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C. E. O’Connor
4201 Wilson Blvd
Suite 110-378
Arlington VA 22203
(703) 589-3660
THE BUSH MOTEL
by
C. E. O’Connor
HUMOR: A political fantasy loosely based on the movie Psycho (1960) -- in
memory of the late Janet Leigh
You see, I’d gotten into a little trouble in Phoenix. Nothing serious, you
understand – nothing I couldn’t handle – but maybe it was a good idea to get out
of town for a while.
So I threw a week’s clothing into a suitcase and drove out of town. I got on
Interstate 10 and headed west with the damn sun right in my eyes, and finally
reached the California line just as it was getting dark. By that time I was dog-
tired, so I took the exit at Blythe, turned south and started to look for a motel.
And damn – wouldn’t you know it? – it started to rain, really pour, and all of a
sudden it was pitch black and I couldn’t see a thing – even with the wipers on
max.
After driving 20 minutes half-blind through the downpour I finally saw a neon
sign of what seemed to be a motel up ahead on my right. I managed to get the
car off the road, through a deep puddle, and into what passed for a motel
parking lot. Then I stopped and squinted through the fogged-up windshield:
“The Bush Motel,” the sign said. The place was a little spooky – deserted, no
other cars in the lot – but I ran though the rain to the office.
I walked inside, and there was a man behind the counter – age 55 or 60, graying
short hair, about 5-11. He stared at me with this odd look and introduced
himself. “Hi,” he said. “I’m Norman Bush.” Big smile, very polite. But then
he started to talk gibberish. “I’m going to rebuild Iraq while, simultaneously,
I’m waging war against Iraq,” he said with this really earnest look. “That’s the
mission, and we have to complete the mission.”
The mission? What the hell was he talking about? “Look, pal,” I told him, “I
don’t want to storm the beaches of Normandy or anything. I just want a room,
okay?”
“No problem,” he said. “We have twelve cabins, and they’re all available. But
first I need you to understand the mission a little better: We’re going to spend
tens of billions of dollars to build up Iraq while, simultaneously, we’re spending
tens of billions of dollars to tear it down.”
I hesitated for couple of seconds. “Sure,” I finally said. “Right. Sounds like a
real plan to me, fella. But honestly, I’m just here for a room.”
“Yes, yes,” he said. “I’ll put you in cabin one.” But suddenly the phone rang,
and he picked it up. “Of course, mother,” he said. “All right, mother. Yes,
mother.” Then he put down the phone and sprinted out the door, slamming it
behind him. I heard him yell, “Just fill out the registration form on the counter.
I’ll be right back. Mother needs me for a minute. She’s not well, you know.”
You can always tell when you’ve arrived in California, can’t you?
I stepped outside, and the rain had stopped. I could see Norman running up a
pathway toward this Victorian house on the top of the hill where – I guessed –
he and his mother lived. He went inside and the door slammed. The clouds
were racing across the sky, so once in a while the moon came out and lit up the
house. I stared up at it. It was completely dark except for one window on the
second floor, where light was pouring out. That’s how I could see the form of a
person standing behind that window – a woman, I think – with a huge halo of
white hair around her head.
Suddenly the form disappeared from the window and I heard a woman’s
booming voice come from the house. “You nitwit! You can’t wage war against
the same country you’re rebuilding, Norman. No one in all history has ever
tried to do both things at the same time. Do you know why? Because no one
in all history has ever been that stupid! It’s totally illogical, totally
contradictory. You’re working at cross purposes with yourself. Is that too
much for you to grasp, Norman?
I heard Norman’s voice answer her. “Rebuilding Iraq is part of the mission,
mother. And we can’t abandon the mission. We can’t show weakness now.”
“Norman, that part of the mission is pure foolishness. It’s certainly possible to
rebuild a hostile state, the way we rebuilt Nazi Germany. But first you have to
crush the enemy, tear it down, totally destroy its will to resist. Then and only
then can you start to rebuild it. We didn’t try to rebuild Nazi Germany while
we were fighting it, did we? We didn’t send rebuilding money to Hitler in
1943!”
“Mother, the mission explains why we’re rebuilding Iraq. We have to rebuild
Iraq so we can turn it into a democracy.”
“A democracy? Norman, you’re a total nincompoop! There’s never been a
single pro-democracy march or rally or demonstration anywhere in the Arab
world, or a pro-American march, for that matter. Ninety-five percent of
Muslims utterly detest Americans – they want us all dead, for heaven’s sake.
So why in the world are we going flat broke trying to turn Iraq into a democracy
when Iraqis hate us, and hate democracy just as much? Why, it will—”
“Mother, you’re not being fair!”
“Don’t interrupt me, Norman! It’ll take 50 years and 500,000 dead American
soldiers to turn Iraq into a real democracy. The Iraqi people are wildly unstable
and totally intolerant. They’re 500 years behind us in political evolution. We’ll
have to kill 75 percent of the population just so the remaining 25 percent can
enjoy our wonderful democracy! And what’s the point of that?”
