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December 01, 2005

A Short Play Starring Christopher Hitchens

"Stop the taunting, and let's have a real debate about the Iraq war"
—Christopher Hitchens, Nov. 22, 2005

Lights come up on a bare stage. At stage left is the VAST MAJORITY OF HUMANITY. Stage right is CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS.

VAST MAJORITY OF HUMANITY
Invading Iraq is a really, really, really bad idea.

CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS
You just say that because you're nostalgic for Stalinism!

VMOH
Uh...right. Also, the evidence Iraq has any banned weapons is shaky.

HITCHENS
Just you wait! Very soon, you're going to look foolish in the extreme!

VMOH
Are you sure about that?

HITCHENS
It's obvious to anyone who can think at all!

VMOH
Okay, whatever. But most importantly, the idea the Bush administration is going to be an agent of democracy is extremely peculiar.

HITCHENS
Thankfully, it no longer matters what you think!

Enter REALITY, stage left. REALITY strides over to HITCHENS and punches him very, very hard in the face. HITCHENS falls to the ground as REALITY exits.

A long pause. HITCHENS coughs and spits out blood and several teeth.

HITCHENS
Stop the taunting, and let's have a real debate!

Posted at December 1, 2005 09:46 AM | TrackBack
Comments

Encore?

Posted by: Sully at December 1, 2005 09:57 AM

I think the second act needs some tightening up.

Heh. heh.

Posted by: Bobo at December 1, 2005 10:04 AM

I think the play is great. I laughed out loud more than once. (Actually, twice, but that's a very high ratio of laughs to lines in the play.)
I'd bet that Hitchens, after he reads it, if he reads it, will fervently hope that your home is attacked by al Qaeda, which, he believes, will then prove him right and you wrong.

Posted by: William Blum at December 1, 2005 11:51 AM

My only quibble is with Reality's punching him in the mouth. If reality ever DID punch people like him in the mouth, perhaps they'd take more notice of it and learn something. But it doesn't, so they don't.

"Swat him vigorously and repeatedly on the bottom, causing him to bellow with outrage", I say.

Posted by: Mike at December 1, 2005 01:04 PM

I remember watching some BBC-sponsored round-table just before the war started. They had various European and US dignitaries and Richard Perle represented the neocons. It was very similar, but a bit more monotonous; the dignitaries were repeating again and again: not a good idea, not a good idea. And Mr. Perle was saying again and again: it'll be fine, trust me, just you wait, it'll be fine.

Posted by: abb1 at December 1, 2005 01:55 PM

dammit, man, that wasn't reality - that was me! my disguise worked beyond my wildest dreams of a real reality!

Posted by: Jesus B. Ochoa at December 1, 2005 05:12 PM

My god, can that man lie.

No, there are two absolutely crucial things that made me a supporter of regime change before Bush, and that will keep me that way whether he fights a competent war or not.

He writes this stuff as if he isn't on record about this.

Posted by: Ed Marshal at December 1, 2005 06:43 PM

Norman Finkelstein's take on Hitchens:

http://www.normanfinkelstein.com/article.php?pg=4&ar=6

Posted by: sk at December 1, 2005 08:51 PM

Hillarious, can we get a third act where REALITY does the same thing to the whole lot of actors standing stage right?

Posted by: J Robinowitz at December 1, 2005 10:41 PM

I can't decide whether I'm pleased or not that you didn't make fun of his drinking.

Posted by: saurabh at December 2, 2005 12:58 PM

sk -

It took a while to get going, but that Finkelstein piece was really good

Posted by: hm at December 2, 2005 02:59 PM

Great stuff!

Posted by: sonic at December 4, 2005 09:34 PM

If you read the play fast enough, you can even SMELL Mr. Hitchens.

Then again, you may not want to.

He being English and all.

Posted by: Sid Leader at December 6, 2005 02:46 PM

Both Schwarz's play and Finkelstein's article deserve standing ovations!

Posted by: War4Sale at December 6, 2005 02:55 PM

Was that from the George Galloway debate? Looking forward to Scott Ritter/Hitchens debate.

