20 years ago, Bin Laden wished America 'A Crappy Valentine's Day'

The Onion also covers the Super Bowl, PowerPoint, the Census Bureau, "love coupons" and the ban on cell phones during flight.

Welcome back to The Onion: 20 Years Later, where we review the print issue from 20 years ago, find out what’s still funny and examine the cultural impact. Today, we revisit Feb. 9, 2005.

I wonder what younger people think about the American fascination with Osama Bin Laden’s grainy videotapes in the 2000s. It feels so quaint now. Anyways, let’s look back at the War on Terror’s archvillain, Valentine’s Day, the ultimate PowerPoint presentation and much more.

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What issue is this?

This was Vol. 41, Issue 06, the 228th new Onion issue of the 2000s. Here is what the website looked like in 2005, 2015 and today. At some point in 2015, The Onion deprecated its print archive pages — that 2015 link looked like this in February 2016.

The front page image is courtesy of former Onion Editor-in-Chief Scott Dikkers. Check out his Substack and his latest book.¹

The front-page headline “Area Man A Walking Bag Of Hazardous Biological Waste Material” is no longer online. Nor is “Love Coupons,” a Valentine’s Day feature where you could cut out the coupons from the print newspaper.

What was the top story, and other impressions?

Bin Laden tears up a "putrid Western Valentine's Day trifle" during his videotaped message.

Osama Bin Laden was a self-declared enemy of the U.S. for many years but was relatively unknown to Americans before the 1998 embassy bombings,² which catapulted him to the FBI’s most wanted list. The Onion occasionally mentioned him afterward, including in January 2000’s “Millennium Actually Starts In 2001, Terrorists Note.”

After 9/11, of course, he was Public Enemy No. 1, with the U.S. invading Afghanistan to hunt him down. But then a weird thing happened.

Bin Laden continued looming over the American consciousness like a Sword of Damocles come to life. But these tapes also served as damage control — proof that he wasn’t dead and still controlled events. Either way, The Onion mocked them as early as February 2002’s “New Bin Laden Tape Contains Three Previously Unreleased Monologues.”³

By February 2005, this joke had evolved to “Latest Bin Laden Videotape Wishes America 'A Crappy Valentine's Day.’” I always loved this headline but didn’t remember the article. Revisiting it in 2025, I’m impressed at how simple the satire is.

Bin Laden knows the importance of Valentine’s Day to Americans, so he wants to ruin it — but he’s become more obsessed with the holiday than anyone I’ve ever met:

“Allah willing, embarrassment and tearful rejection shall rule this day,” bin Laden said. “Paper hearts shall be rent and trod upon, and dreams of love delivered stillborn. Body language shall be misinterpreted, crushes unrequited, and sincere expressions of affection mocked. Invitations to dinner will be rejected, just as Americans have rejected Allah, the one true God.”

President George W. Bush responds during a speech at the Oklahoma Cattlemen’s Association.⁴ He criticizes Bin Laden for hoping Americans receive cards featuring “Monsters Inc.”⁵ characters and the Backstreet Boys.

Bin Laden did not overlook the innocuous custom of giving stuffed animals as gifts.

“The teddy bear that holds the ’I love you’ heart does not love you at all,” Bin Laden said. “It is an unliving, unholy thing filled only with stuffing. Just as the Western infidel is not bestowed with the blessings of Allah, so shall he go unloved by the false bear.”

“The false bear” is an incredible phrase.

A few other notes:

• Bin Laden also calls out Russell Stover, cards that say “bee yours” and “indigestible Western cuisine.”

• The Onion shouts out alt-weeklies that, sadly, have withered away:

  • “In addition to his allusions to classroom valentines, bin Laden cited heart-shaped candies, valentine personal ads in free alternative weeklies, and foot massages.”

• The grainy image above is from a 2004 video, albeit Photoshopped to have Bin Laden tearing up a giant heart.

