Don’t Feed The Animals, A Series of Satirical Musings by: Josh Lorenzo

Washington, D.C. – According to sources within the White House, the President is seriously considering sending Rocky Balboa to Russia to be interrogated for his role in defeating Ivan Drago on Christmas Day, back in 1985. If true, this could send a terrible message abroad regarding America’s standing as a world power, and might seriously jeopardize the possibility of any further Rocky films.

Balboa, as could be expected, is quite concerned about this potential turn of events. “Hey, yo, I don’t know, you know?” he remarked to journalists, “I, uh, like it here in Philly, and, uh, I, you know, don’t want to leave.”

In an interview with Fox News, Trump indicated that he would be amenable to this request, should Putin urge it. “Drago was a tremendous athlete. Tremendous,” he said, “Frankly, I don’t see how Balboa would’ve defeated Drago.”

When confronted with the growing outrage over his anti-American sentiment, President Trump indicated that he misspoke: “In fact, I meant to say, ‘I don’t see how Balboa wouldn’t have defeated Drago.’”

According to the intelligence community, sending an American citizen to be interrogated by a hostile foreign power for winning a boxing match fair and square thirty-three years ago has the potential to set a dangerous precedent not only for diplomacy, but for the future of boxing as well.

A high-ranking individual at the Central Intelligence Agency, who asked to remain anonymous, said, “This is a really silly idea, and proves, once and for all, that our President is willing to make enemies with anyone other than our actual enemies.”

For their part, boxers are also expressing their outrage. Adonis Creed, Rocky’s boxing protege and the son of deceased boxer Apollo Creed, voiced his outrage in a series of surprisingly thoughtful tweets.

“Rocky went to the Soviet Union in 1985 to avenge my father’s death. Was Rocky technically responsible for my father’s death by not throwing in the towel and letting Drago pound him to death? Yes. But still…”

It’s unclear to anyone what a potential interrogation of Rocky Balboa by Russian officials would actually involve. There is no indication that Rocky did anything illegal while training for the fight in Russia. Furthermore, we know, after witnessing the entire fight, that nothing untoward happened.

Russian intelligence officials say that they have requested this interview based on the scene in which Rocky, while jogging with his handlers in a car behind him, suddenly decided to outrun them. According to the film, Rocky was in such peak performance that he decided to run up a large mountain and scream “Drago!” several times. Russian officials are concerned that there was more to that scene than what was shown. Did a clandestine meeting between Rocky and an unknown Russian person of interest take place?

Rocky says no: “Nothing happened. I just decided to run full speed, while wearing thick mountain boots and four layers of wool clothing, up a large, snowy mountain, without being out of breath, so that I could scream my opponents name.”

It remains to be seen what becomes of this, but sources say that Billy Joel, who once proudly sang “Back in the U.S.S.R” is concerned he might be next.

Josh Lorenzo is a part-time humor writer, featured in various places, such as McSweeney’s and the Washington Post. He writes a regular satirical column, Don’t Feed the Animals at Political Animal Magazine. He also has a blog at www.theauthorofsarcasm.com He lives is in suburban Maryland with his wife and two children.

Image: Caricature by DonkeyHotey

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