in a world where others have the “will to power” to become tyrants.

There is a trade-off; it’s the job of a free people to simultaneously see to the order that enables the prosperity that makes freedom possible, and make sure the “order” they create doesn’t become oppressive.

GUNKEL:  All involuntary order is oppressive!

BERG:  So you throw off a “government” that governs by consent of the governed…

GUNKEL:  Yes!

BERG:   And live in a world with only “gentlemens agreements” for order…

GUNKEL:  Yes!

BERG:   So that you can be conquered or killed by someone who took advantage of the fact that you have no means to see to public order?

GUNKEL:  Er…yes!  Better dead than…er…

BERG:  Naturally.

And SCENE

Name-Dropping

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SCENE:  Mitch BERG is at a large gas station in Minnetonka, MN.  Having just bought gas, he’s looking for a new windshield wiper.  He turns down the aisle marked “Windshield Wipers/Condiments/Magazines Showing People Getting Hit In The Groin”, and notices Gutterball GARY – a blogger at the (possibly fictional) progressive blog “MinnesotaLiberalAlliance.Blogspot.com“, who describes his hobbies as bowling, heckling people, and shouting really loud – reading a magazine.  

BERG tries to backpedal out of the aisle, but GARY notices him. 

GARY:  Hey, Merg!   You’re stupid!

BERG:  Nothing my mother doesn’t say.

GARY:  The Second Amendment is not an individual right!

BERG:  Well, the Supreme Court in the Heller and McDonald cases disagreed, and made it both a precedent and incorporated it to the states.

GARY:   You’re stupid and you have no idea what you’re talking about!  Justice Burger said the Second Amendment was “a fraud on the American public.”

BERG:  So?

GARY:  He was a conservative!

BERG:  Maybe compared to Nixon, who appointed him, but not really.   And he was really arguing a strawman; he was saying the Second Amendment doesn’t preclude regulation…

GARY:  Burger disagrees with you!  And he’s from Minnesota! It’s further proof you don’t know what you’re talking about!  Ha ha ha ha ha ha!

BERG:  Um,…

GARY:  …ha ha ha ha ha!

BERG:  Say, Gary?  In what case did Burger  write that opinion?

GARY:  Huh?

BERG:  Was that statement from a Supreme Court, or even an appelate, case?

GARY:  Huh?

BERG:  The thing Burger said?

GARY:  You’re stupid!

BERG:  Right.  It wasn’t part of a case.  It was a personal opinion, in a 1990 PBS interview.  It was of no more legal weight than you or me talking to PBS.

GARY:  He was a conservative, and he disagrees with you, and he’s a Supreme Court judge, so you’re stupid!

BERG:  Huh.  So because a “conservative” SCOTUS justice had a personal, private opinion that dissents from conservative and libertarian orthodoxy, I’m stupid.

GARY:  Yeah!  Ha ha ha ha…

BERG:  um…

GARY:  …ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!

BERG:  So who said this:  “Certainly, one of the chief guarantees of freedom under any government, no matter how popular and respected, is the right of the citizen to keep and bear arms. … The right of the citizen to bear arms is just one guarantee against arbitrary government, one more safeguard against the tyranny which now appears remote in America but which historically has proven to be always possible.”

GARY:  That sounds like Ted Nugent!  Which means you’re an anti-semite!  Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha…

BERG: Actually…

GARY:  ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!

BERG:  Actually it was Hubert H. Humphrey.  A “progressive”, a former Vice President and Senator, and the greatest politician Minnesota ever produced.  And it’d seem he disagrees with  Justice Burger.

GARY:  Who cares what an anti-semite thinks?

BERG:  Oh, the Nugent thing?  Pfft.  I didn’t even like Ted Nugent as a guitar player all that much; I certainly never appointed him my spokesperson.

GARY:  Nope!   Nugent is on your side, so you’re an antisemite!

BERG:  Ah.  So if someone were to say “With Iraq no threat, why invade a sovereign country? The answer: President Bush’s policy to secure Israel. . . . [S]preading democracy in the Mideast to secure Israel would take the Jewish vote from the Democrats.”

GARY:  Sounds like Nugent or some other ReTHUGliCON.

BERG:  First – I’m always amazed to hear people actually talking in caps.  Second – no.  It was Democrat senator Fritz Hollings.

So – does that make you anti-semitic?

GARY:  You’re stupid.

BERG:  Natch.

And SCENE.  

