Soundbytes from the Crusade Against Evil

War Marketing

One of the hottest war planning issues was settled with the announcement that The Rendon Group had been chosen to help manage our worldwide public relations effort against the Taliban. The Rendon Group has served corporations and governments in 71 nations. Rendon is known, according to its Website, for their "hands on approach" to managing communications. Their crisis management skills have been well tested in the Middle East. In Saudi Arabia, Rendon designed a traffic safety game show for Toyota that helped increase "loyalty to Toyota." Rendon has not only performed "outreach" for the government of Kuwait, they also designed a "proactive communications program" for the Kuwait Petroleum Corporation when it was faced with the prospect of a labor strike.

In what may be unrelated news, it was announced that Wayne Newton will be sent overseas to entertain our troops. I'm told this news led to a 200% increase in the number of soldiers volunteering for front line duty and, inexplicably, a similar increase in the number of soldiers volunteering for solitary confinement. (http://www.rendon.com)

Good and Bad News Dept.

The good news is the air drops of food to Afghanistan will continue. The bad news, announced by Gen. Richard B. Meyers: "It is unfortunate that the (unexploded) cluster bombs are the same color as the food packets." You can't win them all. Fortunately we will be dropping leaflets, (even written in Afghani), to explain the problem. Finally, we'll have a foolproof means to determine literacy rates in a primitive country. (Department of Defense News Briefing, 11/1/01)

Collateral Damage Updates

Those of you who've viewed recent photos of hospitalized Afghan children may need a reminder about why we are dropping bombs. Fortunately, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld has clearly stated those goals. We are bombing, he declared, to "create conditions for sustained anti-terrorist and humanitarian relief operations." A fairly simple-minded person might interpret this to mean we plan to starve them first. But, of course, we are not simple-minded.

Should you view any more photos of injured Afghani children, it is important to know whose fault it is. Remember, it's not ours. As Donald Rumsfield explained, "When the Taliban issue accusations of civilian casualties, they indict themselves." Why? Because, "Their leadership are [sic] the ones that are hiding in mosques and using Afghan civilians as human shields by placing armor and artillery in close proximity to civilian schools and the like." They are, as another Senior Defense Official put it, "inviting collateral damage." As it is an accepted practice to randomly shoot hostages in order to capture criminals, we can't be held up to blame. (DoD Press Release, 10/07/01 and 10/24/01)

Air Safety

House Republicans stuck to their guns and voted for an airline security package that will insure that private enterprise will continue to manage our airport security. Unmentioned by them was the fact, pointed out by Rep. Peter Defazio (D-OR), that the three largest security firms are foreign owned. The largest firm, Argenbright, was convicted last year for hiring known felons and then lying to federal regulators about it. However, this year they have only been indicted once on the same charges. (Congressional Record, 10/31/01)

Making a Better World

For those of you wondering what you can do to help the war effort, there are these helpful words from military consultant Loren B. Thompson. As he told the readers of the Wall Street Journal, "The most valuable tool of domestic counterterrorism is a mistrustful citizenry." We need, he said, to encourage "skepticism about strangers." While you are checking under your beds tonight, don't forget the Pentagon's call for ideas on combating terrorism. Your one page proposal needs to be submitted by December 23rd. Check out the contest's Web page at http://www.bids.tswg.gov. (WSJ 9/21/01)

--Wayne Grytting

More nonsense like this can be found at http://www.scn.org/newspeak. To reach the author or join the mailing list, try e-mailing to wgrytt@scn.org