The U.S. government's "Iraqi Most Wanted" cards have inspired politically charged decks by Warprofiteers.com. Sacramento Bee photo illustration/Susan Ballenger

Stacking the deck

Popular spinoffs of the 'Iraqi Most Wanted' playing cards push political agendas

By Will Evans -- Bee Staff Writer
Published 2:15 a.m. PDT Tuesday, June 3, 2003

Playing "War" with a deck of cards just got a little scarier.

The Paul Wolfowitz king of spades beats the Bill O'Reilly eight of clubs. The Barbra Streisand queen of hearts beats the Fidel Castro three of spades. And what happens when the George W. Bush ace of spades ties the Jacques Chirac ace of clubs? "War" breaks out, of course.

These scenarios and more are all possible with spinoffs of the government's "Iraqi Most Wanted" cards. The "Most Wanted" cards, designed to help U.S. troops identify and capture Iraqi leaders -- Saddam Hussein is the ace of spades -- have become familiar to the public, selling fast on the Internet.

Now, various companies, organizations and Web sites are dealing out politically charged decks of their own -- left-wing and right-wing, pro-war and anti-war. Many of the decks, resembling regular playing cards, can be purchased online at prices between $5 and $15. They're proba-bly the most entertaining thing to come out of the war on Iraq.

But there's an edge to the fun and games.

For instance, the Ruckus Society, an Oakland activist organization, turned the card tables on the U.S. government, replacing "most wanted" Iraqis with a deck of "war profiteers." It points fingers at members of the Bush administration and corporate executives alike for making money off the conflict. President Bush is relegated to the joker card -- except it's called "the Jerk."

"I get this delightful sense of justice to see these cards come out because it's like a mirror to these power brokers -- to how they play the world," says Craig Bond, 51, a Carmichael resident who picked up a deck at a Ruckus Society gathering in Sacramento last weekend.

"It offers another perspective that hasn't been offered yet in the media," says Daljit Baines, 30, of Natomas.

The cards are also an activist tool. The Web site that features them, Warprofiteers.com, links to organizations that are campaigning against the public figures.

On the other side, there's NewsMax.com. The conservative Web site produced a "Deck of Weasels," ridiculing the "worst leaders and celebrities who opposed America" -- and using their own quotes against them. Each is pictured wearing an Iraqi Republican Guard-style beret. Jimmy Carter and Jesse Jackson are the jokers. Susan Sarandon, who is also featured, told People magazine: "I am elated to know there are enough people to make a full deck."

The Florida-based company that makes the cards has sold more than 25,000 decks in the past few weeks.

"There's a lot of frustration in America toward Hollywood now," says CEO Christopher Ruddy. "Now we're going to have the last laugh."

Still, Gopal Dayaneni, who worked on the Ruckus deck, finds humor in the "Weasels" deck, too. He actually likes the quotes.

Take Martin Sheen: "By some demented form of logic, the men, women and children of Iraq are relegated to 'collateral damage,' as the dogs of war slouch toward Baghdad." A weasel to NewsMax, a wise man to Dayaneni.

In another shuffle, Bush replaces Hussein as the ace of spades in a "Military Heroes" deck. GreatUSAflags.com, based in Illinois, has sold more than 1 million decks of heroes and other patriotic-themed cards in the past five weeks.

Rick Podgorski of Grayslake, Ill., recently ordered the "Heroes" deck to show his children those who should be honored for their service. The family already has the "Most Wanted" cards, and each time an Iraqi figure is killed or captured, the four kids, ages 3 to 8, take turns marking a black "X" on the cards.

"To them, it's a tangible tie-in to what's going on in the world," Podgorski says in a phone interview.

Another way to get some hands-on action is to "play nuclear Armageddon right in your own bunker."

So says a sarcastic Tom Clements, senior campaigner with Greenpeace International, which created a knockoff deck depicting the nuclear powers of the world -- including the United States and Britain. Other cards in the deck have bits of info, such as the number of people who died in the nuclear attacks on Japan (more than 200,000). You can even play solitaire off of the Greenpeace.org Web site.

"It ties the anti-war message together with the disarmament message," Clements says.

And there are many, many more. Just go fish:

* A deck by anti-globalization Web site Gatt.org that features Vice President Dick Cheney as the ace of spades and Bush as the four of clubs.

* A deck of "Republican Chickenhawks," featuring Republican politicians who avoided military service.

* And a deck made by Republican lawmakers in Texas that pictures Democratic legislators who recently fled the state temporarily to prevent a bill from being passed. "Be sure to call the Department of Public Safety if you see any of these jokers!" says the Web site featuring these cards.

In one deal or another, everyone gets carded. Bill Gates pops up as a "Software Business Imperialist." Lynne Cheney draws the caption: "Uncle Fester's wife."

And in the midst of the Washington, D.C.-meets-Las Vegas madness, the original "Iraqi Most Wanted" cards, recently stocked at some Walgreens stores, keep selling.

"This has been the most incredible playing card phenomenon, in terms of the heat of the consumer interest ... that we have seen in our company's 135-year history," says George White, vice president of marketing for the United States Playing Card Co., which manufactures the "Most Wanted" and "Heroes" decks, as well as well-known brands such as Bicycle.

Cards and the military go way back.

During World War II, the company made special cards to help troops distinguish among silhouettes of enemy and allied aircraft, White says. Another deck had cards that would peel apart, revealing an escape route out of Germany for U.S. prisoners of war. In the Vietnam War, soldiers left aces of spades in villages and on corpses to scare the Vietnamese, whom they believed to be superstitious of the image.

The history of cards and troops follows one simple truth: "When soldiers are not performing their everyday regular duties, they tend to play cards," says Sgt. Scott Boehmler, 27, one of five Defense Intelligence Agency analysts who designed the "Most Wanted" cards. He says the military might make an anti-terrorism deck next.

In the meantime, a few of the analysts ordered their own "Deck of Weasels." Barbra Streisand won't be getting through the next checkpoint.

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