Lightning Fails To Strike

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SCENE:  Mitch BERG is out running his snowblower down the block.  BILL GUNKEL, former Republican who is now chairmain of the Inver Grove Heights chapter of “Former Republicans for Ron Paul”, pulls up to the curb.  

GUNKEL:  Hey, Merg!

BERG:  Oh, hey, Bill.  What’s up?

GUNKEL:  Elections are a sham.  The best way to “participate” in elections is withdrawing your consent by refusing to vote.

BERG:  Huh.  Well, feel free to tell the Minnesota Department of Revenue “I have withdrawn my consent” when they come for your money and property after the DFL wins.

GUNKEL:  Hah.  So what?  Your participation makes absolutely no difference.  In fact, settled science has shown us that your chance of dying on your way to the polls is greater than your chance of affecting the outcome of an election.

BERG:  That’s absurd!

GUNKEL:   It’s science!  Why do you hate science?

BERG:  It’s not science.  It’s arithmetic.  The writer – apparently a barrista who contributes to “Forbes” – calculated your chance of being the single vote that decides an election versus your chance of dying in a car accident on the way to the polls.

GUNKEL:  So?

BERG:  So nothing.  Of course your chances of being the single vote that decides an election are small – although if you think they’re nonexistent, tell it to her.

GUNKEL:  Hah.  That’s just the religion you were taught in high school civics class.

BERG:  Right.  And all of you “libertarians” who sit resplendently above it all snarking at the commoners are so much better than that.  I get it. Look – it was a stupid article, and it reinforces an even dumber point.  It’s not about tipping elections yourself.  It’s about bringing a lot of people who believe the way you do to the polls to help you tip it.  Which, to be fair, is something your crowd has never been good at.

GUNKEL:  Pffft. That never happens.  If it did, you’d see election results change significantly.

BERG:  It most certainly does.  Thirty and forty years ago, support for gun control was extremely common at the state and federal levels.  Over the course of thirty years, Human Rights advocates in ones and twos voted, and convinced others to vote, for rather than against the Second Amendment.  Today, those regular schnooks voting by their ones and twos have flipped that issue 180 degrees.

And you “liberty” people could do it too, if you ever stopped purity-testing each other to a fine sheen and started trying to convince people, instead of bellowing about “principles” to rooms full of people just like you.

GUNKEL:  Oooh, look – a city snow plow!  (Forms a snowball, begins the stalk)

And SCENE

One Evening At The Saint Paul City Council

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SCENE:  The Saint Paul City Council chambers.  Present are:

  • Mayor Chris COLEMAN
  • Ward 1 councilor Bernadette SANDERS
  • Ward 2 councilor Benny TOMUSOLLINI
  • Ward 3 councilor Francine BURNS
  • Ward 4 councilor Evita P. EVITA
  • Ward 5 councilor Hugh GOCHAVEZ
  • Ward 6 councilor L. A. PDOG
  • Ward 7 councilor Katherine ANTSY

COLEMAN gavels the meeting to order.

COLEMAN:  May the meeting come to order.

BURNS: (loudly clears her throat)

COLEMAN:  Sorry.  May the meeting please come to order, by your indulgent leave?

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Pretense Aside

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SCENE: Mitch BERG is waiting in line at the Rack Shack on South Robert.   Stephanie Marie ANNAN – Community organizer for the 5th CD Libertarian Party – enters with a great clatter, vigorously stomps off her boots, and gets in line, finally noticing BERG. 

ANNAN:  Hey, Merg!  I don’t like all that stuff you’ve been saying about how us Ron Paul people just like to throw…what do you call it?”

BERG:  “Turd bombs”.

ANNAN:  Yeah!  The GOP did it first, back in 2008!

BERG:  Yeah, so I’ve been told.  That was about three years before I got involved in the GOP beyond going to caucuses, by the way.  I know there’s been going on eight years of tit-for-tat between the Ron Paul clicque and the “establishment”, which I’m told I’m part of, even though I got involved in the party after the Tea Party.

ANNAN:  You’re already boring me.

BERG:  That seems to happen a lot.  You all apprently got “bored” with Kurt Bills after you you all went to Tampa in 2012…

ANNAN:  Hey – there’s a special primary coming up in a house district 68B!

BERG:  Yeah, it’s been in all the papers.

ANNAN:  I suppose you’re supporting the Republican candidate, like some mindless sheeple?

BERG: No, I support the endorsed Republican candidate because I’m an intelligent, informed voter. I think the endorsed candidate, Mindy Pilph, is an excellent choice.  Although I don’t actually live in the district.

