Forget Uncle Sam-- Homer Simpson Wants You

I was schlepping around town the other day, talking to people about improving America’s image, when I came upon a spin doctor with a potful of ideas on the subject. Replacing Uncle Sam with Homer Simpson was one of them.

Image-altering has been on my mind ever since the Council on Foreign Affairs announced some days ago that we are viewed abroad as arrogant, self-indulgent, hypocritical, inattentive and hostile. And that’s just in Washington.

When President Bush first heard how the U.S. was perceived overseas, he thought we were being praised for our many powerful attributes. But after someone explained to him that they weren’t meant in a positive way, he blinked his squinty little Texas eyes and ordered the creation of the Office of Global Communications.

I personally don’t hold out a lot of hope that OGLOB, as it will no doubt be called, will do us a lot of good, which is what prompted me to do some work on my own. And after talking to various image-makers, I decided that the only man who could be of real help was Manny Spitzik.

Not many people realize it, but Spitz has been operating for many years on an international scale, saving well-known people from themselves, creating positive words and phrases for negative situations and, as he puts it, generally turning skunks into roses.

Among many achievements, he redefined the nature of sex for Bill Clinton, allowing the president to declare with a straight face that he did not have sex with that woman, that Monica Lewinsky, even though he had come terribly close. Spitz came up with the phrase “personal, noncommittal affiliation” to describe what they were doing in that room off the Oval Office.

Just the man to alter the American image.

“Number one,” he said to me as we sat drinking super-oxygenated Himalayan creek water at a club on Melrose Avenue, “Uncle Sam’s gotta go. Too grim. Too warlike. Too arrogant. Think Homer Simpson.”

He peered at me through black-rimmed glasses the size of saucers, the intensity of his gaze leaving no doubt in my mind that he was serious.

I tried to visualize Homer in a star-spangled top hat, pointing like Uncle Sam in that famous poster and saying, “Homer Simpson Wants Beer!” but it didn’t scan.

“Isn’t Homer the epitome of stupid and crude?” I said.

“Exactly,” Spitz said. He leaned closer. “Stupid and crude translate into one thing, my friend: lovable. It’s today’s humor.” He ordered another super-oxy laced with carrot oil. “I told young George when he was running for president, ‘Dumb down, boy.’ And look what happened. He won.”

Spitz leaned in even closer. “This is still pretty hush-hush, but in a few weeks Tony Clifton is going to reappear on stage.”

“The loud, obnoxious character Andy Kaufman used to play?”

“Right. Everyone’s gonna think it’s Andy come back to life or maybe Jim Carrey doing shtick, but you know who it’s going to be?” He didn’t wait for an answer. “Osama bin Laden! Binnie’s coming out of hiding! My idea. The people are gonna love it.”

I don’t sputter a lot, but I did this time. I sputtered and stared. “Th-that’s not only insensitive and offensive,” I said when the sputtering had stopped, “If you’re working for Al Qaeda, it might even be treason!”

“Treason, schmeason,” Spitz replied with a wave of his hand. “We don’t call it that anymore. It’s furtive cross-cultural cooperation. You’ve got to think in today’s terms. It’s not what you do, it’s what you call what you do.”

I probably should have gotten up and walked out right then, but the man has a way of keeping you listening. He did it in this instance by saying, “Not an angry, warlike carnivorous eagle as our national bird, but Tweety Bird, the sweetest animal in God’s gracious kingdom outside of Porky Pig. And not saber-rattling, but money-rustling.”

“We already rustle money,” I said. “That’s part of the problem. The world already thinks we’re greedier than dingo dogs. And nobody’s going to buy a canary representing us unless it’s got laser-guided missiles under its wings.”

“OK, no Tweety, but how about this: mail-in rebates for the leaders of the nations that hate us the most. You don’t just give away money to everyone and his uncle, you sell the guy in power an eight-deck CD player for 50 bucks and give him the opportunity to apply for a $30-billion rebate! Make a game outta foreign aid! Everybody loves games!”

He suggested altering the flag to feature a round, yellow happy face symbol with “Have a Nice Day” in Latin across the bottom, and putting a positive spin on accidental bombings.

OK on the flag, but I don’t think that painting our missiles in bright, cheerful colors would divert attention from the fact that occasionally we blow up the wrong target.

“We don’t blow up wrong targets,” Spitz argued, “we simply perform unintended optional diversions that result in bio-unit fragmentation.”

By the time I left, Spitz had switched from super-oxygenated Himalayan creek water to vitamin-infused synergetic avocado juice with a ginseng twist and was writing frantically on a tablet of recycled hemp. I would guess he was thinking up even more ideas on how to upgrade America’s image, but I’m not sure I want to hear them.

We’re going to have to work on the product instead of the image if we really want to sell the soap, although the idea of Homer Simpson symbolizing America to the world is beginning to make more sense with every passing day.

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Al Martinez’s columns appear Mondays and Thursdays. He’s at al. martinez@latimes.com.