Not That State, This State

Announcer: Good evening and welcome once again to The Trials of Lindsey Graham, Water Carrier. (*) and tonight’s episode, Episode 8, Not that state, this state.

As you may recall from Episode 7, everything is up in the air for our hero, Lindsey, as he anxiously awaits the report of the Fulton County Special Grand Jury convened to investigate alleged election tampering and fraud in the Presidential election of 2020 held in Georgia.

Despite an experienced and dissembling legal team and insurrection-like overtures in Congress following the approval of Republican Caucus member Rep. Kevin McCarthy as the new House Speaker, our hero remains unconvinced of preserving his legacy let alone of ensuring his acquittal of alleged election tampering charges.

In this episode we join our hero and his lawyer, Don McGahn at The Horse’s Ass, a Charleston, South Carolina watering hole for the well-connected and horsey set.

A warning to parents. The material you are about to hear might not be suitable for young ears. Thank you for your consideration.

And now for your pleasure and dystopian entertainment, Episode 8: Not ‘that’ state, ‘this’ state.

Announcer (in hushed tones): Our hero, Sen. Lindsey Graham (LG), is wearing a Braves cap, sitting incognito with his lawyer, Don McGahn, (DM) in a booth near the back of The Horse’s Ass. Its karaoke night and a portly gentleman wearing a MAGA hat and a wrinkled blue blazer with a nondescript country club badge is at the mic hoarsely straining to reach the notes of a Michael Feinstein rendition of Gershwin’s “It Ain’t Necessarily So.”

(The audience is restless… chants of ‘get ‘im off the stage… are heard in the background.)

LG: Who the hell is that?

DM: That’s your surprise visitor, Lindsey.

LG: Is this another joke, “Mister, he asked me to do some crazy shit?”

DM: I think you’re gonna’ like this guy. (Pause) He may save your ass.

LG: What the hell are you talkin’ about?

The gentleman finishes up the song and catches McGahn’s eye who motions him over to their booth.

DM: Heh, Earl… great singing. I love that song. (Pause)… Earl, I want you to meet a friend, Lindsey Graham… Lindsey, this is Earl “Shoeless” Trafficker, (ET) Professor of Poli Sci at George Mason…

ET (interrupting): Well, Don, you should say ‘former, Professor of … Polemics, not Poli Sci. at George Mason…’ I am temporarily on leave… I have a new assignment, which I am kinda’ excited about… I gotta’ call from Cleta. (Pause) Can’t talk about it.

DM: You just did.

ET: Yeah… Well … (turning to Lindsey, winking) you know, hush, hush.

Lindsey, ignores the answer, and shakes Earl’s hand, looking bemusedly at his new acquaintance.

LG: I swear, Earl, I know you from somewhere. (Pause) Let’s see… Oh, I know…the Federalist Society Weekend Symposium…

ET (interrupting, excited): Yeah, thanks for recalling… that would be the virtual symposium, “People Don’t Count, Votes Do…”

LG: Yeah, that’s the one! (whispering to McGahn). You’re right, Donnie…I am gonna’ love this guy.

(Bar Server approaches the booth, gestures towards Lindsey) Well, hello stranger! Whadda’it’ll be? The regular?

LG: Hi Doris, yeah…bourbon… rocks… double.

Bar Server: Gentlemen?

DM: Perrier, lime.

ET: I’ll have a martini, plain olive.

LG: So Earl, I am curious. How did you get the nick name, ‘shoeless?’

ET: I don’t leave tracks. (Laughter) Kinda’ like you… aren’t you a … a water carrier?

LG (Pause): Let’s not go there.

Awkward silence. A white moth flies out from underneath Earl’s blazer lapel.

LG: What the hell was that?

ET (under his breath) Oh, damn mothballs… why… (pause)…it’s another voter! (Laughter)

LG: So, Earl, whaddya’ got for me?

ET: Ever know why some states turn blue and others not?

LG: Tell me about it.

ET: No, seriously… why do only some states turn blue. Why do some states consistently stay red, election after election. As much as the Dems try, they just can’t seem to get the votes to make these states flip…. It’s because voters don’t switch, votes do.

LG: I am not sure I follow you here.

ET: Look… its what I call voter behavioral history. People don’t like to change their votes. They risk losing friends, golfing buddies, family. Sure, maybe some folks go through a rebellious phase like when they are teenagers, or after a bad divorce and they are questioning EVERYTHING. But, you know… we know, that’s a phase… a ‘woke episode…’ not the reality. Soon they switch back and like their friends and family, vote with the group . People like to feel at home, part of a group.

LG: Okay. I follow you here.

ET: Since FDR, who have been the popular heroes? The real people’s preference? Reagan and now … Trump. (Pause) See where I am going?

LG: I think so.

ET: So looking at voting history, we see a steady drip… drip… drip of votes going to Democrats… Congress leaning blue, and then whap (slamming fist on the table, glasses rattling)… a popular President is elected overwhelmingly. See where I am going?

LG: I think so.

ET: Why?, I ask. Why? You ask. (Rising voice) Our friends who know where we stand ask. People don’t just wake up. (Pause) Reagan and Trump aren’t bureaucrats, they are people’s people. The real deal.