The 2005 website version

The 2005 print version

Our other Valentine’s Day feature is “Onion Love Coupons,” as seen on The Onion’s website in 2005 (top) and the print newspaper (bottom). I fear these holiday-themed illustrations have been forgotten because they’ve largely disappeared from the web.⁶

I love this joke, which feels trickier to write than to perform on, say, a sketch show:

One awkward, emotionally chilly hug that, viewed from the side, resembles a capital "A"

Overall, The Onion offers an egalitarian coupon menu — note this side-by-side contrast:

One sexual act completed expressly for the purpose of procreating another child of God

One all-expenses-paid trip to the abortion clinic of bearer's choice

The federal government in action

There are a handful of other politics and government mentions in this issue, including:

• “Columnist Crackdown”: I didn’t remember this scandal, in which conservative columnists failed to disclose federal government contracts to promote Education and Health and Human Services initiatives.⁷ The jokes feature a mix of real and fictional people. My favorites:

  • “Jim Davis, Universal Press Syndicate—$350 for having Garfield laud Social Security privatization in four-panel discussion with Odie”

  • Catherine Edmonds, Reader's Digest—$50,000 to finally print Donald Rumsfeld's "Humor In Uniform" joke about the chief petty officer, the lemur, and the Cambodian laundry girls⁸

  • “Bill O'Reilly, Fox News—$500 per ‘shut up’ yelled”

• “Bush Defends Deny-Side Economics”: I thought this would be about Bush cutting government programs, but it’s simply Bush denying any issues with the economy:

  • “Nope,” the president said. “I keep hearing people say that the U.S. economy is troubled, but that isn’t true.”

• “Census Bureau: 9,000 To 15,000 People Work At Census Bureau”: The Onion quotes real-life Census Director Charles Kincannon, who gives generic excuses for why the Census employee count is imprecise.

• “The In-Flight Cell-Phone Ban”: The Onion asked people about this rule, which remains in place (at least, the “airplane mode” part). This is my favorite answer:

  “What an ideal marriage of the Wright Brothers and Alexander Graham Bell. And Kafka. And Pavlov. And Mengele.”

  Tyler Wilson • Systems Analyst

The Super Bowl!

McNabb attempts to go long with a two-liter bottle of refreshing Pepsi in the third quarter.

“Product Placement Mars Otherwise Exciting Super Bowl” breathes new life into the tired premise that TV is somehow too pure for advertising.

Look, TV (and radio before it) has always had product placement, all the way back to “Texaco Star Theater” in the late 1940s. Soap operas are named after their primary sponsors! And as billionaire Jimmy James said on “Newsradio” over 25 years ago:

“Advertising is what made this country great! What was the Constitution of the United States? It is an advertisement, an advertisement for liberty! ‘When in the course of human events’ — I’m telling ya, that’s right up there with ‘Put a tiger in your tank’ and ‘Where’s the beef?’”

Of course, The Onion is mocking such criticism of the Super Bowl, the most commercialized, non-artistic event of the year. The Onion does 2 things exceptionally well here: 1. Surprisingly good Photoshopping; 2. Taking product placement from something around the game to a key component of the game:

“Don’t get me wrong—this year’s Super Bowl was an exciting face-off,” said Philadelphia Eagles head coach Andy Reid, whose team was defeated 24-21 in a hard-fought contest. “The Patriots only got 331 yards on our defense, mostly because it took us a while to adjust to tackling players doused in Axe Deodorant Bodyspray For Men. But you can be sure they felt the heat of our Ford Motor Company sponsored Lincoln Mark LT blitzes. Our nose tackle drove this season’s hottest new luxury truck straight into their offensive line.”

Some of these advertisers are timeless, like Anheuser-Busch, while others feel ancient, like 1-800-COLLECT and the Kyocera Mita combination copier/printer/fax machine.

Dawkins (left) and Eagles defensive lineman Corey Simon praised the "smooth handling" of the Lincoln Mark LT they used to chase down Dillon in the second quarter.

Other jokes that stand out to me:

• The Lincoln Mark LT was a new car in 2005 (see above), but its Super Bowl ad never aired because it involved a child tempting a clergyman!

• Philadelphia Eagles QB Donovan McNabb was famously a Campbell’s Chunky Soup pitchman, including for Chunky Chili.

• Deion Branch won MVP for catching “The Pepsi Spirit” and many passes.

Area People doing Area Things

Bird and Maddox spend an afternoon at home.

“Woman Begins To Regret Dating Someone Spontaneous” is a delightful concept, well-written, and features photos that are truly worth a thousand words.

