ONE MINUTE RETALIATIONS
When the young man arrived at Mrs.
Bierfurter's office the next morning, he was greeted by an attractive woman in
her late 90's, clad in bib overalls, who led him into a large greenhouse. "Pull
up a cactus and make yourself comfortable," she
urged.
"This certainly is an impressive greenhouse, Mrs. Bierfurter," said the young man, glancing around.
"Of course it is," she huffed. "Beyond the bromeliads, I've got five species of orchid here that no longer exist in the wild."
"That's very nice," said the young man, "But I'm here because…"
"Oh, I know why you're here, all right," said Mrs. Bierfurter, checking for aphids on the underside of the leaves of a tall rubber plant. "You've been to see the rummy, and you think he's just the neatest guy you'd ever want to meet."
"Well, yes," the young man admitted, "Yes, he is," no longer uneasy about expressing his complete and abject adoration of the old galoot.
"And he told you all about being a One Minute President, didn't he?"
"Well, yes," the young man said, "but it's all a bunch of falderal, isn't it?" He was still hoping he'd find someone with a bad word to say about the One Minute Method.
"That depends on what falderal means," Mrs. Bierfurter answered. "But the truth is I hardly ever see the old coot."
"You mean you don't have much contact with him outside your regular weekly meetings?"
"I never see him at all, except on the TV."
"But don't you need to see him on a regular basis?"
"Whatever would I need to see him for?" Mrs. Bierfurter asked, quite seriously. "If the geezer needs to talk to me, he can give me a call. We do, of course, occasionally attend the same diplomatic or social functions, and I do provide the floral arrangements when he entertains, but for the most part, I prefer to watch his occasional news conference and the late night movies."
"But this seems to fly in the face of One Minute Wishes and One Minute Gladhands," the young man argued.
"I suppose it does," Mrs. Bierfurter mused, "but then there are three pretenses to One Minute Presidenting."
"Of course," said the young man. "And that's why I'm here, to learn the final pretense."
"And you'll learn it soon enough," said the woman, swatting at two flies copulating on the potting bench. "And you'll see why I think the wishes and gladhands are hen scrabble."
"So what exactly do you do in the administration?" the young man asked, taking notes and following the woman as she bustled among her plants, feeding, pruning, and hand-picking pests.
"Oh, I'm not with the administration. My son is Secretary of Ultimate Solutions."
The young man was stunned. "But…" he fumbled. "But what do you do?"
"That's obvious, isn't it?" Mrs. Bierfurter asked. "I putter around the greenhouse and answer the phone when it rings."
And, as if on cue, the phone rang. Mrs. Bierfurter shuffled past the young man to the far end of the greenhouse, shouting: "I'm coming. I'm coming.
"Who is it and what do you want?" the old woman barked into the mouthpiece. "Of course this is Mrs. Bierfurter, who else would it be? What?… So they did, did they?" and she picked a hornworm off a nearby tomato plant, popped it into her mouth, and cracked it like chewing gum. "Well, go ahead and put some more plutonium in the reservoirs, for starters… That'll keep them busy for awhile. I said that'll keep them busy for awhile. And then," she said, spitting the hornworm's husk at a cluster of harlequin beetles, "put the Pacific fleet on full alert and have the Marines invade Puerto Rico to collect delinquent parking fines." She listened for a second, then smiled and said: "Well, you're welcome, you old goat. That's what I'm here for. Yes. I love you too." Then she hung up and shuffled back to the young man.
"I couldn't help overhearing," he said. "Do you mind my asking what that was all about?"
"Oh, nothing really," Mrs. Bierfurter said, pinching a sucker off a Better Boy. "One of the papers ran an editorial calling for the resignation of Mr. Ooze."
"But you just…"
"Now listen," she snapped, "You came here to learn the final pretense to One Minute Presidenting, didn't you?"
"Well, yes, I did," the young man said, "but …"
"Well," she chortled, "you were just within earshot of the final pretense: the One Minute Retaliation."
"The One Minute Retaliation?"
"So you heard me the first time," Mrs. Bierfurter said, "Come along now."
As the young man followed the old woman to a soiled bench where she undertook the task of repotting a bonsai Monterey Pine, he tried very hard to take notes without appearing too confused.
"Have you any idea," Mrs. Bierfurter continued, as she hoisted a 50-pound bag of pig manure onto the potting bench, "what the difference is between how our government is run today and how it was run twenty years ago?"
"Well, I…"
"Your time's up. But I'll tell you what the difference is. The difference is our government is totally committed to obliterating the myth of intelligence."
"It is?" the young man asked.
"Don't you think so?" she smiled, pinching his cheek, "I'd say we're doing one helluva job."
"Thank you," the young man blushed, "But what does this have to do with One Minute Retaliations?"