ANNAN:  I plan on supporting her primary opponent!

BERG:  Who?  Jesse Duff?

ANNAN:  Yes!

BERG:  Duff supports doubling the gas tax, banning civilian firearm ownership, rolling back school choice and instituting an entirely grievance-based curriculum, and adopting the North Korean style socialist philosophy of “Juche“, an isolationist firm of Stalinism based on all-seeing, all-knowing, omnipotent state.  Which seems – pardon me for saying so – counterintuitive for someone who was a high ranking functionary in the Ron Paul campaign four years ago.  Since Duff would seem to be the polar opposite of Libertarian, I gotta say, that’s a zig when I expected a zag.

ANNAN:  But he’s independent from the Minnesota Republican Party.

BERG:  Well, with good reason. He stands for everything the party rejects.

ANNAN:  But he’s independent!

BERG:  But he’s the exact opposite of Libertarian.

ANNAN:  So?

BERG:  So yet again, it seems that “libertarian principle” isn’t really as big a deal as trying to TP the MNGOP….

ANNAN:   Squirrel!

(ANNAN leaves the room.  And SCENE)

Sources

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SCENE:  Avery LIBRELLE is sitting in a dilapidated Subaru outside Mitch Berg’s house.  LIBRELLE is peering through binoculars, and starts visibly when a glimpse of BERG is visible through the door window. 

Shortly, BERG emerges, walking his golden retriever. 

LIBRELLE:  (Leaps from car).  Merg!

BERG:  (Turns sharply, then relaxes as alarm turns to a groaning acceptance) Oh, hi, Avery.  (BERG notes the windows of LIBRELLE’s car).  Um, been waiting long?

LIBRELLE:  There’ve been seventeen killed in Chicago in the past ten days!

BERG:  Right.  And 117 total shot.  So…?

LIBRELLE:  By guns!

BERG:  Right.  It’s been in all the papers for years.  Parts of Chicago are incredibly violent,l even with all of the celebrated gun control they have.

LIBRELLE:  Hah!  But those guns come from rural red states!

BERG:  Come again?

LIBRELLE:  You heard the President in his Town Hall meeting!  All the guns used in urban shootings come from guys in vans selling them from their trunk in parking lots in rural red states!

BERG:  Well, for starters, no, they’re mostly stolen.  Often sold to others after being stolen.   Some come from straw buyers.  Almost none come from people selling otherwise legal guns.

LIBRELLE:  But if guns weren’t so available in the neighboring areas, urban crime wouldn’t be so high.

BERG:  If access to guns were the problem, wouldn’t the crime rate in rural Indiana be higher than in the middle of Chicago?

LIBRELLE:  (Mouth flaps open and shut a few times, like a boated bass).

(BERG continues on his walk)

(And SCENE).

Just One Life

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Mitch BERG is walking through a pet food store.  He rounds a corner and runs into Avery LIBRELLE, who is plastering “Simulated Meat Is Murder!” stickers on bags of dog food.   Although BERG tries to evade, LIBRELLE sees him.  

LIBRELLE:  Merg!

BERG:  Aaaagh.  Er…hi, Avery.

LIBRELLE:  It’s time to institute universal background checks, ban clips that shoot thirty assault bullets a second, and get rid of assault AR47s.

BERG:  Two of those things don’t exist, and one of them will have no effect on crime but burden the law-abiding citizen exclusively.

LIBRELLE:  But if we save just one life, it’ll be worth it.

BERG:  So saving “just one life”, no matter how improbably, should be the basis for policy?

LIBRELLE:  Yep.  Human life is sacred.

BERG:  So then we should shut down the Green and Blue lines – about ten dead?  Or perhaps get rid of Obamacare?  Or for that matter, shutting down Planned Parenthood?

LIBRELLE:  Nooooo!  Some things are more important than human life!

(LIBRELLE puts bags of dog food around ears, runs from the store)

(And SCENE)

Today In Amman, Jordan

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(SCENE:  Major Thomas ASHTON and Sergeant Major Iain MACTAGGART, members of the British 22nd SAS Regiment – Britain’s premiere Special Forces unit – are standing by a helicopter pad.  Both are suited up for a mission that nobody will confirm is a hostage rescue mission deep into ISIS territory; guns, ammunition, grenades, radios, and survival gear)

ASHTON: Should be a bit of a dustup, eh, MacTaggart?

MACTAGGART:  Aye.  Not the first bloody time, Major.

ASHTON: True.   All right, Sergeant-Major.  Let’s check the men’s kit.  This is going to be a nasty one.

