U.S.: Charges That U.S. Troops Targeted Freed Hostage 'Absurd'
WASHINGTON -- The White House on Monday said it was "absurd" for a former hostage in Iraq to charge that U.S. military forces may have deliberately targeted her car as she was being rushed to freedom.
White House press secretary Scott McClellan said the car carrying Italian journalist Giuliana Sgrena was traveling on one of the most dangerous roads in Iraq, to the Baghdad airport, when it was fired upon. Nicola Calipari, an Italian intelligence officer in the car, was shot and killed.
Responding to Sgrena's statement that the car may have been deliberately targeted, McClellan said, "It's absurd to make any such suggestion, that our men and women in uniform would deliberately target innocent civilians.
"That's just absurd," McClellan repeated.
The White House nodded. “Reminiscent of Beckett, it is.”
“Thomas â Becket, you mean, of course?” McClellan said back to the White House.
“â Becket, a casket, I lost my yellow ascot,” replied the White House sternly. “No! I don’t mean St. Thomas, that hair shirt wearing Archbishop murdered at the altar of Canterbury Cathedral. I meant Samuel Beckett, with two teas.”
“Apparently without sugar,” observed McClellan with three ells, “how was I supposed to know you meant the 20th century playwright and not the 12th century icon of our great Judeo-Christian heritage?”
“You said ‘absurd’,” the White House reminded "Scottie," (as it liked to call him), “you totally ignored your own verbal clue.”
“I never much cared for ‘Godot’,” Scottie confessed. “It didn't make any sense to me.”
“Well, DUH! That's why they call it the Theater Of The Absurd.”
“I know that. There’s a place in the theater for alienation and that feeling that the heavenly harps are playing out of tune and in a different time signature than humanity, like Le Sacre du printeps. Beckett just never delivered true absurdity with a dreamlike quality to stimulate my imagination..."
“No! Stravinsky was a Modernist, not an Absurdist. We’re talking Ionesco, Genet, Harold Pinter, maybe even Sir Tom Stoppard. How the hell can I have an intellectual discussion with you when you confuse entire movements and even centuries?”
“You are such a prissy snob! Speaking of Stoppard, I did like Brazil.”
“That was Terry Gilliam, you provincial swine!”
“Ha! Gotcha! Stoppard shared writing credits with Gilliam – look here.”
“…uh…okay, yeah…but one out of three doesn’t make you a genius. I think someone inside me has a question for you.”
“Okay, we’ll continue this discussion later. Jeff?…”
5:14:07 PM 
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