Murderers, Thieves, Traitors

So, I went to Walmart at 10:00 PM last night to buy some emergency CD labels for my printer. This was the first time I ever set foot in the store, and I swore after I was finished, I'd never go back. The only reason I went there was because Fry's and Best Buy were closed, and I needed CD labels for a client's print job.

I swear, I have personally given witness to the Decline and Fall of the American Empire. The ghost of Edward Gibbon is down in Hades co-writing the book with Beetlejuice and the tormented soul of Prescott Bush.

There are two places in this world you do not want to go to find hot chicks: 1) Denny's and 2) Walmart. I saw more toothless hags than Fantasia's Night on Bald Mountain, and they all sported Walmart name tags on their black polo shirts. The store is Tweaker Heaven, or where old homeless folks go to die. Leaving the store as fast as I could, I drove home and hit the shower.

"This must be how prostitutes feel," I thought. You sell your soul in exchange for Chinese-made crap. "It's cheap, but it ain't free," Steely Dan once sang.

All of which brought to mind the terrible bridge collapse in Minneapolis yesterday. CNN announced that estimates to repair our broken infrastructure run about $1.3 trillion. But, we have "no money" do repair our bridges, roads, railroads, and airports. Why? Hmm... Maybe because we've squandered a trillion dollars in Iraq?

We've spent all this money in Iraq and have jack to show for it. Their infrastructure is even uglier than ours. "Corruption is the second insurgency," a recent government report stated.
Here's a new and unique idea. By last count, after all the mass murders and bombings, there are about 23 million inhabitants of Iraq. Not counting vermin, of course. So, why not just pull our troops out and give every Iraqi a million bucks? Wouldn't that be the Republican way? "Free market economics: Give 'em the money and let them spend it however they want." Seems like letting them fix their own damn country would be a lot less expensive than letting Haliburton pave it over and rape the earth for oil.

Our relationship with Iraq is like an abusive marriage. As my friend Stefanie recently told me, "We won't leave until they stop trying to push us out." Big Daddy Bush slaps them around and kills 600,000 civilians, and they go all passive-agressive on our ass by planting IEDs under Humvees.

Reminds me of Jack Nicholson in "The Shining." "Here's Jonny!" "Here's your worst fucking nightmare!" A decrepit empire dragging the rest of the world down its own black hole.

Sic semper imperatoris!