o, the war is winding down and you’re forced to turn your attention to mounting credit-card debt, the poor performance of your favorite sports team and the quiet resentment of your family. Fear not, the world offers a variety of potential enemies and distracting conflicts and you can be sure that Bush 2 won’t let you down. Here are the front-runners:

North Korea—They eat dogs. Plus, our brave fighting men already possess an impressive arsenal of racial epithets to use against the North Koreans. A recent study shows that the average foot soldier knows an average of 12 epithets to call people of Asian persuasion, compared to a dismal four derogatory terms for Middle Easterners. Let the dehumanizing begin!

Pundits also note that North Korean leader Kim Jong Il’s bewildering bouffant is quite goofy-looking, thus making him a dream to both demonize and ridicule.

On the down side, North Korea boasts lots of annoying foliage and rugged terrain that could prove challenging to troops with a fondness for flat battlefields with nothing but sand. Also, a lackluster performance in our last Asian land war makes some Americans wary of this prospective enemy. People from that region prove to be tenacious with a history of collective armed struggle against overwhelming odds.

Did I mention they eat dogs? In America we make movies about dogs that become star basketball players, but they eat their dogs. Don’t act as if Jay Leno won’t mention the dog eating every night.

Syria—The enemy du jour—is an honest-to-goodness real country in the Middle East. I thought the White House just made it up, because they never mentioned Syria before, but there it is next to Iraq. Syria possesses a spotty human rights record. In 1982, Syrian troops massacred 40,000 Syrian civilians in the town of Hama. Fabled “Best President Ever” Ronald Reagan said the incident deeply concerned him, kind of. Syria’s ruler at the time, Hafiz al-Asad, died a couple of years back. Now, his son rules the country, which is practically the same thing. Look at our current déjà vu presidency. I’m expecting Nirvana to burst onto the music scene any minute now.

Iraq—We’re talking three-peat, baby! Sure, the current conflict is yet to be resolved, but you can’t argue with the numbers promised by yet another installment in the Iraq saga. Don’t worry about finding a motive for another war. Do you think they made Jurassic Park III because they had fresh ideas and a story to tell?

Iran—CNN would only have to change one letter in their wartime graphics. However, Bush 2’s handlers question his ability to issue ultimatum after ultimatum to Ayatollah Ali Khamanei without screwing up his name. Imagine if Ayatollah Ali Khamanei routed subliminal correspondences to Kuala Lumpur about nuclear secrets in a clandestine library. Bush would butcher that line. But let’s be serious, we need to have confidence in our corporate hand puppets.

Venezuela—Don’t lose sight of this dark horse in the race to receive U.S. bombings. This Venice of South America practically oozes oil and President Hugo Chavez acts like a damn Communist. He even visited Saddam Hussein in happier times. The United States toppled other Latin American nations after less provocation than this bratty country gives us. Luckily, Chavez’s hold on power remains tenuous after labor strikes and an attempted coup in which the CIA had absolutely no involvement. I don’t care what you heard. Proof? You don’t have any proof! You better watch what you say, my friend.

France—They’re begging for it. Do you know that France used weapons of mass destruction in World War I? So did England and Germany, but that’s not the point. Also, ignore the end of World War II and those rumors about someone dropping atomic bombs on cities of little military significance. You really had to be there. We can no longer allow France to keep a strangle-hold on the world’s supply of soft, aromatic cheeses. We are drawing a line in the Bernaise sauce. Arche de Triomphe here we come! (After kicking them in the pants, it would be appropriate to “do a little dance.”)

China—Some say we should just get this inevitable war over with. They ignore the blossoming capitalism in Red China. The “Communist” officials earn a little extra cash by selling organs of executed political prisoners. Democracy is the next logical step. Also, think of the loss of human lives such a conflict would result in. China has billions of innocent consumers—I mean civilians.
cfroehlich@chronicle.utah.edu