Two years ago, to mark Halloween, I related the frightening but true story of the Headless Camelman of Fallujah. Having nothing better to do today except laugh at Bush's mounting problems, I decided to take a break from that and retell the Camelman story. I must reiterate that this is all true.... It also serves to explain why the people of Fallujah are so loyal to little ol' me. Enjoy.

The Legend of Camelman

When I was growing up, and even as a young, studly man baggin' babes left and right, I used to hear stories about some half-man, half-camel creature known as "Camelman." Supposedly this beast prowled the desert of northwestern Iraq, occassionally feasting on unsuspecting good looking teenagers foolishly caught in the throes of unbridled hormonal passion. But I, as all other well educated Iraqi citizens (both of them) dismissed the tales as fables concocted by superstitious villagers to keep the kids in line. However, I would soon learn that it was I who was ignorant....

It was late 1973 when I was on a date with Barbara Streisand. We were in the backseat of my brand new Chevy Vega while parked at the Tikrit Drive-In Cinema and Drafthouse. All of a sudden, Babs jumped up and said she thought she heard something.

Well, I'm busy rounding third base and heading for home plate, so of course I'm going to tell her that I didn't hear anything, so please put your hand back where it was.

No sooner did I start to slide in for the score, that the car began rocking back & forth, up and down, and side to side. Meanwhile, Barbara's screaming at the top of her lungs, "OH GOD OH GOD OH GOD...." Needless to say I was feeling pretty darn proud of my performance.... Or at least I was until I realized I wasn't the one rocking the car... OR Barbara!

I looked up only to see some hideous apparition with a furry face, big ears, and a great big hump on his back clawing at the windows! Well, I immediately yelled and reached for my gun, but the man-beast galloped off into the night before I could shoot my load.

Er, the load in my gun, I mean.

So a few years later, after I had come to power, I kept hearing the tales about Camelman. The beast continued to terrorize the people in the area between Baghdad, Tikrit, and Fallujah, and my fellow Sunnis were begging me to help. Of course, my aids all thought these people were nuts, and I couldn't let on that I knew the stories were true. Plus, we were at war with Iran, so I couldn't just order my generals to go chasing after some myth. Well, I guess I could have, but then they'd start talking behind my back, and I'd have to launch a purge, and execute dozens of previously loyal underlings. And going into a war, I frankly didn't need the distraction.

So in September of '81 I recruited 18 students from Baghdad's Kadhimya High School to go look for Camelman. Well, except I kind of lied. First time in my life, too. I told them it was part of some sort of science project. I calculated that if they disappeared, then I'd have an excuse to send military units up there to search for them.... And for anything else... "suspicious."

Needless to say, they vanished without a trace.

So I began sending army units into the area. But they, too, would either disappear entirely, or else turn up dead and horribly mutilated.

Meanwhile, I'm trying to fight a frikkin' war with Iran, so my resources were somewhat limited. Yet, I also couldn't just ignore the Camelman problem. If he had been victimizing Kurds or Shiites, I wouldn't have given a crap. But this... "thing" was eating my fellow Sunni Muslims! We were already a minority of the population, so I could ill afford to keep losing supporters. Plus, I shrewdly realized that if I got rid of Camelman once and for all, the people of the "Sunni Triangle" would be forever indebted to me. After all, one never knows when one might need to go into hiding for an extended period of time....

So the last week of October, I decided to go after Camelman myself. Nothing happened the first few nights, but on the 31st, I heard a strange noise outside my tank. I peeked outside, and sure enough, it was HIM!!!

But before I could react, Camelman ripped the main barrel right off the turret and ate it. Hoping for reinforcements, I immediatly started driving towards Fallujah with him right behind me. Then, on the outskirts of the city, the stupid tank ran out of gas! I scrambled out the safety hatch just as he began tearing the turret to shreds. I bravely began lobbing grenades at the creature, but Camelman just ate those as well. I tried firing a few mortar rounds at him, but he was still hungry.

I briefly toyed with the idea of taming Camelman and starting an animal act in Vegas, but that dream disappeared in a puff of reality when the beast devoured my machine gun. It was at this point, seemingly face to face with the instrument of my death, that I vowed to never again be caught without a supply of weapons of mass destruction.

My eyes gaught the gleam of my sword amid the tattered remains of my tank. It had only recently been forged from special steel in Japan by a retired Samurai Master. And for the skeptics among you, I'm actually quite good with a sword. Who do you think taught Uma Thurman her technique in Kill Bill? That's right; it was me! Back when the two of us were dating, of course.

But I digress....

In a bold move, I somersaulted over the creature's head, performing a dramatic slow-motion triple backflip in midair for no discernable reason except that it looked really cool, and landed behind Camelman. He swung at me wildly with his tail, but I deftly avoided it by cartwheeling across the ground. In one smooth move I grabbed my sword, lept to my feet, and ran up the wall of a nearby three story building to the roof. From there. I saw a telephone cable directly over the now thoroughly confused creature's head and jumped. Grabbing the cable with one hand and holding the sword in the other, I sliced through the thick wire like it was butter. I swung down towards Camelman, and blindly swung the blade.

