Former CIA Director Doesn’t Know Sports

h, baby, there’s being a girl and then there’s being a girl—know what I’m saying? Take as an example former CIA Director George Tenet, the man who complains in his new book At the Center of the Storm that he became a poster boy for the fuck-up in Iraq and that his comment "It’s a Slam Dunk, Mr. President," was used as grounds for the Iraqi invasion and taken out of context. Now it turns out that, according to Tenet’s new book, the problem is trying to use sports terminology in the workplace without knowing shit about sports.

Like a lot of women out there, this reporter only watches sports for the unspoken erotic tension between the players and the frequent male touching. But honey, at least I watch. Which leaves straight boys like George Tenet trying to fumble (another sports term) around the office to describe international situations in a language the president can understand. If he don’t know sports and the president don’t know international politics, they might as well be speaking Swahili and German to each other, sweetie.

In Tenet’s new book, the freshest alibi that testifies he’s someone else who didn’t do shit to cause the unpopular war in Iraq, the former CIA Director tells how he responded to the president’s question about the intelligence that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction (WMD is so 2003 now), to which Tenet replied with the damned expression "Slam Dunk." But Tenet says the case against him is not so clear.

"The president likes to receive all of his briefings in language that the public can understand," Tenet wrote of his former boss and frequent sly critic. "This makes it easier for the razor-sharp mind of President Bush to prepare information for his press conferences—with so many things on his plate like writing a balanced budget, researching the privatization of health care, and his late-night situation meetings, sports terminology can get the point home to the American people without the president complicating the matter with the convoluted jargon familiar to President Bush, but strange to our ears.

"In this matter, I incorrectly clarified the intelligence case for Iraq’s possession of weapons of mass destruction as a ’Slam Dunk.’ I have very rarely ever seen a football game, so using this terminology was my mistake. I should have gone with ’home run,’ which is at least familiar to me because of dating slang. I did not mean that the ball was knocked out of the park. I meant that that thing happens where—what’s the term for when a player pretends to throw the ball, but you’re not sure he did, and any player could have or not have the ball? A ’clusterfuck,’ maybe? Whatever that thing is, that’s what I meant to say. Boy, I must have really messed up my sports lingo, though."

Tenet’s book further criticizes politicians out there, including the White House, for making him the scapegoat for the war because of the "Slam Dunk" comment. When the intelligence for Iraq was revealed as faulty, detractors pointed to Tenet as the face for the flawed intelligence system and put the burden on him and his people for a war that many accusers say was initiated only by the president’s interests. Tenet goes on to describe the process as "just plain mean."

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was uncharacteristically frank in her response to Tenet’s charges in her response with Wolf Blitzer on CNN Sunday.

"George screwed the pooch and he knows it," said Rice. "That’s not a sports term, so maybe I won’t have to translate it for him. We should send him to the penalty box for his knocking us over it all, but he wouldn’t know where the fuck it is anyway."

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You should take a trip into my world some time. I think you'd be pleasantly surprised. Every night before I go to sleep, I close my eyes and stroll into the kingdom of my own imagination, a fuck-yeah world that's like some kind of fantastic movie or something. It's an awesome place. Nobody has to work, nobody has to ride the bus, and all the chicks are alotta hot. Not to mention that they're all over me like, well you know, like hot chicks on a rich guy. But most importantly, in my world, we don't have any of these candy-assed reality shows that you see on TV here. Survivor? The Mole? That crap is for kids who think eating worms is cool. In my world the reality shows rock, and you know they rock hard.

Probably the most popular reality show in my world is called Feeb Factor. Imagine this, if you can: How will three different pharma-doped-up old farts with high blood pressure and veins as thin as crepe paper react when they're subjected to increasingly stressful and radical environments? The top tier involves making a mad-dash across a football field with a summer sausage stitched to your throat while a pack of crazed, starving German shepherds are released right on your goddamned heels. Keep in mind that you only get this privilege after you've passed the second-most-gnarly fear test, where everybody has to sleep with this nasty old hooker who's like a potluck of weird sex diseases, only some of which are known to science. Some of the middle levels are especially sweet, too. There's one where you glue your face to a wolf's ass and get thrown down a bobsled run wearing only a pair of sneakers. How wicked is that? Or how about the one where you get shot out of a cannon into a gigantic man-made beehive that instead of bees is full of serial killers? Or the one where you have to climb a skyscraper in a hurricane using a rope made of live rats? Holy shit! But to be honest none of the old bastards ever make it past the "parallel parking" test at the beginning. One lady even had a brain aneurysm while they were introducing her to the studio audience. It's a shame, really. But there are some joke challenges they throw in that are pretty killer, like having to run naked into a bank and withdraw $50 to buy some pants. Or one time they stapled all the foges to the studio floor and had them reenact that hilarious "I've Fallen and I Can't Get Up!" show from the 80's.

