Kerry Hires Telepathic Parrot as Aide, Debate Coach

N'kisi's 750-Word Vocabulary Believed to Exceed President's

Flushed with confidence after his win in New Hampshire, Sen. John Kerry announced last night that he has retained a telepathic Congo African Gray Parrot with a vocabulary of 750 words as a campaign strategist and public speaking and debating coach.

The parrot is named N'kisi and lives with Aimee Morgana in New York City.

"With a vocabulary of 750 words, this means N'kisi has a command of the English language that far surpasses that of the President," Kerry told a cheering crowd last night after it was clear he had won the New Hampshire Democratic presidential primary election.

"The presence of this fine American in my campaign with his excellent telepathic and linguistic skills means the campaign next fall will be raised to a new level because N'kisi knows something about aircraft carriers, too," he said.

A Kerry aide, who asked not to be identified, said campaign strategists expect the parrot to be very useful during debates next fall when Kerry faces off with President Bush. The aide said N'kisi will likely sit on Kerry's shoulder during debates. The parrot will use its telepathic skills to listen in on what Bush is thinking during the debate and whisper advice in Kerry's ear.

Though Aimee Morgana is N'kisi's owner, the parrot objects to the human concept of pet ownership and prefers that Morgana be referred to as the parrot's "executive assistant."

N'kisi gained notoriety several years ago when Dr. Rupert Sheldrake, a British biologist, conducted experiments to measure the parrot's telepathic abilities. Sheldrake, who lives in London, is best known for his books "Dogs That Know When Their Owners Are Coming Home", "The Sense of Being Stared At" and "Chaos, Creativity and Cosmic Consciousness."

Parrot scholars consider N'kisi to be one of the most intelligent and talkative "language-using" animals ever studied.

"N'kisi speaks in sentences, showing a grasp of grammar in formulating his own original expressions," Morgana wrote on a Web site devoted to N'kisi and Sheldrake's experiments. "He is capable of actual conversations. He often initiates comments about what we are doing, feeling, looking at, thinking, etc, which is how we discovered his ability to read minds."

She said N'kisi also communicates love, compassion and a sense of humor.

In the Sheldrake telepathy experiment, Morgana opened sealed envelopes that contained photographic cue cards that she had not seen. N'kisi's running commentary, delivered from his cage on another floor of the building and with several walls in between, was studied in relation to what Morgana was seeing as she opened the envelopes. Sheldrake's analysis of the results convinced him that the parrot was often able to read his owner's, or rather, his executive assistant's mind as she opened an envelope and looked at the photographic cue card for the first time.

Kerry campaign aides declined to discuss how much the parrot would be paid and whether Morgana was being paid or was donating her services.

One campaign aide, who also asked to not be identified, said: "When we win, I'm sure a suitable post will be found in the Kerry Administration for a parrot with these skills, perhaps at the CIA or the Department of Homeland Security."