What I found on my trip to the sub-Sahara, a.k.a., "Quick, pack a Hottie and meet me in Niger!"

A Cowboy Times Investigative RETORT

Filed 2.06.07

If you’re like me, Jesus, don’t worry. It’s all almost half over. Nonetheless, maybe you’re one of those guys who have always harbored a lifelong itch to palm the company credit card, pack up the family, your fiancée, wife, lover, pet Iguana, whoever, and elope like I did on a once in a lifetime sun splashed, landlocked, sub-Saharan junket to a little known Shangri-La unimaginatively called Niger.

I mean, have you checked out the eye-popping, Technicolor brochures yet? Uncorked its Whitman's sampler of delicious get-a-way packages to the sandy Kingdom? Quick, call Aspen Travel or Condé Nast before they’re all gone!

Holy smoke, no wonder the Veep shat an ape when he heard Valerie Plame had sent her main squeeze ass-h*ling it across the globe on a secret junket to a desert wasteland the CIA calls the 8th poorest nation on earth.

I mean? Is there nothing these two underachieving loafers with major Malibu Ken and Barbie complexes won’t stop at while taking the rest of us on a bum joy ride?

Sources tell me "Scooter" Libby really wanted an ace uranium sleuth like Borat to vet whether Saddam had gotten yellow cake from Niger.

But noooooo!

The g*ddamn Company had to have its Very Dashing Mr. Wilson go and subsidize half the entire economy of another Godforsaken hellhole with a lower GDP than Botswana, Haiti, Tajikistan or New Orleans, combined, with our sacred and hard-earned doll-Allahs.

Talk about stretching those Rock of Gibraltar Uncle Sam sawbucks while ravishing yourself like you’re living it up on the Riviera! Very clever Mr. Wilson, but Uncle Dick and I see right through your whole why-buy-the-cow-when-you-can-get-the-milk for-free-with-a-Hottie-like-Valerie Plame-charade, sir!

And by the way, if she’s your wife why hasn’t she changed her name yet, Monsieur Wilson? What are you two uber-Progressive, parlez-vous speaking lovebirds hiding from us there, sir?

Ha! Thank God the Vice-Prince of all Darkness and deferments was there to sniff out a goldbricker like Joe Blow Wilson. Try as they may, no impeccably credentialed ex-Middle East diplomat is going to pull a fast one on the clubby, tubby Jedi-instincts of a Beltway insider like Darth One-Beat-Away from Resigning-on-Principle Cheney!

All this I know first-hand, having recently concluded my own undercover safari to Niger on behalf of the non-profit think tank, Get The Hell out of America's Way.

And I’m here to tell all you globe-trotting sophisticates not only did Runaway Joe and his blonde bombshell take us all for fools, but you really haven’t lived until you’ve hired a small militia of Fulani nomads to guard the floss as you towel avian flu off your sweltering privies in a mud hovel with the hide of a skinned hyena.

Debunking claims of yellow cake, HA! In a malnourished Nigerian pig’s eye!

If Joe Wilson couldn't find yellow cake in Niger it's because he was too busy getting some leg off anyone of the 40,000 lazy ass slaves still toiling inhumanely for high government officials there, according to some bleeding heart liberal groups like The Red Cross & Amnesty International.

But back to my memorable evening bath! Which I took before venturing outside our deluxe accommodations in a pitched Bedouin tent that smelled vaguely of camels' toes.

On our first night the concierge at hotel Shek Down had prepared a savory moonlit dinner for my bride and I of stewed Baboons' balls. Our Lady & The Tramp table overlooked such scenic vistas of boys selling their sisters to toothless gunsmiths as young, uneducated men said goodbye to their families, after making videotape farewells in their mosques and madrassas, before heading off to war.

But by far the most culturally enlightening aspect was how throughout the entire meal the waiter’s hand was ever so attentively clutched around my wallet as the Maitre d' and the hatcheck girl took turns pressing sword blades to my blushing bride's swan-like throat!

Though initially concerned, we soon learned that in Niger this was how they showed great appreciation for the ever rare and fatted-up western tourist. Humph! And to think, some dare say they don’t like us over there anymore.

Oh? And talk about hospitality! It got to the point where my gal and I couldn’t tell where our honeymoon ended and their willingness to handle all our financial needs began, free of charge.

And the recreational opportunities in Niger! Boy oh Boy, who needs scuba diving and sailing when you’re on Holiday in the Sahara? No wonder why those two no yellow cake finding freeloaders always look so tan and fit. Let me tell you.

Niger just happens to be one of the world’s leading exporters of hashish and uranium.

And let me say, as a word of caution, you and your honey bunny really don’t want to mix those two up when you’re on a CIA-financed junket to assuage the Bada Bing Cowboy's hoping mad fever, whoa Nelly! There’s no telling what beans you’re liable to spill if you find too much of one and not enough of the other.

By our second day in the merciless sun my lovely lady and I had gotten so wasted hunting for uranium with our little picks and shovels, that I explained to the entire Niger delegation of crackerjack venture capitalists that we Americans are way too busy cheating on our taxes to answer all their e-mails promising us untold fortunes if we give some VIPs named Dr. Clemet Okon or His Royal Excellency Moses Odiaka our banking information.

Then, and all should pray the cat was left in its bag, I told them they’d have much better luck fleecing us if they just simply posed as Halliburton contractors like the rest of Uncle Dick’s Good old boys with their grubby hands stuck in the national honey pot.

My lady friend, an expert in international and unnatural relations, explained how Americans don’t mind getting taken to the cleaners, so long as we get taken to the cleaners by those we elect or those who pal around with those we elect.

This seemed to make a ton of sense. For before I knew it every industrious Nigerian with a laptop and a song and dance was busily crafting the most elegantly worded proposals on DoD letterhead that I had ever seen.

And before the weekend had arrived, most of them had not only gotten responses, but had been promoted by the White House to Under-ambassadors and Secretaries of States. One guy, named Umfofo Bunkums, was even put in charge of reconstruction in Iraq.

Now that’s progress! Talk about making the most of your time on the company dime.

Maybe it was just me, but by the end of the big game last Sunday, I swore I saw Payton Manning leaping across the field yelling, “I just won the f$ckin* Super Bowl and I'm taking the entire family to Niger!”

Yep, well, now that I've returned with my international Man of Mystery credentials freshly vetted by the big boys over at Langley, all I can say is: "Thank our lucky stars, as righteous and infallible Americans, we have Brave, New World men like I. 'Really Got Screwed by My Boss' Libby and 'Duck He's-Hunting-Again' Cheney watching our backs!"

For because of these two tireless public servants' unflinching devotion to the national interest, not to mention sorting out the ugly and ever-elusive truth, wherever it may lie, never again will average Americans fall for the bogus claim of two married ne’er-do-wells and naysayers of this fine and noble regime when one comes back, fresh and tanned off a taxpayer sponsored junket, and tries and tell us: “I just came back from Niger, and all I got was this skirt.”

Always remember and never forget class, "Come back to Niger, come back to the way things used to be."