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<p align="center"><font size="5"><strong>Your </strong></font></p>

<p align="center"><font size="7"><em><strong>Free Copy</strong></em></font><font
size="6"><em><strong> </strong></em></font></p>

<p align="center"><font size="5"><strong>of </strong></font></p>

<p align="center"><font size="5"><strong>John Alejandro King's
classic </strong></font><font size="6"><em><strong>Letter to the
Post</strong></em></font></p>

<p align="left">&nbsp;</p>

<p align="left"><font size="3"><strong>Note: This letter was
recently sent to the </strong><em><strong>Washington Post</strong></em><strong>
by The Covert Comic, a.k.a. John Alejandro King. Apparently the </strong><em><strong>Post
</strong></em><strong>decided not to print the letter or even
acknowledge its existence. Why, we may never know. But now </strong></font><font
size="4"><em><strong>you</strong></em></font><font size="3"><strong>
have a copy of this historic document!</strong></font></p>

<hr>

<p><font size="3">Dear <i>Washington Post:</i></font></p>

<p><font size="3">Many weeks ago I submitted some written works
of mine to CIA&#146;s Publication Review Branch seeking official
approval to publish these documents. I did this because it&#146;s
required of CIA employees and, well, the fact is that I&#146;m a
CIA employee (and one who believes in obeying regulations, I
might add). Although the books I submitted are unclassified in
their entirety, I have yet to receive approval to publish them.
In fact, I&#146;ve heard through the Intelligence Community
grapevine that certain officials at the Agency consider my works
to be &quot;unpublishable&quot;. Given this situation (plus the
fact that the normal time required for publication review and
approval is supposedly two or three weeks, versus the much longer
time I&#146;ve been waiting) I think we can conclude that the
Government, and in particular the Central Intelligence Agency,
does not wish for my books to see the light of day. </font></p>

<p><font size="3">What, you may ask, is in these books of mine
that would cause the Government to apparently want, in effect, to
censor them? And is the Government justified in seemingly wanting
to censor my writings? Well, how better to answer these questions
than by describing, in a very general (and of course totally
unclassified) way, <i>the books themselves</i><em>?</em></font></p>

<p><font size="3">Accordingly, so that the American people (for
whom our Government agencies exist, after all) can make an
informed decision regarding where they stand on the issue,
I&#146;ve included in this letter a <i>general, unclassified
description</i> of the books which I&#146;ve submitted to the
CIA&#146;s Publication Review Branch and which the Government
apparently doesn&#146;t want published. I&#146;ve also included
in this letter some additional compositions of mine in order to
help you and the readers of your fine newspaper get an accurate
sense of the flavor of my writing.</font></p>

<p><font size="3">Anyway, the following are descriptions and
selections of my writing, which descriptions and selections I
hope and trust will convince the many readers of your fine
periodical that the Government has no business whatsoever trying
to censor my books. </font></p>

<p><font size="3">1. <i>My Resume or Everything I Know about The
CIA and Elvis</i></font></p>

<p><font size="3">The book <i>My Resume or Everything I Know
about The CIA and Elvis</i> is a combination job resume, treatise
of business principles, and memoir. It&#146;s a job resume in
that it describes my qualifications, education, and experience in
the professional world, both as a covert intelligence officer and
as a former bass player for many world famous disco music acts
(I&#146;m not lying; I have the gold records to prove it. Many of
my fellow CIA officers, no doubt as a result of seeing my various
music awards and other memorabilia in my office at CIA, have
expressed amazement that I possess a top secret security
clearance.)</font></p>

<p><font size="3">As for business principles, <i>My Resume</i>
(the short name of this document of mine) contains literally
dozens of truths about how to be productive and achieve
recognition as a truly excellent business person. These
principles I offer are based largely on my own experience as a
very successful project manager at CIA (other principles in the
book I learned from my father, a successful businessman and
academic who, by the way, happens to have Spanish blood). Without
going into details I&#146;ll just say that as a result of my
projects at CIA I&#146;ve been promoted quickly and often.
There&#146;s absolutely no reason why someone who reads my
business principles and puts them into practice in their own life
can&#146;t enjoy the same prosperity I enjoy, even if they
don&#146;t happen to possess a top secret security clearance at
the moment.</font></p>

<p><font size="3">Regarding the memoir aspect of <i>My Resume</i>,
suffice to say that this document is filled with fascinating and
true stories of the many amazing things I&#146;ve seen and done
during my many years as a covert intelligence officer, disco bass
player, etc., and that these stories will fill you with wonder
and inspiration, assuming the Government doesn&#146;t stop you
from reading them. </font></p>

<p><font size="3">Incidentally, some people who&#146;ve read <i>My
Resume</i> and are sympathetic to it claim to see in this book a <i>deeper
meaning</i> underlying the discussion of business principles and
job qualifications. How do I respond to such claims? By
confessing that they&#146;re absolutely correct! But just what <i>is</i>
this deeper meaning in <i>My Resume</i>? Without revealing the
whole concept (I think it&#146;s better to let readers make these
sorts of discoveries for themselves) let me just say that <i>it
has to do with being</i>.</font></p>

<p><font size="3">One last point about <i>My Resume</i>: Although
I love my job at CIA, am very good at it, and have every hope of
continuing to serve that excellent organization in its important
mission to protect America, I must confess that I anticipate the
possibility (slight, but a possibility nonetheless) of career
difficulties as a result of having submitted my books to
CIA&#146;s Publication Review Branch (and also for having sent
this letter to your superb newspaper). For this reason I hope
readers of <i>My Resume</i>, in addition to gaining lots of
pleasure and enlightenment from it, will consider actually
employing me, your humble correspondent John Alejandro King,
should I in the future find myself without a livelihood.</font></p>

<p><font size="3">Likewise, in the event I lose my job at CIA as
a result of my decision to write God&#146;s love and truth, I
hope to meet a reader (or readers) who will furnish, at a
reasonable monthly rate, temporary housing for myself, my wife,
our baby daughter, and possibly my mother-in-law (a wonderful
person and an excellent gardener). I say this in case I&#146;m
forced by financial considerations to sell our townhouse (which
is located in a peaceful suburban Virginia neighborhood bordering
a small forest). Incidentally, if you happen to be house hunting
you might want to check with John Alejandro King from time to
time to see how I&#146;m doing at work. You never know, you might
get a real bargain.</font></p>

<p><font size="3">As for how to contact me, my mailing address
appears elsewhere in this letter. </font></p>

<p><font size="3">By the way, I&#146;m fully aware that this
letter of mine is starting to get a little longer than letters to
the editor which you typically receive from your readership.
However, I&#146;m confident that as professional journalists with
a strong sense of your duty to get the truth to the public
(especially where the truth concerns possible attempts by the US
Government to censor American citizens), your fine newspaper will
not only give my letter a fair reading, but will make every
effort to print it for the general public to read. Who knows,
perhaps your fabulous publication will make the highly
enlightened (and no doubt commercially very lucrative) decision
to devote an entire Special Issue to this letter of mine,
something akin to what was done by many newspapers following the
Moon Landing. For without bragging about it I think you&#146;ll
increasingly agree with me, as you go on reading my letter, that
in many ways my writing is something of a moon landing in its own
right. Of course I&#146;m kidding a little when I say this,
although when you think about it there&#146;s definitely some
truth to the claim, if it&#146;s not too arrogant of me to say
so.</font></p>