“Mother, we can’t simply abandon the mission. If we abandon it, that will mean
the mission was wrong. And we can’t admit we were wrong about the mission,
or about anything else – not in an election year, anyway. If we admit the
mission was wrong, it will break the patriotic spell we’ve been creating with our
flag-waving strategy. Then Republican voters will stop blindly accepting
everything we’ve done – out of loyalty and patriotism. They’ll start to question
everything.”
“The mission, the damned mission! Who’s responsible for designing military
missions for the Bush family – a stand-up comedian? Norman, back in 1991
your nitwit father had more than 500,000 American soldiers, not including the
British and the French. He could have gone straight to Baghdad and torn down
the whole filthy regime for once and for all. A million dead Iraqis would be alive
today. But back then, the precious, all-important mission wouldn’t let us go to
Baghdad. The all-important mission said we had to stop at the Euphrates. The
mission? What a joke!”
The mission is all-important, mother. You can’t deny the importance of the—”
“Yes, yes, yes, Norman, but isn’t there any flexibility built into our missions – to
allow for contingencies? The mission isn’t carved into stone by the hand of
God, you know. Political and military leaders created the mission, so political
and military leaders can change it according to circumstances!”
Hearing all this, I shook my head in disgust. Enough was enough. Was this
place a motel or a retirement home for demented former strategists? I stepped
down from the walkway in front of the office to the parking lot, and walked
back towards my car. But then I heard a door slam and saw Norman running
down the path from the house to the office. He was yelling at me and waving
his arms. “Please don’t leave!” he screamed. “I’m sorry, I’m very sorry to
keep you waiting so long! Please don’t leave!”
Well, you had to feel sorry for a guy like that, didn’t you? He was totally
dominated by his mother. So I gave him another chance. He took me into
room one (why did he keep calling it a cabin?). It wasn’t much; it was seedy,
but it would do for one night. I noticed there was no shower curtain, and he
said he’d run up to the house and get me a new one. He swore he’d be back in
a couple of minutes.
But then the same damn thing happened again. Out of that haunted house on
the hill I heard the voice of Norman’s mother start up. She was screaming at
him. “I swear to God, Norman, if there’s any way to foul up a war, someone in
our family will find it!”
“Mother, please! Be reasonable!”
“I mean, it’s pathetic, Norman. How can the world’s only superpower go on
two giant expeditions to the Middle East to tear down the same diddly-poop, flea-
bitten Third World dictatorship, and come up empty-handed both times? How
is that possible? First, your father quits at the Euphrates because of the
ridiculously limited mission – or else he uses the mission as an excuse for
quitting, and letting Saddam off the hook. And now you – you fool! – you
throw away victory by combining rebuilding with waging war, which is as logical
as handing a ham sandwich to a starving man while you’re kicking his teeth in.”
“Mother, that’s enough! You’re simply not being fair to father or to me!”
“Don’t you understand what happens when you combine warfare and
compassion, you dimwit? Right now, we can’t wage real war against Iraq
because of our compassion – we might hurt some of those “good Iraqis” you’re
always talking about. So our compassion holds back the violence that would
win the war. But because of our warfare, no Iraqi appreciates our compassion.
We’ve rebuilt thousands of Iraqi schools out of compassion, but not one single
Iraqi thinks that we’re a compassionate people. After all, every Iraqi has had
family and friends that we’ve killed with our warfare. Do you get it now?
Warfare and compassion are opposites. They nullify each other; they cancel
each other out!”
“Mother, if you keep this up, I’m going to carry you down to the fruit cellar!"
“You’re not man enough to carry me down to the fruit cellar, Norman! You
don’t have the guts! But let me ask you one thing. Is there anyone with the last
name of Bush who has any idea what war is, and how to win it? War is an act
of violence, of physical force, you little sissy. And you can’t mix it with
compassion or you’re dead in the water!
“Mother, stop it! Stop it right now!”
“You don’t have to read past page two of Clausewitz to learn that of all the
mistakes in warfare, the very worst come from a spirit of compassion – or
benevolence or kindness. Wage war, for God’s sake, Norman! And save the
rebuilding for a time when it’s safe enough to send in the Peace Corps.”
That did it for me. This was a Laughing Academy, not a motel, and I was outta
there. I got in my car, started up the engine, and slowly pulled out of the
potholed parking lot. Norman came running up again, yelling, waving his arms,
begging me to stop, but this time I kept on driving right past him, right back onto
the highway.
After all, this wasn’t the only motel in California, was it? A friend of mine had
once told me there was a decent motel on this same highway, about 15 miles
farther south.
The Bates Motel was the name, if memory served.
My friend had said the Bates Motel was a pretty peculiar place. But it couldn’t
be any crazier than this fleabag, could it?
– the end –
C. E. O’Connor is the Executive Director of ConservativesForImpeachment.
com in Arlington, Virginia. He just finished a political novel, Strike Now!