A scenario such as the below would resolve the question of whether or not to show images of the blowed-up Hussein brothers for the purpose of assuring the doubt-prone Iraqi and Arab masses of their demise. But alas, in the real world, I fear only the gory details will do the job.
Borowitz writes:
- In a tape broadcast last night by the al-Jazeera television network, Saddam Hussein’s sons Qusay and Uday acknowledged for a worldwide television audience that they are, in fact, dead, a move that many in the White House and at the Pentagon hoped would bring much-needed closure.
In the three-minute interview, exclusively broadcast by al-Jazeera, a solemn-looking Qusay is the first to speak, saying simply, “I’m not going to sugarcoat this: we’re dead, folks.”
Uday, who looks on silently for most of the interview, congratulates U.S. forces on killing him, but adds that he and his brother plan to “continue to speak out on the issues that matter to the Iraqi people.”
Interim Iraqi administrator L. Paul Bremer said that seeing the two dead Hussein brothers admit that they are dead on television could help the Iraqi people move on: “Many Iraqis already knew Qusay and Uday were dead, but it’s still great for people to hear it straight from the horse’s mouth.”
But he cautioned that the dead brothers’ stated intention of continuing to speak out in the future served “no constructive purpose.”
“If Qusay and Uday continue to appear on television making statements even though they’ve already confirmed that they’re dead, that’s at best confusing and at worst unhelpful,” Mr. Bremer warned.