AT&T to Begin Censoring Phone Calls and Text Messages
By Phil Maggitti

"Little Georgie Bush, leave them kids alone."

NEW YORK – AT&T, responding to what it called “a surprisingly favorable reaction” to its censorship of the lyrics of Pearl Jam and other recording artists, has announced plans to begin monitoring phone conversations and text messages.

As part of its new Freedom U.S.A. Communications Package, which will be funded by the federal government and provided “without additional cost” to all present and future AT&T subscribers, the communications giant will eliminate “objectionable speech and ideas” from any messages carried over its network.

“Although Pearl Jam sought to use our editing of its recent broadcast to further its left-wing political agenda,” said Hal Greenwood, head of AT&T’s Department of Decency in Communications, “we received thousands of phone calls and emails encouraging us to step up and protect our nation and its children from subversive and immoral speech and ideas.”

Mr. Greenwood, who told reporters he has a college-age daughter, said, “I would have been embarrassed if she and I had been watching some of the filth that passes for entertainment these days.”

AT&T did not disclose the criteria it would use to judge whether communication content “could in any way be considered objectionable in your average American subdivision,” the company did say, however, that by the time the Freedom U.S.A. Communications Package was fully operational in late December, all telephone conversations and text messages would be carried on a seven-second tape delay. This will allow AT&T’s monitoring agents sufficient time to replace offending words with bleeps.

In addition, said Mr. Greenwood, words such as fuck in all its manifestations, and any crude word for penis, vagina, anus, or a person who engages in sexual relations with his mother will automatically be replaced with bleeps without the need for human intervention.

Other than that, Mr. Greenwood assured reporters, phone calls will sound “the same as ever,” except for the following message, which will be heard before the ring tone begins: “In the interest of national security and a more decent America, this phone call may be monitored or recorded for detaining purposes.”