"Nothing," said Mrs. Bierfurter, squashing a slug with her thumb, "except that it helps create fear, and fear itself is the greatest communicator. Without fear, Franklin Delano Roosevelt would have been just another polio victim. After all, you can gladhand people all you want and listen to their wishes, but when it comes to the bottom line, the only thing that really keeps people straight is abject terror. And that's where the One Minute Retaliation comes in."
"You know," the young man nodded, "I think I'm beginning to understand what you're talking about."
"I'd like to believe you," Mrs. Bierfurter smiled, "But my geraniums know better."
"They do?"
"Why not ask them?" she said, picking up her scythe and hacking away at a row of hanging fuchsias. "Suppose I were to ask you what makes this the most powerful country on the face of the earth," she proposed. "What would your answer be?"
"We are a free people, united in the belief in the hopes and ideals of representative democracy," the young man said quickly, "defenders of the rights of all men, regardless of race, religion, or immune system deficiency."
The old woman shook her head in frustration. "This isn't a Civics test, stripling," she said, "Even Flipper is more perceptive than that."
"Michael Jackson?" he offered, "Stars Wars? The Los Angeles Raiders? No, wait, it's on the tip of my tongue…"
"Sure it is, but never mind that," Mrs. Bierfurter said in disgust, flinging her scythe at a dwarf banana tree. "The fact is, this is the most powerful nation on earth because it possesses more ways to eradicate all the life on this planet than all the other nations combined."
"I had no idea you wanted the facts," the young man pouted, "Up until now nothing about the One Minute Method had anything to do with the facts."
"And with good reason," Mrs. Bierfurter said.
"But up until now," the young man said, "Nothing I'd learned about the One Minute Method had anything to do with reason."
"And there was a purpose to that," smiled the old woman.
"But up until now," the young man frowned, "Nothing I'd learned about the One Minute Method led me to believe there was any purpose behind it."
"Which is just as well," Mrs. Bierfurter said.
The young man bore down, licking the tip of his pencil. "So what exactly are you getting at?"
"Simply this," said Mrs. Bierfurter, as she picked up a hoe for emphasis. "The most powerful nation on earth can only be the most powerful nation on earth not because it possesses superior weaponry, but because it possesses the notion and determination to use it, whenever it feels like it."
"Yes," said the young man. "I've studied the concept of nuclear deterrence."
"Screw nuclear deterrence!" Mrs. Bierfurter shouted, swinging the hoe within a centimeter of the young man's head. "Can't you get it through that inquisitive young skull of yours?" She held the hoe like an M-16, pointing it at the young man's abdomen. "We've got the power to do whatever we damn well please, and that's what makes the One Minute Retaliation such a useful, non-negotiable tool when dealing with both local and global vandalism."
"But it sounds like you're suggesting … "
"Suggesting?" the old woman shrieked. "I am not suggesting anything! I'm telling you: the use of force, with extreme prejudice, should always be the first solution to any problem, and don't you ever forget it!" And with that, Mrs. Bierfurter brought the hoe down hard on one of her rare orchids, splitting the flower in two. "Never could stand the beauty of that species," she frowned, "African."
The young man decided to look busy by scribbling in his book and, in doing so, made the discovery that his penmanship was improving. He couldn't read a thing he had written. This pleased him a great deal, since, although his notes had never made any sense, now he couldn't read them at all.
"Let me also emphasize," Mrs. Bierfurter continued, tossing the mangled orchid on her compost heap, "that when I speak of problems, I'm not just talking about problems overseas. I'm talking about problems right here at home."
"You mean the unions?"
"The unemployment offices," she corrected him. "This country is swarming with obsolete people determined to say they are still out of work, though the statistics we struggle to invent prove they are no longer eligible for benefits."
"You think we should nuke the unemployed?" asked the young man.
"It's certainly an option," she argued. "But why bother with the expense when TV is so much cheaper and twice as effective?"
"I don't understand."
"Tell me something I don't already know," Mrs. Bierfurter smiled. "But either way you look at it: once those missiles hit their targets, the recipients of a One Minute Retaliation are almost always taken by surprise."
"I imagine it must make people think twice…"
"You haven't listened to a thing I've said, have you?" she asked. The young man started to answer, but Mrs. Bierfurter began to laugh.
"This certainly is an impressive greenhouse, Mrs. Bierfurter," said the young man, glancing around.
"Of course it is," she huffed. "Beyond the bromeliads, I've got five species of orchid here that no longer exist in the wild."
"That's very nice," said the young man, "But I'm here because…"
"Oh, I know why you're here, all right," said Mrs. Bierfurter, checking for aphids on the underside of the leaves of a tall rubber plant. "You've been to see the rummy, and you think he's just the neatest guy you'd ever want to meet."
"Well, yes," the young man admitted, "Yes, he is," no longer uneasy about expressing his complete and abject adoration of the old galoot.
