FREEDOM ISN'T AMERICA'S ONLY GIFT TO THE WORLD

President Bush made a surprise visit to Budapest yesterday, arriving just in time to join the 50th Anniversary of Hungary's 1956 Revolt against the Soviets. Initially, the Hungarian government & citizens were surprised that the man they associate with "oppression, invasion, and torture" would join them in commemorating an attempt at freedom.

"I very surprised to see the President Bush here to celebrate our famous push for freedom," said Zoltan Kovacs, 62, a young boy when his countrymen attempted to liberate themselves from the Soviets. "I always think of him as man who invades Iraq and tortures men at prison in Cuba. I very interested to hear what he say."

"This is most unexpected," Laszlo Toth, 43, told us. "As you know, your leader Eisenhower did not help us in 1956. I did not think Bush even knew where Hungary was. But like many, I want to hear what he tells us."

Magda Szabo, 24, a university student in Budapest who grew up in a small town near the Czech border, insisted that she did not "know one person who like Bush. We all think he is bad man, violent man, who like attack people. When we hear yesterday that Bush coming, we think they mean he come to war us. But I very interest to hear what he say today."

Eventually, after much pomp and circumstance, including laying a wreath on the grave of Imre Nagy, the Hungarian leader in 1956, Bush addressed the crowd: "I am here to celebrate the 1956 revolution, the idea of a revolution that celebrated the notion that all men and women should be free," he said, picking at a shred of beef stuck in his hind teeth. Citing the Hungarian people's "unbelievable thirst for freedom," Bush also went on to note that "all of us who have the blessings of freedom must remember the spirit that took place here and we must not take freedom for granted."

"I've always felt very strongly that hunger is one of the, you know, the most important bad things we gotta eliminate," he continued, still working hard to get at his back teeth. "When you're hungry, ya can't fight terror, ya can't fight for freedom, ya can't fight for, ya know, for freedom and food. When you're hungry. So we should all commemorate and remember the sacrifices that The Hungry made in 1956, so that, ya know, y'all could all eat in 2006. Cause The Hungry Revolt in '56 was a blow against oppression and terror and . . . hunger. So God Bless food, God bless The Hungry, and God Bless America. Now, y'all got more a' that goo-losh stuff?"