Mission: Save The Republican Party!
Condition Red and the countdown has started.
"Keep your friends close and your enemies closer."
-- The Godfather
The waitress appears with another pitcher of beer. "There's a woman out front and she's asking questions. Looks a lot like your friend here," she explains.
Handing her a fifty, I ask, "Is there a back door out of here? We're in kind of a hurry." Nudging Buchanan across the table, "Wake up. Your sister's found us. We have to move fast."
Leaving the restaurant, we enter the back parking lot and head for the car, pain suddenly stabs through my right shoulder. "Pat, you have to get that voodoo doll away from Bay before she does some real damage."
I'm in Wyoming for secret meetings with Pat Buchanan. He must be convinced to stick with the Republican party. The turncoats are turning out in force. Carville has Al D'Amato rolling up Dole's left flank. Now, only Buchanan can stop the Republicans from eating their own.
The schedule at the AllPolitics web site claimed there would be caucuses in Wyoming Saturday, May 4th but not even the tracks have been sighted much less the campaign train.
Tuesday, the campaign train surfaced long enough to pickup delegates in Indiana, North Carolina and Washington, D.C.
Dole, after collecting better than 70% of the votes, still can't afford to get on this train. Having reached his primary spending limits, he's forced to campaign from inside the beltway. Carville knows a sitting duck when he sees one and continues to hit him below the beltway.
Richard Nixon said run to right to win the primary then move to center for the general election. The Dole campaign is having trouble with this simple advice. 1) The primary isn't over yet. 2) Moving to the left of Clinton is not the center. Are these people trying to shoot themselves in their collective foot before they even start campaigning? This is how the Coca Cola Company screwed up. They changed Coke to taste like Pepsi in the hopes of cutting into Pepsi's market share. All they got for their trouble was a world wide uprising of the hard core Coke drinkers.
Newt Gingrich gave the Republicans their first victory in 40 years and now they want to give Newt the boot. After Al D'Amato's shameless attack denouncing Gingrich and the freshman Republicans as extremists, you'd think the Democrats were running Dole's campaign. Did the Republicans lose for 40 years without some inside help? Did Dole dump Mary Matalin only to replace her with James Carville?
Buchanan, unable to pull even 20% in any race, is still on the train. The media has lost interest. So we really don't see much of Pat these days. He;s still trying to figure out how to convince Dole to run on the Republican ticket. The Democrats already have a candidate.
Forbes got off this train in New York. Even out of the campaign, he managed 10% of the vote in Indiana and 4% in North Carolina. Apparently some of the voters thought they were subscribing to his magazine. Steve Forbes and Jack Kemp seem to have had a falling out. Forbes has left Empower America to form a new organization to push the flat tax plan.
Keyes took time off from his important duties elsewhere on this train to collect 4% of the votes in North Carolina.
Clinton continues to win the Democratic primaries without breaking a sweat. With no Democratic opponents and a 21 point lead over Dole, Bill has become cocky and was caught off guard at a White House press conference. The press corps, responding to mounting accusations of liberal bias, showered Clinton with a barrage of tough questions. The White House correspondents will pay for this short burst of courage with a few pounds of flesh after Carville takes them to the woodshed. This is the man that got the press to stop asking question about Jennifer Flowers and other assorted affairs during the '92 campaign.
Heading north on I-25, we leave Buffalo, Wyoming behind.
Walker: "Pat, how does that bar look?"
Buchanan: "Great. If we had the secret service for backup."
Walker: "I see you point. How 'bout The Hole in the Wall Saloon. It's up the road near Custer's last stand."
The Hole in the Wall Saloon is a rustic place with that old west look, a high log beam ceiling and old wood paneling. There's a large mirror behind the bar, pool tables in the back and cowboys on the stools. We take a table in the back and the barmaid comes over to ask, "What'll be boys?"
Walker: "Your best bottle of scotch and a pitcher of beer. Pat, what are you having?"
The barmaid returns with our drinks. She looks us over trying to determine the size of any possible tips. I explain, "Pat here's an important man. He's running for president. He has connections and that's better than tips." She sets down the drinks and hurries back to the bar.
Walker: "Pat, you have to save the Republican Party. D'Amato has been bite by a rabid dog and turned into a liberal. He's gone to the media and wants the Republican revolution stopped. I don't know if Dole's behind him or Carville but either way we must neutralize his attacks. I think he's even sandbagging the Whitewater committee. Arkansas is littered with dead bodies. Politicians are taking bribes in broad daylight and he can't find a smoking gun?"
Buchanan: "Yeah, I hear the conspiracy bunch are trying to testify and he won't them out. Maybe he's one of those commies "Machine Gunner" Joe McCarthy was looking for? At a minimum, the Republican Party has been infiltrated by liberals."
Walker: "Al and his gang of pixies much be taught a lesson. We'll drive to New York and cover D'Amato's house in toilet paper. We'll TP the bastard into submission. There's not a minute to lose. We must leave immediately."
Buchanan: "Are you crazy? We haven't finished our drinks yet. Beside, have you seen the gas prices these days? It'd cost a small fortune to drive to New York."
A drugstore cowboy at the pool table behind us prepares to go into a diatribe about the cost of gasoline in Europe. A preemptive strike with a cue ball between the eyes silences his sheep like bleating. During the distraction Bay Buchanan walks in the front door and begins scanning the room.
Walker: "Pat, did your sister take determination lessons from the Terminator? She been dogging our trail since Silva's Saloon back in New Mexico. More importantly, does she have money for gas."
Buchanan: "No, she gave them and yes, she has gas money. Don't forget, she still has the voodoo doll."
Walker: "Great! After we deal with Al, We'll go to Boston and pour all the gasoline we can get our hands on into the harbor. That'll show those big oil companies. It will be the oil slick smelt around the world."
Corrections to last week's column:
Next week's episode: "A subpoena for Mother's day." or "D'Amato denounces Whitewater hearing as witch hunt."
Our tax dollars at work: Citizens Against Government Waste