Dear Dubya,

You don’t know me, but I promise I’m not one of those dweebs who spends all his spare time writing to the president. I’m a sophomore here at the University of Florida, majoring in Finance, and currently the treasurer of our chapter of the Delta Kappa Epsilon house, so actually, we’re like frat brothers.

I realize you’re pretty busy, what with guiding world policy and chilling at the ranch and working out. By the way, I think it’s very cool that you work out every day, not like some recent presidents I could mention, who were too busy wolfing down Big Macs and getting blown by interns to do their job. I know you’d never get a hummer from an intern. If you did, though, what I’m saying is, I’m sure she wouldn’t be some porker, like Monica.

Anyways, this is the first such letter I’ve ever written and, to be totally honest, it’s actually an assignment for this one class of mine called "Social Action," which, by the way, I didn’t even mean to sign up for but I was sick on registration day and my girlfriend Kathy had to go sign up for me and she got the numbers all confused – so she says – and I wound up in this, like, civics class and I’m kind of stuck with it, because a withdrawal looks really bad on your transcript.

The point is, we’re supposed to come up with a "unique solution to a current political crisis" and attempt to effect change, ergo, this letter.

Okay, so here goes.

I realize you’re very big on this war thing at the moment. And let me tell you, I realize this guy Saddam is clearly a menace to the civilized world and a tyrant, and worst of all, he went after your Pops. So, can I just say this? I feel your pain, brother. And I know you’ve got all these mamby-pamby liberals and wimpy European dudes telling you this is a big enough decision that you should do some deep contemplative thinking before you launch Operation Saddam and Gomorrah.

Well, let me just tell you: I think that’s a load of horsepoop. As we both know, deep contemplative thinking is not your bag.

Still, I do sometimes wonder if there’s a little too much — what do I want to say here — unresolved aggression maybe, in your attitude. And that’s why I’m suggesting that, before you, like, send in all the troops, you consider my alternative:

Heavy metal.

Not heavy artillery. Heavy metal.

As in: the greatest musical genre of the late 20th century. Or, well, maybe not the greatest, but certainly among the Top 10 and, more important, a really cool way of working out various anger issues.

What I think you should do, before even your next workout session, is to get on-line and buy the following albums:

AC/DC, Back in Black;

Guns n’ Roses, Appetite for Destruction;

Led Zeppelin, Houses of the Holy;

Anything by Black Sabbath.

Then you should like set aside some downtime and crank up the Presidential stereo system and let it rip.

Get your head as close to the speakers as you can stand and feel the music, man. Feel the drums, the drub of the bass, the crunch of the power chords. Let the music take you, George. Let the music bang your head and rattle your heart and then open your throat and like, hoooooowl.

Because the whole point of heavy metal is to vent those deep, dark, war-making impulses in a way that is totally cool and creative. And I think we can agree that air guitar is a lot cooler than, like, bombing women and children.

Now I hope you’re not going to read this letter and be like: Whatever. Because from what I’ve read about your past, I know you were an air-guitar god.

I realize that this course of action would definitely bum out some of the more hawkish guys on your staff, and would probably also kind of put the emphasis back on, like, the whole domestic-policy area, which is sort of sticky.

But the thing is, if you play this the right way, you could some good press out of it (Remember Slick Willie and the whole sax thing!). You could even go to some shows. Or better yet, you could go on tour with some bands. Ozzy Osbourne is still huge. Metallica. Or Queens of the Stone Age, who are like, these totally killer younger ax men.

You could even consider a reality TV-type setup. Like: Bush Rocks Live, where you tour with a bunch of bands, and the ones who don’t rock hard enough, you could have them, like, deported. Seriously, dude: you’re the president. You could actually kick their butts out of the country, unlike most reality-TV shows, which are just a bunch of LA wannabe actors auditioning for a future life in commercials.

Now the other thing I was going to mention – and I know you don’t like people talking about this stuff anymore – but the fact is, you were once a major-league party animal. I think it’s really great that you don’t complain about all the dignified presidential crap you have to put up with. But I know, deep down, there’s still a part of you that wishes he were still in the basement of the DKE house, doing beer bongs and eight-balls.

I just hope you can see that launching a totally unilateral war against an overmatched bunch of towelheads is not really the best way to recapture those days.

So, my point is: I honestly feel there’s a better solution, which is to bang your head, not Iraq.

I have numerous other ideas to share on this topic – including a whole plan for fomenting a democratic revolution in the Middle East using various kick-ass metal albums – but I know you’re super-busy, so I’ll wait until midterms to send that proposal along.

Better to burn out than fade away,

Robert Roberge (’05)

Finance Major

University of Florida

P.S. – With all due respect, your daughters are hot.

Steve Almond's collection of short stories is "My Life in Heavy Metal." You can browse the collection here. He can be reached at www.stevenalmond.com.