Why have dozens of Iraqis stopped working in low-level positions for Al Qaeda? Is it because they don’t want their faces cut off with piano wire, or is there something more? After diligent research, I’ve discovered there are actually a variety of reasons:

• No falafel-flavored donuts in employee break room.
• Tired of asking customers, “you want IED’s with that?”.
• Insanely high co-pay for doctor visits involving bullet removal.
• Annoying woman at corner desk constantly ululating to herself.
• Sick of being reminded about the damn TPS report cover sheets.
• When hired, they were lied to about the 401(k) including a 73rd virgin.
• Every five minutes, have to stop working to shake sand out of the keyboard.
• Cards in Windows Solitaire not in Arabic.
• Soda machine constantly out of Mecca Cola.
• Only management is allowed to drive company camels.
• Stray goats keep wandering in off the street and eating the timecards.
• Have to provide own beheading knife.
• Not allowed to take a personal day to stand in line for new Harry Potter book.
• Office secretary no longer falling for the old “my 43rd wife doesn’t understand me” line.
• Stray, timecard-eating goats protected by company sexual harassment policy.

Still beats working in the Microsoft Security Response Center, though.

People get angry if they get singled out for having their patriotism questioned, so I’m just going to go ahead and questions everyone’s patriotism. No one gets patriotism until it’s approved by me. I automatically get patriotism because I came up with the idea. So, go ahead and prove your patriotism in the comments, but if you can’t say something great about America without feeling the need to point out something bad about America or you can’t refer to the troops without patronizing them like they’re dumb little children, then NO PATRIOTISM FOR YOU! You get to die and go to traitor hell where Satan will torture you with hot pokers for all eternity while laughing his head off (but don’t you dare question his mercy).
UPDATE:
I have commenters that are so patriotic that it makes me feel sad and pathetic. You may all be patriotic, but you should feel bad for making me feel bad!
UPDATE 2:
Actually, that previous statement was too touchy-feely which isn’t very American. Thus I rescind it and would like to express that I’m a much better patriot than each and every one of you.

We are going to be facing a challenging election in 2008, but we’ve got a bit of a problem: Current Republicans kinda suck. They’re old, they move slowly, they don’t listen, and some of them kinda smell. If the Republican Party wants to succeed in the future, we need a brand new breed of Republicans. We need to give all the old Republicans a shiny new watch, say, “Thanks for your service,” and then air out their offices in time for the dynamic breed of Republicans: The Next Generation.

“You’re blabbering on like a mental patient. This is ‘So You Want to Be a Republican,’ not ‘So You Want to Be Ron Paul.'”

So, how do we find great new Republicans to run for office, one who will stay steady on the war, secure the borders, and kick ass wherever an ass needs kicking?
American Idol.
American Idol has been successful at publicly selecting new singing stars who go one to sell multi-platinum albums. Why can’t a similar format select great new Republicans who would then go on to win elections and terrorize our enemies?
First step, we need good judges to weed out the best Republicans from those who tryout. We don’t want a Sanjaya Republican to make it to later rounds, someone who seems good at first but ends up being tone deaf on core issues. My first choice for judge would be Ann Coulter. She’s not always my favorite pundit, but she’s quite frank and will tear someone apart when needed. I’d say my choice for the other two judges (you always have three judges) would be Rush Limbaugh and Michelle Malkin… but that’s just off the top of my head. Anyway, getting the right judges will be key as I assume there will be a lot of people trying out to be Republicans and trying to impress us with their rhetoric, and we want only the best to get to the later rounds where the public will vote. So initial rounds will quiz the Republican tryouts on all the key issues and the judges will toss out all the ones who don’t measure up.
Then we make it to the final round where the Republican wannabes will tell us their plans for war and taxes and then the public will vote on their favorite at the end of each show. Each show will be different topics they’ll have to debate on as the public weeds out the weaker ones. Finally, only one will be left and he or she will be named a new Republican and automatically become the Republican’s candidate for a seat in the House of Representatives or a Senate seat. Now all the people who voted for this Republican on the show won’t be able to wait to vote for him or her for real.
This is a genius idea. I’m sure that after we do it, there will be pale weak imitations like So You Want to Be a Democrat, but there’s no way they’ll be as successful (who wants to watch an hour of people trying to out whine each other?).
So, let’s get to this. If the Republican Party wants to succeed, it needs great, new candidates, and what better way to find them than a huge public spectacle? That’s not a rhetorical question; what better way is there to find someone we know everyone will want to vote for? You can’t name one. I win.

Isn’t telling a gun owner to his face that he’s mentally deficient a display of mentally deficiency? Really, what’s the best outcome you can expect from that? Politically, it will lose you a lot of votes, but if you honestly think the person is crazy, aren’t you anticipating an even worse outcome?