Around eight-thirty Friday night at the Round Robin Bar in the Willard Hotel, I chanced upon Jefferson Jackson Beauregard Clay III, a key member of Representative Steve Stockman’s staff. He was enjoying a specialty of the house – the branch water mint julep, and the one he was drinking might not have been his first of the evening, either.
“Collins!” Jeff roared, “You old son of a [expletive]! Come on over here, I need your famously famous Beltway insider ad-vice!”
“Sure,” I chuckled as I took the stool to his right and raised a finger for the bartender’s attention. “Why not? Maybe if you like what I say, your boss will book an appointment for a paid consultation someday – right after olinguitos sprout wings and fly.”
“What the [expletive] is a olinguito?” Jeff demanded in his thick East Texas drawl. “Sounds like something you might pay forty bucks to get from a Juárez puta.”
“Well,” I conceded, as I ordered a Hendrick’s martini, dry, up with a lemon twist, “it is Latin American, anyhow. You got that part right.”
“Look,” he pursued, “I suppose you’ve heard about Clowngate, right?”
“You mean,” I sought to verify, “the set of circumstances presently prevailing brought about by (1) a rodeo clown by the name of Tuffy Gessling, who, while performing last weekend at the Missouri State Fair, put a broom handle between his butt cheeks and donned a rubber Barack Obama mask, thus creating a scandal by ridiculing the President of the United States as a confederate flapped the mask’s oversized lips while the rodeo announcer yelled ‘he’s gonna getcha, getcha, getcha’ and Gessling subsequently pretended to be trampled by a bull; (2) the denunciation of Gessling’s shtick by Mark Wolfe, the Missouri State Fair Director, who called it ‘an unconscionable stunt,’ and certainly not the kind of thing that’s wanted at the Missouri State Fair; (3) the resignation of Mark Ficken, the rodeo announcer, as president of the Missouri Rodeo Cowboy Association for not ousting Gessling from the organization on grounds of unprofessional conduct; (4) the banning of Tuffy Gessling from the Missouri State Fair for life; (5) the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People calling for a federal investigation of the incident as a racial hate crime; (6) your boss, Representative Steve Stockman, Republican, Texas, thirty-sixth congressional district, commenting on the incident by saying, quote, ‘Liberals want to bronco-bust dissent. But Texans value speech, even if it’s speech they don’t agree with,’ followed by; (7) your boss, Steve Stockman, inviting Tuffy Gessling to come on down to Texas and perform his Obama act, followed by; (8) the Director of the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo, the only major rodeo event remotely near his congressional district, announcing to the media that, quote, ‘The Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo had no conversations with Congressman Stockman and he has no authority to invite any person to perform at our show,’ after which; (9)…”
“Yeah, yeah, that [expletive] [expletive],” Jeff confirmed, “what the [expletive] lame-stream media are calling [expletive] Clowngate!”
“Would you believe,” I ventured, as the bartender delivered my drink, “you can’t make this stuff up?”
“Would you believe,” he countered, “that Steve thinks this whole [expletive] thing is totally [expletive] awesome?”
“Sure,” I allowed. “This is Washington DC in the Year of Our Lord Twenty Thirteen. Why the hell not?”
“Steve’s sentiments exactly,” Jeff vouched, “and mine, too! Look, you and I both know Steve just loves to stir the [expletive], right? Anything he can say or do to outrage those [expletive] liberal [expletive] [expletive] [expletive] socialist [expletive] loving [expletive] [expletive] [expletive], he’s gonna [expletive] do it, right?”
“No doubt about that,” I agreed. “So I take it he’s delighted with the reaction to his invitation?”
“You bet your [expletive],” Jeff acknowledged. “And what’s more, he asked me and the boys to brainstorm up some other [expletive] he can shove in those [expletive] [expletive] faces.”
“And you want to run those ideas by me?” I asked.
“Sure do,” Jeff barked as he signaled the bartender for another mint julep.
“I am, however,” I reminded him, “a policy consultant, I am not a lawyer…”
“But I am,” proclaimed Titus Johnson Steptoe as he grandiosely seated himself to Jefferson’s left, “and totally [expletive] faced, I might add!”
“Excellent,” I noted. “My good friend Titus here is a Constitutional lawyer, which I suspect will figure heavily in our deliberations. So shoot.”
“Okay,” Jeff began, “first of all, since the darkies are all dancing around the fire in leopard skins and feathers with their spears, ready to go on the warpath about Tuffy’s President [expletive] act, we were thinking, how about Steve rounds up a few like-minded hard-core conservative congressmen and… congress-women, for that matter… and they put on a good old-fashioned minstrel show, maybe on CSPAN?”
“In blackface?” Titus inquired, askance.
“Actually,” Jeff explained, “we were thinking of using Barack masks, just like Tuffy did at the Missouri State Fair, plus some Michelle Obama, Jesse Jackson, O.J. Simpson and Martin Luther King masks for… um… you know… variety.”
“I don’t think,” I assessed, “that would be viewed as free speech unless it were made abundantly clear that it was entirely political in nature.”
“Tom’s right,” Titus concurred. “And to keep it one hundred percent political speech – and thus the most protected speech under the First Amendment – you’d definitely have to lose the O.J. Simpson masks.”
“Really?” Jeff smiled. “Is that all?”
“If it’s political speech,” Titus affirmed, “you can say pretty near anything you like. But you have to make sure you keep it political.”
