Ghost Troop Home Page April Fools Part 2
Boys and girl, I’m Captain May, and if you don’t know me you don’t know shit. You are badly outside the loop, because the prez already knows who I am. He knows that he will soon cease to hold his office because of me. By the end of this letter you will know so, too.
I am the man who cried his eyes
out, rode a bike a thousand miles, then risked my life (a la Dr. David Kelly)
because I was heartbroken at the fate of my comrades in Iraq. I was once a boy cavalryman too, just like
the boys and men of the 3/7 Cavalry, whose deaths are a silent obscenity across
Hey James, I’m a baldy, too, so I dig the look. I have almost come to respect you for being scathing, articulate and intellectually courageous. Had you followed your gut and screamed out the truth that was cutting into your soul back in July, I would have respected you. Instead though, you got told to cool it for the paycheck, and you did. Since then you’ve been a loser in my book, which is about to be the book. Now pick your dick up out of the dirt and use your talents as an American to rectify the fucked-up Constitution and the deluded psyche of the public. I don’t mind the fact that you’re an asshole, because I’m one, too. You’re invited to join my light cavalry, and I’m having more fun than Jeb Stuart.
Like you, I’m a cracker who’s most at home with coloreds. I was born with a sky-high IQ and enough ego to climb up despite the constant attacks by guys with half my brains and piece-of-shit establishmentarian credentials and connections. I just hate ‘em, don’t you? They remind me of the prez.
I suspect that you and I share more than hairstyle. That’s why I like and loathe you the most, because I would have expected better from a Southerner than I’ve seen, sir, and I hope you are man enough to profit from the correction.
One last thing: Quit trying to out-yell everyone like one of my brother Baptists. Man, hollering holy rollers ran me out of church years ago.
Hey Bob, I think you may have actually read Machiavelli. Have you? Well, in Il Principe he notes that there are two kinds of men: foxes and lions. You are a fox. A fox like you will never be lured into a trap, but he has a great failing: He is not brave and capable when attacked. You see, that’s a job for lions like me. Actually, you rather remind me of a comrade of mine, Dr. David Kelly. He was a fox, and a fine one at that, but I believe his government assassinated him. (So do you and so do you all, by the way, but you’re nowhere near to saying it.)
Do you ever feel like Dr. Kelly, Bob?
You should. If we become a police state, folks are going to look back at all the July CNN tapes and transcripts and they’re going to realize that you were uttering words about military coups and impeachments and blood on the president’s hands. You did it in loud, ironic tones, of course, but now you should learn some wisdom from a military intelligence lion: The people you and your clever colleagues will deal with in the future that you are helping to create will be men who have proved themselves by enduring brutal lives and brutal training as specialists in areas you don’t even want to talk about. They are clever, they are cruel, and they study books about the psychology of homicide. They will be quite as formidable as the Gestapo and the SS. I know their type, because I was one of them, and I’ll tell you for them that if they take over, your irony isn’t going to sound so ironic. How’s that for irony, Bob?
Here’s more: If it’s true that you blew the cover of Ambassador Wilson’s wife for the White House, then you’ll deserve whatever you get as the toady of a tyrant.
Tucker, you and the other boy
(no offense, but I forget his name) are O.K., in a snide sort of preppy way,
but as far as I’m concerned, it’s a dull day when it comes down to you two,
unless there’s some spice from the guests.
Y’all lack the power of the asshole Carville and the irony of the fox
Novak. Give it time, boys, give it
time. I’ll be watching to see you grow
up. Handle this letter correctly, by all
means, because I’ll certainly have looked up your names before I append this it
to the Congressional Hearing that I’ve got set up like a big booby trap for the
media. When that happens you’ll have to
prove that you have been as grown up as the boys who have died downrange, whom
you do not honor by acknowledging their deaths.
By the way, this letter to Crossfire is instantly a chapter in the book,
which is simply the report of it all, seen from the eyes of an unembedded military/media pro. Shit, fellas, I’m
one of the Army guys who cooked up the plan to make you our bitches in the
prison of political power games. Anyway,
the document I’ve been cooking up from the underground will soon complete my
anti-war operations by ending the war in
Boys, I’ll dismiss you with a bit of advice: Y’all have tried to surf a mighty tricky wave of political doom, and there’s the riptide of public opinion waiting when you fall off. Soon it will be every man for himself. That’s too bad, but none of you had the guts to lay it on the line for justice. Repent and recant, all of you. James, I thought you said it right when you suggested that everyone just go down to the confessional (or the Congressional, as it will turn out) and bare the truth. I guess now the first rat out of the sinking ship (or should I be the first to say the burning bush) will be the most likely to survive with a career.
