Advice From God

Dear God,

Senator Joseph Biden has declared his candidacy for the Democratic nomination for President in 2008. I’m wondering, though, how Senator Biden thinks that he can win the Democratic nomination, much less the general election, given that Biden supported George W. Bush’s decision to start the war in Iraq.

If you were working for the Biden for President campaign, what would you do to compensate for this dramatic failure in judgment?

- Polly

Polly,

I would advise Senator Biden to do exactly what he has done in his campaign so far: Pretend that he never supported Bush or the Iraq War.

I am well aware that Joe Biden helped Bush start the Iraq War back in 2002 and 2003. I have a better memory than most people, however. Many Americans assume that, because Biden is a Democrat, he opposed the war and tried to stop Bush.

Many Americans also don’t know that two of Biden’s Democratic opponents in the 2008 presidential campaign, Barack Obama and Dennis Kucinich, had the wisdom to oppose the Iraq War from the start. So, if I were on Biden’s campaign staff, I would advise him to make more statements like the one he made in January, 2007, completely ignoring the early insight of Obama and Kucinich on the Iraq War. Biden derided these opponents, pretending that they had not said anything on the Iraq War until recently, commenting, “You didn’t hear any one of them get in this debate at all until they announced for President.”

You and I may know that candidates Obama and Kucinich had developed better Iraq policies than Biden years ago. Then again, I’m not registered to vote, and most Americans who are registered to vote don’t know as much about the Iraq War as you do.

It’s a sad thing to say, but Senator Biden can probably count on the ignorance of American voters.

- God

Dear God,

I read just yesterday about how the Bush government has been demanding that search engines like Yahoo, MSN and Google turn over their databases of private information about what web sites Americans have been looking for and visiting. Apparently, President Bush decided that he needed to know what kinds of pornography Americans are looking at. Yahoo and MSN are said to have caved in to Bush’s demands, while Google did the right thing and said no to Bush.

On a legal level, this news disturbs me because it seems illegal for the President to go snooping into Americans’ private behavior just in order to find out what kind of pornography they like. On a more philosophical level, it makes me wonder about what Google really is. The Google database is many, many times bigger than the Holy Bible, or any human-compiled library, for that matter.

So, what I want to know is this: Is Google bigger than you, God?

- Irving Bonn

Irving

Google is bigger than me. In fact, Google is bigger than the universe.

It makes sense, if you think about it. After all, the universe is only the universe. Google, on the other hand, contains the direct records of the universe, plus a huge stream of comments about the universe.

So, if there’s a big rock outside of Cheyenne, Wyoming, Google will have the picture and measurements of the rock, a satellite photo of the rock from space, a map of the rock in relation to prominent roads, a web site about the rock, a blog chronicling developments related to the rock, and a discussion board debating the various qualities of the rock.

Medieval monks illuminating the Bible had nothing on the Googleverse.

Yet, I still have a leg up on Google. Google is bigger than me, but I speak through George W. Bush, the President of the United States. Can Google say that?

- God

Dear God,

I see in the news that Senator Joseph Lieberman is supporting Republican tax cuts for the rich, thinks that invading Iraq was a great idea, and says that Democrats who criticize George W. Bush are putting America in peril. I remember back in 2000, when Joseph Lieberman said that the Bill of Rights gives Americans “freedom of religion, not freedom from religion.” It sounds to me like Joseph Lieberman is a Republican, and a pretty extreme Republican at that.

Why doesn’t Joseph Lieberman just acknowledge his right wing beliefs and join the Republican Party?

- Wenzel

Wenzel,

Senator Lieberman is what you might call a political transvestite. I arranged for Joseph Lieberman to be born a Republican, but something went wrong with his upbringing, and little Joey decided to dress up as a Democrat. Now, some say that Senator Lieberman did so for crass political purposes, because the Democratic Party is where he made powerful connections. I prefer to look at Senator Lieberman’s problems as more along the lines of a mental disorder.

Don’t worry about the Senator from Connecticut, though. I understand that he has joined a support group, and plans on returning to his Me-given true Republican identity any minute now.

- God

Dear God,

I have recently heard reports that President George W. Bush has set up secret prisons in old Soviet-era gulags in Eastern Europe, in Poland and perhaps Romania. There are credible allegations that President Bush is having people tortured at those prisons.

I understand that George W. Bush talks to you a lot. What has Mr. Bush told you about what happens to people in those secret prisons of his?

- Edmund

Edmund,

Sorry, I can’t tell you. You see, I have to respect the will of the American people. They, or their representatives, have spoken. Just a couple of days ago, in the United States Senate, Senator Carl Levin introduced Senate Amendment 2430, which would have created an independent commission to investigate allegations of torture and other forms of abuse of prisoners in George W. Bush’s international network of secret prisons.

Although many senators voted in favor of the amendment, not a single Republican voted to approve commission. So, because the Republican majority of the U.S. Senate voted to block the commission to investigate torture, I feel obliged to keep my mouth shut. As long as the Republican majority in your Congress says that it’s going to refuse to ask any questions about the torture being conducted by the Bush Administration, I’ll go along with their decision.
You see, George W. Bush isn’t the only Republican who talks to me. Jack Abramoff talks to me too, and he has arranged some pretty nice favors to come my way over the years.

- God