The United States has often been called, directly or indirectly, the most brutal, repressive, and rapacious empire ever to place its yoke on the shoulders of humanity. But today, in an alarming policy shift that has the world recoiling in horror, the Bush administration, fed up with its critics, announced that America will immediately begin to live up to its unflattering, media-driven image.

Iranian President Ahmadinejad: "We've always called the USA the Great Satan. But for them to go ahead and start acting like one is way out of line. Will there ever be a limit to America's insolence?" Many progressive college professors, trial lawyers, and radical political activists were rudely awakened before sunrise and shipped off to secret thought-reconditioning facilities in the Red states. Michael Moore, secured to a chair that prevents him from closing his eyes, is forced to watch as Morgan Spurlock consumes huge portions of fast food before him. CUBA OR BUST! Hollywood's Baldwin, Robbins, Penn, Clooney, Sheen, Streisand, and Sarandon are among hundreds set adrift off the coast of Florida on makeshift rafts, which Donald Rumsfeld has sarcastically dubbed "the flotilla of fools." Air America Radio crew, including Franken and Garofalo are sailing with more comfort than others on a pimped-up truck stolen from an orphanage for blind children. Hours after the reinstatement of the Alien and Sedition Acts, reports began coming in that nearly every Democrat member of the House and Senate and a few moderate Republicans were missing without explanation. Sources close to Senators Kennedy, Reid, and Biden, as well as Representatives Pelosi and McDermott, say that these politicians and their staffers were awoken, in the pre-dawn hours, by the sound of government agents kicking in their doors. We have since confirmed that the Bush administration has established a new gulag for legislators of dubious loyalty at Heart Mountain, Wyoming, the site of a WWII-era Japanese-American internment camp. A guard at the political detention center was overheard as saying that Sen. Dick Durbin, upon seeing his spartan quarters, screamed, "Please, God, no, I wanna be transferred to G'itmo! I want my own prayer blanket!"

"We're damned if we do and damned if we don't," a stone-faced Vice President Dick Cheney snarled at a morning press conference. "For decades, this nation has been falsely accused of committing just about every atrocity imaginable."

"You punks wanna see some real imperialism? Well you're gonna get it," roared the Vice President at the hushed journalists. "We have initiated Phase One of a strategy of global 'Shock & Awe' that will transform America into the social, cultural, political, religious, and economic behemoth that its detractors, both foreign and domestic, claim it to be. Watch America as it takes the gloves off and puts on a shiny pair of brass knuckles. We're going to implement every freakin' Hollywood scenario that depicts this country as an immoral and corrupt superpower, no matter how far-fetched the plot line is, as long as it scares the living hell out of the ordinary citizens of the world."

"We'll begin by shutting down all US bases located in so-called 'old Europe,'" Cheney continued, as deadpan as ever in his delivery. "The 69,000 troops currently stationed there will be redeployed to the Middle East, where they will be joined by another 76,000 soldiers, who are being withdrawn from South Korea due to the ingratitude of its government and people. Screw South Korea, there's no oil there! The combined forces will help to protect our soon-to-be-established American-Arabian Oil Colony that'll encompass all of Iraq's and Kuwait's major oil fields, pipelines, and the transportation routes needed to get the crude to port. Our thirst for fossil fuel also demands that Saudi Arabia and Venezuela pay us tribute in the form of 'black gold' - or it's cruise missile and B-2 time!"

Following Dick Cheney's speech, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice issued an ultimatum to the governments of Syria, Sudan, and several African countries, insisting that they "cede to the American Empire the territory specified on the maps provided or suffer dire consequences." Asked what the consequences might be, Ms. Rice said, "You know, the usual: devastating air strikes, perhaps followed by ground invasions. We don't care what condition the land is in when we get it, we'll use it for dumping nuclear and industrial waste anyway."

The reaction on Wall Street has been mixed thus far - but the news that the Justice Department has greenlighted the merger of several Fortune 500 companies into one mega-corporation, The Walliburton Group, has worked investors into a frenzy. The market also reacted favorably to the administration's decision to privatize the torturing of captured terrorists by allowing a company called Black Sites Interrogators, Inc. to start selling franchises.

In other financial news, spokespeople from various government departments announced that the income tax will be eliminated on all households earning over $82,000.00 per year and that blanket pardons will be issued for all CEOs previously convicted on corruption charges. Furthermore, the US is suspending aid to every Third World country currently receiving American subsidies and calling in all foreign debts, except from Israel. Treasury officials estimate that cutting off foreign aid, alone, will save the federal coffers billions of dollars a year, thus justifying the tax cuts for the rich.

In another dramatic development, the Border Patrol has deputized members of the anti-immigrant organization known as "The Minute Men," instructing them to press captured illegal aliens into service as forced laborers for erecting a colossal border fortification mockingly dubbed "The Great Wall of America." The hapless immigrants will also be made to construct the Taj Mahalaburton palace for the Bush family in Crawford, Texas.

Mexican President Vicente Fox has attempted to appeal to the UN, calling for a resolution denouncing US border policy, only to find out that, as of this morning, the National Guard has seized the UN headquarters in New York City. All foreign diplomats, delegates, and employees have been given the choice to swear an oath of allegiance to the American empire or be imprisoned in the basement and force-fed copies of their own anti-American resolutions.

We will try to keep you informed as events warrant, but there is no telling how the news will be reported in the US in the near future, since the Joint Chiefs have issued an order whereby "any member of the media who reports an unfavorable story may be considered an enemy combatant not subject to the protections of the Geneva Conventions or imperial law." This effectively declares an open season on journalists who refuse to toe the party line. With the exception of the ultra-rightwing FoxNews, all news agencies are preparing to leave Iraq immediately. Here at home we expect martial law to be declared at any minute.