<p><font size="3">Not to digress too far from our main topic, but
the other afternoon someone at CIA (a psychiatrist, if I remember
correctly) asked me how I would characterize my writing. In
particular this person wanted to get my perspective on what,
exactly, my writing is <i>about</i>. I told this person &quot;In
my opinion, my writing is for the most part about different
aspects of <i>existence</i>.&quot; I also told this person that
early in my development as a writer I made the fateful decision
to emphasize themes relating to existence rather than those
relating to nonexistence. The reason? Well, when it comes to
nonexistence, how much can one say, really? Indeed, given a
choice between existence and nonexistence, I for one will take
existence every time.</font></p>

<p><font size="3">It all reminds me of an extremely important
point that needs to be made regarding censorship, namely, that <i>not
every FBI officer is spying for the Russians</i>. Earlier in my
career as an intelligence officer I made the regrettable error of
asserting that all FBI officers were spying for Russia. While the
logic behind my claim was impeccable, I now realize that the
claim itself just isn&#146;t supported by the facts.</font></p>

<p><font size="3">Here was the problem: While investigating the
application of logico-quantitative approaches to intelligence and
counterintelligence problems, I realized that the statement
&quot;All FBI officers are spying for the Russians&quot; is <i>logically
equivalent</i> to the statement &quot;If a person <i>isn&#146;t</i>
spying for the Russians, then that person isn&#146;t an FBI
officer.&quot; Technically these two statements are exactly the
same. So according to the basic principles of reason, if you
prove one of these statements you&#146;ve proven the other.</font></p>

<p><font size="3">For some time after this I quietly undertook
(at no expense to taxpayers, by the way) careful and exhaustive
research in this area. And as it turned out (or seemed to turn
out), <i>every</i> randomly selected person I observed who
wasn&#146;t spying for the Russians also was not an FBI officer.
And I randomly studied <i>thousands</i> of people during this
time. So by virtue of the fundamental rules of logic it followed
necessarily that, since whoever wasn&#146;t spying for the
Russians wasn&#146;t an FBI officer, therefore all FBI officers
were spying for Russia.</font></p>

<p><font size="3">Well, I&#146;m sure you can see the shortcoming
in my method. Yes, with great embarrassment I confess that I
completely failed to take into account the problem of <i>measurement
of data</i>. Sure, I studied thousands of randomly selected
people, none of whom a<i>ppeared</i> to be FBI officers; but how
certain am I that none of these people were <i>undercover</i> FBI
officers? The answer, I have to admit, is that I&#146;m not
certain at all. Recognizing the error of my ways, I now
understand, of course, that not all FBI officers are necessarily
spying for the Russians. In fact, the number of FBI officers
spying for Russia could easily be well less than fifty percent of
the total staff of that fine agency. Sorry, people! My mistake!</font></p>

<p><font size="3">One potential silver lining to this otherwise
dark methodological cloud: Recognizing the shortcoming in my
experimental procedure, I recently undertook some preliminary
research using an improved method of evaluating test data and was
able to tentatively conclude (more study is needed, of course)
that every resident of the state of New York <i>may</i> be a
Satan worshipper. </font></p>

<p><font size="3">What does all this have to do with censorship?
Well, if Government officials can&#146;t share some of the
unclassified elements of their work with the general public, an
excellent chance may be lost for identifying and correcting
mistakes in the Government <i>before</i> these mistakes grow into
problems of truly gigantic proportions. I mean, can you imagine
what might have happened if my research on the FBI had resulted
in each and every employee of America&#146;s premier law
enforcement agency being investigated for espionage? First of
all, <i>who would investigate them?</i> The FBI <i>itself?</i>
Talk about a dilemma! Likewise, if it <i>does</i> turn out that
every resident of the state of New York is a Satan worshipper
(I&#146;m not claiming that this is true, but <i>if</i> it&#146;s
true), then isn&#146;t it all for the best that we Federal
officials get the word out to people so that appropriate action
can be taken sooner rather than later?</font></p>

<p><font size="3">Well, anyway, here&#146;s a description of
another document which I submitted to the CIA&#146;s Publication
Review Branch recently, official approval of the publication of
which has unjustly (in my estimation) not been given. </font></p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>

<p><font size="3">2. <i>The Covert Comic (1/98 Briefing)</i></font></p>

<p><font size="3">Now, admittedly this book is a transcript of <i>an
actual intelligence briefing</i>, although I think you'll agree
on reading it (if the Government ever allows you to read it) that
this document is hardly a threat to our National Security.</font></p>

<p><font size="3"><i>The Covert Comic (1/98 Briefing) </i>is
utterly unclassified, consisting of dozens and dozens of
hilarious, good-natured, and completely harmless gags (along with
not a few rather deep truths) about topics like cosmology, near
death experiences, human reproductive organs, and the crucial
question of who really killed JFK.</font></p>

<p><font size="3">The following is an example of the sort of
material which can be found in <i>The Covert Comic (1/98
Briefing)</i>. <b>Note</b>: The italicized statements in brackets
refer to audience reaction to the jokes; they&#146;re intended to
make reading the document more like attending an actual Covert
Comic intelligence briefing. Certain US Government officials,
after reading <i>The Covert Comic (1/98 Briefing)</i>, have
commented that these brackets are something like a &#145;literary
laugh track&#146;. This is just one of many innovations which I,
John Alejandro King, have to offer to the literary world, and
which are certain to bring great joy and enlightenment to many
people if only the Government will refrain from trying to
suppress publication of my writings.</font></p>

<p><font size="3">So here are a few of The Covert Comic&#146;s
jokes (and by the way, if you get a chance to hear The Covert
Comic tell them at an actual intelligence briefing, many of these
jokes will seem <i>even funnier</i> than they do here).</font></p>

<p><font size="3">THE COVERT COMIC <i>(walking to the podium
carrying some written notes, waving to the audience, and</i> <i>grinning
good-naturedly):</i> Ladies, gentlemen, and other life-forms: <i>[Chuckles
from the audience]</i> My name isn&#146;t The Covert Comic,
a.k.a. John Alejandro King, I don&#146;t work as an intelligence
officer for the CIA, and you&#146;re not here at this
intelligence briefing. <i>[More chuckles and scattered laughter
from the audience]</i></font></p>

<p><font size="3">THE COVERT COMIC <em>(appearing to become
serious in order to get to the business at hand): </em>In
addition to the fact that their only real function is to kill
millions of people, a major objection that I have against
biological weapons is the amount of space they take up in a
person&#146;s basement. <i>[Audience pause followed by laughter]</i>
That, and the smell, of course. <i>Phew</i><b><i>weee!!!</i></b> <i>[Laughter]</i></font></p>

<p><font size="3">THE COVERT COMIC: Somebody once asked me
what&#146;s the worst thing a CIA officer can do. I said I
imagined that committing espionage against the United States was
probably the worst thing a CIA officer can do, although I&#146;ve
noticed that CIA officials also get pretty upset if you crawl
around under the table during an intelligence briefing trying to
set people&#146;s shoes on fire. <i>[Laughter]</i></font></p>

