When President George W. Bush heard that Al Gore won the Nobel Prize, he terrified White House staff by smashing vases, slapping and kicking any servants that crossed his path and demanding to know why they hadn't bought the prize for him, drinking two bottles of cooking sherry, and refusing to take his psychiatric medications.By Saturday, his handlers were able to calm him somewhat by sending him on a bike ride and promising he could watch ESPN the rest of the day when he returned.
Bush was enjoying his ride until he stopped to let Secret Service agents dab a bead of sweat from his brow and rehydrate him. Two anti-war protesters jumped from the bushes and shouted, "You should be the first American president judged by the Hague! You're a war---"
Fortunately, they were cut off by taser and pepper spray intervention.
While the protesters were being stripped, hooded, and thrown in the trunk of a Lincoln Town Car following the president, Bush asked his handlers what this "hag" was.
A quick thinking aide told him it was an international prize far more prestigious than the Nobel, and one that no American president has yet won, unlike the Nobel, which had been won by Jimmy Carter and Teddy Roosevelt. Bush asked one of his religious aides, known for not lying, if this was the truth. Not wanting to be berated, beaten, fired, or killed, the aide said, "I have heard that the judges at the Hague would like to...acknowledge what you have done in office."
Bush was confused. "They said something about me being a war something?"
"A war hero," a less scrupulous aide said. "They want to honor what you've done in the Iraq War."
Bush sought to verify this and called the president of the ICC in the Hague for confirmation. Shocked, the chief judge said he could not say what the outcome would be unless President Bush came to be judged in person.
"You have done so much to so many to help so few, we could not possibly address your actions in absentia."
The judge did not realize that Bush's limited English and even weaker grasp of abstract concepts rendered his statement meaningless to Bush, at least after "you have done so much."
He also added that the Hague was in the Netherlands, and it would be a crime to order airstrikes on the judges to influence the outcome.
Bush hung up and asked his minder why the judge thought he was going to bomb someone who wanted to give him a prize.
"Not everyone sees things with the moral clarity you do, sir."
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