An Ill Wind is Breaking For Our President

T. Coddington Van Voorhees VII
Editor at Large, the National Topsider

Another Labor Day weekend wafts into Montauk, borne as always upon a
chill wind of melancholy; a breeze that ushers in blithe spirits for
the coming gay lawn soirees, the final chukkers of the summer polo
leagues, the annual Montauk-to-Newport gin barrel regatta. But the
selfsame mistral likewise presages season's end, and the maids' ritual
packing away of the pastels and seersuckers for the annual migration
to the dismally gauche winter quarters of Florida.

The seasonal affective disorder seems especially hard on Montauk's
children, cleft as they are from the loving breasts of their household
staffs by the stately carillons of distant preparatory academies. I
could see it in the dilated pupils of young T. Coddington VIII last
week, as his driver Evgeny packed the lad's trunks into the old family
Daimler for the long lonely drive to Quonsocket Boy's Prep and
Rehabilitation Center. At our farewell I left him with the same
bracing words of encouragement left me by my father, swashbuckling
Topsider founder T. Coddington Van Voorhees VI, upon my annual boyhood
departures to the finishing schools of Switzerland: "the Alps will
bloom soon enough, dear boy -- persevere, persevere."

As the legendary founder of the modern conservative movement Dad knew
the perseverance of which he spoke. From the moment he printed the
first Topsider in 1946 as an underground anti-Eleanor Roosevelt
newsletter at Fauntleroy Country Day to his untimely demise last year,
the old man more than once saw his conservative mettle sorely tested.
And yet, through all of it, he remained a sturdy beacon of the cause,
resolute in the knowledge that conservatism's fortunes would
eventually turn. As he wrote in the Topsider's commemorative Nixon
resignation issue in 1974, "keep two eyes fixed on the horizon, boys,
and three pitchers full of Tom Collins."

Wise words to be sure, but one wonders whether even Dad's famous
forbearance and scotch inventory would be equal to the recent
privations now suffered by the conservative movement; not the least of
which, I might add, have been cruelly inflicted on our gallant young
conservative president. I was dumbfounded as you to read the scattered
reports of Mr. Obama's diminishing popularity in the hinterlands, as
his star remains unequaled in Montauk; particularly among the
gracefully aging rock-and-roll troubadours and hiphop moguls who have
joined the neighborhood in recent years. But if the nation's
statistical prognosticators are to be heeded, the President's
political stock has taken a nasty tumble not seen since the Baltimore
& Ohio Preferred that sent Great Uncle Exeter Van Voorhees plummeting
to a Wall Street sidewalk in 1958. The winds of approaching Autumn
bode him no less ill, and unless quick corrective action is taken I
fear the conservative renaissance under Mr. Obama will be strangled in
the crib.

If I gather correctly from my correspondence secretary, a few Topsider
subscribers have taken umbrage to my previous encomiums to Mr. Obama
as the nation's foremost voice of conservatism. Invariably, these
missives will emphasize at great length the President's trillion
dollar shopping sprees, diplomatic apologies and bank nationalization
schemes, between explicit invitations to fornicate myself. It is
apparent these slow-witted correspondents are incapable of seeing the
plain truth: that these are merely brilliant tactical policy feints
designed by Mr. Obama to appeal to the wide swath of sensible American
moderates who, I am assured, are quite keen on unlimited credit and
state ownership of the means of production. Once the proletariat is on
board, I have every confidence that our intrepid young captain will
deftly steer conservatism back to safe harbor. In saner times it would
have been a quick fortnight's journey; instead he has been buffeted by
the endless gales and squalls of self-styled "conservatives" who have
opposed him at every turn.

These, as is now obvious, are the real enemies of conservatism. Is it
really necessary that I once again recite their roster? The
Limbaughs, the Becks, the Levins, the entire bloviating panoply of
talk radio baboons peddling their toxic brew of anti-government
sedition and foot unguents to hordes of slackjawed exurban megachurch
McMansionites. The Jindals and Perrys, crypto-secessionist boondock
Babbits who rudely decline Mr. Obama's gracious offers of federal
largesse. I suppose it is some comfort that we no longer must count
the execrable la Palin in their ranks, as her resignation and exile
afforded right-thinkers of the nation a brief moment of rational
exuberance. But it appears that the ever-fertile Napoleon of Nome
intends some sort of coup from her Facebook Elba, attempting to rile
up the online lumpenproles with hysteric tales of "death panels" and
"tax increases." One is tempted to dismiss it all as some sort of
elaborate hoax, but their grunted entreaties have somehow found
support among the nation's more dimwitted burghers. What began with
the unsightly "Tea Party" idiocy of Spring has metastasized into the
full blown dementia on display by health care protesters, filling
America's high school auditoriums with simian hoots of insolence
directed at the very congressional representives on whose noblesse
oblige they depend.

Not even the occassional well-deserved finger-eating seems sufficient
to stop this loathsome ill-dressed plague. Is it any wonder that one
no longer finds self-admitted conservatives on Montauk, save for the
gardening staff and a few swarthy weekend invaders from Queens in
rental Porsches? Just as Dad drove Mamie Eisenhower and her cabal of
UFO conspiracy lunatics out of the party in 1963, I have made it my
personal crusade to purge our ranks of these downscale populist
cretins before they inflict further damage to Mr. Obama and the
conservative movement. It is for this reason the President wisely
summoned me last week to an intimate political confabulation on Health
Care strategy at Martha's Vineyard during his holiday there.