(An orderly – Royal Air Force communications specialist Aircraftman Sheila O’RIORDAN – jogs up to ASHTON with a piece of paper.  She stands at attention and salutes the Major)

ASHTON (taking the paper):  Yes?

O’RIORDAN:  Flash message from Ministry of Defense, sir.

ASHTON:  Thank you.  Dismissed.

(O’RIORDAN salutes.  ASHTON returns the salute.  O’RIORDAN jogs back to the radio tent)

MACTAGGART:  So w`hat’s MOD say, Major?

ASHTON:  President Obama has declared a climate conference.  ISIS has surrendered.

MACTAGGART:  ISIS couldn’t face the onlaught of Powerpoint, eh?

ASHTON:  Sounds like the mission’s off.

MACTAGGART:  Peace has broken out?

ASHTON:  Yes, Sergeant-Major.

(Both men stand for a beat – and then erupt in laughter)

MACTAGGART:  I’ll tell the helos to spool up.

ASHTON:  Right.  Wheels up in ten.

(And SCENE)

Today, In Raqqah, Syria

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SCENE:  Abu Bakr AL-BAGHDADI, leader of ISIS and self-proclaimed “caliph” of the new “Khelifa” or Caliphate, is in a conference with a group of his lieutenants, including Sheikh Abu Ali HABIB.

AL-BAGHDADI:  Reports from the front look good.  We’re holding the Kurds, we’re gaining ground in Syria, and the Iraqis are folding like  a Salafist end-table.

LIEUTENANTS:  Allahu Akbar!

AL-BAGHDADI:  And the Great Satan is reacting as we expected; with dithering disguised as grand pronouncements.

LIEUTENANTS:  Insh’allah!

HABIB:  Caliph, I have some bad news.

AL-BAGHDADI:  What is it, Sheikh?

HABIB:   Little Miss Satanette – President Obama (group snickers) is holding a…

(HABIB pauses, catches breath)

….climate change conference.

(Entire group cringes in horror)

AL-BAGHDADI:  That does it.  Let’s give up.  Find an evangelist; I’ll devote my life to Christ.

(Entire group pauses for a silent beat – then breaks into uproarious laughter)

And SCENE

Today In Kurdistan

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(SCENE:  Two Kurdish Peshmerga fighters, Ali and Sayid, are manning a Russian-built machine gun, scanning a valley warily, watching for ISIS movement.  Suddenly, the radio crackles)

RADIO:   Kebab Six to all Kebab.   President Obama is holding a climate change conference.  Six out.

ALI:  (scanning with binoculars)  Well, I’ll be.

SAYID:   What?

ALI:   (Hands Sayid the binoculars)  Look!

SAYID:  (Looks through binoculars)  Wow.

(Cut to scene through binoculars.  ISIS troops are climbing out of foxholes, hurling their weapons, ammunition and webgear into the distance, and running away, leaving a cloud of dust behind them)

ALI:  Huh.  Don’t see that every day.

SAYID:  Like I’ve been telling you, Ali – it’s all about the climate.

ALI:  Gotta hand it to you.  When you’re right, you’re right.

And SCENE

What A Terrorist Wants

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SCENE:  December 8, 1941, in the well of the House of Representatives – in an alternate universe.    President Barack Delano Obama is addressing a joint emergency session of Congress.

OBAMA:  Yesterday, December Seventh, 1941, is a day which will live in infamy.

Now, let me be clear:  this attack did not represent the Real Japan.  Japan is an ancient, honorable culture, dating back over 2,000 years; Shinto is a religion of peace, famous for its pastoral scenes and transcendental poetry.

And this attack does not represent the real Japanese people; a people who invented sushi, and baseball, and the number zero, named after their fighter plane.

We know the attackers were the junior varsity; who even knew the Japanese had aircraft carriers?

The lesson of yesterday?  We must not give in to fear, or bigotry, in framing our response to this attack.  We must not let fear drive us to launching an air raid on Tokyo, or a two-pronged offensive through the Solomon Islands, or an island-jumping campaign through the Central Pacific, because that is exactly what the attackers want.  If they force us to attack them, we are playing their game, their way.

We must respond to the parts we control – to the National Rifle Association, which has, through the intransigence of Congressional Republicans,  made it easier for criminals like the attackers to buy bombs than books in Tokyo.

I urge Congress also to accelerate passage of the Affordable Defense Act.

Thank you, and let’s not waste this crisis.

