Obama Apologizes to Asteroids for ‘Observing Their Motions Without a Warrant’
Comets and other cosmic debris aren't our enemies. They are simply Facebook friends that we haven't met yet.
WASHINGTON (Routers) With his historic speech today, most analysts agreed that the Obama administration made huge inroads in rebuilding America’s relations with the rest of the solar system, reversing anti-terrestrial hostility that had understandably built up in the wake of years of Bush administration arrogance and interplanetary war mongering. In an address before the International Astronomical Union, the president made a moving plea for understanding to all the asteroids that may find our planet in their path.
“This asteroid problem is one that we inherited from the last administration, which not only did nothing about it, but exacerbated it with its cowboy attitude. They were actively belligerent, repeatedly lighting them up with radar and blatantly, even proudly observing their motions without a warrant,” Obama said. “But it was much worse than that. My predecessor not only made a completely unprovoked attack on an innocent comet, but reveled in it, cynically calling it a ’smashing success,’ and declaring that ‘we hit it exactly where we wanted to.‘ And now there are plans to cruelly exploit these bodies for their resources, without the proper labor safeguards in place or an international regime to ensure that the wealth is spread around.
“With all of this arrogance and blatant disregard for the rights of others, I believe that it is long past time for us to appropriately ask, ‘Why do they hate us’?
“Despite the lack of warning, the most recent incidents were clearly not hostile, but meant to show that they mean us no harm, simply wanting to fire an appropriate warning shot over our bow shock, so to speak, to get us to change our bellicose and oppressive Western ways.”
With the deeply insightful song “Imagine” playing in the background, Obama laid out an inspiring vision of solar peace for the future to the awe-struck crowd of scientists:
Now, I understand that it is a problem that has been growing for millions of years, but particularly over the last eight, and it’s not reasonable to expect us to solve it in a hundred days, but solve it we will. It was caused by reckless talk of deregulation by the previous administration, by things like revisiting the Outer Space Treaty. We can’t allow the greed of the few to result in a righteous retaliation by the oppressed. I recognize that it may not happen in my lifetime, but I want to set a goal of a solar system that is safe for all of its inhabitants and not just the wealthy and sentient.
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Rand Simberg is a recovering aerospace engineer and a consultant in space commercialization, space tourism and Internet security. He offers occasionally biting commentary about infinity and beyond at his weblog, Transterrestrial Musings.
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12 Comments
1. A. Nonymous:Not funny. Just sad. But right on target!
Apr 14, 2009 - 5:35 am 2. Delia:ROTFL! What next? Apologizing for cow poop? Oy vey!
Impact in 5, 4, 3, 2, 1….
Apr 14, 2009 - 6:05 am 3. BC:Gawd, I thought you were goofy on Usenet….
Apr 14, 2009 - 7:51 am 4. Warpublican:I love watching the right wing implode. I mean love it…
Apr 14, 2009 - 7:53 am 5. Peter the Bubblehead:Geez, BC and Warpublican, get a sense of humor!
Apr 14, 2009 - 9:11 am 6. krgard:Has Cape Kennedy, I mean Canaveral, just been insulted by Houston’s lack of any clear direction to somewhere over the Ozone layer?
Apr 14, 2009 - 9:23 am 7. Cybergeezer:Now, this is a story with real “gravity”; GRAVITY, get it? Ha, ha, ha, ha, ………
Apr 14, 2009 - 10:50 am 8. Phineas:Apophis is back again?? Man, how many times does SG-1 have to kill him?
Apr 14, 2009 - 12:10 pm 9. Rocky:Great satire! I especially love the fact that all you have to do is change the nouns here or there, and like Ad Libs (remember those from about 30 years ago?), this Obama speech can be used and re-used for all kinds of his speeches, and it still will be right on target EVERY time.
Beautiful work.
Apr 14, 2009 - 2:36 pm 10. Bob:HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Apr 16, 2009 - 3:15 pm 11. Whack Job:What is the point of this satire. Is it simply straw man humor. Obama has never come close to saying anything this stupid so where is the joke. Satire requires some semblance to reality. So where is the connection here. Or is just another example of the space industry’s biggest idiot blathering on yet again about how much he can’t stand sharing the planet with Obama. Get over it Rand, the tall guy won, and the majority of voters picked someone you don’t like. But instead you carry on like an elitist at every opportunity – with your idiot fan club denouncing the rest of the citizenry for voting for someone they and you don’t like. Sorry but that’s democracy and just because you don’t like the result does not mean those that voted for him are stupid. Unless you really are an elitist who thinks he knows so much better that the rest of the nation who did vote for him. Which is it Rand – are you an elitist or just a sore loser who can’t accept that people don’t agree with you and therefore they are morons – a word you use so often on your stupid blog to describe most if not all people you don’t agree with.
Jul 10, 2009 - 9:46 am 12. Michael Lonie:“Obama has never come close to saying anything this stupid so where is the joke.”
You obviously did not pay attention to what he was doing at the UN the other day.
Obama won the election. That gives him the opportunity to present his ideas to the nation and persuade the voters to support them. Since his attempted actions (and those of the Congresscritters of the Democratic Party’s Left Wing) are far to the left of his campaign rhetoric he needs to make some very good arguments. He doesn’t make them, and he doesn’t have any good arguments, so large numbers of people are ceasing to support him as a result. They don’t want Big Brother making their medical decisions for them. Obama’s attitude seems to be, and you are echoing it, that he won the job of dictator not President, and all we proles must bow to his demands. I got news for you Whacky, that ain’t how it works.
And when did Democrats say to themselves after the 2000 election: Bush won, get over it, don’t oppose anything he does? That’s right, never. Why should you expect Republicans, or conservatives more generally, or libertarians like Rand Simberg to be so much more cooperative and civil with Obama than the Dems were with Bush?
Sep 26, 2009 - 4:16 pm