Bush Unveils Martyr Prevention Hotline

n the face of wildly escalating violence in Israel and Palestine, political commentators the world over have been looking to American President George W. Bush for a sign as to the path America will take in dealing with the Mideast crisis. After making an early dismissive statement about how at least the Palestinians don't have flight schools, Bush had been conspicuously quiet on the issue. Some observers theorized that the president was carefully weighing America's options before he made a public statement, while others argued that his attentions had been split between a new model train set and the Fox prime-time drama 24. Today's announcement might have proved either side correct.

In a press conference this morning, Bush unveiled plans for a new Office of Martyr Prevention, headed by syndicated radio call-in therapist Dr. Judy Kuriansky and manned by a staff of 300 licensed suicide-prevention professionals who will be available via a toll-free telephone number 24 hours a day.

"I have created the OMP in response to the internationalary outcry for American action to address the Mideast peacelessness," Bush stated. "Suicide bombers are threatening world peace and the time has come to find a solution. These young men and women need to be shown that there are other, better ways to express their anger and frustration than blowing up a Circle K with explosive underpants.The answer is not to perpetuate terroristical attacks of an inhumanitarian nature. I understand that the people of Palestine, and other miserable places I need not mention by name, need a shoulder to cry on. Now they know that America is there for them, over thousands of miles of telephone wires. No need to come here, we'll pick up the phone bill. There's nothing to blow up here that you couldn't blow up back home, anyway. Operators are standing by."

Dr. Judy Kuriansky accepted her appointment with a brief speech on the Mideast situation. "It's time to break the cycle of violence. The time has come for Palestinian youth to understand that the dark, dead pit of bile in their chests is not the bitterness of living in a relocation slum or the dull ache of hunger, nor is it some tiny embryonic Jew implanted in their chests that's gnawing at their internal organs, regardless of what their newspapers tell them. It's the all-too-familiar ache of feelings yearning to be expressed.

"What we need here is communication. Palestine needs to stand up and say to Israel: 'It hurt my feelings when you kicked the snot out of our armed forces back in 1967.' And Israel needs to say to Palestine: 'Hey, asshole, if you hadn't attacked us then you wouldn't have lost all the land you're bitching about now. What's your freakin' problem, anyway?' And Palestine needs to say back to Israel: 'Listen, we never agreed to let you guys move in here in the first place, and now you're trying to force us all to move to Jordan. Fuck Jordan, Jordan sucks.' And then the UN needs to come over and slap them both on the back and say: 'Alright, you're all a bunch of assholes, but we need to do something about this or the rest of the world is going to run out of explosives.' Then the UN can take them both out and get them drunk and hope they have sex together and we end up with a bunch of Jewrab babies so nobody can tell who they're supposed to blow up any more. But my point is that communication is the key."

National reaction to today's announcement has been typically harsh, with many critics pointing out that there aren't any Circle K stores in the Middle East. At press time, OMP staffers had received three phone calls: two wrong numbers looking for Sears AutoCenter and a call from Iowa asking if it was possible to overdose on mini-marshmallows.

Reactions from Palestine have been even less promising, with Hamas leader Zaccaria Walid Akel promising a large cash reward for the family of the first suicide bomber to blow up OMP headquarters.

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My first month of retirement has been a rough one. Since I'm all out of acting jobs, I've had to go looking for a new source of steady income. I mean, I still get my commune pay, but that's about as steady as the San Franciscan fault lines. And about as big as the straight population of that city.

Have you ever had to get a job before? Man, they suck. People tell you what to do and expect you to get it done or they'll fire you. If you ask them about your motivation they'll tell you to do it or you'll get fired. No subtext work at all, these guys. And very few of them cater worth a shit either. I tell you, this is the 21st century. How am I supposed to watch the register without a break when I haven't had any rye bread and pimento-less olive snacks in more than twenty minutes? Not a good way to keep your employees happy.

So in the three weeks since I announced my retirement, I've gotten jobs at Pizza Hut, K-Mart, Home Depot, Uncle Macho's Family-Style Restaurant, Target, and Bed, Bath & Beyond. I've also gotten fired from Pizza Hut, K-Mart, Home Depot, Uncle Macho's Family-Style Restaurant, Target, and Bed, Bath & Beyond. If nothing else, I'm a completist, right?

