No floods in Fallujah

No floods in Fallujah

By JT Seravat

"Shirley, damn it, you're out of peanuts, again."

"Oh shut up JT and read you're damn paper," said Shirley, my beloved bartender.

“Well, we are really sorry, Mr. and Mrs. Johnson, but the U.S. government can’t afford to give you a grant of $32,407 to clean out and rebuild your flooded home here in Iowa because we are spending that amount every 10 seconds on our war in Iraq,” said a Federal Emergency Management Agency spokesman, who refused to give his name to the Johnsons.

Quotes like this are why I shouldn't read newspapers.

See, I hate to point out that residents who have lost everything in several Midwestern states cannot have the help of their own government to rebuild their lives because their government is too busy trying to rebuild the electrical grid in Iraq – the same grid that our government destroyed in the invasion and the same one that, after we do rebuild, insurgents attack and destroy over and over again, but I will.

The Johnsons, like those of us here at the bar, use common sense when looking at problems like flooding.

This is disturbing to neoconservatives and the current administration.

“Joe and his wife don’t understand the larger global ramifications of our government’s policies,” said one of those “neocons,” who refused to be identified due to fear of reprisals from reasonable Americans.

To help us better understand the “larger global ramifications,” we contacted former bar patron Tom Claulewis, now third-grade math teacher at Jefferson Elementary School in Clinton, Illinois.

We presented the former barstooler, now teacher, with the numbers involved and asked him to come up with a formula that could explain the larger economic problems and a possible solution.

We told Claulewis that the United States is spending approximately $100 million a month on rebuilding the infrastructure, or roughly $1 billion a year, resulting in a yearly budget deficit, with other government expenses of $244 billion.

The Iraqis, mainly through the sale of oil, have recently been able to build up a surplus of $76 billion, which is deposited in U.S. banks.

Now, we admit we had to speculate on the interest rate one would get for $76 billion in the bank. Frank, a welder at the end of the bar, advised us that his mother has $15,000 in the bank and she gets a 4.8 percent annual interest on her money.

We’re assuming that if you have $75,000,085,000 more than Frank’s mother in your local bank, you are most likely to get a higher interest rate, let’s say, 10 percent.

We turned the info over to math teacher Claulewis, who, by the way, finished second in the 1997 Math Teacher of the Year competition in Illinois, and let him get to work.

After five minutes at the blackboard, Claulewis called back with an answer for us.

“It would seem to me that the most economical method to solve this problem would be for the Iraqis to use some of the $760 million they earn in interest each year to rebuild their own country and have the United States use our money to help Americans,” he reported.

We sent Claulewis’ findings to Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, White House Chief of Staff Josh Bolton and Secretary of State Dr. Condoleezza Rice.

We received a joint press release from the State, Treasury departments and the White House.
We quote it below in its entirety; because since, after reading it 14 times we couldn't understand it we couldn't paraphrase it.

“Your government appreciates the input of groups and individuals, including America’s teachers and the less fortunate unemployed writers who spend most of their days on bar stools. The capital augmenting relative to the gamma distribution formula as a part of the Americanist bias and the use of asymptotic variance in math teacher Tom Claulewis’ formulations are interesting and in need of further study."

“Therefore, an independent advisory committee is being formed that will bring together some of the leading mathematicians, sociologists, economists and university professors from other fields who are in need of paid government advisory positions to study this complex problem.”

“The Secretaries of State and Treasury have agreed to ask this special advisory committee to report back no later than May 2018, at which time careful consideration will be given to the findings of said committee.”

“The President has personally through his 'Assistant Junior Aide for Passing Messages to other Assistants' advised me to thank you for you patriotic interest in this nation’s future.”

The release was signed by Edmund D. Egdum, Junior Undersecretary for Public Response, Office of Inquiries, State Department, United States of America.

Two plus two equals four. Three plus three equals six. Four plus four equals eight…

First published June 16, 2008

© 2008 Seravat Writers Group LLC