Difficile est satiram non scribere.
(It is difficult not to write satire.)
--Juvenal
Bush Signs No-Call Bill, Hurdles Remain
Mon September 29, 2003 05:39 PM ET
By Andy Sullivan
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Bush signed into law on Monday a bill removing a hurdle to the national "do not call" list which officials predicted would be largely effective despite other legal setbacks. Bush's signature overrules the objection of a judge in Oklahoma City who said the FTC did not have the proper authority to oversee the list. Congress quickly rewrote the law last week to give the FTC the authority. "Given a choice, Americans prefer not to receive random sales pitches at all hours of the day and the American people should be free to restrict these calls," Bush said.
At the same time, Bush decried the effort by the United nations to setup a parallel effort, known as the "Do Not Invade" list. Originally suggested by Cuba as long ago as 1961, the Do Not Invade list has been a perennial non-starter due to the Objections of the United States Department of Telemarketing, Tele-Democracy, and Tele-Explosives.
Nonetheless, its cause continues to be pushed by nations such as Syria and Iran. "Do you have idea how annoying it is" asked the Iranian Minister for Innocuous and Unobjectionable Nuclear Programs, "to be sitting down to dinner with your family only to have the International Atomic Energy Agency ring the doorbell and insist on vacuuming up Uranium samples?"
Many others agree. Pakistan reports that America routinely calls and asks if they are interested in subscribing to the New York Times or shutting down ties to the Taliban, even though Pakistan insists it has already done both, and Yemen reports it cannot get through an evening at home without Washington calling and hinting that a new credit card tied to its mineral reserves would strongly reduce its chances of being paved over with cluster bombs.
Nonetheless, the United States insists the creation of such a list would be a disaster. "Thousands of Americans make their living in the telepersuasion industry, and the enforcement of a Do Not Carpet Bomb list would throw many of them out of work." said Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld. "And most of these people are unemployable in civilian life outside the CATO Institute or Heritage Foundation."
States such as Syria disagree. "Just because some ninny in Central Asia decides to grant overflight rights doesn't mean the rest of us are actually going to be persuaded by some PFC reading from a clunky script about the advantages of political and cultural prostitution," said Syria's Minister of Burying One's Valuables Before the Invaders Get Here. "If I didn't want to switch my long distance provider from the Syrian Air Force to the Kitty Hawk Battle Group last week, why would I change my mind this week?"
He and his colleagues hope that, even if they cannot get the Do Not Obliterate List up and running, perhaps they can at least get the Pentagon to stop sending out dozens of junk mail solicitations suggesting "You may already be a Dead Man." The letters, featuring the faces of Ed McMahon and Paul Wolfowitz, had to be read very carefully before the recipients realized they had not necessarily won the Grand Prize (a million tons of high explosive), and that sending in complete blueprints for banned weapons facilities was not in fact a requirement for entry into the sweepstakes. Nonetheless, many continue to watch the skies for the distinctive contrails of the B-52s of the "prize patrol."
(Remember, Kids, the part in bold is actual 100% news-flavored media product. The rest is the fakey part.)
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