To: All Sovereign Nations
From: International Atomic Energy Agency
Re: Form #2984v: Voluntary Compliance
Hi! Hola! Shalom! We’re just checking to make sure that you are where you said you were regarding your nuclear facilities, power plants, and/or weapons. Not that we’d imply that you’re not where you said you were last time - honest. We just want to know where you are now so that we can be 100% sure that it’s where you said you’d be the last time you told us where you were. That’s all. Please fill out the form below and return it to us at your convenience.
- Your Friends at the IAEA
_______________________________________________________
Just circle the answer that you think applies best to your nation. Please remember that there are NO “wrong” answers!
1. How is your nuclear program in relation to how it was three years ago?
a) About the same.
b) It’s moving along nicely.
c) What nuclear program?
d) None of your goddamn business.
2. If you are not a nation with nuclear weapons, are you currently in the process of trying to develop them?
a) No, of course not - that would be illegal.
b) To the best of our knowledge, no.
c) No - but we are looking into enriched uranium as a dietary supplement, so we can see why you’d be confused.
d) Well, now that we think of it, yes. Sorry we didn’t speak up earlier. Gosh, it feels good to get this off our chest.
[If you chose “d,” please go to Form 2984n.]
3. Really? You’ve got no nuclear ambitions at all?
a) We said “no.” Get off our back already.
b) How DARE you accuse us? Just for that, you can’t come and inspect anymore!
c) One more unfair question like that and we’ll blow you sky-high!
d) No, no, no.
4. Can we come by and inspect? Just to be sure?
a) No! We find your suggestion of mistrust very, very hurtful.
b) Absolutely not. Our sovereign, sacred soil must never be violated.
c) Well, okay, but you can’t go anywhere near our nuclear facili- oh damn - you got us.
[If you chose “c,” please go to Form 2984n.]
5. Okay, okay. Maybe you could give us some advice. Um, we know this country…. we’ll call it “Pafoufistan.” They’ve got a secret nuclear weapons development program, and we know they have it and we’d like them to stop. What do you think it might take to make them discontinue their program.
a) Money! You should give them money!
b) A trade agreement would probably hit the spot.
c) It sounds to us like Pafoufistan just wants to be loved.
d) Our guess is that the mighty nation of Pafoufistan will not be deterred from enhancing its God given right to defend itself. Viva Pafoufistan!
6. Hey, we’re giving away valuable prizes to the non-nuclear nation that’s closest to possessing nuclear weapons! Do you know of anyone who might qualify?
a) Oooh, yes! Us! Us!
b) No, we wouldn’t know of any nation that fits that description.
c) Yes, and that nation is ____________.
d) Really, how dumb do you think we are?
7. One last time: ARE you developing nuclear weapons?
a) No.
b) No.
c) No.
d) Okay, yes. Please send money.
Fanny Roborat
11 comments
Murray
November 8, 2003 at 5:38 pm
1Pafoulistan, I think I know where that is. I believe that it lies between Dunnundistan and Hotdogistan, just adjacent to Carjackistan.
Who says a good grasp of geography isn’t important.
Barney Gumble
November 8, 2003 at 9:37 pm
2I have been so busy between greeting people at Walmarts and cleaning glory holes that I haven’t had much time to blog anymore. I can’t keep all these NEOCONS at bay alone you know! Swing by the site and say hello. It’s up and running again!
Barney Gumble
November 8, 2003 at 9:37 pm
3I have been so busy between greeting people at Walmarts and cleaning glory holes that I haven’t had much time to blog anymore. I can’t keep all these NEOCONS at bay alone you know! Swing by the site and say hello. It’s up and running again!
Steve P.
November 9, 2003 at 12:21 am
4I hear the People’s Republic of Adam Felber “won” on “Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me!” this week by suggesting that winning would deter him from fully developing his nuclear capabilities.
Barney Gumble
November 9, 2003 at 10:15 am
5Steve,
When I think about you, I touch myself.
tim
November 9, 2003 at 1:00 pm
6Not to sound like Condi Rice, but it seems like the UN will discover a nuclear weapons program about the time Kofi Annan’s office reaches one million degrees Kelvin.
Chicory
November 10, 2003 at 9:27 am
7Felberstan has gone nuclear? No way! That was a stealth plane they tested, not a missle launcher.
(Motto: “When we launch a nuke, we don’t missle anything.”
johne
November 10, 2003 at 5:50 pm
8Tim may be right that any IAEA discovery of an atomic weapons program will come too late, but both it, and the actual US government experts (as distinct from the US government types who see reality as dependant on PR), seem to have come pretty close in their assessment of Saddam’s non-existent Iraqi nuclear weapons program. And of course since the fall of Baghdad, any American experts’ pronouncement, whatever their past track record, is automatically regarded as tainted and suspect.
John Isbell
November 10, 2003 at 7:27 pm
9Inspired. Outstanding. Good!
Some of my favorite exam questions are in “1066 And All That”, including the instruction: “Do not under any circumstances attempt to write on both sides of the paper at once.” But this is up there.
Will
November 11, 2003 at 9:59 am
10Inspired indeed… it perfectly shine light on the situation as it happens!
John Isbell
November 12, 2003 at 4:02 pm
11My GOP uncle, a NASA scientist, just wrote that this was the funniest email he’s ever received. I doubt he’d like the Armistice Day one so much, though.