"Sometimes nothing can be a real cool hand"-
Paul Newman as Luke in "Cool Hand Luke"

"Ahianen lashay yany shay azem"-
Saddam Hussein as himself in the Baghdad remake.

BAGHDAD, October – Responding to U.S. Senate debate repeatedly comparing Saddam Hussein to Adolph Hitler, senior Iraqi officials said the senators have it all wrong. “Why do they call him Hitler?” asked one aide on background. “He is Luke,” the aide insisted, referring to the chain-gang character played by Paul Newman in the 1967 movie Cool Hand Luke. Facing overwhelming western military force, Baghdad insiders confirm the Iraqi dictator watches the movie for strategic guidance, scrutinizing the devices Luke employs to outsmart his infinitely more powerful prison guards.

Luke plays his weaker hand with such repeated success that the camp warden finally explodes in exasperation. “What we have here is a failure to communicate.” The line is apparently Saddam’s favorite. Aides say he watches this part of the movie after lunch each day, taking notes and mimicking the dialogue in a mirror before doubling over and choking in nearly unstoppable laughter.

Among the scenes that impress Saddam most, according to senior Iraqi officials, is a prison yard fight where giant Cajun inmate Dragline, played by lumbering George Kennedy, hammers at will against the helpless Luke. While Luke has no chance he refuses to quit, hanging on for life until Dragline finally gives up, embarrassed by the spectacle of the one-sided pummeling. Then, barely standing, Luke lamely slaps at his outsized foe, technically winning the fight by landing the final punch.

The Iraqi dictator has reportedly smuggled countless pirate dubs of Cool Hand Luke through the Iraqi-no-fly-zones everyone except Iraq is allowed to fly through. According to sources close to Saddam, he expects top generals to study scenes and dialogue in detail. Failing one of the dictator’s Cool Hand Luke pop-quizzes could mean a swim with the fishes in the Shatt-al Arab.

It’s been 11 year since Saddam first muttered, "mumkan akol khamseen bayda," or "I can eat 50 eggs." In Saddam’s native Takriti dialect this idiom translates roughly into, "Fire 50 cruise missiles down my throat, and I’ll still nail you with the Scud I keep in my sister’s garage."

On weekends, Saddam has been seen relaxing in a sweat shirt imprinted with the line, "Shakin’ It Here Boss, I’m Shaking It Here." In the movie, guards require their chain-gang road crews to shake bushes and repeat that line whenever they break to relieve themselves. Luke obliges as his taciturn senior guard silently observes through mirrored aviator glasses. But the remark foreshadows Luke’s latest successful escape, leaving his hapless overseers to do little more than glower.

Luke always does what his guards ask but only to further what he wants. Iraq watchers say you could see the most recent Saddam parallel when the dictator agreed to unconditional United Nations inspections then began discussing conditions. "Shakin’ it here boss," Saddam seemed to announce in feigned obedience as his troops played Three-Card-Monte with Iraqi weapons of mass destruction.

Like Saddam, Luke routinely wriggles free from his shackles but never for long. His punishments vary upon recapture. One time guards force Luke to repeatedly dig-up and re-fill the same ditch. Another time guards toss him in “the box.” Luke suffers but never relents.

Saddam has endured penalties ranging from withering economic sanctions to periodic air strikes. But like Luke, Saddam shakes off each punishment and comes back for more. Following new U.S. demands that Saddam surrender his weapons and get his “mind is right” or face military attack, Saddam instead challenged George W. Bush to a dual.

Iraqi aides call that challenge the latest example of Saddam effectively speeding off in the equivalent of a stolen chain-gang dump truck (rent the movie if you need a reference here). George Bush and Tony Blair fume at the roadside, while Gerhard Schroder, Jacques Chirac, and Vladmir Putin double over in silent guffaws then furtively slap each other five as Saddam whips passed, cackling madly and tossing a cigarette butt from his open driver’s window.

Dragline summarizes Luke’s life-strategy by reminiscing fondly about their one-sided prison-yard pummeling. “Dat’ ol Luke, he just beat me wid’ a whole lot o’ nothin’," prompting Luke to retort, “Yeah well, sometimes nothin’ is a real cool hand.”

Substitute ‘Luke’ for ‘Saddam’ and replace ‘Dragline’ with ‘George W.’ and you can see the real-life version of the movie classic. The law eventually puts a brutal stop to Luke’s fictional hi-jinks. Unclear today is how Saddam’s reality will end. Iraqi minions say they deleted the dictator’s version of the movie coda.