JON STEWART: Maybe it's just time we all went back to where a lot of these problems started. The original sin, where a British man 100 years ago drawing a map of a place he'd never been to, filled with people he'd never met, forming new countries with no attention paid to ethnic or religious tensions. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Sir Archibald Mapsalot III. (audience cheers as Sir Mapsalot III walks out) Sir Archibald!
SIR ARCHIBALD MAPSALOT III: Good evening, Jon!
JON STEWART: Nice to see you sir!
SIR ARCHIBALD MAPSALOT III: Absolute pleasure to be here, Jon! Now what's all the bother about?
JON STEWART: It's actually about the Middle East, Archibald.
SIR ARCHIBALD MAPSALOT III: Oh, ghastly place, never been there, don't want to. Now, India, there is a land worth subjugating, I'll tell you!
JON STEWART: I understand. Archibald, it's just, you know, the borders that you drew back after World War I, well they've proven to be a little unstable and somewhat controversial.
SIR ARCHIBALD MAPSALOT III: Really? Not a problem, we'll just draw them again.
JON STEWART: Right, well.... (facepalms) That's the problem. You're a little cavalier about that.
SIR ARCHIBALD MAPSALOT III: Righty. Well, this time I will take great care. Quick scribble on the old globe, I guarantee you before you know it, Bob's your uncle, it's gin o'clock. Let's take a look. Yep, yep, yep, I see your problem right here. The lines are too squiggly, Jon. As my father once told me, "When borders get squiggly, people get squiggly."
JON STEWART: Really.
SIR ARCHIBALD MAPSALOT III: What you want is a nice straight line, Jon, a nice straight line, straight as you can, like that.
Lovely, lovely. Makes it straight, look.
JON STEWART: Yeah, that's... what you've done there, actually, you've taken some land from Turkey, and now you've got a Kurdish population there in a disputed zone.
SIR ARCHIBALD MAPSALOT III: A what in a who living in a where, Jon?? This is imperialism, boy! First rule is don't overthink it. Second rule, don't think at all. Check your brain at the door with your brolley.
JON STEWART: Brolley?
SIR ARCHIBALD MAPSALOT III: The Turks will learn to live with it, Jon. And if they don't, who really cares? See how easy this is? Biff boff, pish posh, take out the squiggles, put in the straights, lovely.
There you go, there you go. And we're done. I'm parched, time for a naughty sherry, because if I know Arabs, Jon — and believe me, I do not — they like nothing more than alcohol after a good Western intervention.
JON STEWART: See, right there, what you're doing there, that's... technically, Iran is not Arab. They're Persian.
SIR ARCHIBALD MAPSALOT III: What? Persian??
JON STEWART: Yes.
SIR ARCHIBALD MAPSALOT III: You're saying they're cats?
JON STEWART: No, I'm not!
SIR ARCHIBALD MAPSALOT III: They're cat people! What, cats and rugs living side by side? It'll never work, Jon!! They're natural enemies!
JON STEWART: I understand that. I know that cats and rugs are natural.... Look....
SIR ARCHIBALD MAPSALOT III: What?
JON STEWART: That's not what Persian means. Why didn't you touch Saudi Arabia?
SIR ARCHIBALD MAPSALOT III: Why don't I touch Saudi Arabia, Jonathan? They're a good, decent, oil-producing people!
JON STEWART: See, this is not... I don't think this is going to work out.
SIR ARCHIBALD MAPSALOT III: Look, there's nothing the Arab respects, Jon, more than a strong steady white hand drawing arbitrary lines twixt their ridiculous tribal allegiances.
JON STEWART: But that, see, right there, see, that seems a bit racist.
SIR ARCHIBALD MAPSALOT III: What, what?? You're calling me a what now?
JON STEWART: It's a bit racist. It seems a bit racist.
SIR ARCHIBALD MAPSALOT III: Ah bop-bop-bop-bop! Ah bop-bop-bop-bop-bop! You steady it! You steady that ship! To call me a racist would be to imply that I cared enough to hate them. (audience oohs) Or, was interested enough to learn things about them to dislike. That's it, that's it.
JON STEWART: But see, that is exactly the kind of mindless imperialism that got us into this situation. Your casual ignorance has doomed the region to exist in a perpetual state.
What are you doing?? What are you doing right now?
SIR ARCHIBALD MAPSALOT III: I'm playing poker! (wild audience cheering and applause)
JON STEWART: Wait, why?? Why??
SIR ARCHIBALD MAPSALOT III: Why? Why am I playing poker? Because you're boring me, Jon! And this is what real gentlemen do! They play poker on their iPhones whenever they become inexplicably bored by something incredibly important. I bid you good day, sir.
JON STEWART: Sir Archibald, we have to draw th....
SIR ARCHIBALD MAPSALOT III: I SAID GOOD DAY!!! GOOD DAY TO YOU!!
JON STEWART: We'll be right back.
from a Russian-sponsored think tank to talk about what can be done to improve relations between Russia and the U.S.
.
.