"And he told you all about being a One Minute President, didn't he?"
"Well, yes," the young man said, "but it's all a bunch of falderal, isn't it?" He was still hoping he'd find someone with a bad word to say about the One Minute Method.
"That depends on what falderal means," Mrs. Bierfurter answered. "But the truth is I hardly ever see the old coot."
"You mean you don't have much contact with him outside your regular weekly meetings?"
"I never see him at all, except on the TV."
"But don't you need to see him on a regular basis?"
"Whatever would I need to see him for?" Mrs. Bierfurter asked, quite seriously. "If the geezer needs to talk to me, he can give me a call. We do, of course, occasionally attend the same diplomatic or social functions, and I do provide the floral arrangements when he entertains, but for the most part, I prefer to watch his occasional news conference and the late night movies."
"But this seems to fly in the face of One Minute Wishes and One Minute Gladhands," the young man argued.
"I suppose it does," Mrs. Bierfurter mused, "but then there are three pretenses to One Minute Presidenting."
"Of course," said the young man. "And that's why I'm here, to learn the final pretense."
"And you'll learn it soon enough," said the woman, swatting at two flies copulating on the potting bench. "And you'll see why I think the wishes and gladhands are hen scrabble."
"So what exactly do you do in the administration?" the young man asked, taking notes and following the woman as she bustled among her plants, feeding, pruning, and hand-picking pests.
"Oh, I'm not with the administration. My son is Secretary of Ultimate Solutions."
The young man was stunned. "But…" he fumbled. "But what do you do?"
"That's obvious, isn't it?" Mrs. Bierfurter asked. "I putter around the greenhouse and answer the phone when it rings."
And, as if on cue, the phone rang. Mrs. Bierfurter shuffled past the young man to the far end of the greenhouse, shouting: "I'm coming. I'm coming.
"Who is it and what do you want?" the old woman barked into the mouthpiece. "Of course this is Mrs. Bierfurter, who else would it be? What?… So they did, did they?" and she picked a hornworm off a nearby tomato plant, popped it into her mouth, and cracked it like chewing gum. "Well, go ahead and put some more plutonium in the reservoirs, for starters… That'll keep them busy for awhile. I said that'll keep them busy for awhile. And then," she said, spitting the hornworm's husk at a cluster of harlequin beetles, "put the Pacific fleet on full alert and have the Marines invade Puerto Rico to collect delinquent parking fines." She listened for a second, then smiled and said: "Well, you're welcome, you old goat. That's what I'm here for. Yes. I love you too." Then she hung up and shuffled back to the young man.
"I couldn't help overhearing," he said. "Do you mind my asking what that was all about?"
"Oh, nothing really," Mrs. Bierfurter said, pinching a sucker off a Better Boy. "One of the papers ran an editorial calling for the resignation of Mr. Ooze."
"But you just…"
"Now listen," she snapped, "You came here to learn the final pretense to One Minute Presidenting, didn't you?"
"Well, yes, I did," the young man said, "but …"
"Well," she chortled, "you were just within earshot of the final pretense: the One Minute Retaliation."
"The One Minute Retaliation?"
"So you heard me the first time," Mrs. Bierfurter said, "Come along now."
As the young man followed the old woman to a soiled bench where she undertook the task of repotting a bonsai Monterey Pine, he tried very hard to take notes without appearing too confused.
"Have you any idea," Mrs. Bierfurter continued, as she hoisted a 50-pound bag of pig manure onto the potting bench, "what the difference is between how our government is run today and how it was run twenty years ago?"
"Well, I…"
"Your time's up. But I'll tell you what the difference is. The difference is our government is totally committed to obliterating the myth of intelligence."
"It is?" the young man asked.
"Don't you think so?" she smiled, pinching his cheek, "I'd say we're doing one helluva job."
"Thank you," the young man blushed, "But what does this have to do with One Minute Retaliations?"
"Nothing," said Mrs. Bierfurter, squashing a slug with her thumb, "except that it helps create fear, and fear itself is the greatest communicator. Without fear, Franklin Delano Roosevelt would have been just another polio victim. After all, you can gladhand people all you want and listen to their wishes, but when it comes to the bottom line, the only thing that really keeps people straight is abject terror. And that's where the One Minute Retaliation comes in."
"You know," the young man nodded, "I think I'm beginning to understand what you're talking about."
"I'd like to believe you," Mrs. Bierfurter smiled, "But my geraniums know better."
"They do?"
"Why not ask them?" she said, picking up her scythe and hacking away at a row of hanging fuchsias. "Suppose I were to ask you what makes this the most powerful country on the face of the earth," she proposed. "What would your answer be?"
"We are a free people, united in the belief in the hopes and ideals of representative democracy," the young man said quickly, "defenders of the rights of all men, regardless of race, religion, or immune system deficiency."
