In a bold move intended to short-circuit the ravages of terrorism in Russia, President Vladimir V. Putin placed
before his cabinet a panoply of proposals to substitute absolute rule for the rather pathetic form of democracy which now
exists there.
"We hope to become a model for the entire civilized world," he said, and praised Homeland Security in the
United States for giving him the idea. "One would never, never think that the U.S. would allow hardfought liberties to be
given up so readily, but now that we see what Homeland Security, Vice President Cheney and Karl Rove have done, it is clear
that Mother Russia is now ripe for a new Czardom!"
Jolly President Putin, of whom it was once said, and only once, that "I could look into his soul," read his
proposals which included abdication of almost every electoral practice which resulted in election of anybody to the left of
Ghenghis Khan (a body which decidedly does NOT include President Putin) to his cabinet, to cheers from everybody who has any
memory of the KGB.
"We need no wimpy Guantanamo Bay offshore or in some other poor third-world ruler’s backyard to deal
with dissenters now," extolled the Minister of Security. "Hell, we INVENTED concentration camps."
Although the connection between ending democracy, such as it is in Russia, and ending terrorism or making
a single village safer, was unclear, the administration was not only very upbeat but took the trouble to communicate with
the White House, where only Attorney General Ashcroft was available to take the call. He pronounced the moves, "positive and
in keeping with making the United States a safer place, like it became somehow by destroying an impoverished regime without
rocket fuel sufficient to reach Syria, let alone Israel."
In the meantime, plans for inauguration of Czar Vladimir the First in early October are in progress.
