The Intelligence Estimate

Ok, did everyone else know this and just forget to tell me? How come I had to read about it in the Christian Science Monitor? The Army has its own video game?!

This is why satire is so hard: you have to stay ahead of the curve. Back in June I wrote a post about the video game Silent Scope where I suggested that the Army was using it as a new recruitment method like the alien army did in the movie The Last Starfighter (1984). Now I know a lot of you are thinking, "Hey, the army is reading your blog and putting your great , albeit alarmingly short-sighted ideas into action!" Well, think again. The video game came out in 1992. I was merely 14 years behind the diabolical masterminds at the Pentagon who were, in turn, 8 years behind Hollywood. I'm not sure who should be more embarrassed about that.

I would have never pegged Bush for a video game player, but it kind of makes its own warped sort of sense. When you start a new game (Iraqi Freedom, Democracy's Deathgrip!) it takes you awhile to get a hang of the strategy. In massive multi-player games there is a pretty steep learning curve, especially if you don't know where all the power ups (They aided Al-Queda, they had nuclear capabilities and SUPPORT THE TROOPS!) and hidden weapons caches are. And no matter how many first person shooters you play (like Afghanistani Apocalypse or Tora-Bora and the Terror Below!) they all have their own peculiar quirks (What do you mean they don't think of us as liberators? Well we'll show them! Now we'll never leave!) I'm sure the Bush administration is just looking for the reset button on Iraq so they can call a do-over. And you know, now that they know what the "evil-doers" will actually do it should go a lot more smoothly this time around.

Just a word of warning: the cheat codes you get from the Polish only allow you to use the word "coalition" in speeches. They don't give you any actual ammo. And you're gonna need a lot of ammo because I hear it takes 15 clips (and years of rhetoric) to finish off that last guy.

Labels: America's Army, Comedy, Embarassment, Hollywood, Lost Post, Military, News, Silent Scope, The Last Starfighter, Video Games