Kevin McCarthy represents the twenty-second California congressional district, and this November, the Republicans selected him to be the new Majority Whip in the 112th Congress, which will assume power in January. Meanwhile, Eric Cantor, who represents the seventh district of Virginia, is Minority Whip in the current 111th Congress, and is certain to be the new House Majority Leader in the 112th.
You’d think both of those gentlemen would be pretty pleased with the current circumstances, but instead, I have reason to believe they’re rather worried. That reason, in the person of Harry Priapus, notorious Capitol Hill go-between, graced the couch in my office early this afternoon.
“What seems to be the problem?” I gamely opened.
“It’s that damned wet, weeping Boehner!” Priapus exclaimed. “Would you believe it? Cantor’s staff and McCarthy’s staff both called me within ten minutes of each other yesterday afternoon, each asking me to beat around the bushes to see if I can find a way to do something.”
“About him crying like a five year old school girl all the time?” I presumed.
“Right,” Harry affirmed. “The manly men of the Republican Party, which is to say, all of them, of course, are terribly concerned about Boehner’s recent displays of… limpness.”
“You mean,” I pursued, “like when he broke down and cried – twice – during his 60 Minutes interview with Lesley Stahl?”
“Unfortunately,” Harry huffed, “as representatives Cantor and McCarthy can both readily attest, Boehner turns from a solid, stiff and reliable Republican spearhead into a soggy, disgusting, flaccid mass at the drop of a hat. He even choked up and started bawling like a baby on election night in November!”
“I’ve heard,” I mentioned, “that he’s had chronic problems with premature lachrymation.”
“Yeah,” Harry sighed, “it’s got to be one of the worst kept secrets on Capitol Hill. He’s even done it on the floor of the House itself – during debate.”
“Is it true, then,” I asked, “that, as rumor has it, Boehner is a master debater?”
“No doubt about it,” Harry confirmed. “Although Congress is full of guys who have beat Boehner in public.”
“I don’t understand,” I honestly confessed. “If you virile, masculine, muscular and testosterone-charged Republican men of the House know from your own, personal manly experience, that the whole Boehner deal was going to be a big, deflated flop that couldn’t stand up to the challenge, why in the world do you want to elect him Speaker?”
“Exactly,” Harry shrugged. “That’s why I’m here. We’re beginning to have… uh, second thoughts, I guess you’d say. And you’re well known in this town for unraveling complicated problems. So what in the hell,” he wondered, leaning toward me with an intense gaze, “do you figure is up with this guy?”
“You mean,” I assumed, “what’s making him turn on the waterworks like some kind of namby-pamby sissy?”
“Damn right,” Harry confirmed. “We’re really worried about our… image and all. I know, some people have suggested that we spin it as proof that he’s compassionate, that he has an empathetic side, but our polls indicate that’s not going to sell with our current political base, not at all.”
“It was certainly the end of the line,” I remarked, “when Ed Muskie was simply perceived as possibly being a crybaby way back when in New Hampshire. I mean, it wasn’t even verified that he actually shed any tears. The man was standing outside in a New Hampshire snowstorm, addressing the press, and everybody was getting snowflakes in the face, melting all over them. But combine that with a few choked up words and it was curtains – it looked like Muskie might be crying, and in 1972 that was enough. Not that Muskie didn’t have plenty of reason to be upset, of course. William Loeb was a ruthless conservative attack dog who owned a major New England newspaper and he had used it to accuse Muskie’s wife of… well, being a libertine – on that newspaper’s front page, no less. But none of that mattered to the voters. Ed Muskie, front runner in the Democratic primaries, had cried in public, in front of the television cameras, and his campaign was over, right then and there. It’s not so bad today, I suppose, and I’m certainly no big fan of Hillary Clinton, but still, look how everybody jumped all over her when it looked like she might have gotten emotional enough to cry during the 2008 campaign – at a coffee shop in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, no less. The press called it her ‘Muskie Moment,’ and her staff was issuing denials about it for weeks. So it’s no surprise to me that your polls indicate that telling the world Boehner’s bawling makes him look complex and humanitarian would go over like a lead balloon. Folks don’t want a weak sister in charge of nuclear weapons.”
“What?” Harry threw me a quizzical look. “Nuclear weapons?”
“Sure,” I nodded. “Muskie and Clinton were both running for President, weren’t they? And when he becomes Speaker, Boehner’s going to be third in line for the presidency, right?”
“True,” Harry morosely admitted.
“And you can imagine what people like Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh would have to say if Nancy Pelosi were to cry in public, in front of the television cameras.”
