As any good political operative will tell you, their role in a campaign is to make their candidate as famous as possible while themselves remaining, if not anonymous, at least thoroughly obscure. But late yesterday afternoon, Gretchen patched through Eric Fehmstrom, a gentleman who works for the Mitt Romney campaign, and, as many readers of this Web log are no doubt aware, a man who has lately managed to obtain a very significant degree of public notoriety himself.
Fehmstrom: Hello, Tom Collins?
Tom: At your service, sir. How can I help you?
Fehmstrom: It’s this Etch-A-Sketch thing.
Tom: You mean, the incident earlier this week when you appeared on the CNN morning news and told John Fugelsang that,”You hit a reset button for the fall campaign. Everything changes. It’s almost like an Etch-A-Sketch. You can kind of shake it up and we start all over again,” right?
Fehmstrom: Uh, yeah, that. The reporter was asking me if Mitt had gone so far trying to please right wing, conservative Republicans during the primaries that it might affect his appeal to moderate and independent voters. All I was trying to say was, the general election is a whole new ball game versus the primaries, you know? That Mitt could essentially start all over again with a clean slate. Am I right? You’re a long-time Beltway insider, you know what I’m talking about.
Tom: Mr. Fehmstrom…
Fehmstrom: Call me Eric.
Tom: Okay, Eric, yes, you’re absolutely correct. As all of us here in Washington know, American voters have such limited attention spans and such short memories that once the party primaries end and the general election starts, the candidates can completely change their platforms, their ideals, their principles, their message and their promises, and only a tiny fraction of the public will even notice.
Fehmstrom: Exactly, so…
Tom: But tell me, Eric, what in the world made you think it would be a good idea to go on a national television program and tell the truth about how stupid, ignorant and lazy American voters are?
Fehmstrom: Well, uh… when CNN invited me, I told Mitt and he approved…
Tom: Of course. And when he did, I’m sure he thought he was approving yet another opportunity to sell his current positions on the economy, health care, the military, foreign policy, social relations, guns and mandatory preoperative trans-vaginal sonograms – which is to say, that hackneyed package of randomly selected platitudes based on Adam Smith, Ayn Rand, George Wallace, Barry Goldwater, Torquemada, and the portions of the Bible written in either the Bronze Age or on the Island of Patmos which passes for a political philosophy among self-professed conservative Republicans these days.
Fehmstrom: Um… yeah… I supposed he did.
Tom: And what did you do instead? Open the kimono all the way, right there in front of John Q. Public, and the wife and kids, gathered at the family breakfast table, and show them what the man behind the curtain is really up to.
Fehmstrom: Ah… er… okay, yeah, I’ll admit it… I did that.
Tom: Good – admitting you have a problem is the first step to recovery.
Fehmstrom: Recovery? From what?
Tom: From C.F.I.M.D.
Fehmstrom: C.F.I.M.D?
Tom: Chronic Foot In Mouth Disease. Lots of people in politics have it – it’s usually the candidates, though.
Fehmstrom: And admitting you have it is important?
Tom: If a person with C.F.I.M.D. doesn’t admit it, they have no hope of recovery. Take George W. Bush, for example – he spent his entire political career in denial. And look what happened – his condition just got worse and worse. Now his gaffes are legendary and he’s condemned to be the eternal butt of liberal Democrat cocktail party jokes forever.
Fehmstrom: Oh, my God, that’s terrible just to contemplate. But how did I get… develop…
Tom: Contract. The word you’re looking for is “contract.” You caught C.F.I.M.D. from your boss.
Fehmstrom: You mean, Mitt’s got it?
Tom: You’re kidding, right?
Fehmstrom: Huh?
Tom: Remember when he said, “I’m not concerned about the very poor” after the Florida primary?
Fehmstrom: Oh, yeah, that, well…
Tom: How about when, during one of the debates, he bet Rick Perry ten thousand dollars that Perry was wrong about what Mitt’s book said about health care?
Fehmstrom: Okay, Mitt sure did it that time, I guess…
Tom: What about when he said, “I’m running for office, for Pete’s sake – I can’t have illegals” working on his lawn?
Fehmstrom: Um… all right… ah…
Tom: Then there was the time he told the crowd at the Iowa State Fair, “Corporations are people.” Remember that?
Fehmstrom: I have to confess, I do.
Tom: And when he told unemployed voters in Tampa, “Hey, I’m unemployed, too!” How about that one?
Fehmstrom: He was just trying to relate to their predicament… but yeah, that really came off sounding very, very wrong.
Tom: Not quite as wrong as when he said the Republicans were going to “hang Barack Obama” with some imaginary “Misery Index,” though.
Fehmstrom: Admittedly, that was an extremely bad choice of words, given the president’s, um… ethnic background.
Tom: And what you just said was the understatement of the month, no doubt about it. And speaking of insensitive, how do you suppose American soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines fighting for our freedom in Afghanistan and Iraq felt when your boss forgot about them entirely, claiming that Obama is engaged in “one of the biggest peacetime spending binges in American history,” in print, no less, on the editorial page of the Manchester Union Leader? When the victim starts putting outrageous gaffes like that in writing, it’s a sure sign of highly advanced C.F.I.M.D.
Fehmstrom: Sweet Jesus, you’re right – Mitt’s got it bad. I must have caught it from him! Please, please, tell me there’s a cure!
Tom: Well, there are… treatments, anyway.
Fehmstrom: Like what, for God’s sake? Like what?
Tom: Okay, take Joe Biden for example. He’s got an extremely serious case of C.F.I.M.D., but he controls it, more or less, using yoga and psycho-behavioral techniques.
Fehmstrom: Meaning what – he does something – some kind of exercises?
Tom: Yes, regularly.
Fehmstrom: What? What does he do?
Tom: He stands on his head and repeats the alphabet backwards.
Fehmstrom: Really?
Tom: Yep. Twice a day, for ten minutes.
Fehmstrom: You think that would work for me?
Tom: You could try it.
Fehmstrom: Okay, I will. How about Mitt?
Tom: I don’t think standing on his head would be good for Mitt’s famous hairdo.
Fehmstrom: No?
Tom: Definitely not. I’d suggest gravity boots.
Fehmstrom: Gravity boots?
Tom: I know, what with Mitt being on the move all the time campaigning, setting up the equipment will be a bit of a chore, but if it reduces his gaffe rate, it could very well mean the difference between winning and losing the general election.
Fehmstrom: Okay, I’ll start standing on my head and reciting the alphabet backwards right away. Um… should Mitt recite the alphabet backwards, too, when he’s hanging upside down in his gravity boots?
Tom: No in Mitt’s case, I would suggest he recite something else backwards.
Fehmstrom: What?
Tom: The Lord’s Prayer.
Fehmstrom: The Lord’s Prayer? Backwards? Ah… can you tell me why?
Tom: It fits his personality better.
Fehmstrom: All right, the Lord’s Prayer, backwards, it is then. Would you suggest anything else?
Tom: Tell him to announce to everyone who works for him that from now on, interviews of his campaign staff are strictly off limits.
Fehmstrom: Uh… sure… good idea.
Tom: And one last thing.
Fehmstrom: Which is?
Tom: Make absolutely sure you don’t let anyone make a video of Mitt Romney hanging upside down in gravity boots reciting the Lord’s Prayer backwards and post it on the Internet.
Fehmstrom: Oh, yeah… right.
Tom: Because the public might get the wrong idea about him, and we don’t want that.
Fehmstrom: Check. Okay, I’ll get right on it, then. Thanks.
Tom: You’re welcome. Goodbye.
Fehmstrom: ‘Bye.