<p><font size="3">THE COVERT COMIC: Do you think if a CIA officer
accidentally ordered a military coup in a Third World country,
CIA management would laugh off the whole incident and give him
his scheduled promotion anyway? I don&#146;t think so either.
Damn... <i>[Laughter]</i></font></p>

<p><font size="3">THE COVERT COMIC: This society of ours is so
materialistic. In my opinion, <i>people</i> are much more
valuable than &#145;things&#146;. That&#146;s why I have several
trunks full of people in my basement. <i>[Laughter]</i></font></p>

<p><font size="3">THE COVERT COMIC: I remember when I was
stationed on the planet Furpee. <i>[Chuckles]</i> So I&#146;m
floating down the street there one evening when four natives with
fire spears float up to me, and one of them says &quot;Hey,
Mundoman, give us your wallet.&quot; I said to him &quot;Hey,
Plasma,&quot; and I pulled out my laser and shot him in the
lightgills. <i>[Chuckles]</i> So then a policeman shows up and
says &quot;Hey, Mundoman, why the hell did you shoot that
guy?&quot; I said &quot;Hey, Plaz&#146;, these guys were trying
to mug me. Besides, I&#146;m a diplomat.&quot; And he says
&quot;So what?&quot; So then I gave the policeman some money, and
he let me go. What? What&#146;s that you ask? The point of this
story? Well, I suppose one point of this story is that if
you&#146;re ever stationed on the planet Furpee and you go out
floating at night, unless you want trouble you&#146;d better
remember to wear a BFS, you know, a body form simulator. <i>[Pause
followed by laughter]</i></font></p>

<p><font size="3">(<b>Author&#146;s Note</b>: Just why a CIA
officer would tell jokes about being stationed as a diplomat on
another planet is frankly a mystery to yours truly. Could it be
that the Government is secretly engaged in diplomatic relations
with one or more extraterrestrial civilizations, and that as part
of this project the CIA is undertaking intelligence operations
under diplomatic cover on the planet(s) in question? Well, if
such a scenario <i>were</i> true, then by definition I
wouldn&#146;t be allowed to admit it, would I? Suffice to say
that I personally doubt such activity is happening, although you
can never be sure about things like this.) </font></p>

<p><font size="3">THE COVERT COMIC: It&#146;s interesting how we
acquire different nicknames in the course of our life. For
instance, I remember when people used to call me &#145;The
Beeper&#146;. They called me &#145;The Beeper&#146; because they
said that whenever I talked it sounded like something beeping. <i>[Chuckles]</i>
They used to say &quot;How&#146;s it going, Beeper?&quot; Or
&quot;Hey, here comes The Beeper.&quot; <i>[Chuckles]</i> After
that, people started calling me &#145;Man&#146;. They only called
me &#145;Man&#146; for a short time, though, about four seconds. <i>[Chuckles]</i>
During this brief period in my life people said things to me like
&quot;Hey Man, it&#146;s cool, Man; just put the flamethrower
down, Man.&quot; <i>[Laughter]</i> Today I have a different
nickname. Today people call me &#145;Sleepy&#146;. They say
things like &quot;Wake up, Sleepy, it&#146;s time for your
medication.&quot; <i>[Laughter]</i> </font></p>

<p><font size="3">THE COVERT COMIC: If I&#146;m ever captured by
foreign intelligence agents and they&#146;re torturing me, and
one of my torturers is eating a hot-dog, I hope I have the
presence of mind to reach over and grab his hot-dog from him and
start eating it, right while I&#146;m being tortured. <i>[Laughter]</i>
And then, when he tries to take the hot-dog back from me, I
struggle with him for it. I mean, that would be pretty funny,
don&#146;t you think? <i>[Laughter]</i></font></p>

<p><font size="3">THE COVERT COMIC <i>(adopting a more serious,
reflective tone):</i> You know, in my opinion the CIA&#146;s
greatest asset is people. After all, without people the CIA would
be no different from, say, the FBI. <i>[Pause followed by
laughter]</i></font></p>

<p><font size="3">THE COVERT COMIC: Hey, you&#146;ve been a great
audience, folks. In fact, you&#146;ve been so gracious that
I&#146;ve decided not to call my buddies in Operations and tell
them to make you disappear. <i>[Laughter]</i></font></p>

<p><font size="3">THE COVERT COMIC: Ladies, gentlemen, and other
life-forms: <i>[Chuckles]</i> My name isn&#146;t The Covert
Comic, a.k.a. John Alejandro King, I don&#146;t work as an
intelligence officer for the CIA, and you&#146;re not here at
this intelligence briefing. <i>[The Covert Comic waves to the
audience and grins good-naturedly. There is laughter and warm
applause. The Covert Comic walks from the podium into the
audience, touching and healing many people along the way]</i></font></p>

<p><font size="3">Naturally The Covert Comic&#146;s full
intelligence briefings are longer than this; what you&#146;ve
just read is a small sample of the kind of jokes The Covert Comic
tells in a typical briefing. The purpose of the above sample is
to help readers see A) just how riotously funny The Covert Comic
is, and B) why there&#146;s<i> absolutely no good reason</i> for
the Government to attempt to stop publication of written
transcripts of The Covert Comic&#146;s periodic unclassified
briefings at CIA.</font></p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>

<p><font size="3">The following information, which I share in
order to let the public know that CIA officials are quite serious
about counterintelligence, is not compartmented or classified in
any way. (Incidentally, for those who don&#146;t understand the
terminology of covert intelligence, the word <i>compartmented</i>
refers to an operation in which no person in any one part of the
operation knows what people in any other part of the operation
are doing. An example of a compartmented operation is, well, any
part of the Government, really.)</font></p>

<p><font size="3">After several years of research (at my own
expense, not that of taxpayers) I&#146;m now convinced that
I&#146;ve solved our nation&#146;s counterintelligence problem.
What we should do is make it so that every time a US Government
employee tries to pass classified information to unauthorized
people, that employee&#146;s head explodes. As for how to
accomplish this, I&#146;ve got the answer to that question too.
What we can do is implant a small explosive device in the brain
of every federal employee possessing a security clearance. No
doubt there will be concerns about the constitutionality of such
a procedure, but then, it&#146;s been well-established as a
result of many court cases that a security clearance is a <i>privilege</i>,
not a right.</font></p>

<p><font size="3">Anyhow, the explosive can be connected to a
tiny computer which also (like the explosive) can be implanted in
the Government official&#146;s brain. The computer, in turn, can
be connected to a small video camera and audio recorder which, by
relaying their signals to special software in the computer, can
enable the computer to establish that the Government employee is
in fact trying to illegally pass Government secrets. I guess the
camera and audio recorder should <i>also</i> be implanted in the
person&#146;s head, since if these devices were on the outside of
the employee&#146;s body they could possibly be disabled by that
person or by someone else.</font></p>

<p><font size="3">I&#146;ve looked into the technology that would
be required for the implementation of this approach, and it turns
out that the entire package (i.e., the explosive, the computer,
and the various recording devices that would be implanted in the
heads of Government officials) would only weigh about twelve
pounds and take up a total area much less than the size of a
regulation basketball. So all that&#146;s needed to make the
concept feasible (at least for Phase One human testing) is a
small, efficient, relatively lightweight power supply to run the
whole thing. I would like to take the opportunity of this public
forum to propose that the Government consider sponsoring research
in this area (I feel that nine hundred million dollars would be
about the right level of funding for the first year of research,
with more for the follow-on, of course).</font></p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>

<p><font size="3">I hope you won&#146;t think less of me if,
right in the middle of my letter (more or less), I take this
opportunity to offer a little constructive criticism of your
excellent newspaper. Please understand that I have absolutely
nothing against your news reporting or (in many cases) your
editorial stance, and of course I consider your sports section
first rate (you consistently provide more and better coverage of
sporting events, and also publish box scores from late games the
morning after they&#146;re played, a fact which puts you head and
shoulders above your competitors). No, my constructive and <i>really
quite loving</i> criticism of your paper has nothing whatsoever
to do with what you put in it. Rather, I wish to gently chide you
for what you <i>don&#146;t</i> put in it. I refer here to a
letter I wrote to you some time ago which you apparently have
chosen not to publish. Why you exercised your completely
legitimate right not to publish this correspondence from a loyal
reader, I can&#146;t say, although I certainly don&#146;t condemn
you for your decision (who knows, perhaps you never actually
received my letter owing to an honest mistake by an employee in
your mailroom or for some other reason, in which case your fine
journal is of course totally blameless).</font></p>

<p><font size="3">Anyhow, here in its entirety is the letter I
wrote to you earlier, which letter addresses a very important
issue relating to the CIA and its future as an intelligence
agency in a vastly changed world.</font></p>

<p><font size="3">Dear <i>Washington Post:</i></font></p>

<p><font size="3">Throughout the halls of power in our
nation&#146;s capital the question is increasingly being asked:
Now that the universe no longer exists, do we really need the CIA
anymore? Critics of the Agency point out that one could justify
having an organization to collect, process, and analyze
intelligence during the era immediately following World War II
when there were still things like objects with mass. But, these
critics continue, now that the universe has effectively ceased,
can the CIA (at least in its present form) still be considered
relevant? </font></p>

<p><font size="3">I, for one, wish to address these questions by
arguing that the CIA is still <i>quite</i> relevant, the death of
the cosmos notwithstanding. For one thing, although the universe
has ended, <i>how do we know it won&#146;t begin again</i>? And
if the universe <i>does</i> begin again, doesn&#146;t it make
sense to have an already existing, highly capable, relatively
well-run intelligence agency on the scene collecting, processing,
and analyzing information about this new universe (and the
potentially hostile plans and intentions of any foreign
governments in it) from <i>the very first moment</i> of that
universe&#146;s inception? On the other hand, if the universe <i>doesn&#146;t</i>
begin again (so that we in effect remain without a cosmos
indefinitely), how can policymakers be sure from one moment to
the next that this is <i>still the case</i> unless we have a
professional, well-staffed, well-funded intelligence organization
constantly monitoring and providing reliable reporting on the
situation?</font></p>

<p><font size="3">While it&#146;s true that I am a CIA employee
and therefore partial to the Agency, I believe that an objective,
reasoned examination of this issue will convince even critics of
the CIA that, although technically speaking there&#146;s no such
thing as space, time, or matter anymore, having an intelligence
agency is still eminently preferable to not having one. </font></p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>

<p><font size="3">John Alejandro King</font></p>

<p><font size="3">Covert Intelligence Officer and Comic</font></p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>

<p><font size="3">You know how I&#146;ve said throughout this
letter that there&#146;s no classified information of any kind in
it? Well, the following selection represents a rather thorny
problem in this respect, since it appears to have been written in
the distant future (approximately six million years from now),
and I mean, who knows what the classification of a given document
might be at that time? Fortunately, the fact that the document
seems to be some sort of book review or possibly an academic
article enables me (and, I think, most other rational readers) to
conclude that it almost certainly is <i>not</i> classified
(either now or in the future), and that therefore I&#146;m not
violating any official regulations (either now or in the future)
by disseminating it. So here&#146;s the document which, as usual,
I offer for your review in order to help you decide whether my
writing should be censored by the Government or not.</font></p>

<p><font size="3">Recently, while experimenting with some time
travel technology we&#146;re developing at CIA, I received the
strangest E-mail message on my computer. It appears to be some
sort of discussion in the distant future of an ancient book
written by, well, by <i>me!</i></font></p>

<p><font size="3">Rather than comment on it, I&#146;ll share with
you the full text of this odd document:</font></p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>

<p align="center"><font size="3">The Dead Mall Videos </font></p>

<p align="center"><font size="3">and </font></p>

<p align="center"><font size="3"><i>The Covert Comic</i>:</font></p>

<p align="center"><font size="3">Ancient Truths for Our Own Time </font></p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>

<p><font size="3">The discoveries of the Dead Mall Videos and the
ancient literary classic <i>The Covert Comic (1/98 Briefing) </i>have
served, perhaps more than any other events in modern
anthropology, to establish once and for all our true historical
origins and finally lay to rest previous uninformed, unscientific
speculation. For example, thanks to the Dead Mall Videos we now
know beyond doubt that the earliest humans were black and white,
that their mouths moved but no sound came out, and that they
walked around with a rapid, jerky motion and wore extremely
funny-looking hats. Later records show our ancestors to have
evolved into full-color organisms who could make sounds, but who
for some reason insisted on taking all their clothes off and
getting into the shower every time a monster was in their
apartment. Following this period humans appear to have finally
developed into the many-dimensional, multiform beings we are
today, though why they initially insisted on referring to this
modern form of existence as &#145;virtual reality&#146; is not
completely understood. Perhaps they thought of themselves as
being somehow not quite fully real.</font></p>

<p><font size="3">In any case, it all serves to remind us of the
great value of historical record keeping, and also just how
severe the consequences of failing to preserve and correctly
interpret our past can be. After all, who can forget the famous
Sitcom Hoax? And what about the now discredited &#145;News
Theory&#146;? For readers who are unfamiliar with it, the News
Theory claimed that so-called &#145;TV news&#146;,
&#145;documentaries&#146;, and &#145;investigative
journalism&#146; were serious attempts to objectively report
facts, rather than the obviously neurotic forms of low humor we
now know them to have been. One&#146;s lightgills shudder at the
thought that, as recently as a mere six million years ago, most
respectable historians and anthropologists actually believed the
News Theory. Indeed, this clearly flawed theory might even have
survived to the present time if it hadn&#146;t been for the
fortuitous discovery of the cryogenically preserved book <i>The
Covert Comic (1/98 Briefing) </i>written by the ancient comic
philosopher John Alejandro King, which set the historical record
straight.</font></p>

<p><font size="3">As the great old sage himself brilliantly
observes in <i>The Covert Comic (1/98 Briefing)</i>, &quot;Those
who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.&quot;
Surely if a primitive form of life like this ancient bipedal joke
teller can recognize such a truth in his own time, we can do the
same today. Therefore, let us not fail to leave a faithful record
of life in our own era so that future generations will know how
we lived, what we thought, and how zangingly we frushed. And let
us continue perfecting ways to make our boobs and penises ever
larger and more numerous, just as Saint John Alejandro King has
exhorted us to do in <i>The Covert Comic (1/98 Briefing)</i>.
After all, we wouldn&#146;t want the Bogey Man to get us, would
we?</font></p>

