I got this email today:
Dear World:
We, the United States of America, your former top-quality supplier of the ideals of liberty and democracy, would like to apologize for our 2001-2008 interruption in service. The technical fault that led to this eight-year service outage has been located and was determined to be a particularly malignant virus which caused significant damage to both our operating systems and our ability to interface productively with other entities. Please rest assured that the software responsible was replaced on November 4, 2008. Early tests of the newly installed program indicate that we are now operating correctly, and we expect it to be fully functional effective January 20, 2009. We offer a heartfelt apology for any inconvenience caused by the outage. We look forward to resuming full service and hope to continue improving in years to come. Our internal processes have experienced changes which, we are confident, will prevent the reoccurrence of such a malevolent infection. We thank you for your patience and understanding.
Sincerely,
THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA