To: All al-Qaeda franchises
From: al-Qaeda Headquarters
Re: The al-Qaeda experience
The following assumes that there is such a thing as al-Qaeda (as opposed to a bunch of hotheads with fertilizer, like Tim McVeigh), or if there was such a thing, if it was capable of, as the Australians say, organizing a chook raffle. Or, al-Qaeda might be a mass of random angry people with access to explosives who want the geographicaly-challenged NATO to return to the North Atlantic. Take your pick.
- Our organization has existed for over ten years, providing unequaled terror experiences.
- The al-Qaeda experience of 9/11 drew unprecedented attention to our brand.
- Following 9/11, there has been an exponential growth of al-Qaeda, with franchises established in Yemen, Sudan, the Arabian Peninsula, Libya, Mali, Iraq, Syria, and Saskatchewan.
- We were kidding about Saskatchewan.
- The health of our business model mandates a uniform experience when clients encounter our brand ("client/brand disposition matrix"), and quality control ("QC") is therefore crucial.
- The need to abbreviate quality control as QC is, well ...part of the whole franchise thing.
- Vital elements of our business plan include: xenophobia (the target market is white, preferably Anglo-Saxon although French is acceptable); willingness to die for customer satisfaction; Semtex literacy; current driver's licence; and an almost fanatical devotion to the Pope.
- About the Pope....
- We are currently recruiting nuclear physicists, longshoremen, and merchant seamen.
- Fluency in Arabic, Farsi, Pashto, English, French, Russian, Mandarin, Hebrew, German, and Greek will be an asset.