This is a classic “opposites attract” pairing. Heidi Bird works in mortgages at Wells Fargo, while Jason Maddox is a “part-time bicycle-shop employee and occasional street musician”:

“I was walking my dog Shadow when I heard someone call out to me from above,” Bird said. “I looked up and saw Jason sitting on a tree branch. He told me he once had a dog like Shadow. Then he asked me to come on up and see the view. I don’t usually do stuff like that, but he was so cute and intriguing that I tied Shadow to a bench and joined him up on the branch. We sat up there for two hours eating golden raisins and reading jokes from this kids’ joke book he fished from the trash. It seemed magical—at the time.”

“Kids’ joke book he fished from the trash” does not feel like a green flag, but what do I know?

Maddox woos Bird with a romantic gesture.

Bird is somehow swept away by Maddox showing up at Wells Fargo with flowers and a ukulele. And while that jump-starts a passionate fling, Maddox later strikes out when he brings roller skates for their 13-week anniversary.

As usual, The Onion talks to an academic to explain the situation. This time, it’s Sue Merrill, a therapist and author⁹ who says you must fight fire with fire:

“In order to have a viable relationship, you must either match his erratic behavior point-for-point, or maintain an almost bulletproof independence,” Merrill said. “Vulnerability is fatal. Ask yourself this, ’Do I have the stamina to water my plants one moment, float in a hot-air balloon an hour later, spend eight days alone, then stand in line at a bail-bonds office until 1 a.m. on a Tuesday?’”

The Onion also talks to Bird’s “too boring” ex-boyfriend, who will take her back if it doesn’t interfere with watching “CSI.” Meanwhile, Maddox …

Maddox was unavailable for comment, as he was assembling a Cupid costume out of a bed sheet and applying to film school in Poland.

“Project Manager Leaves Suicide PowerPoint Presentation” feels like a very dark sitcom plot.

I’ve argued that Robin Williams’ death moved the culture away from cheap and easy suicide jokes. What’s notable here is that The Onion recognizes the high bar — if anything, it’s trying too hard.

I mean, The Onion created a suicide note as a PowerPoint presentation! (Only the final slide appeared in print, but all 5 were published online immediately)

Co-workers of Ron Butler are shocked, especially because the PowerPoint was created almost 6 months earlier. But they admire his professionalism and productivity:

According to Williams+Kennedy president Bradford Williams, finalgoodbye.ppt was “clear, concise, and persuasive.”

“After everyone left the room, I sat down and went through Ron’s final presentation in slide-sorter view,” Williams said. “Man, I gotta tell you, it blew me away. That presentation really utilized the full multimedia capabilities of Microsoft’s PowerPoint application.”

“We’re really gonna miss Ron around here,” Williams added.

A copywriter has some notes that, sadly, Butler will never receive:

“I felt some of the later transitions were weak,” Pruriyaran said. “The point of a transition is to maintain audience interest and lighten the mood. To me, the door-closing sound effects in Will & Funeral were repetitive and heavy-handed. But Ron’s choice to end with that Hamlet quote and then fade to black was really powerful. There wasn’t a dry eye in the room when Hector flipped off the projector and brought up the lights.”

Other Area People items in this issue include:

• “Frederick's Of Anchorage Debuts Crotchless Long Underwear”: Should the human mind conceive of this joke? Maybe not, but it’s great.

• “Guy In Rome Does As The Tourists Do”: This feels clever more than funny. Love the Macalester College sweatshirt.

• “Cocksucker Beats Up Motherfucker”: A very 1990s Onion joke, in a good way.

  • “You want a piece of me?” asked the motherfucker, who minutes later got his goddamn ass handed to him on a plate.

• “Awkward Tension Mistaken For Sexual Tension”: A great one-liner that you could write many ways.

• “'Get TiVo' Friend's Solution To Everything”: What will be the 2045 equivalent of TiVo — no longer a buzzword but somehow still in business?

Were the infographics good?

“Where Do We See Ourselves In Five Years?” is a solid collection of jokes, although “Still in Iraq” was more prescient than anyone hoped.

I like “Unsold skeleton in Midwest Medical Supply warehouse” because it’s unclear whether you’re already a skeleton or will become one.

What columnists ran?

“Truth Be Told, I Have Nothing To Say” is an anti-column. What if you were a terrible communicator with half-formed thoughts but demanded to speak anyway — and at length?

