Unofficial notes of a meeting of Chinese spies in the Vatican:
Wang Chi: Ladies and Gentlemen we have a great crisis to meet.
Fang Fang: It fills me with fear and tears!
Cao Pi: But face it we must.
Huángsè Wēixié: Rome is the greatest duty station we all have ever been in! (Nods from all in attendance.) And now they want to take it from us.
Wang Chi: Can we help it that the Vatican so slavishly follows our policy that espionage is not needed, and that the black arts of bribery and blackmail
are unnecessary?
Fang Fang: Well, I for one am not going to go meekly back to the motherland. I have a boyfriend here and the fashions here are beyond my dreams. You men
can laugh, but Rome is a paradise for women.
Cao Pi: And for men: the food, the wine, the women, la dolce vita!
Huángsè Wēixié: So, we are in agreement that we all wish to stay, but how is this to be accomplished?
Wang Chi: Perhaps our old enemies, the American imperialists can be of assistance?
Fang Fang: How, is not Biden a pawn under our control?
Wang Chi: I do not mean the American government. I am referring to Catholics in America.
Huángsè Wēixié: True, the main opposition to the Vatican has come from some American Catholics.
Wang Chi: Precisely! We will tell our superiors that the American Catholics will either push the Pope to the right, or force the election of a new Pope.
Fang Fang: But does that not oversell the propensity of the conservative American Catholics to do anything. Thus far they have been filled with sound
and fury but accomplishing nothing.
Cao Pi: Perhaps we could plant stories in friendly media to exaggerate the influence of the American Catholics?
Wang Chi: Brilliant! We could also claim to have an American who is feeding us information about their nefarious plans. All in favor of taking these steps
to appraise our superiors of the Yankee menace brewing against the Pope.
The vote in favor was unanimous.
And with that PopeWatch will be on Fourth of July hiatus until July 6. After having his fill of the rockets' red glare and the bombs bursting in air,
PopeWatch shall return.
