Monday, January 11, 1999
Scandalous sleaze gets costly
CONGRESS: Presidential sex life overshadows more important
issues
Many wonderful and magical things happened this holiday season.
Parents put down payments on the fuzzy talking turds known as
Furbys, in an attempt to make sure their children don’t grow up to
hate them and open fire on their classmates. But more importantly,
porn king Larry Flynt was able to use his position to completely
destroy the career of Speaker-of-the-House-to-be Robert "Oopsie"
Livingston.
For those of you who were never teenage boys, Flynt publishes
Hustler magazine, which is full of degrading pictures of women in
compromising positions, uh, not that I’d know, because, uh, I read
it for the articles.
Just what did good ol’ Flynt do? He offered $1 million to anyone
who could conclusively prove that they had an adulterous affair
with a congressman or woman, preferably Republican. Like shooting
fish in a barrel, eh Flynt? When asked about his noble crusade,
Flynt told CNN that sex "should be a private matter." He added:
"Desperate times deserve desperate actions. Look at what they were
doing to the president."
Let’s take a look at just what was happening to the president at
this time. He was about to be impeached for perjury, which is a
noun meaning "the chopping down of a cherry tree by an elected
official." Here is a transcript that I just made up from President
Clinton’s grand jury testimony. See if you can spot the lie.
Fine Upstanding Citizen: Now, Mr. Clinton, did you touch Miss
Monica Lewinsky’s right breast first, or her left, and which one
was slightly larger?
William Jefferson Clinton: What? I don’t have to answer
that.
Citizen: OK then, after you fondled and caressed the throbbing,
heaving left breast, as you just previously stated, when did you
feel tingly in your tingly places?
Clinton: Define "when."
Citizen: "When," an adverb referring to the time an event
occurred.
Clinton: Oh, then no.
Citizen: It wasn’t a "yes or no" question.
Clinton: I don’t recall.
Citizen: All right. Now, after you broke out the whipped cream
and electric stapler …
Some of you may be laughing right now, but remember, politics is
a very serious matter. Then again, we did spend all of 1998 in a
heated debate about the president’s wiener.
Getting back to our good buddy Flynt, his actions "reduce this
whole thing to the theater of the absurd and a lowest common
denominator that even the scoundrels among us don’t want to
achieve," said Marlin (that’s right, like the fish) Fitzwater, who
was White House spokesman for Ronald Reagan and George Bush. He
then added, "That kettle is black."
Many of you may ask what defines the theater of the absurd.
Leonardo DiCaprio in an elf costume with a bottle rocket up his
nose comes to mind, and although I’d love to see it, that’s not the
kind of absurd theater Fitzwater is talking about. See, when
Republicans spend $40 million to investigate the sex life of the
top Democrat, it’s legitimate governmental business, but when
Democrats investigate the sex lives of top Republicans better,
quicker and cheaper, then it becomes theater of the absurd.
When asked for a comment on the situation, Clinton, always the
mature statesman, responded, "I’m rubber and you’re glue, nyah nyah
nyah nyah nyah!"
Livingston isn’t the only Republican worried about Flynt.
Apparently, Flynt has a few more chicks up his sleeve, enough to
make life very difficult for up to 12 more congressmen.
New-Speaker-of-the-House-for-now Dennis Hastert has already drafted
a resignation speech, just in case.
With Livingston out of the way, that leaves 291 Republicans left
on Capitol Hill. What I propose is a fun gambling game. Maybe you
can get an office pool going. Start betting on which Republican is
next to go. You have about a 5.5 percent chance of picking a
winner, and Flynt plans to unveil the next one really soon!
Sex, gambling and politics. Sure doesn’t get any better than
that.
So who are these women who Flynt has on the end of his little
finger? Well, one is named Mitsy, (26 years old, 36-24-36) and she
loves long walks on the beach, her favorite color is clear, and she
lives in Malibu. She’s looking for a guide who really knows his way
around Washington, D.C. She’s just dying to run up the flag pole
and see if anybody salutes. No wait, that’s the centerfold in
Hustler this month.
This leads me to my next idea. Since sex and politics seem to be
so inexorably intertwined anyway, why not combine Hustler with a
political publication such as George magazine? (Motto: It’s OK,
even though we don’t read it!) Just think of it! I even have a
title: Filly Buster. One could "read articles" such as "Girls of
the Oval Office, from Marilyn to Monica" and "Deep Throat’s House
of Naughty Secrets" or simply, "The Majority Whip."
Seeing the turn the Lewinsky scandal has taken, and especially
with Flynt’s involvement, why not simply have the impeachment
proceedings presided over by none other than the master of sleaze,
Jerry "No Worse than Ken Starr" Springer? I think we’ve all been
waiting to see Lewinsky and Linda Tripp pulling each other’s hair
while cries of "Slut!" erupt from the audience. Maybe Flynt can
smash Livingston in the face with his wheelchair. On this note, I
have some important Springeresque advice of my own for Lewinsky.
Girl, maybe you got your groove thing working, but you got to check
yourself before you wreck yourself. Your man is a dog, and he
belongs in the doghouse. Yeah, you know what I’m saying, girl?
This is all very silly, but there is a very serious side to this
whole fiasco, if you can believe it. Here is a list of all the
issues that were ignored in 1998 because we were so worried about
the president’s favorite humidor: Social Security, welfare,
Medicare, drugs, AIDS, illiteracy, gang violence, rape, the
homeless, tobacco companies, abortion, racism, illegal immigration,
education, cancer, taxes, nuclear weapons, biological weapons, too
many weapons, starvation, terrorism, unemployment, child labor, the
environment, gun control, equal pay for men and women, organized
crime, unorganized crime, ignorance, child care, oil prices, the
arts, unions, campaign finance reform, liberty, equality,
fraternity, your poor, your tired, your huddled masses yearning to
be free, and perhaps most importantly, when is somebody going to do
something about Barney and those god-awful Olsen twins?
"I don’t think you can ask the press to ignore the fools and
idiots in our society," Fitzwater said. That’s not true. We’d be
perfectly happy to stop writing about fools and idiots, just as
soon as they stop running the country.
Comments, feedback, problems?
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