Bring Peace, Bring Cookies
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The following are excerpts from a news briefing given by Secretary of State Madeleine K. Albright to questioners in the front room of a white house after her recent return from the Middle East:
Dr. Albright: As you may know, we have reached a historic moment on the journey towards peace between Israel and her neighbors, and I'm happy to say that the recent discussions based on United Nations Resolutions 242 and 338 have been constructive, forthright, and, I think, very serious. I'm grateful to the governments of Israel and Syria as well as to Chairman Arafat for their continued willingness to be a part of the process. Obviously, we still have a long way to go. I know that many of the details are not clear to most of you, so I'll be happy to take questions at this time ... Yes, Bethany?
Q: Madame Secretary, in light of recent developments -- the slight easing of tensions and the pullout of Israeli troops from southern Lebanon and so on, and your own optimistic statements about the prospects for peace in the region -- well, in light of all that, can you take us to the Willowbrook Mall?
A: The important goal here has been to achieve peace and come up with a lasting and workable agreement, and since I don't think taking you to the Willowbrook Mall is an essential part of that, my answer is no, I won't.
Q: Dr. Albright, I'd like to follow up if I could on Bethany's question. Since President Lahoud of Lebanon has not been personally involved in the talks up to this point, do you think he could take us to the Willowbrook Mall?
A: I believe I've already answered that question, Justin. Neither Mr. Lahoud nor I nor any of the other heads of state or their representatives are going to have time right now to take you to the Willowbrook Mall. That's all I have to say about that. Kaylie?
Q: How come you recommended the use of sanctions against Yugoslavia and Indonesia, but you won't let us go to the Willowbrook Mall, and we haven't even done anything? And secondly, if we can't go to the Willowbrook Mall, can we at least take down the Halloween box?
A: Yugoslavia and Indonesia and taking you to the mall are separate issues which I'm not going to go into here. As for the Halloween box -- bringing it down from the storage facility and opening it and all the rest -- we have a firmly established policy which I will be happy to review briefly for those of you who don't remember from last year.
In the past, we have brought the Halloween box down as early as six or seven weeks before the usual October 31st deadline. We had no international precedent to refer to in this, of course, because most other countries don't celebrate Halloween. And what happened, as some of you know, was that the Halloween things got scattered all over the place, on our diplomatic planes and in the offices of the State Department and in many of our embassies around the world. Then the string of pumpkin lights got broken and those Dracula lights that you persuaded us to buy stopped working except for one of them, and then Foreign Minister Shara of Syria stepped on a little black plastic witch's hat in his bare feet and registered a formal complaint with our government. So now we don't take down the Halloween box until after Columbus Day at the very earliest, and this is a policy we're determined to stand by.
Q: BUT I WANT TO TAKE DOWN THE HALLOWEEN BOX!
A: The answer is no.
There followed a brief interruption, while Secretary Albright went to buy dinner and return some videos.
Q: Madame Secretary, turning now to the subject of China --
A: Will you give me a minute here, please, while I put these away? ...
Q: Is it a minute yet?
A: Can't you see I'm still -- oh, all right.
Q: Madame Secretary, the United States recently granted the Chinese most-favored-nation trading status. And yet China is also building a second short-range missile base that will allow them to attack Taiwan with little or no warning. Within China there's been some lip service given to improving human rights, but meanwhile vast numbers of people work for low wages in conditions that would be unacceptable in our own country. China, with its potential new market of 1.3 billion consumers, is an irresistible temptation to Western capital, but also an enormous question mark in many ways. You have traveled extensively in China and met with many Chinese leaders; what is the sense that you get of them, and in particular, which movie do they think is scarier, Scream 1 or Scream 2?
A: Well, I think we all know by now that Scream 1 is the scarier movie, and Scream 2 is just a knockoff. That's crystal clear. As for the Chinese leaders I talked to, most have had a chance to see Scream 1 at high-level diplomatic sleepovers emphasizing cultural exchange, which I believe is a very good development. But most of the leaders' parents have not allowed them to see Scream 2, for whatever reason, and we simply don't want to interfere with that. Unfortunately, this restriction gives them no information by which to compare.
Q: Scream 2 is definitely scarier.
Q: No way!
Q: Yes, way!
Q: You're just a baby! You still suck on a blanket! You nurse!
Punching, kicking; short interruption for Time-out.
A: I'd like to say, just parenthetically, that cameras and boom microphones and tape recorders and laptops are all fine, if you use them properly, but if you use them to hit your colleague over the head, it's not fine, and we'll have to take them away.
Today's been a long day, and those of us on the negotiating teams have been working very hard, and I'd like to wrap this up. I'll take just one or two more. Gabriel?
Q: Dr. Albright, recent U.S. foreign policy has left many important questions unanswered, and it's rather frustrating for those of us whose job it is to find out what's going on. Concerning arms limitation talks with the Russians, for example -- one of our chief negotiators, Paul Nitze, recently had an incident at a meeting in Moscow where he accidentally swallowed his gum, and a Russian arms expert who was present told Mr. Nitze that when you swallow your gum, it takes you seven years to digest it. Now, is this a scientific fact, or just more Russian disinformation? The State Department has not issued a clarification on it so far. In a similar vein, the terrorist leader Osama bin Laden released a statement last week claiming that if you cross your eyes and the doorbell rings, they'll stick. This is naturally a very frightening prospect for those Americans who do cross their eyes sometimes to bother their sisters or imitate a cartoon character, or for some other reason, and who also happen to live in houses with doorbells. Shouldn't the State Department be putting out some solid information to counter this perceived threat? Just yesterday there was a wire service story in which Kim Jong II, the leader of the rogue state of North Korea, called some U.S. citizens "losers" because they still liked Hanson. According to the story, when a worker for the Dutch Red Cross challenged Mr. Jong on this characterization, he simply held up his right forefinger and thumb, making the shape of a capital L, apparently to indicate "loser," and when she pressed him further, he pushed his palm towards her face and said, and I'm quoting, "Talk to the hand." Plus, he and his North Korean army general friends have been throwing soccer balls at our group during recess. Admittedly, they're too far away to really do any damage -- but, still. How does the United States plan to respond?
A: Gabriel, I'm sorry -- can you rephrase that as a single question?
Q: Oh, okay. [Holds up a plastic Tyrannosaurus rex head.] Does anybody in the State Department, or do you personally, know where the body to this is?
A: [Unintelligible; then, faint sounds of Dr. Albright weeping, ice tinkling in cocktail glass.]