Posted by: RppPolyp at December 6, 2005 03:12 PM

Heh, indeedy.

Posted by: Glenn Reynolds at December 6, 2005 04:01 PM

That's just the kind of feeble-minded tripe oozing out of the left that makes the anti-war movement such an easy target. A good gauge of the left's myopic sanctimony is writing the words representing a "Vast Majority of Humanity." We did the right thing, but Bush and his cronies have since fouled it up. Where's Ramsey Clark's character?

Posted by: colin plummer at December 6, 2005 04:56 PM

In the 60`s we(the peace,love,dove types) used to have disdain for REALITY,but we could laugh at ourselves about it.
Now, it`s the Right that seems to hate Reality as well as the Vast Majority of Humanity.If they have a sense of humor,it`s sure escapes me.

BTW, as I am now an alcohol/drug counselor I would be happy to give Chris a free assessment.

Posted by: Sully18 at December 6, 2005 05:46 PM

You pussies wouldn't know how to punch someone in the mouth even if you wanted to. Hitchens is a loud asshole, and he's wrong about Iraq, but he's not stupid. He'd crush the lot of you in a debate -- probably in a fist fight too. Elitist choads like you are the direct reason why normal good people reject the right ideas, and as a result we have Pudya in office. You are so stupid. Pat each other on the backs -- you got W elected twice and keep gas in his tank. Viva Zapata, you fucking morons!

Posted by: johnnie at December 6, 2005 06:26 PM
Elitist choads like you are the direct reason why normal good people reject the right ideas, and as a result we have Pudya in office. You are so stupid. Pat each other on the backs -- you got W elected twice and keep gas in his tank. Viva Zapata, you fucking morons!

Of course, of course! Normal good people always base their decisions on spite, hatred, their own worst interest and they fully respect the infantile screechings of people like you, Johnnie.

You wouldn't, by any chance, be an enema bondage torture wingnut, would you? Out for a little awkward trolling?

Posted by: J Alva Scruggs at December 6, 2005 06:52 PM

Heh. Sorry, johnnie, the idea of a gin-soaked coward like Hitchens like being able to stand upright long enough to engage anyone in debate, much less a fistfight, is a bit silly.

Hitchens is acknowledged by almost everyone as a hopelessly failed writer/pundit. His likely-upcoming obituaries (something tells me his liver must be close to giving up the ghost) will focus on the promise of his past and the pitiful failure and humiliating Bush-slurping of these last few years...

Posted by: Wally Whateley at December 6, 2005 06:56 PM

Ahhh shit. For the record, that's not me with the "18" up there.

Posted by: Sully at December 6, 2005 06:59 PM

TOO LATE, SULLY! THE ALCOHOL COUNSELING COMMITMENT HAS BEEN MADE, AND YOU CAN'T BACK OUT NOW, WHETHER OR NOT IT WAS YOU WHO MADE IT.

Also: I would add to the remarks of colin plummer and johnnie, but they're so lucid and insightful I can't really think of anything more to say.

Posted by: Jonathan Schwarz at December 6, 2005 07:11 PM

I think you're onto much something bigger here.

"WMD, the musical!"

Just replace VMOH with CHORUS,
and let REALITY be played by a guy in a gorilla suit.

Posted by: Railroad Stone at December 6, 2005 11:08 PM

"Ahhh shit. For the record, that's not me with the "18" up there."
For the record,"Sully"isn`t me--Sully 18.I am grateful he isn`t.
It`s sad what addiction does to people,but addiction never killed a soul.What kills `em is denial.That`s what`s killing this country.And that,my friends,is Reality.
America`s in the toilet,and the "D" word`s flushing it.

Posted by: Sully18 at December 7, 2005 01:10 AM

"You pussies wouldn't know how to punch someone in the mouth even if you wanted to."


AAAHHHHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!

Oh little Johnnie, if you only knew....

If the Dojang's too "elitist" for you I'll meet ya on the jobsite...

BWWWWAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!

Posted by: A Hermit at December 7, 2005 09:38 AM

Recently Hitch, appearing on one or another of the usual shows, actually called for "a sober discussion" on Iraq...which, of course, would immediately rule him out.