Wait a minute Tucker. I need to tell you something special. When you were threatening to throw hot coffee onto Carville after he accused you of not caring about enlisted men, I’m glad you didn’t do it – for your sake. I’m pretty sure all four of you knew about the cover-up of the Battle of Baghdad and the whole propaganda sham of the war, but the tension was running really high that week (July 14-18), because you guys were clever enough to see the foundations of our republic upheaved. If Carville is still a true soldier, then at the moment he was shouting for the forgotten soldiers he was feeling a little of the agony I have felt for five months, and brother, I have howled at the fucking moon and scared away the wolves. That day that man would have hurt you, because for a moment he was man enough to feel the outrage of the desecrated dead. Squabble with a veteran like Carville over a parking space or a piece of ass and he’ll back down, because he’s mostly bluff, but don’t try him when he’s grieving for his comrades.
And now for another kind of fox (and, God knows, I don’t mean Novak): Hey, fox, I don’t even know your name, but you’ve stuck in there well this week. You had some nervousness, and that’s natural, but you also sent out some good vibes. I dig the tats, and I think you’re crazy – I dig that even more. I like boldness in women as much as in men, I just don’t find much of it in either gender, especially not in journalists.
I write poetry, read books, teach martial arts and fuck with people who fuck with the people I love, soldiers at the top of the list. If you ever want to listen to some Hendrix and have a hand-rolled cig, call me up or bring me over to the studio. I’ll be good and listen to Bach if you want. I’ll bet you write poetry, or used to, until you decided to be a journalist…
You kinda
remind me of Nancy Shafran, a semi-foxy news director
for KPRC (NBC) in
Anyhow, one day after an
editorial board meeting, I gave
It’d be a damn shame if that was true for you, because the thing a cowboy hates to see worse than anything is road kill, and a road-killed soul is the sorriest sight of all. Ask the boys.
A couple of words about me: I’m a weird mix of fascist and anarchist, black belt and white knight. I’ve got a red/blue yin/yang on my right shoulder because I’m a priest of Thor. Let’s talk. I’ll show you some weapons and tae kwon do forms, break a brick for you and talk about Homer or hell-raising, whichever you prefer. How can you resist?
Babe, you’re the freshest thing they’ve had on the air since I’ve been watching. How ‘bout you and one of the boys call me up for your not-so-scary amateur ambush. Just to make it even, how about me and you against as many of the boys as want to show up for the wrong side. I’ll win your heart when I show you the intellectual cavalry captain’s solution on how to counter Crossfire. Anyone with decades of soldiering could tell you, but hell, who in your neck of the woods has any experience? All these megamedia pukes do is talk to military public affairs guys (which I used to be) directed by military higher commands (which I used to be) to dress up the Bushling’s version of war for a public that y’all continue to bullshit.
You know this, right? And that makes you bright, right? Wrong, darlin’. I had it all figured out before it happened, and that’s a damned fact, which I am pleased to say will soon be appearing in my emerging but instant classic, the best military book since T.E. Lawrence, who gave me a lot of the ideas, to tell you the truth. (I only steal ideas or kisses from the best.) And hey, fox, you’ve got more balls than the boys, so put a message out to the prez out for me today:
“Why should anyone expect the
Bush Team to have a coherent war plan. They have buried the Army up to the axles in
Middle Eastern quicksand, and now they want to gun the engine and spin the
wheels by having Senators Hutchison and McCain holler for more troops.
“For God’s sake, the prez, the veep or the SecDef have run this war from the beginning over the
objections of their military and intelligence professionals, but the sad truth
is that the three of them couldn’t field-clean an M-16 to save their lives, and
they can’t run a war to save ours!”
Captain
May, former general staff officer, 75th Army Division
If you want to get together on air, write back – personally. I don’t deal with fucking producers. Consider it an honor that I’m allowing you to invite me, ‘cause you and Christiane Amanpour (apologies for the spelling) are the only folks in TV land to whom I’ll say a word. The reason I’ll talk to you is that you’re a fox. Do you usually play muse or a siren? I bet you’ll say “muse,” and I bet the truth is “siren.” Smile when you say it and I won’t care. The reason I’ll talk to Christiane is better: she is a mensch. She felt outrage while CNN covered up the Battle of Baghdad, and it showed; then she felt outrage again on Mayday, and it showed. She didn’t like it any more than I did when the Bushling took a plane ride into a Disney World War. I admire her for having the simple human decency that the all-American CNN home crew lacked.
Since that bloody weekend in April I have assumed a title that no man would ever want, and I conclude my message to you with it:
Captain May, Commander, Ghost Troop, 3/7
Cavalry (Light)
PS: If we meet the boys mano a mano, you won’t be the nervous one, trust me.
PPS: I’ve included the last few days of my report. I wouldn’t be writing you if I weren’t entering the last phase of operations, termed rout. That’s the military word for when your opponent has lost spirit, turned, run and is waiting to be cut down by the cavalry. We come.