In a Bid for Balance, Rove Joins the Cast of Sesame Street

Queens, NY-- Answering widespread criticism that America's most famous educational television show lacks a pro-Bush ideologue, Sesame Street will add White House strategist Karl Rove as a permanent cast member in new broadcasts beginning in the fall. From an office on Sesame Street above Alan's candy store, Mr. Rove will promote the same moral values which resonated so deeply in the re-election of President Bush, such as punctuality, obedience, and the importance of bunker-busting nuclear weapons.

"This isn't quite where I thought the show would end up when we started back in 1969," said longtime cast member Bob McGrath. "Then again, I never thought we'd end up with a president who makes Nixon look like a cautious, responsible leader."

Unlike the other human characters on the show, who dress casually and are on a first-name basis with the children and puppets, Mr. Rove's wardrobe will be strictly Brooks Brothers and he will be known as "Mr. Rove." He hopes to "change the tone" of a program that he claims shortchanges the importance of economic growth.

"One of the problems with Sesame Street is that the human characters don't have the kinds of jobs that are going to make these kids any money," Mr. Rove said in a phone interview on Friday. "A music teacher? A librarian? Gina taking time off to get a Ph.D? What in the hell is that?"

In one already completed episode, Mr. Rove takes Big Bird and several children to play golf with lobbyist Jack Abramoff . In another, he invites his friend Laura Bush to talk about how constant criticism from the news media makes the president sad because it hurts America.

Mr. Rove's tenure on the show has already stirred controversy. Sensitive about his weight, the strategist was reportedly angered when a 7-year-old Texas boy named Larry Harris drew a picture of Rove with his body in shape of a birthday cake.

"Mr. Rove loves cake so much he is one!" Harris explains in an on-air segment as he displays the drawing to a visibly-excited Cookie Monster.

According to anonymous sources, Mr. Rove retaliated by orchestrating a whisper campaign asserting that the young boy was a bed-wetter. Taunted mercilessly by the other children and by Mr. Rove, Larry quit the program in humiliation before shooting on his segment could be completed.

"Larry had some problems right after we moved in '03, but he hadn't peed in bed in over a year and a half," the boy's mother Yolanda Harris says. "Now he cries himself to sleep each night and 'the problem' is occurring about three times a week. Mr. Rove should have do my laundry."

"To take the perceived strength of an enemy and turn it into a weakness is classic Rove," said G.O.P. pollster Frank Luntz. "That kid will be a laughingstock for years, but he's learned a valuable lesson -- about what it takes to be a winner."