The old woman shook her head in frustration. "This isn't a Civics test, stripling," she said, "Even Flipper is more perceptive than that."
"Michael Jackson?" he offered, "Stars Wars? The Los Angeles Raiders? No, wait, it's on the tip of my tongue…"
"Sure it is, but never mind that," Mrs. Bierfurter said in disgust, flinging her scythe at a dwarf banana tree. "The fact is, this is the most powerful nation on earth because it possesses more ways to eradicate all the life on this planet than all the other nations combined."
"I had no idea you wanted the facts," the young man pouted, "Up until now nothing about the One Minute Method had anything to do with the facts."
"And with good reason," Mrs. Bierfurter said.
"But up until now," the young man said, "Nothing I'd learned about the One Minute Method had anything to do with reason."
"And there was a purpose to that," smiled the old woman.
"But up until now," the young man frowned, "Nothing I'd learned about the One Minute Method led me to believe there was any purpose behind it."
"Which is just as well," Mrs. Bierfurter said.
The young man bore down, licking the tip of his pencil. "So what exactly are you getting at?"
"Simply this," said Mrs. Bierfurter, as she picked up a hoe for emphasis. "The most powerful nation on earth can only be the most powerful nation on earth not because it possesses superior weaponry, but because it possesses the notion and determination to use it, whenever it feels like it."
"Yes," said the young man. "I've studied the concept of nuclear deterrence."
"Screw nuclear deterrence!" Mrs. Bierfurter shouted, swinging the hoe within a centimeter of the young man's head. "Can't you get it through that inquisitive young skull of yours?" She held the hoe like an M-16, pointing it at the young man's abdomen. "We've got the power to do whatever we damn well please, and that's what makes the One Minute Retaliation such a useful, non-negotiable tool when dealing with both local and global vandalism."
"But it sounds like you're suggesting … "
"Suggesting?" the old woman shrieked. "I am not suggesting anything! I'm telling you: the use of force, with extreme prejudice, should always be the first solution to any problem, and don't you ever forget it!" And with that, Mrs. Bierfurter brought the hoe down hard on one of her rare orchids, splitting the flower in two. "Never could stand the beauty of that species," she frowned, "African."
The young man decided to look busy by scribbling in his book and, in doing so, made the discovery that his penmanship was improving. He couldn't read a thing he had written. This pleased him a great deal, since, although his notes had never made any sense, now he couldn't read them at all.
"Let me also emphasize," Mrs. Bierfurter continued, tossing the mangled orchid on her compost heap, "that when I speak of problems, I'm not just talking about problems overseas. I'm talking about problems right here at home."
"You mean the unions?"
"The unemployment offices," she corrected him. "This country is swarming with obsolete people determined to say they are still out of work, though the statistics we struggle to invent prove they are no longer eligible for benefits."
"You think we should nuke the unemployed?" asked the young man.
"It's certainly an option," she argued. "But why bother with the expense when TV is so much cheaper and twice as effective?"
"I don't understand."
"Tell me something I don't already know," Mrs. Bierfurter smiled. "But either way you look at it: once those missiles hit their targets, the recipients of a One Minute Retaliation are almost always taken by surprise."
"I imagine it must make people think twice…"
"You haven't listened to a thing I've said, have you?" she asked. The young man started to answer, but Mrs. Bierfurter began to laugh.
"That's terrific," the young man said, helping Mrs. Bierfurter out of the compost heap. "How did you learn to do that?"
"Simply," Mrs. Bierfurter answered, "by watching the old lummox do it himself."
"You mean the President can laugh until he needs CPR?" the astonished young man asked.
"Well, not all the time," Mrs. Bierfurter admitted. "Usually he just chuckles, like the rest of us. But now and then he likes to split a gut. And when he does, it has a positive effect on everyone around him."
"He must be pretty stable," the young man suggested.
"Steady as a tombstone," Mrs. Bierfurter answered.
The young man was impressed. He was beginning to see how valuable such a President was to a country that had had so little to laugh at in the past two decades.
"So why do you think One Minute Retaliations are so effective?" he asked.
"I think you better ask Methuselah yourself," Mrs. Bierfurter said, as she picked up a chain saw and walked the young man to the door. "I've got to get back to my little rascals."
When he thanked her for her time, she winked and said: "Time is something I wish I had a bit more of." And they both howled. He was beginning to feel like a member of the family rather than a solicitor, and that made him feel just fine.
As soon as he was out in the hall, he realized how much time he had spent with Mrs. Bierfurter and how little information she had given him. He reflected on what she had said, consulted his notes, and began to hear a pleasant tune pop into his head, as he formulated in his own mind what you should do whenever you feel like it:
Posted: Fri - March 13, 1987 at 09:01 PM
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