The Capitol

 Dear American People 

You've been slow in catching up to the rest of us sh..hole countries.

There were cries of 'scandalous attack on democracy' from various people highly skilled at stating the obvious (key skill in a politician's CV). Democracy has been thoroughly moered, (as the Daily Sun would probably put it), on our continent for as long as I can remember. 

Of course, the minute you guys started  emulating us, the rest was inevitable. You dispensed with irritating logic and commonsense, just as we did. Then you elected a stand-up comedian, just as we did. We know about your proud boast that any American child can become president. Did you really have to go all out to prove it? The guy was barely out of short pants intellectually. We can make the same boast but singing and dancing are essential prerequisite skills. That, and a total absence of what we used to term 'skaam cells' back in Wentworth.

Talking of singing and dancing, we've learned that protest, whether violent or non-violent is best accompanied by a couple of rousing choruses and some nifty stepping. I am willing to come over as a visiting professor to discourse on these nuggets of South African wisdom. 

We also have touchingly loyal, but highly sensitive, ground forces who will support disgraced / inept / corrupt politicians to the very end. As someone said, in Shakespeare's Julius Caesar (slightly retouched): 'even if he had disembowelled their mothers, they would still have run after him'.

Of course, we have an advantage. Chris Barnard performed the first human heart transplant operation. Our government has mastered non-invasive brain transplant surgery. And we don't even need donors. A food parcel here, a braai there, a bit of pungent horse manure, and voila...

Just one question: did your president also tweet, as did one of our wise, revered politicians: 'Ground forces: Attack'. That would have made a ringing final soundbite.

Welcome to sh..hole territory.

Richard