<p><font size="3">Now, really, is this the kind of writing that
Government officials should have some sort of &#145;problem&#146;
with? Of course not! In the first place, there&#146;s no solid
evidence that any of the events described in the above document
are certain to happen (six million years <i>is</i> a long time,
after all, and the course of future history could undergo any
number of unforeseen changes between now and then).</font></p>

<p><font size="3">By the way, I&#146;m <i>not</i> claiming that
the CIA actually has time travel technology yet.</font></p>

<p><font size="3">Come on, folks! Let&#146;s be realistic here!
There&#146;s <i>no legitimate reason</i> why my writing
shouldn&#146;t be approved for publication. In fact, I have it on
<i>very</i> good authority that in the future my writing not only
won&#146;t be censored by the Government, it will actually be
taught to all new CIA officers entering on duty in the
Agency&#146;s Employee Medical and Psychological Branch. And it
won&#146;t take six million years for this to happen, either!</font></p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>

<p><font size="3">The following are several advertisements for my
book <i>The Covert Comic (1/98 Briefing). </i>I&#146;ve created
similar advertisements for my other books as well. I produced
these advertisements on my home computer recently and, if and
when the Government refrains from trying to prevent publication
of my writings, I intend to place these ads in newspapers,
magazines, on the internet, and also on bulletin boards of as
many bookstores as possible. I include these advertisements in my
letter because: A) I think they can give readers of this letter a
better idea of what my books are all about and why there&#146;s
no legitimate cause for the Government to try to stop me from
publishing them. B) I frankly hope to generate as much publicity
for my books as possible. In particular, I&#146;m hoping that
people who read this letter in your newspaper will help the cause
of freedom by making copies of these advertisements and
distributing them as widely as possible. C) I would also like to
get the opinion of members of the advertising staff of your fine
newspaper as to what, if any, changes I should make in these
advertisements so that they can be even better than they are now.
Perhaps there&#146;s room for a few small improvements in these
ads of mine, in which case I&#146;ll be extremely grateful for
any input your advertising people might care to offer me in this
regard.</font></p>

<p><font size="3">The advertisements appear below.</font></p>

<p><font size="3">This first advertisement is fairly
straightforward.</font></p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>

<p align="center"><font size="5"><b>CIA CIA CIA CIA CIA CIA CIA
CIA CIA CIA</b></font></p>

<p align="center">&nbsp;</p>

<p align="center"><font size="6"><b><i>America&#146;s Funniest
Covert Intelligence Officer!</i></b></font></p>

<p align="center">&nbsp;</p>

<p align="center"><img src="../ccframe.gif" width="289"
height="203"></p>

<p align="center">&nbsp;</p>

<p align="center"><font size="6"><b><i>THE COVERT COMIC!</i></b></font></p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>

<p><font size="4"><b>Read the document the </b><b><i>Washington
Post</i></b><b> will probably call &quot;A masterpiece. The most
exciting expose in decades.&quot;</b></font></p>

<p><font size="4"><b>The document is called </b><b><i>The Covert
Comic (1/98 Briefing)</i></b><b>, and it&#146;s a zany,
laugh-filled transcript of a recent CIA intelligence briefing
about many important topics including covert intelligence,
cosmology, who really killed JFK, and everyone&#146;s favorite
parts of the human body (yes, </b><b><i>those</i></b><b> parts). </b></font></p>

<p><font size="4"><b>By the way, a portion of the profits go to
Amnesty International and local food banks.</b></font></p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>

<p><font size="4"><b>&quot;An extremely readable and enlightening
document.&quot;</b></font></p>

<p><font size="4"><b><i>- A noted CIA Officer</i></b></font></p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>

<p><font size="4"><b>Price: Only $6.00</b></font></p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>

<p><font size="4"><b>To order, make check or US postal money
order payable to </b><b><i>The Covert Comic</i></b><b>, and send
to: </b></font></p>

<p align="center"><font size="5"><b><i>The Covert Comic</i></b><b>
</b></font></p>

<p align="center"><font size="5"><b>2831 Gallows Rd. #248 </b></font></p>

<p align="center"><font size="5"><b>Falls Church VA 22042</b></font></p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>

<p align="center"><font size="6"><b><i>The Covert Comic. Read him
while you still can!</i></b></font></p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>

<p><font size="3">Incidentally, I really do intend to donate a
portion of the profits from the sale of my books to Amnesty
International and local food banks.</font></p>

<p><font size="3">This next advertisement seeks to grab the
attention of the reader by means of a sensational (yet in a very
real sense true) statement. </font></p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>

<p align="center"><font size="7"><b>I Killed JFK</b></font></p>

<p align="center">&nbsp;</p>

<p align="center"><b><img src="../ccframe.gif" width="290"
height="203"> </b></p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>

<p><font size="4"><b>...possibly. Therefore, shouldn&#146;t you
read this CIA officer&#146;s controversial intelligence briefing
whose publication the US Government nearly tried to suppress?
It&#146;s called </b><b><i>The Covert Comic</i></b><em><b> (1/98
Briefing)</b></em><b>, and it&#146;s deep, funny, and full of
information about covert intelligence, cosmology, near death
experiences, and everyone&#146;s favorite parts of the human body
(yes, </b><b><i>those</i></b><b> parts).</b></font></p>

<p><font size="4"><b>By the way, a portion of the profits go to
Amnesty International and local food banks.</b></font></p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>

<p><font size="4"><b>&quot;An extremely readable and enlightening
document.&quot;</b></font></p>

<p><font size="4"><b><i>- A noted CIA Officer</i></b></font></p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>

<p><font size="4"><b>Price: Only $6.00</b></font></p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>

<p><font size="4"><b>To order, make check or US postal money
order payable to </b><b><i>The Covert Comic</i></b><b>, and send
to: </b></font></p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>

<p align="center"><font size="5"><b><i>The Covert Comic</i></b><b>
</b></font></p>

<p align="center"><font size="5"><b>2831 Gallows Rd. #248 </b></font></p>

<p align="center"><font size="5"><b>Falls Church VA 22042</b></font></p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>

<p align="center"><font size="6"><b><i>The Covert Comic. Read him
while you still can!</i></b></font></p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>

<p><font size="3">The following advertisement is, in some ways at
least, the best of all of them in my opinion.</font></p>

<p align="center">&nbsp;</p>

<p align="center"><font size="7"><b>Win a Trip to the CIA!</b></font></p>

<p align="center">&nbsp;</p>

<p align="center"><img src="Heads.gif" width="405" height="286"></p>

<p align="center">&nbsp;</p>

<p align="center"><font size="7"><b>Enter The Covert Comic
Sweepstakes!</b></font></p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>

<p><font size="4"><b>Win a visit to a CIA building!</b></font></p>

<p><font size="4"><b>You&#146;ll be escorted by the world famous
CIA officer and comedian, The Covert Comic. Not only that,
following your visit you&#146;ll be permitted to leave and return
to your home!</b></font></p>

