Soap Flakes and Political Fakes

Some people spend hours ensconced on their couches enmeshed in the melodramatic meanderings of sordid soap opera offerings. Others hover above their keyboards surfing sources for unsavory political punditry and picayune policy pronouncements.

But is there really much difference between soap operas and politicking? Consider:

DAYS OF OUR LIES
Interior - Congressional Office - Day
Corn Lobbyist Wheeler Deeler confronts Senator Flip Phlopper in his Washington DC office.

Lobbyist: (emotional) I've given you everything. I embraced your body politic with my assets. I caressed your palm with hush money. I've gotten you high in our corporate jet. Now I catch you with that scrawny little two-faced soybean lobbyist slut!

Senator: (defensive) Wheeler, listen, it didn't mean a thing. I just went to her smoke-filled room for a little cronyism, that's all.

Lobbyist: You were whispering sweet No-Nothings in her earmarks, weren't you? Admit it!

Senator: No, no, we didn't become strange bedfellows.

Lobbyist: I saw you taking civil liberties with her mugwumps.

Senator: I just took her to that Bull Moose party, that's all.

Lobbyist: You're playing both sides of the aisle with us!

Senator: I'll make a mandate with you. I'll sweeten your pot by pushing my big pork project into your backroom deal.

Lobbyist: Well...I'll have to take a wide stance on that...

Senator: (sighs) Then it's agreed. Will you shake my underhand on it?

ONE LOWLIFE TO LIVE
Interior - DC Apartment - Night
Congresswoman Misty Meenors slumps despondently in an overstuffed chair in her lushly appointed taxpayer-funded apartment. Congressional Aide Browne Nozer, a Beltway sycophant, hovers nearby.

Congresswoman: (Distressed) Bill is dead. It's all over. What am I going to do?

Aide: (Solicitously) Who is Bill?

Congresswoman: My beautiful Childcare Bill. Such a sweet New Deal. Dead and buried. And I tried so hard to help Bill come of age. I nurtured Bill behind closed doors. I held Bill's hand during probes. I massaged Bill's poll. I wrestled Bill through numerous compromising situations.

Aide: There'll be others, Misty. Don't forget Gunnar Banning. He can rescue you from your Blue State of mind.

Congresswoman: Maybe you're right. I've always had a liberal fondness for Gunnar Banning. I'd love to press the flesh with him. Tell him I'm ready to be courted.

GENERAL WHORESPITTLE
Interior – hospital – Surgeon's office
The Senator's black call girl, Scarlette Hussey, stands weeping before Dr. No, the notorious conservative congressman who, with his cane in his right hand as always, is leaning libertarian.

Hussey: Please, Doctor, you can straight talk express to me. How badly has Senator Lowe Morrals been injured?

Dr. No (frowning): As you know, the Senator has just come back from the Class War. We know he was in a Logrolling accident. When he tried to extend his hand across the aisle he became the victim of severe arm-twisting. His public facade has been painfully damaged. There are signs that the Other Side buttonholed him. And I'm very sorry to say this, but I think he was subjected to a form of political torture known as Watergating.

Hussey: Will he be Okay?

Dr. No: About all we can do right now is PAC his boondoggle with a little soft money, grease his palm with graft and put his name on the big donor list.

Hussey: Will he ever be able to run again? For reelection, I mean.

Dr. No: Well, his ratings are low, his constituency is crashing and his home district is being systematically gerrymandered. And as you know, his overall constitution has been shredded.

Hussey: Will he be able to return to his malpractice of law?

Dr. No: As you know, his healthcare plan was toothless, so he won't be much of a mouthpiece. But maybe a dentist can build him a bridge to nowhere.

Hussey: What am I going to do?

Dr. No: Change, madam. It's time for you to backdoor a different dark whores candidate.