Shakespeare and King Dubya
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ACT 3, SCENE 2
Crawford. A ranch. Enter George W. Bush, Condoleezza Rice, Dick Cheney, and Robert Gates. |
|
| RICE |
Welcome, sweet President, to Crawford, To your chamber. |
| BUSH |
Welcome, dear Condi. The weary war Hath made you black bile. And welcome you, Cheney, my thoughts’ monarch. You too are melancholic. |
| CHENEY |
No, Number Forty-three; but our acts of treason Under artful semblance of rebuffing terror Hath made it tedious, wearisome, and heavy. I want more quail here to welcome my bullets And lawyers to eat them. |
| BUSH | Your days are foul and your drink dangerous. |
| CHENEY | Go rot! |
| BUSH | Enough, poisonous bunch-backed toad. Help me welcome Gates, return’d from Iraq. He’ll tell us what to do. Gates—the untainted virtue of your years hath not Yet dived into this administration’s deceit; For what more can you distinguish of my bastard war Than of its outward show, which, God He knows, Seldom or never will bring peace to any land. The friends which you join are dangerous; You will attend to our sug’red words but look Not on the poison of our hearts. Report what you saw and what you found. |
| GATES |
Upon my return? My eyes feast upon the rotten banquet now: Namely, your sycophant mouthpiece Who prettily and aptly devours Her yellow cake delusions with mushroom clouds. She stands beside the vile overlord of Haliburton, A measureless liar, all spleen and nothing of a man. |
| BUSH | And what say you of me? |
| GATES |
A puppy-headed monster! You are the wonder of a poor drunkard, A most devout coward, religious in it. By cock and pie! Peace your lean-witted tattlings! A nation lays honors on you; You bear them as the ass bears gold. |
| CHENEY | Hang! Beg! Starve! Die in the streets! |
| GATES | Your counsel for Iraq be the same. |
| RICE |
Terrible hell! This man thinks too much. Such men are dangerous. |
| BUSH |
So have I heard and do in part believe it. But look, the oil, in undiluted mantle clad Slips neath the sand of yon high eastward dune. Break we our watch up, and by my advice Let us impart more troops, for, upon their surge Lives, dumb to us, will enrage. Needful love of might completes our greed. |
They all exit.
Read More: George W. Bush, Condoleezza Rice, Dick Cheney, Robert Gates, Iraq, war, Shakespeare
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I like it, but there is one problem. Mr. Bush couldn’t and wouldn’t talk that well.
Very nice. Brevity is the soul of wit.
Brent: Hahaha…true, true, true. George could never speak that well.
I’d try to fix it with some phraseologistic verbialagism, but it’s probably more fun to review some actual Bush quotes (reportedly assembled by Washington Post writer Richard Thompson):
I think we all agree, the past is over.
This is still a dangerous world.
It’s a world of madmen and uncertainty
and potential mental losses.
Rarely is the question asked
Is our children learning?
Will the highways of the internet become more few?
How many hands have I shaked? They misunderestimate me.
I am a pitbull on the pantleg of opportunity.
I know that the human being and the fish can coexist.
Families is where our nation finds hope, where our
wings take dream. Put food on your family!
Knock down the tollbooth!
Vulcanize society!
Make the pie higher! Make the pie higher!
Fred: Thanks! It’s interesting to add the next couple of lines to your Hamlet quote:
…since brevity is the soul of wit,
And tediousness the limbs and outward flourishes,
I will be brief: the ignoble Bush is mad.
Well, I may be a few words off on that last line, but it’s close :-)