Monty Python, Satire and David Sedaris for President

Monty Python's famous sketch "The Mouse Problem"

I've seen him four or five times and have laughed so hard that I'm folded over in my seat. I've read nearly all his essays and books. David Sedaris manages to be hysterically funny and poignantly sweet with a good dose of black, black and sometimes over-the-top vulgar humor thrown in. Yesterday I read a brief essay he wrote in Vanity Fair online that made me laugh. As the political process heats up, I'm determined to stay out of it. I'm going to pretend I'm French and not pay any attention until weeks before election day (that's their LAW). C'est dommage pour les autres candidates. But I'll listen to David Sedaris.

Here's my favorite part:

If we want to get out of this mess we’re in, we’ve got to think outside the box. On the one hand, we have immigrants pouring across the border, and on the other, the price of gas is going through the roof! I say we kill two birds with one stone and have illegal Mexicans push our cars. Canadians too, and why not? They’re on our land, so can’t we punish them as we see fit? Another example: You have babies born addicted to crack and meth, kids who will never be able to think straight, no matter how much money we throw at them. At the same time we have streets blighted with potholes. I’m not suggesting that we train these children to fill the potholes, but that we fill the potholes with these children, just stuff them right down there and cover them with asphalt. Then we take the money we’ve saved and put it toward the deficit.


I know, it's rude and outrageous. But I think Sedaris is a satirist in a long line -- Swift, Orwell, Twain, Huxley, Heller, Monty Python, Stewart -- and the satirists always get it right.


If you like your Michelle Bachmanns skewered, read the whole piece here.