“Good,” Jeff continued, “in that case, we Tea Party conservatives down in Texas don’t hold with that Sharia Law all the Moslems want to impose on us, and I reckon that subject is about as political as you can get. So what if Steve and his supporters organize a nice smoky, fragrant whole-hog open-pit, hickory-spit barbecue across the street from some major Texas mosques on that there Ramadan holiday of theirs?”
“As long as you don’t apply any measures of duress to Moslems in order to cause them to eat pork barbecue on Ramadan,” Titus advised, “it’s not a federal hate crime. But in order to make sure the barbecues are acts of political speech, I’d recommend that Steve visit each and every one of them and deliver… well… a political speech. Given the current composition of the Supreme Court, that should do it.”
“Outstanding,” Jeff beamed, “maybe this ain’t gonna be so much of a [expletive] [expletive] after all. Now, how about next Christmas, Steve sends leaf blowers to every member of the Democratic Congressional Hispanic Caucus, and fruit baskets of assorted bananas to the NAACP leadership?”
“No,” Titus sighed, “that, I’m afraid, would not be found to qualify as protected political speech under the First Amendment by a majority of the current Supreme Court.”
“Okay,” Jeff shrugged, “how about if Steve makes some statements that suggest people organize tobacco ‘smoke-ins’ at federal buildings?”
“Tobacco,” Titus pontificated, “is a health issue and an economic issue, but not necessarily a political issue. That one could go either way, and it would be close – a five-to-four decision, no doubt about it. Very risky.”
“No risk, no reward,” Jeff mused. “So all right, what if Steve invites the entire executive board of the National Organization for Women to a hot dog lunch at Hooters?”
“On that one,” Titus assured us, “I can state with a great degree of confidence that only the female members of the Supreme Court would be insulted and/or outraged. Given NOW’s highly political agenda and the likewise extremely political nature of the feminist movement, I’m positive that all the guys on the bench would find such an invitation to be an obvious exercise of constitutionally protected free speech.”
“Nice,” Jeff chortled. “Also, given the fact that God hates [expletive] fags, and therefore so does every patriotic Texan, we were also thinking about having Steve advocate the use of rainbow flag toilet paper in all Texas government buildings.”
“No, no,” Titus admonished, “that will never do. Constitutionally, it’s out of the question for a state government to engage in symbolic acts of such a nature as to amount to de facto hate speech; and, furthermore, such acts cannot be disguised as constitutionally protected political expressions. However, if Congressman Stockman’s campaign organization were to sell rolls of rainbow flag toilet paper, given that gay rights is, without question, definitely a political issue, doing so would be as much an instance of protected political free speech as Abbie Hoffman wearing the Stars and Stripes on his butt or, for that matter, a Quaker burning our flag to protest US foreign policy or, actually, any US citizen burning the flag to protest anything else about the US government that they don’t like.”
“When Rand Paul is elected President,” Jeff solemnly intoned with a bit of a drunken slur, “and Steve Stockman is Vice President, I guarantee, gentlemen, they are going to [expletive] deal with those [expletive] flag burners!”
“Ahem – yes, no doubt they would,” Titus smirked.
“You mean, no doubt they will,” Jeff insisted. “So our final idea from that brainstorming session today was to have Steve get up on the floor of the House of Representatives and read selected passages from Huckleberry Finn – you know, the one’s that have lots and lots of ‘[expletive]’ in them, just to show that the word ‘[expletive]’ is not only free speech, but that great literary geniuses like Mark Twain used it all the time.”
“I don’t know about that one,” Titus fretted. “Steve Stockman standing up there in the House of Representatives saying ‘[expletive], [expletive], [expletive]’ is probably going to come off sounding pretty much like George Wallace, Bull Connor or Strom Thurmond, even if he is reading passages of literary genius by Mark Twain.”
“But what if he does it while he’s wearing a rubber Barack Obama mask?” I interjected.
“Now that – that would definitely be more likely to be perceived as protected political speech under the First Amendment,” Titus conceded.
“And if he did it dressed in a clown suit,” I elaborated, “then it would be political performance art, and consequently above any reproach whatsoever.”
“Why yes,” Titus exclaimed, “that’s brilliant!”
“Brilliant?” Jeff repeated in a puzzled tone.
“Yes, brilliant,” Titus assured him, “because if an act is both political and artistic, it gets double First Amendment protections!”
“Double protections?” Jeff repeated uncertainly. “You mean, it’s got like [expletive] special powers or something? It’s [expletive] invulnerable and [expletive], like Superman?”
“Precisely,” Titus nodded, “it’s the Constitutional equivalent of an impenetrable force field invented by the unholy alliance of Lex Luthor and Brainiac!”
“So political art is Constitutional free speech kryptonite?” Jeff asked.
“That’s it,” Titus replied, “absolutely invincible.”
“I don’t know,” Jeff mused shaking his head uncertainly, “getting Steve to put on an Obama mask is probably doable, but I don’t know if we can talk him into wearing a clown suit.”
“Remember this, Jeff,” Titus reminded him, “I know the man you’re talking about, and I say, if there’s ever been anyone for whom it would be more appropriate for them to dress up like a clown, put on a rubber Obama mask, and read the parts of Huckleberry Finn that go ‘[expletive], [expletive], [expletive],’ well, they aren’t a member of Congress, and by God Almighty, Steve Stockman is!”
“You’re absolutely right!” Jeff shouted as he passed out and fell off his bar stool.
Fortunately for him, I caught Jeff before his head hit the floor.
Unfortunately for me, when I did, he puked all over my brand new Armani bespoke silk suit. And I swear, no matter what United States Representative Steve Stockman does next, either he or Jefferson Jackson Beauregard Clay III will pay for it to be cleaned.