Conversation: 9/11, part 2

[Two workers hover over a computer monitor reading stories of 9/11.]

Andrew Lee Hunn: Ten bucks says we go to war with Iraq.

Redneck: Nah, that’s too easy.

ALH: We’ll bet for what country. I say Iraq, you say someplace else.

RN: I don’t have to name a country? Just war anywhere else?

ALH: Fair enough.

RN: Bet.

ALH: This is the excuse he’s been waiting for. You had to know he was going to try and top his Daddy over there.

RN: Yeah, the first Bush shoulda finished what he started.

ALH: No, the first one at least had the sense not to start something he couldn’t finish. But if there’s one thing I know about rich idiots, it’s that they’re always trying to have a bigger pecker than Daddy. Or be a bigger prick than Daddy.

RN: Why d’you always have it in for this guy? Wha’d he ever do to you?

ALH: What’s he done FOR me or you or anyone other than his rich friends? Seriously! Tell me, I wanna know!

RN: Well, he cut taxes.

ALH: Is your paycheck any fatter?

RN: No, but it takes time for it to trickle down…

ALH: I know a retired truck driver, and I asked him once about Reaganomics, and he said, “Only thing trickled down to me was a layoff!”

RN: You always talk like you know what you’re doin’, but you couldn’t do that job. I couldn’t do it either, they’re…

ALH: What, smarter than us?

RN: Yeah, I mean, they got education and business sense, and…

ALH: They’ve got friends in high places, or should I say low places, and they’ve got lots of money. There are no qualifications for elected office.

RN: Sure there are, they need experience. We don’t just put any slob in office.

ALH: Maybe we should. Tell me, if some slick suited bastard came up to you and offered you a briefcase full of money if only you would steer some government contracts his way, and you know that’s illegal, would you do it?

RN: If the contract’s gotta be filled…well, no, that’s how we wound up with those eighty-dollar toilet seats in the Army.

ALH: There you go, you’re already a better President than any we’ve had in our lifetime. If you were President, we wouldn’t be going to war.

RN: Now wait a minute, why do you say that?

ALH: ‘Cos we’re not going to war to defend anything, we’re going in order to use up bullets and ammo and toilet seats so defense contractors will be able to make more money. That’s the Vice President’s bag, you know, the defense industry. He goes out to eat with all those pricks, then he sends patriotic guys like you out to suffer and die so his buddies can buy more yachts and vacation homes.

RN: [A strange and never before encountered silence falls over the Red Neck.] Well, you may have a point, but I still think we should defend our country. Someone has to avenge those attacks.

ALH: What would you hope to achieve by that?

RN: Teach ‘em a lesson. Make ‘em think twice before attackin’ us agin’.

ALH: Okay. Let’s say your neighbor is a prick…

RN: He is!

ALH: There’s a shock. So let’s say you lose your temper and chuck a rock through his picture window. But you hate his guts and you feel like he deserved it…

RN: He does!

ALH: Beautiful. So you can’t bring yourself to apologize. Then one night, he breaks into your house, ties you up, rapes and murders your family while you watch, and burns the place down. Is that going to stop you from throwing another rock?

RN: Man, you’re sick.

ALH: If I’m sick, it’s only from reading accounts of what our own soldiers have done in the past. I shit you not, war is not what John Wayne wanted us to think it was.

RN: There’s supposed to be honor and valor—

ALH: And raping and pillaging.

RN: OK smart guy, what the heck do you propose?

ALH: Get a third party involved, before the raping and murdering starts. Both of you sit down, your neighbor admits that he’s been a prick and he’ll try not to act that way anymore, and you admit that you acted rashly and promise not to throw any more rocks. And the moderator reminds you that a return to your previous behaviors will only bring more trouble and humiliation down the road.

RN: Yeah, right, and I’ll be inviting the A-rab over for summer barbecue.

ALH: So long as it’s not pork. And who said it was your neighbor that was “A-rab” anyway?