A Brioche! Where Can I Get A Brioche?!

NOT to be found in Crawford!

Well, the Prez is back in Crawford (complete with teary moms at the gates, bemoaning Dubya's jackbooted, fascist war), so it's time to trot one of the finer bits of satire written in the last few years back out for the benefit of a new audience. IowaHawk first published this back in ought-one, but it's just as spot-on today:

[There is a] growing cultural underclass in America; a voiceless society deprived of even the most basic access to transgressive sculpture, conceptual performance spaces, experimental cuisine, cutting-edge urban fashion, or drag queen pageants.

For most members of the Washington and New York media, their existence had, until recently, been only a vague rumor. But a jolting reality awaited those consigned to this remote hamlet to cover the vacation of President George W. Bush.

E.J. Dionne of the Washington Post described a common experience of the visiting press. "When I arrived in Crawford, I had a sudden craving for a quick brioche and mineral water, and set out in search of a decent Belgian patisserie," he recalled. "Two hours later, the horrible truth dawned on me. In Crawford, there are no decent Belgian patisseries."

Panic stricken, Dionne said he began asking for help from local passers-by.

"I kept asking them, 'where can I get a brioche? Where can I get a brioche?', only to see blank stares," he recalled. "Finally, one man in a pickup truck said he hadn't heard of that brand of beer, but offered me a Shiner Bock."

...

For the citizens of Crawford, filling the void of culture often means turning to sinister substitutes.

Shockingly, an apparent loophole in Texas law allows many - if not most - to own firearms, despite Crawford's miniscule crime rate. Some have joined strange religious cults that hold members in sway with weekly ritual performances and bingo nights. Others lose themselves in the cheap high offered by bass fishing and high school football.

Still, perhaps no one suffers Crawford's cultural vacuum more than its children. There are no adequately gritty abandoned warehouses for hosting acid house raves, and there are limited supplies of Crank and MDMA.

Faced with strained budgets, the Crawford Independent School District has been forced to cut back on basic curricula like Self- Actualization, and Gay, Lesbian and Transgender Studies.

"It's almost a form of societal child abuse," said Richard Doherty, an early education specialist at the New School. "Without a basic grounding in the fundamentals, these kids will be at a severe disadvantage at 17 when they're desperately trying to enroll at Bennington, Swarthmore or Mount Holyoke."

Check out the whole thing. It's better than a double-caramel latte machiato sprinkled with a hint of Madagascar cinnamon!

Monk