Broken News: America concludes, decade best forgotten

AMERICA—Today it was announced that, pending a final count vote tally, that exit polling had revealed this last weekend’s nationwide referendum on whether to remember, not talk about, or forget the previous decade had concluded with “not remembering” winning with a 74% share of the vote.

While the full scope and design of the willful forgetfulness America has elected to conjure on January 1st remains unclear, a preliminary panel has been convened to create both a plausible backstory for the memory loss as well as credible explanations for technological advancements and changes the country has undergone over the past 10 years.

Until some of the preliminary details are sketched out, Americans have been advised that when they awake of Friday morning, they are to act as if they were awaking from a long slumber, without any recollection of any of the events that happened over the past decade. Given that most of the country will have gotten black out drunk the previous night, this is expected to be rather easily initially.

Citizens are to keep from discussing history or make any references to the past 10 years until such a time as the Historical Revision Committee has issued an explanation for what happened.

“Look, it is essential that we as a country stick with this lie, I cannot stress this enough,” explained Dr. Samuel Seward, one of the newly announced members of the hastily assembled committee. “The longer we stick to it and the more forcefully we assert that it must be true, the easier it will be to convince ourselves that it is true. Just shut up, keep your head down, and when anyone mentions they can’t remember the last decade, just nod and say ‘Me too.’ Do not fuck this up for us.”

While no official explanation has yet been decided upon, sources say that the HRC currently is considering two ideas.

In the first, all manner of trees, plants, and various flora will have turned on mankind, releasing a memory altering neurotoxin that blocked out the past 10 years, much like the plot of The Happening.

One scientist on the project was overheard to remark, “People loved The Happening, right?”

The second and more popular idea floating around is that America was invaded and conquered by an alien race, who forced us to build them some great weapon for some nebulous intergalactic purpose that we couldn’t ever possibly comprehend. Once work was completed, the aliens left and wiped our memories.

“Personally I think this is the perfect explanation,” observed Adam Weiss, a historian tasked with eliminating a 10 years worth of news archives from the internet.

“First, it can explain so much. The high unemployment is from all the people left jobless now that the aliens no longer need us to build their weapon. It also explains our decaying infrastructure as the aliens would have moved all of our resources and efforts into building this space gun. It explains the shitty economy because the only thing that had been fueling our economy for a decade is now off to fight an intergalactic war. Plus it also explains why we haven’t made any progress on the environment or anything of note; because we were building a giant laser! It’s perfect!”

Following that logic, things like hybrid cars, increased internet speeds, HDTV, and the iPod would be explained away as technology we were able to steal from the aliens, which, at this stage, are being envisioned as some sort of giant space dogs that dressed like highly advanced Vikings.

When asked how this project was going to explain major events like 9/11, the war in Iraq, and the devastation of New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina, group members were admittedly unsure. But, they did say that while they were working on solutions to those questions, they were not deeming them a necessary priority.

“It’s not like Americans even remember or discuss them now, so why should we try to come up with an explanation,” observed one panel member. “We’ll just classify it under the subheading of ‘unexplainable magic’.”

For now, American’s are being advised to “just go with it” and are being told that the only alternative is to not only remember what happened over the past decade, but to take responsibility for it.

“Who wants that,” asked Dr. Seward. “I have hopes that we’ll be able to use this collective lie we’re entering into to actually move us forward without any of the diversions of the past 10 years, but I’m not hopeful. At the very least this will allow me to pretend that Dick Cheney, the Black Eyed Peas, that guy with the puppets who is always on TV now, the American auto industry, and my lying whore of a wife not only didn’t occur, but also didn’t sleep with any of my lab assistants.”

He concluded, “Fuck you, Judith!”

For now, the country is expected to spend the next few days walking around confused, rubbing their eyes, and asking “What happened’ a lot. Soon after they are advised to marvel at the “new” technologies they find they have and remark with astonishment that a black guy is now running the country.

As the days move on, the Historical Revision Committee will issue findings and explanations which are then to be accepted and repeated as fact. After an appropriate cover story and whitewash of contrary evidence has been performed, society will be expected to move on with a new purpose. Those on the committee expect this whole process will take upwards of a month.

“Seriously,” Dr. Seward repeated forcefully. “Do not fuck this up for us.”