Posted by: Michael at December 7, 2005 04:55 PM

Is all this Hitchens bashing because he made George Galloway look like a fool in September?
You know, I bet you all laughed and cheered when Galloway remarked that butterflys come from slugs, when they actually come from furry caterpillars.
Hmm, lets see who's on Hitchens side? Jose Ramos Horta, Eli Wiesel, Bernard Kouchner, The Northern Iraqi Kurds....
And who's on your side? George Galloway and Ramsey Clark? Eww....

Posted by: JudeObscure84 at December 7, 2005 10:53 PM

.

Posted by: at December 8, 2005 12:34 AM

so do you guys really believe that scott ritter would beat Hitchens in a debate?

Posted by: JudeObscure84 at December 8, 2005 12:35 AM

I believe that wingnuts need to pick their literary allusions much more carefully.

Jude stood bending over the kettle, with his watch in his hand, timing the eggs, so that his back was turned to the little inner chamber where the children lay. A shriek from Sue suddenly caused him to start round. He saw that the door of the room, or rather closet -- which had seemed to go heavily upon its hinges as she pushed it back -- was open, and that Sue had sunk to the floor just within it. Hastening forward to pick her up he turned his eyes to the little bed spread on the boards; no children were there. He looked in bewilderment round the room. At the back of the door were fixed two hooks for hanging garments, and from these the forms of the two youngest children were suspended, by a piece of box-cord round each of their necks, while from a nail a few yards off the body of little Jude was hanging in a similar manner. An overturned chair was near the elder boy, and his glazed eyes were slanted into the room; but those of the girl and the baby boy were closed.

Half-paralyzed by the strange and consummate horror of the scene he let Sue lie, cut the cords with his pocket-knife and threw the three children on the bed; but the feel of their bodies in the momentary handling seemed to say that they were dead. He caught up Sue, who was in fainting fits, and put her on the bed in the other room, after which he breathlessly summoned the landlady and ran out for a doctor.

When he got back Sue had come to herself, and the two helpless women, bending over the children in wild efforts to restore them, and the triplet of little corpses, formed a sight which overthrew his self-command. The nearest surgeon came in, but, as Jude had inferred, his presence was superfluous. The children were past saving, for though their bodies were still barely cold it was conjectured that they had been hanging more than an hour. The probability held by the parents later on, when they were able to reason on the case, was that the elder boy, on waking, looked into the outer room for Sue, and, finding her absent, was thrown into a fit of aggravated despondency that the events and information of the evening before had induced in his morbid temperament. Moreover a piece of paper was found upon the floor, on which was written, in the boy's hand, with the bit of lead pencil that he carried:

DONE BECAUSE WE ARE TOO MENNY.

They also need to stop kidnapping people for their enema bondage torture games.

Posted by: J Alva Scruggs at December 8, 2005 02:48 AM

Was that an allusion before of after the invasion because I could've sworn that Iraq was NOT a peaceful place to live either? I guess Fedayeen troops storming a Marsh Arab home or a Kurdish village was not enough for you to realize that people have been dying in that country for decades. If the Badr Brigades of all people can lay down thier guns and fight against insurgency, why can't you mugs?

Posted by: JudeObscure84 at December 8, 2005 11:00 AM

Hitchens wins by a nose. Ritter will use his "knowledge" of the UNMOVIC reports to spin it to his favor when Hitchens has Rolf Eukus, Richard Butler, Bill Tierney and host of others on his side. Even Blix does not agree with Ritter.

Posted by: JudeObscure84 at December 8, 2005 11:53 AM
Ritter will use his "knowledge" of the UNMOVIC reports to spin it to his favor when Hitchens has Rolf Eukus, Richard Butler, Bill Tierney and host of others on his side. Even Blix does not agree with Ritter.

I wish I were surprised by JudeObscure84's complete lack of knowledge of this subject.

Posted by: Jonathan Schwarz at December 8, 2005 12:11 PM

For "Hitchens vs Galloway The Musical" check out this website!!!

http://www.geocities.com/thegrappleinthebigapple/

Posted by: zleitzen at December 12, 2005 08:50 AM