Moderate Syrian Rebel Application Form - Borowitz/Walrus

This appeared in the New Yorketr today via The Borowitz Report and is posted without comment. Walrus

 

"Welcome to the United States’ Moderate Syrian Rebel Vetting Process. To see if you qualify for $500 million in American weapons, please choose an answer to the following questions:

As a Syrian rebel, I think the word or phrase that best describes me is:
A) Moderate
B) Very moderate
C) Crazy moderate
D) Other

I became a Syrian rebel because I believe in:
A) Truth
B) Justice
C) The American Way
D) Creating an Islamic caliphate

If I were given a highly lethal automatic weapon by the United States, I would:
A) Only kill exactly the people that the United States wanted me to kill
B) Try to kill the right people, with the caveat that I have never used an automatic weapon before
C) Kill people only after submitting them to a rigorous vetting process
D) Immediately let the weapon fall into the wrong hands

I have previously received weapons from:
A) Al Qaeda
B) The Taliban
C) North Korea
D) I did not receive weapons from any of them because after they vetted me I was deemed way too moderate

I consider ISIS:
A) An existential threat to Iraq
B) An existential threat to Syria
C) An existential threat to Iraq and Syria
D) The people who will pick up my American weapon after I drop it and run away

Complete the following sentence. “American weapons are…”
A) Always a good thing to randomly add to any international hot spot
B) Exactly what this raging civil war has been missing for the past three years
C) Best when used moderately
D) Super easy to resell online

Thank you for completing the Moderate Syrian Rebel Application Form. We will process your application in the next one to two business days. Please indicate a current mailing address where you would like your weapons to be sent. If there is no one to sign for them we will leave them outside the front door."  Borowitz

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http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/borowitzreport/2014/06/moderate-syrian-rebel-application-form.html

 

 

Comments

[Castellio]

Love it!

That will sort things out!

[G. I. Hazeltine]

Kudos Walrus. This really needs to go viral.

[Babak Makkinejad]

Walrus:

You may wish to include the following:

1 - Do you hate the Shia and Iran?

[Lord Curzon]

Class!

[turcopolier]

All

The link seems dead. Suggestions? Maybe Walrus can fix it? pl

[Walrus]

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/borowitzreport/2014/06/moderate-syrian-rebel-application-form.html

[Dubhaltach]

In reply to turcopolier 28 June 2014 at 08:46 AM

Colonel,

This URI:

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/borowitzreport/2014/06/moderate-syrian-rebel-application-form.html

Works for me:

Dubhaltach

[Arne]

Great!
:-D
More weapons, more fighting, more war, more deads.
...and the winner is: The Military Complex!

[oofda]

Borowitz also did a great one on both the Sunnis and Shia telling Cheney to shut up.

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/borowitzreport/2014/06/in-rare-consensus-sunnis-shiites-tell-cheney-to-shut-up.html

Here is the correct link to the application form piece.

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/borowitzreport/2014/06/moderate-syrian-rebel-application-form.html

[turcopolier]

Arne

Actually - The political/jounalistic/contracthustler complex. The actual military was really not the culprit in this. pl

[SAC Brat]

The http://www.duffelblog.com/ is having go at the subject.

http://www.duffelblog.com/2014/06/reaching-baghdad-isis-militants-declare-mission-accomplished/#!5hF5h

[turcopolier]

All

that link doesn't work on my machines. Yours? pl

[Charles Dekle]

Col Lang,
We'll said.
Regards

[nick b]

The first link did not work, but the reposting did.

Borowitz had this gem last summer:
http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/borowitzreport/2013/08/obama-promises-syria-strike-will-have-no-objective.html

This was in last week's Onion:
http://www.theonion.com/articles/to-defeat-them-i-must-become-them-john-kerry-says,36356/

[Peter C]

The link Dubhaltach posted worked fine for me.
The only mainstream TV guy is John Stewart that I have noticed holding anyone's ass to the fire on who were the cheerleaders and actual people who decided to remake the Mideast by using a blender and lots of cash, not to mention blood, suffering, and national treasure of the U.S. Not to mention a small matter of sovereign Iraq. I am still waiting to find out who got the big finders fee for the location of Sadam.

[Margaret Steinfels]

All: Not as amusing but also to the point: Top 5 reasons US aid to "Moderate" Syrians is quixotic. Juan Cole.http://www.juancole.com/2014/06/moderate-fighters-quixotic.html

[Bill H]

I agree entirely with your point, but I suspect that by "Military Complex" one normally means the manufacturers of weaponry and the politicians and lobbyists are enriched by shilling for them.

[Babak Makkinejad]

I think this is a political ploy by Mr. Obama; he is kicking the proverbial ball into the court of the US Congress, daring them to set aside $ 500 million for Syria; making it their call.

If those funds are ever allocated, I should imagine the Electorate - yes that mythical creature that has ceased to exist in NATO member states - would demand to know why funds are not being spent on say VA.

Mr. Obama is a brilliant politician as far US domestic politics goes.

[charly]

Spending money on VA is to positive. I think a large part of the electorate would rather spend it on a birthday party for Putin than on so called moderates.

[different clue]

I once read an article which began by noting that when Eisenhower wrote his Military-Industrial Complex speech he was going to call it the Military-Industrial-Congressional Complex but he decided that it was not fitting for a President to criticize Congress in a speech. So he deleted
the word "Congressional" from the phrase. Here is the article.
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2000/dec/21/military-industrial-man/