<p><font size="4"><b>Even if you don&#146;t win, enter now and
your name will automatically be put on The Good List for when the
Revolution happens!</b></font></p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>

<p align="center"><font size="6"><b>How to enter </b><b><u>The
Covert Comic Sweepstakes</u></b><b>:</b></font><font size="5"><b>
</b></font></p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>

<p><font size="4"><b>Buy a copy of the legendary intelligence
briefing </b><b><i>The Covert Comic (1/98 Briefing)</i></b><b>,
or any other Covert Comic product. You&#146;ll be notified by
mail if you win.</b></font></p>

<p><font size="4"><b>By the way, a portion of the profits go to
Amnesty International and local food banks!</b></font></p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>

<p><font size="4"><b>&quot;An extremely readable and enlightening
document!&quot;</b></font></p>

<p><font size="4"><b><i>- A note CIA Officer</i></b></font></p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>

<p><font size="4"><b>Price: An unbelievably low $6.00!</b></font></p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>

<p><font size="4"><b>To order, make check or US postal money
order payable to </b><b><i>The Covert Comic</i></b><b>, and send
to: </b></font></p>

<p align="center"><font size="5"><b><i><u>The Covert Contest</u></i></b><b>
</b></font></p>

<p align="center"><font size="5"><b>2831 Gallows Rd. #248 </b></font></p>

<p align="center"><font size="5"><b>Falls Church VA 22042</b></font></p>

<p align="center">&nbsp;</p>

<p><font size="1">Note: Winner(s) subject to background
investigation and search. Cost of travel to and from CIA
building, lodging, food, and all other expenses, are the
responsibility of the contestant. Another prize may be
substituted in the event the sweepstakes winner is deemed
ineligible for a trip to a CIA building. Winner(s) selected at
random. Other exceptions and limitations may apply. Have a
pleasant day, and God bless you. </font></p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>

<p align="center"><font size="7"><b><i>The Covert Comic
Sweepstakes! </i></b></font></p>

<p align="center"><font size="7"><b><i>Enter while you still can!</i></b></font></p>

<p><font size="3">Whether I could actually get the contest winner
into, say, CIA Headquarters, I don&#146;t know, although I
believe that if I did the paperwork in just the right way this
would be feasible. Unless the Government refrains from trying to
suppress my writings, however, the Covert Comic Sweepstakes offer
is unfortunately null and void.</font></p>

<p><font size="3"><b>An important note relating to my
advertisements:</b> If anyone wishes to purchase <i>The Covert
Comic</i><em> (1/98 Briefing) </em>or any of my other books prior
to that book (or books) being officially approved for
publication, <i>don&#146;t wait</i>. Just send me the appropriate
amount of money in the form of a check or US postal money order,
and when it becomes obvious that the Government isn&#146;t trying
to stop my writings from being published (which I predict will
happen shortly after your check or money order clears at my
bank), I&#146;ll immediately send your book(s) to you.</font></p>

<p><font size="3"><b>One other important note relating to my
advertisements:</b> The price of <i>The Covert Comic (1/98
Briefing) </i>is $6.00. The price of <i>My Resume or Everything I
Know about the CIA and Elvis</i> is $7.00. The price of <i>The
Penis</i> (a work I&#146;ll describe at greater length in a few
moments) is $4.00 (<i>The Penis</i> isn&#146;t as long as my
other works, though as we all know, it isn&#146;t how long a book
is, it&#146;s how well the book is written). Please remember to
make your check or money order payable to <b>The Covert Comic</b>.
Prices are subject to change without notice. Thank you.</font></p>

<p><font size="3">This topic reminds me of a thought I had the
other day: I, John Alejandro King (a.k.a. The Covert Comic), <i>need
an agent</i>. I&#146;m not talking here about an intelligence
agent (although if anyone wishes to contact me with information
vital to our National Security, I&#146;m quite willing to speak
with them). No, I&#146;m referring to a person or persons who can
assist me in getting my writings published and promoted,
negotiate movie rights, arrange for me to give intelligence
briefings, etc. I&#146;m happy to pay ten or even fifteen percent
to an agent who will help get my work out to the public in such a
way that my family and I attain a reasonable level of prosperity.
Interested persons can get in touch with me at the above mailing
address or contact me at this web site. To the extent it&#146;s
applicable, I would also like to have a corporate sponsor.</font></p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>

<p><font size="3">Someone once speculated that the universe might
be a piece of dust on the button of a policeman&#146;s jacket.
While this may or may not actually be true, for sure we can agree
that the dust on the button of his jacket is a piece of the
universe on that policeman. What does all this have to do with
censorship and the CIA? Not a lot, admittedly. But what if the
policeman works with the FBI? Specifically, what if the policeman
shows up at the scene of a crime which the FBI is investigating,
the piece of dust on the button of his jacket happens to fall to
the ground, and FBI forensics experts find it and conclude that
the crime was committed by someone who spends a lot of time
around universes?</font></p>

<p><font size="3">Consider the following nightmare scenario: FBI
investigators, discovering the universe near a crime scene,
conclude that a person who regularly handles, produces, and/or
disposes of universes was responsible for the crime in question.
How long, I ask you, would it take before the FBI identifies <i>God</i>
as the focus of their investigation? After all, though many of us
come in contact with universes on a fairly constant basis, only a
very small number of people actually <i>make</i> them. So now we
have the Federal Bureau of Investigation, America&#146;s premier
law enforcement agency, pursuing a well-intentioned but
hopelessly misdirected investigation against arguably the most
admired person in America today. Can there possibly be a winner
in this scenario?</font></p>

<p><font size="3">All this constitutes, in my opinion at least, a
strong argument in favor of caution when it comes to the use of
microscopic items (such as the universe) as evidence in criminal
cases. Thank you.</font></p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>

<p><font size="3">As I&#146;m sure the people at your fine
publication are well aware, no CIA employee can address a public
forum without being asked about what are commonly referred to as
&#145;conspiracy theories&#146;. I&#146;m speaking here of
everything from claims that our Government is hiding information
about captured aliens, to suspicions of possible CIA involvement
in the Kennedy assassination, to those persons who insist that
our Government is undertaking a secret program to covertly and
without their consent increase the average bust size of the women
of America. Nearly all such claims, of course, are totally
absurd. While some might conclude that I&#146;m getting a little
far afield in bringing up such a topic in this letter, I consider
it my responsibility as a Government official to take every
opportunity to assure the American people in this regard. Having
for some reason been assigned a number of projects having to do
with unusual topics of this kind during the course of my career
at the Agency, I speak from a position of extensive knowledge and
experience in telling everybody that the overwhelming majority of
these conspiracy theories can be dismissed outright. As the old
joke around Washington DC goes, &quot;There are no Government
cover-ups. However, the Government doesn&#146;t want you to know
this.&quot; Seriously, though, with <i>very</i> few exceptions
there&#146;s absolutely nothing to these conspiracy theories at
all. </font></p>