The next most popular reality show in my world is called Temptation Island of the Cannibal Sluts. Six average guys are let loose on the island, just looking to score. Only one comes back. Actually, usually none of them come back but it doesn't seem to hurt ratings, and Arby's has a tie-in promotional deal for a pretty choice sandwich. One time a guy came back but he'd just spent the whole time recording birdcalls, I don't know what his problem was.

One season they tried doing Temptation Island in Manhattan, with the whole island as the set, but that just got confusing as one guy ended up with a family, another got engaged to a drag queen and the others were all hacked up by the Meat Market Killer. Cool idea though.

Another popular reality show in my world is Big Brother, which sounds familiar, but it's actually way cooler than you think. On this one, contestants are assigned an immature, muscle-bound and nearly psychotic older brother who belittles them in front of their friends, pushes them around and tries to score with their girlfriends when they're at band practice. The first one to crack and split open their Big Brother's head with a jack-handle wins. This is one that really hits home.

So I don't think you have to waste any time arguing that this world's feeble reality programming can hold any kind of candle to the awesome shit I've got going on in my head. Maybe one day those TV people will wise up and come to me for ideas, but they seem to be the stubborn sort who will have to suffer through some pretty weak ratings before they wise up and decide to cash in the gold mine I've got going on upstairs.

Incidentally, the movies in my world kick a lot more ass than the ones here do, too. If you haven't seen Allan Quarterbag and the City of Lost Couch Poofs, or Fuzzbumbers in Paradise, and I'm thinking you haven't since they've only played out on the vast theater screen in my imagination, you truly haven't enjoyed film. Sucks to be you, but you have my condolences.

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I'm thinking about getting into the stand-up comedy business. I don't consider myself to be all that funny really... well maybe wearing a fruit-covered headdress and some canastas to the premiere of "Lambada: The Forbidden Dance" was pretty funny, but more on point I don't have a serious interest in stand-up comedy. But it does seem to be the lucritive pathway to success as a celebrity endorser of phone company services. Which is my real dream, when you get down to brass tacks that look like they're gold until you get down and really look at them close. I want to be the guy on television who's telling you to press a bunch of numbers on your phone so you'll save big. I don't care what the numbers are, you can make them up if you want. Go ahead. I'm not claiming to be an artist here. I just want to tell people what to do.

I'm sure you're asking yourself right now, "Well Omar, if they've already got George Carlin, what in the world do they need you for?". Good question. It seems to me I'll have to carve my own niche. Surely there's other phone company services that need advertising. I think I'll be the guy who tells you that if you pick up the phone and you don't get a dial tone, press the hang-up switch a bunch of times fast. The next step is to hit the receiver on the outside of the phone booth. See? I know this stuff. I watch movies.

I think I can make a career out of this, maybe even spin it off into a sitcom. Like what about those times you pick up the phone and there's somebody already on the line, WHEN IT NEVER EVEN RANG? Isn't that freaky? How do they do that? I think we could do a whole season on that. I'm thinking about having Don Ameche as my sidekick. I've always thought he was serious sidekick material.

Besides, the industry has already done too many adds on calling collect. It's tired, so formula. The people want something fresh. I think we could go high-tech... like a series of spots on phone taps. They're more common than you think. Sometimes I'm talking on the phone and I'll hear it in the backgroud, just this clicking sound. Click click. Who's tapping my phone? I'm not saying I'm any kind of expert on phone taps here, but if they were going to make a sound, I think that would be it. Click click. Tap tap. Y'know? We could do an animated spot with Barney Rubble as my straight man. Like in those old commercials you used to see. "BARNEY! You wiretapped my phone!". And then I could chase him around in a costume or something. I think that would make people want to call more long distance.

That gets me to thinking about commercials in general. Why is it that you never see the people you trust endorsing products? When's the last time Chris Rock called anybody collect? I don't think so. We need more credible sources, the people want to know. Like what does President Clinton take when he gets Herpies Symplex B? That's a hell of an endorsement. What does Kenny Rogers know about chicken? I want to eat at Domingo Pavoratti's Roasters. That tub looks like he knows his chicken. Jerry Seinfeld for American Express? What does he care if it has a high annual rate? He's probably just tired of getting papercuts from handling so much cash. Put Kato Kaelin up there on the screen. Put his hide-a-bed sleepin' mug on an American Express card and I'll think about it.

Until next time, I'm Omar Bricks.

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