All my jobs go through the same life cycle—I get hired, things are okay for a while, and then I'm fired for no reason at all. Right now I'm working for Ms. Diffy's Jewelry, and I'm in that middle "everything's cool" phase. I'll probably get fired by tomorrow or the day after. Wednesday, if I play my cards right.

It's not as great as you'd think, working in a jewelry store. They make you sell things to people. Customers act like complete dicks and you can't tell them they can't shop there anymore. Which I don't understand, because when I'm on the other side of the counter, that's what I usually get. At least I'll know how things really work the next time some smart-ass employee tells me that bullshit.

I've never met Ms. Diffy. I guess she lives on some ranch somewhere in Arkansas, or wherever diamond magnates live. South Africa maybe. Ms. Diffy's second in command is Julie, the shift supervisor. I've been trying to get Ms. Diffy on the phone all week to let her know Julie is a real bitch who hires all her friends and treats everybody like shit, but the secretary I get on the phone at the head office keeps trying to tell me Ms. Diffy is only a corporate icon and doesn't really exist. I've heard some lame excuses to get out of showing up to work, but that takes the cake. I should probably call in sick sometime to Bagel and tell him I never existed, I'm only a corporate entity designed to sell the commune. He'd probably buy it, if you catch him early enough.

Oh, here's some more bullshit from the world of retail jewelry: Did you know you can't wear the stuff out, like, even if you have important shit going on later? You could've knocked me over with a fart when they told me that. I tried all the angles, too, like telling them it was good for the business, free advertising or whatever. I told them my doctor said I had a condition where I had to wear two pounds of diamonds or I get sick. Nothing. They knew it was all bullshit. At least the people at Uncle Macho's were more gullible, and let me wear all the chicken wings I could carry.

I'm not desperate enough to go back to acting or anything. Shit, I hope I'll never be that desperate. But I am almost ready for some major alternatives to working. Like going for a college business degree.

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Dear commune:

I’m an idiot. Let’s just get that out in the open right now so there’s no confusion on the subject. Judge me if you will, and egg my minivan if you must, I won’t put up any kind of lame, face-saving argument to the contrary. As you may have guessed, I completely forgot to send out thank-you notes for the Christmas presents I received last year. Totally slipped my mind. Didn’t even think of it until last Tuesday, when I was shopping for a Christmas bone for my dog and I suddenly realized I was the one in the doghouse. Figuratively.

My immediate urge was to correct this oversight, posthaste. I even had a box of thank-you notes and a pair of wavy border-cutting scissors in my cart when it dawned on me that Christmas, this year’s version, is less than a week away! So what should I do? Should I send out the belated thank-yous now, only to follow them in less than a week’s time with additional notes of gratitude for this year’s presents? What if they get the first one and think this means I didn’t get this year’s presents? What if they sent me the same thing two years in a row and they think I opened it early? That’s not very nice. Should I wait until after Christmas and send dual thank-you notes? Or would that just be rubbing it in their faces that I spent a whole year not appreciating their present? Or should I just consider last year’s gaffe water under the bridge and hope they didn’t notice? But then I might have to start pretending like I did send a note last year, should it come up, and that’s one web of lies that could prove sticky. Maybe I should just say piss on it and not send any notes this year either, rather than drawing attention to the fact I forgot to last year. I could even return to sender any notes I receive, like "What the hell is this? I don’t want your charity. Asshole." Yeah.

It’s times like this I often ask myself that timeless question: WWtcD? What would the commune do?

Larry Belfast
Lower Bend, MO


Dear Larry:

Thank-you notes? Jesus Pete! No time to write, Larry, the commune has about 30 years of poor manners to catch up on and time is short! Last thing we want is to get crushed under a bus tomorrow and sent to Emily Post’s own personal version of hell. Quick, how do you spell bar mitzvah?

the commune

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Editor’s Note: the commune is not responsible for any embarrassing misspellings or grammatical boners on the gravestones of your dearly departed. “the commune’s Gravestone Proofreading Service� was a woefully misbegotten brainstorm courtesy of commune stone-bleeder Gay Bagel, and we must stress that what goes around should come around specifically to him some time when the rest of us are all out of pistol range.

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