I am, in some fashion, Mr. Obama's "go-to man" on matters
conservative, and of course agreed. I know the route to the Vineyard
well; in his dotage grandfather T. Coddington V often piloted me there
in his old auto-gyro, believing it was still Prohibition and he was
making libation runs to Joe Kennedy's estate . I instead took the
Nancy, our old ketch, laden with a precious cargo of like-minded
conservative thinkers; the Mighty Davids, Brooks and Frum, Kathleen
Parker and Bruce Bartlett. Not accustomed to the rigors of nautical
life, I am afraid that all spent the journey violently vomiting off
the beam. But after showers and a fresh change of khakis none were
worse the wear when we arrived at the harbor in Gay Head.

The President was there to greet us, looking as elegant as ever,
although it appeared his unfortunate smoking habit has increased in
intensity. At his side was Mr. Emanuel, his brilliantly ambitious
Chief of Staff, whose effortless grace and shiftily dancing pupils
tell of his time as a classically trained terpsichorean. Soon joining
us were David Axlerod and the Vice President, apparently in the grips
of one of his occasional sunstrokes. We were also joined by the
dashing Mr. Van Jones who has done such a yeoman's job as national
Green Jobs Czar in organizing a boycott against the insipid TV
harlequin Glenn Beck. Beck, as is now reported, is lamely attempting
to retaliate by blithering about Mr. Jones' past dalliances with the
Communist Party and the Black Panthers, as if those bore the slightest
relevance to his job as a presidential advisor. For God's sake, our
own family driver Evgeny is a former member of the Politburo, but it
doesn't mean he can't parallel park a 26-foot Daimler town car.

After a toast to the late Senator Kennedy, it was finally time to get
down to business.

"So," asked the President, elegantly lighting a Marlboro with the hot
end of his previous Marlboro, "how do we avoid the Waterloo scenario?"

All hands went up, spasmotically shaking in breathless hopes of a
presidential dialogue. For some reason, he selected Frum.

"Maybe... hee hee.. hee.. you should... heh.. like.. spin the
protesters?... hee.. like maybe like.. hee hee.. they're crazy or
something?" said the starstruck Canadian boob, collapsing into
convulsive schoolgirl giggles with Parker. Brooks was too far rapt in
an epileptic trance over the President's trouser crease to offer
anything of substance.

"We tried that, you ****ing retarded ****," said Mr. Emanuel,
understandably irritated. "We spun them as ****ing retards, as
teabagging perverts, as ****ing ****head corporate tools, as goddamned
bat**** crazy violent ****ing gun extremists. We called those
ass-munches every ****ing name in the cocksucking book, and for some
****ing reason they still won't support us. Now why don't you give us
a new angle, before I put a size 7 Capezio slipper up you ass."

"Family," I said.

The eyes of the room turned to me.

"Elaborate," said Mr. Obama, curiously.

"It's really rather simple, Mr. President," I explained. "By all
accounts, these simpletons respond like Pavlov's dog to a ridiculously
small set of stimuli. God, country, family. Rather than the direct
insult approach, perhaps you should leverage those weak spots."

"Hmm... no insults," said the President, intently puncturing a smoke
ring with his index finger. "Interesting. Go on."

I continued to expound on my thesis, using a quite personal example. I
explained that unlike the obscenely fertile Palin clan, we Van
Voorheeses have long struggled with fecundity. As an only child, Dad
always impressed upon me the importance of producing an heir,
especially after my betrothal to the elegant German-Argentine beauty
Mariska von Hilter. On our 15th childless anniversary, Dad asked if we
had seen a fertility specialist, and I assured him we both held a
clean bill of reproductive heath. "So your mother was right," he
sighed. "you are a homosexual." I was shocked by the supposition,
having always found fairies too flamboyant and tacky for words. I
explained that Mariska and I merely found the procreative act
undignified at best, not to mention a sap on our mixed doubles
baseline game. "Then there's hope for the family yet!" Dad enthused
boisterously. To make a long story short, Mariska and I contracted a
fantastic medical specialist who mixed our respective genetic hoo-hah
in a test tube and injected it in Guatemalan woman, leaving us to
enjoy the entire 1992 summer party season. Nine months and two
surrogate arbitration disputes later, the world welcomed T. Coddington
Van Voorhees VIII.

"You see, Mr. President, if you can convince these rubes that your
health care reform plan will help create and sustain American
families, they will eventually fall in line," I said. "I suggest you
get your Madison Avenue creative wizards on the case."

"The old sappy soft-sell, huh?" said Mr. Emanuel. "I gotta hand it to
you, Van Voorhees, you're a regular ****ing Don Draper."

"And if that doesn't work?" asked the President, warily.

"If they won't listen to reason, Mr. President," I said, "perhaps
they'll listen to more finger biting."

The President and staff escorted us to the harbor at Gay Head where we
said our goodbyes and traded thank yous.

"If I could ask one favor in return, Mr. President," I said
presumptuously. "With Senator Kennedy's seat vacant, perhaps you could
prevail upon your friend Governor Patrick to appoint a Von Voorhees. I
have a few acres on Nantucket, and an heir awaiting at Quonsocket
Prep."

The President elegantly flicked his cigarette into the bay and assured
me he would take the suggestion on advisement. In concluding our
discussion I left the President with words of encouragement and
recalled my father's wise counsel of perseverance.

"I am an old hand at sailing, Mr. President, and I have learned that
the winds do not always blow one's way," I said. "When you find
yourself in the doldrums, I want you to know that all of us in the
conservative intellectual movement will be there to blow you."

Via Iowahawk.

http://iowahawk.typepad.com/iowahawk...president.html