Mullings A Political Cyber Column By Rich Galen

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Bye, Spy

Friday, March 23, 2001

President Bush has ordered more than 50 Russians out of the country on the suggestion they are spies. This suggestion comes from the investigation of Robert Hanssen who passed secrets to these guys - and maybe some of their fathers - for about the past 15 years.

Many of these spies have titles at the Russian Embassy in Your Nation's Capital as well as in consulates around the United States, and at the United Nations in New York and so have diplomatic immunity which means they cannot be arrested, convicted for espionage, sent to jail and become some very bad man's wife.

Their titles are things like:

"The Deputy Commercial Attach� For I Can Park My Big, New Americanski Car Any Place I Want," and
"The Senior Protocol Officer in Charge of Dropping Off Invitations to the Annual Kim Philby Memorial Picnic Sponsored By the Walker and Pollard Families (Place To Be Determined)," and
"The Assistant Charg� for I Can Go in The Eight-Items-Or-Less-Cash-Only Lane at the Supermarket With 59 Items, Make Everyone Wait While I Fill Out a Tax Exemption Form, and Then Pay by Check Which I Don't Even Bother to Root Around in My European Hold-all For Until the Last Item Has Been Scanned."

The Russians will retaliate by sending back to the United States probably twice as many American Diplomats. In the Foreign Service this is called the "Please don't throw me into the briar patch" scenario.

On the tax front, the House Ways and Means Committee approved a bill to remove the marriage penalty from the tax code, while Senate Republicans began moves to use $60 Billion of this year's projected $93 Billion surplus for tax relief.

The Democrats complained that the GOP was not moving fast enough to help the sinking stock market. Let's do that again: The Democrats complained that the GOP was not moving fast enough to help the sinking stock market. See what happens when Jon Corzine gets to the Senate? He teaches them about the stock market.

To capture this moment, perhaps that other well-known champion of capitalism, Warren Beatty, should produce a new film starring all 37 Baldwin brothers titled: The Pinot Noir Grapes of Wrath: A Story of Redemption �Of 3-month T-Bills.

Speaking of Hollywood, the Academy Award ceremony will start on Sunday night and end sometime Monday morning. I want everyone in the class to take out a sheet of paper and write the number of award recipients who will (a) say something awful about George W. Bush and/or; (b) say something like, "This is for you PRESIDENT Gore."

To follow along with a printable Oscar ballot as well as other interesting stuff like the answer to the question at the bottom of this page, go to the Secret Decoder Ring

Inasmuch as so many movie types promised to leave the country if George W. became President, maybe we should let the Russian spies stay here and send the Hollywood crowd to Moscow instead.

If nothing else it would be fun to see who ended up with the uglier wife: The Russians in American jails or the Americans in Russia.

Still on the stock market, stock traders aren't known for their stand-up humor but one floor trader interviewed on CNBC during this week's carnage described the markets' drop as "Mad Dow Disease." Another called it, "Heart-In-Mouth Disease."

A 3.5 million year-old skull has been found in Kenya which may knock the famous "Lucy" off the main branch of our ancestral tree. The researchers named it Kenyanthropus platyops.

Fair is fair. They should have named it Linus.

Boeing Corporation announced the other day it will be moving its corporate headquarters from Seattle to a yet-to-be determined location. This is the first step in what may well become a grand march of companies and individuals moving away from the West coast to cities in the South, Midwest, and East to escape the onerous taxation, social engineering, not to mention the lack of electricity.

This last census will go down as the last time California gained a Congressional seat. Starting in 2011, it will lose at least one seat.

John Philips of the Mamas and the Papas rock group died the other day at the age of 65. Here's a bar bet worth a million bucks: Name all four members of the group: Let's see there was John Phillips, OK we got that one. Michelle Phillips. Cass Elliott. And, um, Dopey, Sneezy, Doc, Dancer, Prancer, and Rudolph.

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Copyright © 2001 Richard A. Galen

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