As I landed in a cloud of dust just down the street, I turned just in time to see the beast's head fall to the ground and roll down a storm drain. The rest of the body stood there motionless for a moment, then toppled forward and landed with a dull thud in the dirt.

And that, ladies and gentlemen, was the end of Camelman.

Epilogue

Stories persist to this day that the ghost of Camelman appears every Halloween and wanders the streets of Fallujah searching for his missing head. However, in 22 years, there has never been another documented attack by the creature.

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Wonderful news out of the United States! Vice President Cheney's top aid, Lewis Libby, was indicted yesterday on charges of perjury. Libby lied under oath and deliberately tried to mislead investigators who were looking into the leaking of a CIA agent's name. This agent--whose name I won't mention here because I don't want to get myself in trouble... well, more trouble than I'm already in--is married to Joe Wilson. Wilson, you may recall, was the guy who went to Niger to investigate those claims that I had been buying yellow cake uranium. When he decided that the whole thing was a scam, he went public with his doubts, thereby embarrassing the President.

So this whole thing gets down to the trumped up reasons for attacking Iraq, and the efforts by Bush's people to get revenge against anyone who dared question the Administration.

And I'm the one who's on trial!?!? Give me a break!

One would think that a country as powerful as the United States, so quick to impose freedom on the rest of the world, and claiming to be so proud of its military, would treat its soldiers like heroes, right? That would seem perfectly reasonable, wouldn't it?

Well, you would be wrong.

A Michigan woman recently traveled to Indiana to see her husband off to war. Any loving spouse would do the same, since this may well be the last time the two of them ever see each other again. As reward for her own efforts--as well as her husband's sacrifice--Suzette Boler was fired by her employer, some company called Benefit Management Administrators, Inc.

Some benefits package, eh?

The American military death toll has now hit 2000 in Iraq, and President Bush says more are certain to follow. The American people, on the other hand, are becoming increasingly skeptical about Bush's war.

And what does the President have to show for it? Not much. Iraq is in complete disarray, and much of Europe is genuinely worried that the country is turning into the world's newest terrorist breeding ground.

And need I point out that this is happening in a country that did not have terrorists before? A country that had nothing to do with the 9/11 attacks? A country that had NONE of its citizens among the 19 hijackers (Indeed, 15 of the 19 were Saudis, and the leader of the plot was an Egyptian)? A country which has now become fragmented and descended to the brink of civil war?

But Bush says that it is better to fight the terrorists here rather than the streets of America. Does that mean that the thousands of innocent Iraqi civilians that have died as a result of the terror attacks here--attacks we didn't have until Bush butted into our internal affairs--are some how less valuable than American citizens?

Um, okay, don't answer that last one.

As it stands now, Bush's policies have only increased anger and resentment throughout the Arab world. Sure, there are thousands terrorists flocking to Iraq to fight. But the only reason they're becoming terrorists in the first place is because there are Americans occupying the country. If it weren't for that, these so-called "terrorists" would still be tending to their goats in Syria or Jordan.

Many of you are probably wondering how the Iraqi people feel about my trial. Well, most are probably torn. On the one hand, most are glad to see that I'm out of power. Yet many of those same people also miss the strict sense of discipline I used to impose upon the country.

It's kind of like a teenager: They claim to hate their parents, and insist they would be better off without them. Yet these same kids also welcome the sense of limits parents impose upon them.... Including the occasional dope slap upside their 15 year old heads.

A perfect case in point is Hassan Alwan Saad, who is the mayor of a small town north of Baghdad:

“He was a great president,” said Saad, 50, as images of Saddam's trial flashed on a small television. “He was a dictator. He did bad things to his people. But he was able to control the whole country. Today, everything is out of control.”

Saad obviously recognizes that sometimes you have to take the bad with the good.

A similar comment came from Raed Mahmoud:

"Iraqis would be more critical of the former regime if life were better today."

Indeed. With all the power outages that now plague the country, one has to wonder just how many people were even able to view my hearing the other day.

A rat on some island near New Zealand evaded capture by scientists for 18 weeks.

So what? I evaded capture by the entire American army for 25 weeks!!!

Er, not that I'm comparing myself to a rat, of course.

Did you see me in court yesterday? I was pretty impressive, wasn't I? Especially when that stupid judge asked me if I was guilty of killing all those people. Well, of course not!!! What an idiotic question!!! What kind of moron would even ask such a thing!?!? Then again, he was a Kurd, which explains a lot.

I started to kick those two guards asses, but then I decided to back off. I didn't want to embarrass them on worldwide TV.

Congratulations to Mohamed ElBaradei and the International Atomic Energy Agency for winning this year's Nobel Peace Prize. I'm sure President Bush was disappointed, not only for failing to get nominated, but for the choice of a final winner as well.

The Bush Administration had long been seeking to have ElBaradei removed from his position. The trouble started back in 2003 during the run-up to the unlawful, illegal, and highly irregular invasion of my peace-loving sovereign nation. Bush and his people kept insisting I had a highly advanced nuclear weapons program, while the IAEA said there was no proof of it. And I think by now, the entire stinkin' world knows who turned out to be right on that little point, eh?