LG: So?

ET: (Voice lowers) So, the votes… the voters who consistently vote red… those are the voters’ votes, the true votes, the authentic votes.

LG: And the others?

ET: Those votes, what I call the ‘drip votes,’ are the fake votes… the stolen votes... Yup. Stolen votes. Mangled votes. Lost votes. Call it what you want… they are not real.

LG: Yeah, but what’s that got to do with me?

DM: You see, Lindsey, I invited Earl to join us today because I wanted you to see what you and I are up against… what I call the ‘administrative state.’

LG: Yeah, Georgia. Tell me about it.

DM: No, not that state, this state… the administrative state.

ET: Cleta says, a whole lotta’ states.

DM: (Annoyed, turning to Earl) That’s not the point. (Pause) And a discussion, Earl, we are not gonna’ have.

DM: Lindsey, to carry water, we need a cause, a patriotic cause…

And that’s to revolt against the administrative state. We can find a vote here, a vote there…

ET: Damn, another moth…I am so embarrassed.

DM: Button it up, Earl.

What’s all that gonna’ amount to, if the folks making the rules, administering the institutions are not our people? Not your people? How do we get rid of them?

LG: Go on.

DM: We can’t vote them out. That’s why they are what I call “the administrative state.”

LG: I am all ears.

DM: We keep them from asserting their privilege… even if this means subverting the institutions, they work for…

LG: You mean the election overseers? Didn’t we try that?… Man, that was bad optics.

DM: We go higher… (Pause) We challenge their authority — from within the state house. They have bosses. They have a hierarchy. We start with drafting challenges to their authority — in the state houses, at the state courts. We work their levers of power.

LG: What’s the big picture?

DM: Help me out here, Earl.

ET: By inserting distrust in the current state of affairs, you know a little smoke here, a little smoke there, we reclaim our history… our story which includes…

LG (incredulously): Which includes?

ET: You… (Pause, clears throat) We want to help you reclaim your relevance.

LG: ME…? MY relevance?

ET: Don?

DM: What Earl is trying to say, Lindsey is ….(pause)… ok, look…besides me, are you getting any phone calls recently?

LG: Well, a few after last week Trump’s visit.

DM: Yeah, but then?

LG: Well, not that many, now that you mention it.

DM: Precisely. See? Didn’t you say that if you don’t back Trump as President, the phone stops ringing?

LG: Yeah, but then…

DM: So, Trump announces he’s running in 2024 and the phone stops ringing…

LG: Yeah, what do you think is going on?

DM: It’s you, Lindsey. Drop the bucket, Lindsey. Spill a little water.

LG: You mean the 2020 election?

DM: Yesss…Old news. You know it was stolen, so we need to restore sanity to the system. We need to stop the “administrative state.”

LG: How do we do that — state by state?

ET: Yeah…

DM: Shut up, Earl.. (to Lindsey) No, not that state, this state. The big kahuna. (Pause) We retry the fourteenth amendment.

ET: It was passed only by coercing…

DM: I said, shut up Earl…

LG: You know… I hate that amendment.

DM: Ok, good… so here’s where you come in…

Remember the bump in ratings after you introduced the national abortion ban?

LG: Sort of. There was pushback too. Murkowski went crazy.

DM: Forget her. Focus.

We kill two birds with one stone — retry the fourteenth.

LG: I dunno’ if I follow you.

DM: You have standing as Vice Chair of the Judiciary Committee to propose investigating abuses of enforcing the fourteenth amendment.

LG: Another subcommittee?

DM: Exactly. States are suffering under enforcement of equal protection. Rights are being subverted.

ET: Votes are being stolen.

DM: Will you shut up, Earl? Stop interrupting, and order me another Perrier… my mouth feels dry.

LG: Like… affirmative action?

DM: Yeah, now you’re cookin’. (Pause) Like affirmative action.

LG: Do you think North…

DM: Carolina. Yeah… We are on the same page. (Pause, speaking under his breath) I am on the line with Ginni. We have the votes.

LG: But Gorsuch… Kavanaugh?

DM: Forget them. They’ll come around. We have momentum. Any legislation maneuver you try, the court’l’ dismiss an adverse plea.

LG: Wow. You guys have been busy.

DM: Well, there’s more. We can use this amendment retry to buy time, before ‘24. Actually, it’s not my idea.

LG: How about Trump? Does he know?

DM: It’s way over his head. But he trusts me… and owes me a big favor.

LG: I know… ‘Mister Crazy Shit.’

(As voices trail off, the David Byrne theme song “Once in a Lifetime,” softly crescendos)

(Announcer) We leave our hero to ruminate over Don’s proposal. Will he take up the cause and fight for equal conspiracy? Subvert enforcing the fourteenth, the firewall for free and fair elections? Don’t miss Episode 9, The Trials of Lindsey Graham, Water Carrier.

(*) Water Carrier: one who keeps the narrative of autocracy in play, keeps the narrative fluid; one who repeats and redeploys the rhetoric of the authoritarian.

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