Rent-Seekers Seeking Rent

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SCENE:  Mitch BERG is sitting on his porch, working on his next book project.  

chanting_points_200px

Avery LIBRELLE walks through the gate from his back yard and toward the sidewalk.

BERG:  Um, hello, Avery?  Hanging out in my back yard, were we?

LIBRELLE:  Oh, I was sorting your trash.

BERG:  Looking for recyclables?

LIBRELLE:  No.  Evidence of thoughtcrime.

BERG:  Huh. I burn all of that.

LIBRELLE:  Hah!  There’s some evidence of thoughtcrime!

BERG:  Of course.

LIBRELLE:  Hey – speaking of thoughtcrime – Ben Carson is a hypocrite.  He speaks out against welfare – but he and his mother used it!

BERG:  Yeah, I just saw the photomeme your side has been passing around:

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LIBRELLE:  Yeah!  Hypocrite!  His entire success was rooted in the welfare system!  Hypocrite!

BERG:  Well, if his entire success was rooted in the system, then every child growing up on welfare would be a doctor or a lawyer, wouldn’t they?

LIBRELLE:  He’s still a hypocrite!

BERG:  OK, let’s just for get for a moment that the whole “argument” is a logical fallacy…

LIBRELLE:  That’s a stereotype!  Trigger warning!  Trigger warning!

BERG:  No, fallacy.  It’s a Tu Quoque Ad Hominem – saying that because someone has ever said, or done, or believed something that’s at odds with their argument, their argument is invalid.  It’s like saying because someone was once in the Klan, they could never speak out against the Klan.

LIBRELLE:  But he’s not a former Klan member!  His mom was on welfare!  He grew up in the system!  It made him what he is today!

BERG:  So you’re claiming credit for Ben Carson’s success on behalf of the welfare system?  Fair enough.  Will you claim “credit” for all the people of all races who’ve become multi-generational dependents of the system?

LIBRELLE:  There is no such thing!  The science is settled!

BERG:  Of course it is.  Look – what you are saying is this; if someone’s ancestors went on welfare, to which they are entitled – because welfare is, for better or worse, an entitlement in this country – and that person not only uses the system exactly the way it was intended to be used, but goes on to succeed far above and beyond any rational expectations, that person isn’t allowed to point out what an exception to the rule he is, and how the welfare system as it is today *harms* the upward mobility that he experienced?

In other words, if you’re born into the system, don’t care speak out against the system, because the system owns you and everything you are, think and believe, forever?

Doesn’t that pretty much prove Carson correct?  That you, the system’s supporter, are using it as a form of intellectual indentured servitude?

LIBRELLE:  Steven Colbert!  John Oliver!  Rachel Maddow!  Neil DeGrasse Tyson!

BERG:  Of course.

(And SCENE)

Consistent

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16

SCENE:  Mitch BERG is sitting on the hood of a Dodge, drinking warm beer in the soft summer rain, beneath the light of a giant Exxon sign.  

Avery LIBRELLE putters up to BERG in a Prius and climbs out of the car.  

LIBRELLE:  Hey, Merg!

BERG:  Hey, Avery.

LIBRELLE:  I’ve got a question for you, mister Immigrant Hater.

BERG:  Bla bla bla.  I don’t hate immigrants, and I won’t let a stupid manipulative strawman pass without showing it up as the idiocy it is.

LIBRELLE:  Why do you hate science?  Anyway – so it’s time for you immigration opponents…

BERG:  …We’re not “immigration opponents”.  We oppose illegal immigration.

LIBRELLE:  If NPR says it, it’s settled science.  Anyway – it’s coming time where you have to decide; are immigrants taking our jobs, or are they soaking up welfare dollars?   You can’t have both.

BERG:   Saying the two are mutually exclusive is like saying there’s no way white people could simultaneously produce Beethoven and Jefferson and James Watt while also including people who sit around Walmart parking lots lighting their beer farts and arguing about whether Van Halen is hard rock or heavy metal.

Because it’s a fact that Immigrants are disproportionally on welfare – counter to years of media chanting points – and they are also taking most of the new jobs in the Obama Economy this past seven years.  You’re presenting me a false dilemma – and, given that this policy disporoprtionally affects African-Americans, presenting yourself a real dilemma.

So there is no contradiction.  Fact is, unrestricted immigration of low-skill workers drives down the price of low-skill jobs – which aren’t worth much to begin with, and don’t pay much with the glut of workers, who have families, which disproportionally use welfare.

LIBRELLE:   Why do you hate women?

BERG:   Of course.

And SCENE.