More recently, ElBaradei's agency has been locking horns with Bush over how to best handle the nukes program in Iran. And despite the tremendous amount of international respect that Bush has earned in recent years (HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!) ElBaradei has been mostly winning that argument.

Well, I better get to bed. I've got a big day tomorrow.

The U.S. State Department says that my upcoming trial will close a "dark chapter" in the history of Iraq.

What a load of camel crap!!! Until the Americans figure out how to keep the electricity on in Baghdad and the rest of the country, that darkness isn't going anywhere.

Well, voting on the new constitution is continuing. I'm disappointed to report that so far there has been no massive loss of life.

On the other hand, turnout in the Sunni regions appears to be light while in the Shiite areas it is very heavy. This bodes well for continuous political infighting and childish bickering in the future.... Kind of like of like the Democrats and the Republicans in the United states.

I gotta hand it to those nutty insurgents: The day before the big vote on the new, temporary Iraqi constitution (temporary because I plan to make paper airplanes out of it the moment I return to power) they knocked out a major power transmission line leading to Baghdad and plunged the whole city into darkness! It's so bad, in fact, that I'm being forced to post this entry by candlelight!

The outage won't interfere with the voting directly since they are using paper ballots. It does, however, send a major message about the sad state of affairs in the country.

President Bush recently held a much publicized "conversation with U.S. troops" in Iraq. The teleconferenced question and answer session was intended to show the American people that things here are going wonderfully well despite the occasional car bombing that kills a hundred innocent women and children.

Now it turns out that not only was the whole thing staged, but the questions and answers were rehearsed as well.

Quick! Go to Google, type in the word failure, and click the "I'm feeling lucky" button.

There's another round of elections coming up this Saturday, and I have been given permission to vote in them. Some people are surprised by this, but they really shouldn't be. After all, it's not like I've been convicted of anything.... Yet.

On the other hand, I'm yet to decide IF I will vote. After all, if my name isn't on the ballot, what's the point? And I'm certainly not inclined to vote for anyone else since that would only give a false claim of legitimacy to this foolish talk of democracy for Iraq.

Most importantly, I'm afraid I might embarrass myself. You see, while I've voted plenty of times in past elections, my name's always been the ONLY one on the ballot. That certainly makes things a lot easier when it comes to determining a winner. And with only one name to pick from, it's not like I have to stand there and make up my mind. But now, with all these different people to pick from, I don't know if I could handle the stress.

On the other hand, by voting I'll get to see who's running. That will give me an idea of who to arrest and torture once I return to power.

Have you seen that video of the New Orleans police officers beating up the unarmed drunk guy? I've watched it over and over several times now, and it's very exciting!! Kind of makes me miss the good old days....

But you know what's not fair? If that same incident had happened here in Iraq back when I running the place, and a videotape of it had gotten out, the entire world would have been all over me like stink on camel crap. The United Nations would have been slapping me with even more damn sanctions, Amnesty International would have been condemning me for human rights violations, and the Americans would be screaming for my removal from power.

Careful what you wish for you, eh?

I have just heard the most revolting tale imaginable. It's about a guy in South Africa, Mark Scott-Crossley, who attacked one of his farmhands with a machete, seriously injuring him. He then tied up the wounded man and threw him into an enclosure filled with lions. The poor soul was torn to pieces and eaten by the wild animals.

And what crime did this poor victim commit, you may ask, that was deserving of such a brutal punishment? Well, supposedly it was because he ran a personal errand while on the clock. But his REAL offense, however, was that he was.... Black.

What is this world coming to, killing a man solely because of the color of his skin? What kind of narrow-minded ignorant bigot would carry out such a heinous, unprovoked crime? Crossley has been sentenced to life in prison, but he's getting off easy. If it had been up to me I would have sentenced him to same punishment he inflicted on the poor black man.

Now if the guy had been a Shiite, well, then Crossley would have deserved a medal.

Last week (Sept. 27, to be exact) I posted an entry about some topless antiwar protesters, and how some people just don't look good doing that sort of thing. Surprisingly, a number of you were offended by that. So the bottom line is that it's okay for me to joke about slaughtering Kurds and Shiites by the thousands, but heaven forbid I should make a derogatory comment about fat women with breasts sagging down almost to their knees.

I'll have to remember that.

Anyway, I bring that up again only because I'm NOT the only one who feels that way....

Nothing gives me more satisfaction than watching all this infighting between the various factions of the current illegal, illegitimate, and highly irregular Iraqi government. That's why this latest piece of good news made me erect a tent pole in my shorts: The country's Kurdish President has called on the Shiite Prime Minister to step down! And the best part is that this major split is taking place a mere two weeks before the country votes on its new constitution.

Life just doesn't get any better than this.

Apparently the two are pissed at one another over some issue important to the Kurds or something. I don't know the details, and I don't care. After all, they're Kurds and Shiites, for crying out loud! The only time I pay attention to those people is when I engage in target practice.