SOMEWHERE IN THE UNIVERSES — This week, former President George W. Bush took time away from his studies at the Ward Monger School of Artistry to give a sixteen minute, blistering speech against current President Donald Trump’s nationalism and agenda, without mentioning the alleged billionaire by name even once.

The speech was given to the George W. Bush Foundation, and it was longer than the 43rd president has spoken on American politics in public since leaving office. Sources close to the White House say President Trump has been locked in the bathroom for six hours, drafting and deleting several angry tweets in response. It’s unclear at this time when the tweet storm will start, but aides say the Department of Defense is readying its entire nuclear arsenal, in case Trump declares war on Texas, where Bush lives.

In response to Bush’s speech, Lt. Jacob Lands issued the following statement from Somewhere in the Universes. Lt. Lands was killed in action, fighting in the Iraq War in 2003. Lands left behind a wife and a small daughter, who is now old enough to enlist now. Land’s letter was sent to several outlets. We are reproducing it below, verbatim.

On behalf of the over 4,500 men and women who died, just like I did, serving the United States of America’s military in the Iraq War, I’d like to take this time to thank George W. Bush for having the courage of his convictions to come out and say critical things about President Donald Trump’s agenda and the racist, white supremacists among his base. When President Bush said, “We’ve seen nationalism distorted into nativism,” I was reminded of the days and months in the wake of 9/11, when he urged us to enter a never-ending War on Terror and support two wars of choice in pursuit of winning the larger war, but not because we hated Islam…because we loved war so much we knew it was the only path to peace.

Throughout his speech, I kept thinking, “Good job, President Bush! I’m so glad someone is speaking out against xenophobia and bigotry from the right-wing.” And you know what? As his speech went on, I started having this new feeling in my heart. All of a sudden, it was like my death was way less unjustified! In fact, I bet if I were to call my widow or my daughter I haven’t seen since I laid down my life for Dick Cheney’s checkbook, they’d probably tell me that they don’t miss me anymore, now that George W. Bush has come down with a 24 hour case of the scruples.

When Mr. Bush said, “We need to recall and recover our own identity. Americans have a great advantage: To renew our country, we only need to remember our values,” why, I felt this renewal of spirit, I just can’t explain. Oh, it wasn’t a real renewal of spirit, because I’m still, you know, dead…from fighting in an illegal and unjust war…but hey, at least it was nice to hear the same kind of lofty rhetoric he used when he convinced America with a bunch of lies and shitty intelligence to go into the very war that cost me my life.

So…you know…there’s that, I guess.

The soul of Dick Cheney could not be found in time to ask it for comment on this story.