<p><font size="3">I feel I would be remiss, however, if I
didn&#146;t bring up one mystery that has been vexing me for
quite a long time now, and which I believe needs to be addressed.
(The whole topic is unclassified and, I&#146;m genuinely sorry to
say, not paid nearly enough attention by our Government, so as a
result there&#146;s no reason I can&#146;t discuss it in public).
Here&#146;s the mystery: <i>Where are the dead birds?</i> As a
CIA officer I&#146;ve asked this question frequently, and am
still asking it.</font></p>

<p><font size="3">Now, I don&#146;t pretend to know just how many
birds there are in the world. And I think as you read my letter
and reflect on this issue you&#146;ll see that the whole point is
that ornithologists (i.e., people who study birds) <i>don&#146;t
know either</i>.</font></p>

<p><font size="3">Have you ever stopped to notice, perhaps while
strolling through the park or hiking in the woods, that there
just aren&#146;t any dead birds anywhere (I&#146;m referring here
to birds that have died natural deaths)? I <i>have</i> noticed
this, and the situation has inspired me to do some research (at
no expense to taxpayers, by the way), which research has yielded
the following very curious facts.</font></p>

<p><font size="3">First, given that conventional ornithology
(i.e., bird science) estimates a total population of <i>tens of
billions</i> of birds worldwide, and given that the normal <i>claimed</i>
life span of an average bird is a few years only, the number of
dead birds we see <i>should be</i> much higher than it actually
is. Indeed, if the claims and assumptions of ornithology are
correct, we should on a daily basis be (not too figuratively
speaking) up to our necks in dead birds! Needless to say, of
course, we aren&#146;t. On the contrary, go out into the
wilderness sometime (where the great majority of birds make their
habitat), and if you look carefully you won&#146;t fail to note
that <i>there simply are no dead birds to be found.</i></font></p>

<p><font size="3">Once again, when I speak of there being no dead
birds anywhere, I&#146;m referring to bird deaths from natural
factors (old age, etc.). Hence I&#146;m <i>not</i> counting bird
deaths brought on by the deliberate poisoning of birds (primarily
pigeons, crows, and members of other bird species that make
themselves a nuisance to humans). Nor am I referring to birds who
pass away as a result of contact with automobiles, industrial
waste, or hunters (and yes, there is the occasional instance of <i>ornicide</i>,
that is, the killing of one bird by another; and we obviously
mustn&#146;t forget cats). Rather, I&#146;m speaking of the fact
that, aside from these extraneous sorts of events, <i>birds just
don&#146;t seem to die from natural causes</i>. </font></p>

<p><font size="3">When I was seven years old I found a dead bird
once, the cause of whose death I was unable to determine. It was
lying under a tree at which I had been hurling rocks the previous
afternoon, but I <i>strongly</i> doubt that I killed it (at that
time I lacked sufficient marksmanship and arm strength to have
struck a bird fatally with a stone). Except for this one <i>possible</i>
counterexample, the fact is that over an entire lifetime, many
hours of which have been spent searching for them, I have yet to
encounter a naturally deceased bird.</font></p>

<p><font size="3">I&#146;ve spoken with (and in several cases
sent official memoranda for the record to) many people at CIA
about this subject, including intelligence analysts, case
officers, and high-ranking officials at the Directorate level.
What&#146;s more, not one of these officials disputes my claim
that the issue of the missing dead birds is as important to our
National Security as it is genuinely intriguing to the mind.</font></p>

<p><font size="3">In response to my frequent musing on this
question, my beautiful wife (a licensed schoolteacher) has
suggested various possible explanations to me over the years for
why I can never find naturally deceased birds anywhere: rapid
decomposition of bird corpses, the dead birds being carried away
by animals, etc. Unfortunately none of my beautiful wife&#146;s
explanations of this phenomena have proven, upon careful testing,
to explain what&#146;s going on. (I should probably mention at
this point that my beautiful wife is from the former Soviet
Union. And yes, socialism notwithstanding, according to my
intelligence sources the same general absence of bird corpses has
existed throughout the history of that large and troubled region,
right up to this very day. This despite the fact that there have
always been, and continue to be, many birds within the territory
of the former Soviet Union.)</font></p>

<p><font size="3">In the interest of maintaining an open mind on
the issue, I&#146;ve even pursued some of my beautiful
wife&#146;s more improbable hypotheses. For example, I remember
the time she told me &quot;Perhaps birds go off to die somewhere
in private, like cats do, my darlink.&quot; (I&#146;ve written
&quot;darlink&quot; here to convey to the reader a sense of my
beautiful wife&#146;s slight, though very attractive, Russian
accent.) &quot;But where, exactly, do they go, my lovely Slavic
firefly?&quot; I asked. My beautiful wife answered that, since
birds spend much of their lives in trees, maybe they preferred to
die in trees too. When I expressed skepticism toward this theory
and began offering numerous reasons why such a thing is highly
unlikely, my beautiful wife suggested that I go climb several
trees and find out. Well, needless to say, after examining
hundreds of treetops I can assure you that birds do <i>not</i>
(at least in this country and Mexico) &#145;go off to die&#146;
in trees. And so, after all the various explanations using the
accepted thinking of conventional science have been examined and
rejected, we&#146;re left with the same troubling question: <i>Where
are the dead birds?</i></font></p>

<p><font size="3">At this point I&#146;d like to offer a possible
answer to the above question, one which, if true, will require
radical changes in our assumptions about birds as well as the way
we view our own place in the cosmos. After many years of careful
research and sober reflection I&#146;ve come to the remarkable
and highly counterintuitive conclusion that <i>birds are immortal</i>.
In other words, unless they&#146;re actually killed (by
predators, pollution, contact with automobiles, etc.) <b><i>birds
don&#146;t die</i></b><i>.</i></font></p>

<p><font size="3">Obviously such a claim is bound to generate
resistance in certain quarters of the scientific (and yes, the
intelligence) community; and I myself will be the first to admit
that the thought of a bird living forever is a little hard to
swallow (no pun intended). Accordingly (not because I&#146;m
afraid to stand by my hypothesis, but because in the interest of
science I wish to remain flexible) I readily concede that
it&#146;s possible birds aren&#146;t <i>strictly</i> immortal
(that is, live <i>forever</i>). Instead, it may be that birds
have an extremely long, though finite, life span (say, nine
million years).</font></p>

<p><font size="3">If my thesis is true (and I fully recognize
that additional research is needed to thoroughly test it), the
implications are many and profound. First, it seems to me that if
birds are immortal or nearly immortal, then <i>there probably
aren&#146;t as many birds as we think</i>. In fact, given an
average bird life span of as little as several hundred thousand
years, basic arithmetic suggests that there are no more than a
few hundred birds worldwide. Just think of all the great moments
in history which these venerable birds have witnessed!</font></p>

<p><font size="3">Another significant implication of my theory: <i>Birds
are probably stronger and a lot more mobile than we originally
believed</i>. I mean, if there are only, say, twenty-two members
of a given bird species, and if people in New Jersey and
Ouagadougou see a large flock of that same species of bird on the
same day (which I believe has happened), then this clearly
suggests that birds are able to fly incredible distances at an
almost unimaginable velocity, which in turn means that birds have
truly amazing stamina.</font></p>

