Dear Terrorists:
OK, you win. We surrender.
Never thought I’d say that, but then, I never thought I’d see gunmen burst into the offices of a satirical magazine as happened Wednesday in Paris. Never thought I’d see 12 people killed — most were employees, two were police officers — because a magazine published provocative cartoons mocking extremist Islam.
Here in the United States, as in France, as in pretty much every free place on the globe, we’ve cherished this crazy idea that people should be free to say whatever they darn well please. We have particularly believed in the power of humor, not simply as a means of expression, but as a way of puncturing the powerful and pricking the pretentious, of defying those who seek to make us fear.
But the bloodshed at Charlie Hebdo magazine forces us to realize the error of our ways. So I am here to announce that you have achieved your goal. From this moment on, no one on the planet — the entire planet, do you hear? — will ever, ever, ever again make fun of you. This is The End of Satire.
So you’ll hear no more cracks about Osama bin Gotten.
No one will ever again say you’re full of Shiite.
And you won’t have to hear anyone sing, “Bomb bomb bomb, bomb bomb Iran” to the tune of an old Beach Boys song.