Sauce for the Teflon goose.

After gliding through the clouds of popular acclaim like a Teflon goose, President Bush has seen his poll numbers drop faster than a beer keg falling out of the loading bay of an airborne C-130.

There was the small problem of those sixteen little words about uranium from Africa. The whole nuclear threat turned out to be as vacant as Dick Cheney's conscience. Looking back, the only difference between the daily briefings of Iraq's Minister of Misinformation and Bush's State of the Union address was a beret.

Now no one wants to accept responsibility for that speech. As a matter of fact, you'd have an easier time finding a teenager enjoying a Kenny Rogers concert than anyone willing to go on record having ever seen the CIA's report discrediting the uranium claim.

Personally, the whole thing has been worth it to me just to see Bush going public with the confession that perhaps he misspoke, but if he did, it was simply because he lacked the proper intelligence. Finally. Admitting what we've been going on about for years.

The Teflon goose ain't quite cooked yet, but he's getting there.

Dear Secretary-General of the United Nations:

Hey Kofi. How's it going, bud? How's the missus? Hope you two had yourselves an excellent summer.

Say, about that whole "the U.N. is a quaint anachronism" and "the U.N. is a bunch of irrelevant wimps" and "the U.N. would rather sip chamomile tea than kick evil ass" stuff that went down last spring. Well, as you may or may not know, when a Texas boy swallows his pride, he's got to chug a fifty-five-gallon drum of castor oil to prime the chute, and that's what I'm doing. And, believe it or not, I got some experience with fifty-five-gallon drum-chugging.

What I'm trying to say is, I'm sorry. Might have gotten a little carried away there pre-war.

Well, as you probably read, the whole "shock and awe" thing went fairly well. For us. Not so good for the evildoers, if I do say so myself.

Got ourselves the junior evil ones--Uday and Qusay. But in the eight-hour standoff, they did manage to get a bit bruised up. Didn't look quite right to the Iraqi people, so we had some of our boys do a post-mortem makeover. Worked like the proverbial charm. Sort of a battlefield version of Queer Eye for the Straight Guy. Have you seen that show? What a hoot!

Did find ourselves embroiled in a couple of minor internal squabbles. Happens in every family. Can't have an omelet without breaking a couple of huevos. Not going to blame the Rumster for getting a little cocky. That man's spirit is a thing to behold. Just got to make sure to slap him up once a month or so. And truth be told, we got ourselves a three-page, single-spaced list of folks volunteering for that job.

So, let me cut to the chase. The reason I'm writing: Well, it seems we're losing some boys. About one a day. And it's having some nasty repercussions, militarily, financially, and politically. Not the best of timing, what with an election coming up and all, and I was just wondering. ... Well, we were wondering.... OK, Colin Powell wonders if you guys might agree to send some of your people over, taking a bit of heat off us?

You know my public stance. "Either you're with us or you're against us." But hey, I love you guys. Don't forget, when my dad was ambassador to your hallowed halls, the VIP bar off the Security Council was my second home for about a year and a half. By the way, if you get a chance to say hello to Roger, the bartender with the perpetual cold, tell him "the check is in the mail."

Sincerely, George W. Bush

Will Durst is a big fan of cooked goose. He likes the skin crispy and the meat well done.