That’s Corey Steinhoff in a nutshell:

If you’ll give me a chance to finish my point, Donna, I’ll be able to explain. I mean, I hate to be rude, but I don’t like to be interrupted when I’m in the middle of trying to say something, even if that thing has no value at all. I mean, I’ve been sitting here listening to all of you go on and on about every little thing. I would think you could do me the same courtesy by allowing me to dominate the conversation for a moment.

Steinhoff admits that he has “a desperate, pathological need to talk and, more importantly, to be heard by other people,” which probably means in 2025, he’s a successful podcaster and streamer.

Our other column is the return of Point/Counterpoint, which in print and the 2005 website carried the label “Point/Counterpoint: Cosmology” and the headline “Darling, I Will Give You The Moon And The Stars vs. Giving Me The Moon And Stars Would Have Disastrous Effects On Our Galaxy.”

I always like an Onion article that interprets someone’s figurative turn of phrase as extremely literal. In this example, English graduate student Brandon Hendrickson is waxing poetic as he woos his study partner:

Do you want the moon? I will reach up and take it in my hands, write your name on it, and give it to you. It will be yours until the end of time.

Do you want the stars? I will roam the universe for all eternity, gathering up the twinkling points of light in the night sky. I will string the glittering stars into a latticework of jewelry to tuck into your hair, to adorn your neck, and to string around your pretty ankles. Say the word and I will do it.

Unfortunately, he’s wooing a physics grad student, Sally Toeffer, who sees things differently:

Presume, for the sake of argument, that it is within your power to give me the moon. As you know, impact with an extraterrestrial object a fraction of the moon’s mass—one the size of Rhode Island, for example—would constitute an extinction-level event for most of the planet. If the moon were to collide with the Earth’s surface (where I would be standing when you gave it to me), it is unlikely that even bacteria would survive.

She also tells Hendrickson that his only accurate statement was that he’s “an insignificant speck in an uncaring universe,” which seems unnecessary.

If you told me “The Big Bang Theory” was created entirely based on this column, I might believe you.

What was the best horoscope?

My favorite horoscope this week is Cancer for the mention of in-flight magazines, which were finally killed off by COVID.

Cancer: (June 22—July 22)
Travel hinders your creativity when, for days after your flight, all your pottery designs refer to things you read in US Airways' in-flight magazine.

Once again, the horoscopes don’t display correctly on today’s website. The 2005 archive has a better view.

What holds up best?

I think “Latest Bin Laden Videotape Wishes America 'A Crappy Valentine's Day’” holds up as a reminder of that era and a mockery of Valentine’s Day traditions.

“Woman Begins To Regret Dating Someone Spontaneous” feels even more timeless, as many of the best Onion dating stories do.

What holds up worst?

“‘Get TiVo' Friend's Solution To Everything” is an interesting cultural marker, but otherwise not that relevant today.

What would be done differently today

The headline “Bush Defends Deny-Side Economics” wouldn’t have translated smoothly to President Joe Biden during the past couple of years, but passages like this would have:

Leading economists say they are curious to see whether the president’s optimism will trickle down into the public consciousness.

Thank you

Grateful to have you here. Please continue to like, comment and share the newsletter so the algorithm remembers me!

Next week, we’ll revisit the Tulip Revolution, Michael Moore, Teach for America, an Israeli-Palestinian cease-fire and much more. See you then!

1. I may get commissions for purchases made through book links in this post, including this one.

2. Note this 1993 softball profile where Bin Laden claims to be nothing but a “construction engineer and an agriculturalist.” There’s also a 1996 Time magazine interview, when Bin Laden was suspected in a 1995 bombing of U.S. troops.

3. Interestingly, Bin Laden released most of his recordings after 2005, but I guess the shock value had already worn off.

4. I didn’t find any record of Bush speaking to this group, a la The Onion’s mention of real-life Bush fundraisers in 2003.

5. This movie was also mentioned the prior week in Jackie Harvey’s Golden Globes column.

6. April 2000’s Easter cards are another example. The Onion’s December 2024 print issue recently offered a twist on this theme by including several pages designed like wrapping paper.

7. A notable example of the government paying media to make content, rather than subscriptions to media outlets.

8. My grandmother subscribed to Reader’s Digest for decades, so I read it regularly from circa 1990-2015.

9. The Onion usually gave these authors a ridiculous fictional book title, but not here.