by Steven Schultz
When questioned about the plan by some guys, Bush pulled down a wall-sized chart and lurched into additional oratory: “As you can see, high-tech businesses became much and much profitable in the 90’s, culminating in record profits both for internet stocks and for the NASDAQ as a whole in the year 2000, and we’ve been going downhill ever since. Now look at this other graph, which I reckon we can, uh, also call it a graph. This other graph here shows the incidence of products with ‘2000’ in their names. At the same time that American stocks are peaking, we note extreme spikery in the 2000-name graph. KABOOM!! I mean, that’s one heck of a spike there. You got Compuserve 2000, Office 2000, of course Windows 2000, Voodo3-2000, Polaroid VDC-2000, Summer Olympics 2000, ThugJam2000, Pokemon 2000, Infomart 2000, Navajo 2000, CommerceNet 2000, Pony Express 2000, Poland 2000, and of course all the so-called Y2K products. I would like to point out right here that all these products were made right here in the USA!! See, Americans are quick to recognize a breakthrough when we see it: adding 2000 to a product’s name actually makes that product much more technological and futuristic, and without the unions getting involved, without the third-world ladies going blind assembling circuits, without polluting the environment. Which I care about. It wasn’t until late August that other countries started even trying to play catch-up, but putting silver spray paint on a candy and calling it Halvah 2000 isn’t going to fool anyone, with all due respect to Mr. Ehud and his Mossad minions. What I am proposing is nothing less than a total re-vamping of the American economy to shake off these Democratic doldrums for once and for all! Since adding ‘2000’ to last year’s product names was so successful, adding ‘2001’ to all products manufactured this year will be even more so!!” The President added,”Heck, if you think Census 2000 was a success... wait till you see the new fururistical Census 2001!"
The controversial new Mandatory 2001 Legislation would virtually require every product manufactured this year to add ‘2001’ to its name. Critics, especially the Libertarian William F. Buckley, were quick to point out the socialist nature of the legislation: “How can the Republicans claim to be the party of business and smaller government when they’re taking away the first-amendment rights of businesses? That’s what they do in Sweden!!” But Bush was undeterred: “This so-called ‘Socialist Agenda’ of mine is pure hogwash. What we’re doing here is helping businesses make more money. To get back on top of the global economy, we need to have even more futuristic-sounding dates than competing countries. At this very moment, Japan is working on the Hibachi 2004! And it’s scheduled for release in 2003!! It’s the businessmen who short-sightednestically refuse to modernize their products through techno-nameage that are helping Socialism by sabotaging our economy, and these varmints must be exposed to punishment!!”
Congressman Barney Frank, or Senator or something, decried the new legislation as “Probably homophobic and intolerant, somehow! Not what America stands for, and clearly an unconstitutional power grab on the part of a corrupted Executive Branch!! ” However, after consulting the new ‘Constitution 2001’ Frank later admitted, “I guess the President can do that now.”
So far, the only victim of the new legislation was film-maker Wes Craven, whose epic “Dracula 2000” wasn’t released until 2001. Speaking from his isolation unit at Corcoran State Penitentiary, the director mewled that he really, really, wanted to finish it last year. Plans for Leprechaun 2000 have reportedly been scrapped.
Meanwhile, other businessmen have been enthusiastically lining up at USDFN2001 (United States Department of Fiduciary Nomenclature, 2001) offices to obey, obey, obey!! Stuart Huuh, CEO of MicroMediaScatonics2001 Incorporated, said, “Well, now I’m laughing at my friends who said Bush was dumb! Thanks to this legislation, I’m going to be able to make my product, whatever that might be, exactly one year more technological with no capital outlay! (I’ve already laid off my whole R&D staff) And I expect to double our profits as a result. . . I mean,” gushed Huuh, “Look how many products Microsoft had named 2000. It’s obviously the key to their success, and now that the Feds have broken their monopoly, I’m getting a piece of that. ”
Speaking through an increasingly bizarre series of minions, Bill Gates said, “At last the conspiracy has been revealed. This entire anti-trust suit has been exposed by the culprits themselves as bogus—it was just an excuse to allow our competitors to steal our most brilliant innovation—futuristic-sounding dates!!” The minions began weeping and left the shack.
Consumers have yet to reach a consensus about the success or failure of the legislation. Ricky Kwanzaa just threw out his “Allright, I guess,” mouse pad and was unpacking his “Totally crazy, innovative” Mouse pad 2001. But Kwanzaa also opined that “Who needs Weeble 2001? And Physical Graffiti 2001 doesn’t even have any new songs... it’s not even remixed. They just put a sticker on it saying, like, 2001. I at least expected some jungle beats or some shit. . . .dude, I’ve lost faith in the Zep.” In addition to the Zep, sales of Nachos 2001 and Mother’s Old Fashioned Cookies 2001 are not trending upwards. At all. Abdullah Vasquez, founder of the non-profit, internet-based Pan-Islamic Research Council, adjusted his Speedo mournfully as he announced, “This whole ‘Koran-2001’ thing just isn’t selling like we thought. We’ve tried spamming the Ayatollah, Osama Bin Laden, and even The Motherfucking Sultan but I guess they don’t check their email. . . I don’t think we’ve had more than three hits, and two of those were Unitarians.” On the bright side, sales of Heroin 2001 remain pretty damn constant.
Heidi Huang, manager of San Louis Obispo Blockbuster 2001, reports that “A lot of the customers are having trouble telling Highlander 2001:2 from Highlander 2: 2001. And, basically, the same situation with, like, Child’s Play 2:2001 and especially 2001:2001. Even the clerks are ringing that one in wrong. We’re trying to get a new button put on the thing.” One part of the private sector that’s already showing record profits is the ASCII business. ASCII chairman Peter Schoolwerth spoke with us from under an ominous cowl: “Sure, every business in America is suddenly needing way more twos, ones, and especially zeroes. Not only for their own products but for invoices when they deal with other companies. And China seems to be buying several billion of each integer just to be on the safe side. We don’t ask why. We can’t.”
Only time will tell whether this bold, visionary new legislation, somehow passed without consulting or even talking to Congress, will succeed in resuscitating the American economy. A senior analyst at Paine Webber could also tell us, but she stopped returning our calls since the breakup.
"...note extreme spikery in the 2000-name graph.
KABOOM!! I mean, that’s one heck of a spike there."
George Bush - Refering to his graph at a White House lawn press conference
"Probably homophobic and intolerant, somehow! Not what America stands for..."
Congressman Barney Frank Refering to the Mandatory 2001 Legislation
"Physical Graffiti 2001 doesn’t even have any new songs.... it’s not even remixed..."
Ricky Kwanzaa expresses his disappointment with the Physical Grafitti 2001 and Led Zeppelin 2 : 2001 albums
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