“That’s different,” Harry contended. “Pelosi is a Democrat. But what do you think is behind Boehner’s blubbering, anyway?”
“Anger,” I answered. “Pure, unadulterated anger.”
“You mean, he breaks out crying,” Harry replied, astonished, “because he’s mad about something or another?”
“Precisely,” I confirmed.
“But he’s a millionaire,” Harry protested. “And a very successful politician, to boot! He’s got a wonderful wife and kids, and he’s an absolute wizard on the golf course! Now he’s going to be Speaker of the House! What in the world could John Andrew Boehner possibly be angry about?”
“He’s angry,” I said, in a matter-of-fact tone, “because it took him ten years to finish college.”
“Well, okay,” Harry conceded, “so maybe he’s not exactly a genius. But his whole life is proof that you don’t have to be a genius to have the American dream…”
“He’s angry,” I continued, “because he grew up in a house that had only one bathroom, which he had to share with eight brothers and three sisters.”
“Twelve children?” Harry interrupted. “Catholic family I presume – as least, I hope so, because otherwise, it’s blatantly obvious that his mother was way, way too fond of sex.”
“Oh yes,” I confirmed. “Very, very, Catholic family. Rest assured, Boehner’s mom never enjoyed a single moment of the coitus required to produce twelve children. Well, probably not, anyway. Anyway, if she did, I’m sure she confessed it and performed the appropriate penance. And so yeah, there’s another thing – John Boehner is angry – albeit subconsciously, most probably – about having to live in a state of constant guilt, just like most devout Catholics are. And he’s angry about his father making him mop out the family bar when he was a kid.”
“You think so?” Harry wondered aloud.
“Oh yeah,” I vouched, “for sure. Everybody knows he complains about it every chance he gets, doesn’t he?”
“Come to think of it,” Harry recalled, “he does. That, and being a janitor.”
“Another thing he’s incredibly angry about,” I noted. “Which is because he realizes that salesmen and politicians aren’t good for much of anything else. If he couldn’t sell plastics or something, if he couldn’t be a congressman or a state representative back in Ohio, all John Boehner would be good for is sweeping floors, or, maybe washing dishes, collecting garbage, that sort of thing. And he knows it, and deep down, that knowledge makes him extremely angry. He has no talent, no imagination, no creativity, and no particular intelligence, either, and just below the surface, being aware of that makes him boiling mad. So when he talks about not being able to visit schools anymore, and then starts crying, it’s not because he gets all misty thinking about how important it is for those kids to achieve the American dream…”
“Oh, God,” Harry moaned. “That was just terrible, when he tried to explain it like that. First of all, it doesn’t make any sense. Secondly, it makes him look like a total sap. Thirdly, it’s downright preposterous – even one of those school kids would be able to tell a line of crap like that is completely bogus.”
“Quite right,” I agreed. “In reality, talking to a bunch of normal school children makes him immediately realize what a mean, selfish, twisted jerk he really is. As a matter of fact, just thinking about it sets him off. And when that happens, he experiences extreme cognitive dissonance, loses control of his emotions and starts crying.”
“Okay,” Harry concurred in a thoughtful tone. “But what about when he started crying on election night?”
“Let’s look at what he said during his speech,” I suggested. “I have a copy of the text here on my workstation in a political rhetoric database I maintain… ah, yes. On election night, just before he started crying, Boehner said, quote, ‘I started out mopping floors, waiting tables, and tending bar at my dad’s tavern. I put myself through school working every rotten job there was and night shift I could find.’ See? It was thinking about that very stuff I just mentioned that, a couple of minutes later, set him off.”
“So how come,” Harry inquired, “he starts crying whenever he talks about patriotism and stuff like that?”
“It’s the same as when he reminisces about how tough his life has supposedly been,” I explained. “He does that, then he votes to cut off unemployment benefits for people who can’t find work during the worst recession since the Hoover administration. He prates on about God, the flag and the virtues of good old American freedom, then he kisses up to K Street corporate lobbyists and helps them put our government in their back pocket. So when he goes off on a patriotic rant, and the anger kicks in, he gets another fit of cognitive dissonance and starts crying.”
“So what, in your opinion,” Harry demanded, “is Boehner’s major malfunction?”
“I’m afraid,” I advised, “the party may have to reconsider their selection. It looks like Boehner may not have what it takes to be a Republican Speaker of the House.”
“Why not?” Harry implored.
“Because,” I elaborated, “it’s obvious he can’t cope with the necessary level of hypocrisy.”
“Oh, Christ,” Harry muttered, staring down at the floor. “Now I think I’m going to cry.”