<p><font size="3">A study of the genetics of birds may reveal
that their great longevity and strength is the result of some
special gene or combination of genes in bird DNA, <i>the
replication of which may be possible in humans</i>. If so, then
the implications for our National Security (and indeed, for the
entire human species) are gigantic. In fact, if my thesis is in
any way correct, it necessarily follows that <i>if we are to
secure our species&#146; survival, we must become like birds.</i></font></p>

<p><font size="3">Obviously the idea of using genetic engineering
to create &#145;bird people&#146; raises profound ethical
questions and will no doubt provoke spirited debate among
scientists, theologians, and academics, to name just a few. As an
official of America&#146;s Intelligence Community I don&#146;t
think it&#146;s appropriate for me to make any comment in this
forum regarding how I personally think such a debate should be
decided. After all, the Government must in the end receive its
marching orders on this and all other important issues from an
informed public.</font></p>

<p><font size="3">Man has always looked with admiration at birds.
In the past this admiration was due to man&#146;s desire to fly.
Now, a desire to <i>soar above time</i> (if you will) may soon
become the reason man looks to the birds with a sense of wonder
and longing. Incidentally, regarding the CIA and the dead bird
question, I can truthfully report that I have never seen a dead
bird at CIA Headquarters, though I have seen several live ones.</font></p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>

<p><font size="3">3. <i>The Penis</i></font></p>

<p><font size="3">Finally, I&#146;d like to mention a book
(rather short in length) which I recently wrote, the publication
of which the Government has still not formally approved. This
book is called <i>The Penis</i>. In my humble opinion this book
(if it&#146;s ever published) is not only destined to be hailed
as philosophically brilliant, it&#146;s certain to be recognized
as a great literary innovation as well. Specifically, I believe
that this book of mine, <i>The Penis</i>, constitutes nothing
less than the first true instance of <i>sampled literature</i>.
What do I mean by the term <i>sampled literature</i>? Well, as
you probably are aware, many Rap, Hip-Hop, and artists from other
musical genres routinely &#145;sample&#146; (that is, record)
excerpts of existing, already published music which they then use
in their own songs. This practice, controversial in the opinion
of some, has nevertheless resulted in a whole new dimension of
musical expression. What I, John Alejandro King, have done is
apply this concept of sampling to <i>the literary world</i>.</font></p>

<p><font size="3">You see, what I did was &#145;sample&#146; a
well-known story written by an intelligence officer (who
I&#146;ll refer to here as Nick G.). The story is about a foreign
government official who wakes up one morning and discovers that
his nose is missing, and all the fascinating events and insights
that result from his efforts to become reunited with it. Using
commercially available data processing technology, I inserted the
word <i>penis</i> in place of the word <i>nose</i> everywhere in
this fine work. As a consequence of this and a few additional
minor alterations (for the purpose of continuity I changed the
leading character from a foreign government official to a CIA
division chief) a great <i>new </i>book was born, one which
offers many profound observations regarding the true meaning of
existence.</font></p>

<p><font size="3">Now, if Nick G. was eventually able to get his
story about noses past the government censors and into literary
history (and Nick G., I should mention, was writing in a country
which traditionally has been considered anything but a
&#145;bastion of freedom&#146;), then doesn&#146;t it seem just a
little incongruous that a citizen of the United States of America
can&#146;t get US Government approval to publish a similar,
totally unclassified (and, I might add, <i>very patriotic</i>)
story about penises?</font></p>

<p><font size="3">By the way, I&#146;m just now putting the last
touches on another book about penises which I assume the
Government will also want to censor; the name of this book is <i>Diary
of a Penis</i>, and I expect to submit it for Government review
soon. It&#146;s about a CIA officer who realizes one day, while
strolling along a dark corridor at CIA Headquarters, that
he&#146;s a penis and that his life&#146;s mission is to <i>fertilize
people&#146;s souls</i> by writing and publishing books full of
love and truth. And yes, I suppose one could claim that this
document of mine is semiautobiographical. This excellent book, <i>Diary
of a Penis</i>, is almost finished (it of course contains no
classified information of any kind). Without bragging I&#146;d
like to say that with God&#146;s help I&#146;ve managed to make
this a powerful and penetrating document, a book which fills the
reader with one bold stroke of creative insight after another. So
probably the powers that be at CIA won&#146;t want anybody to
read it. </font></p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>

<p><font size="3">Did you know that CIA officials are aware of
what happens when we die? It&#146;s an absolute fact. Yes, many a
CIA officer, in the process of collecting intelligence, has
actually ventured into that dark passage and followed it straight
to The Light. As for what these officers saw, well, believe me
when I tell you that there&#146;s really no way to fully describe
it using human language. One thing I <i>can</i> confirm, however:
It&#146;s definitely not a secret. Additional details regarding
this fascinating and important topic can be found in my books. </font></p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>

<p><font size="3">So now that you&#146;ve read descriptions and
selections of my writing, tell me point blank: Do you think my,
John Alejandro King&#146;s, books should <i>really</i> be
censored by the Government? Or do you tend to agree with my
insistent claim that these writings are not only completely
harmless, their publication offers potential benefit to many
people who are currently seeking a direction in life, and
therefore to prevent these books from being disseminated
constitutes nothing less than <i>a crime against humanity?</i></font></p>

<p><font size="3">As a taxpayer and loyal American citizen I
hereby call for an independent Congressional inquiry for the
purpose of ascertaining whether there&#146;s any good reason for
the Government to censor my writing. Additionally, there&#146;s
the work that ordinary Americans can do to stop this unjust,
totally pointless censorship from happening. Call your
Congressmen and Congresswomen and demand that the writings of
John Alejandro King not be suppressed. Write to leading
newspapers (such as the <i>Washington Post</i>) about this
situation. Make copies of my advertisements for <i>The Covert
Comic</i> <em>(1/98 Briefing) </em>and disseminate these
advertisements widely (but only in places where it&#146;s legal
and appropriate to do so, of course). Most importantly, <i>order
my books</i> (I personally think you should order dozens of my
books right away). Mail your order to the address I mentioned in
my advertisements, and remember to make your check or US postal
money order payable to <b>The Covert Comic.</b></font></p>

<p><font size="3">In any event, in the words of The Covert Comic
himself:</font></p>

<p><font size="6"><b><i>The Covert Comic. Read him while you
still can!</i></b></font></p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>

<p><font size="3">Yours for love and truth,</font></p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>

<p><font size="3">John Alejandro King, a.k.a. The Covert Comic,
loyal CIA employee, concerned citizen, and writer with integrity</font></p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>

<p><font size="3"><i>Postscript:</i> In the interest of brevity
I&#146;ve omitted any discussion of the profound and highly
stimulating parallels that exist between near death experiences
(&#145;NDE&#146;s&#146;) and the process that occurs when a
fertile penis has loving intercourse with a fertile vagina. This
subject is probed deeply and at great length in my book <i>Diary
of a Penis</i> (which I briefly discussed above). Please be sure,
when writing letters, faxes, telegrams, e-mail messages, and
other communications aimed at prodding the Government to refrain
from suppressing my writing, that you mention this excellent
book, <i>Diary of a Penis</i>, along with the others. One last
item in this connection: A copy of <i>Diary of a Penis</i> costs
$6.00.</font></p>

<p>&nbsp;</p>

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