Search for Missing ‘Noble Cause’ Continues

CLEANING LADY QUESTIONED IN DISAPPEARANCE OF ‘NOBLE CAUSE’

Washington, Sept. 8 –

FBI spokesman Alvin Smithers acknowledged today that agents have questioned Juanita Robinson, 38, a White House cleaning lady, in the disappearance of the “noble cause” which President Bush has frequently cited as the reason for the U.S. invasion and occupation of Iraq. Ms. Robinson is employed by a temp agency which the White House, in its privatization efforts, has contracted with to clean various government offices.

Smithers said, “Ms. Robinson is a person of interest in our ongoing investigation, but she has not been charged and is not being held at this time.” Robinson’s name was initially floated as a suspect in the case by administration officials anxious to assign responsibility for the missing “noble cause,” preferably to someone with no political connection to the White House. Interest in Ms. Robinson accelerated when her fingerprints were found on items on the President’s desk. An angry Ms. Robinson has vehemently denied any involvement in the disappearance of the missing “noble cause.”

“The only reason my fingerprints were on that autographed baseball and those other toys was I picked ‘em up to dust, and then put ‘em right back where I found ‘em,” said Ms. Robinson. “I didn’t take nothin’! The whole month of August, while the President was on vacation, I came in every day and dusted and vacuumed his office so it’d look nice when he came back. And this is the thanks I get!”

Ms. Robinson said, “I want to find that ‘noble cause’ just as much as anybody else. Maybe more. My oldest boy Malcolm’s in the Army, and he just got sent back from Iraq. He’s in Walter Reed right now for rehabilitation. He lost part of his right leg and his spleen and one of his kidneys when a roadside bomb exploded under the truck he was ridin’ in. Now Malcolm be tellin’ me there ain’t no ‘noble cause,’ an never was one. How could I take somethin’ that don’t even exist? And why would the President say there was a ‘noble cause’ if there wasn’t? I don’t understand politics, but this jes’ don’t seem right.”

Malcolm Robinson, Ms. Robinson’s son, is well-known in D.C. athletic circles. He was a track star in high school, and won several hurdle events in the district championships. According to Ms. Robinson, he gave up a college track scholarship to join the Army after the tragic events of September 11, saying that he wanted to defend his country from further attacks. The son is not a suspect in the disappearance of the “noble cause.”


© Tony Russell, 2005