Interface (93 page)

"Now, these are perfectly good things to do. But in a modern
political campaign, it's regarded as improper, somehow, to act like
a normal human being. And this brought me to the realization that
there is something evil and twisted about the campaign process: the
traveling, the speechifying, the television spots. The mudslinging.
Wearing makeup sixteen hours a day. And most of all, the debates,
with their false and pompous trappings."

In the production trailer, the director could not restrain himself
from punching the button that cut away to a long shot of the
auditorium stage. At the moment, it consisted of a number of
stuffed shirts, arguing, consulting with aides, and staring in shock at
television monitors.

"And I made up my mind," Cozzano said, "that the entire thing was corrupt. Only a scoundrel can participate in such a campaign;
only a cipher can win. I am neither. So I have decided that I am no longer interested in campaigning for president of the United States.

"Earlier today, I drove my car down to Sterling Texaco, down on the corner. It's a place I've been buying gas and tires ever since

I bought my first car back in high school. And old Mr. Sterling
came out to fill up my tank, wash my windshield, check my oil.
This is kind of an old-fashioned town, and that's still how we do things here.

"Well, Mr. Sterling, who sold me my very first tank of gas back
in the early sixties, took one look at my dipstick and he told me to get out of the car and come and have a look. I did so. And sure
enough, the end of that dipstick was coated with the darkest,
grimiest, sludgiest coat of oil I have ever seen. It was disgraceful,
and Mr. Sterling didn't have to say so. I knew it. I knew I'd gone
too long without changing my oil. So I bought five quarts of fresh
oil along with my tank of gas, and drove them home."

As Cozzano told this story, he was strolling back into his garage,
where his car was angled up on a pair of ramps. He kneeled beside
the car, reached underneath with one arm, and slid out the metal
basin, which was now filled with black oil.

"Just a few minutes ago, as I was crawling under the car to let
that old sludge out of the system, I realized that there was a
powerful metaphor for politics. Our political system is basically
sound, but over the years it has gotten all fouled with dirt and
sludge."

Cozzano carried the basin over to a counter, where an empty plastic milk jug sat with a funnel stuck into the top. He held the
basin up and tipped it, pouring the oil down the funnel and into the
plastic jug.

"Of course, that kind of thing rubs off. It permeates everything
after a while. And I realized that being a presidential candidate had
fouled and stained my life in many ways, some obvious, some a little more subtle."

Cozzano set the basin down. He took a metal oil spout off a pegboard on the wall, then picked up a fresh can of oil. He shoved the spout into the can, piercing its top, then tilted it just a bit and
spilled a few drops of clean, clear, golden oil into the palm of his hand. "Now, that's more like it," he said. "This is how my life used
to be. And this" - he set the oil can down and slapped the milk jug
full of sludge - "is how my life was after a few months of
presidential politics. Of course, the President and Tip McLane have
been in the same game for much longer than I have. I don't know
how they do it."

Cozzano pulled the rag out of his pocket and wiped his hands. "Well, I've got some burgers to eat. A son and daughter to get
reacquainted with. Some new oil to put in the car. Then I think
we'll go for a stroll around town, maybe take in a movie. And I know that the President and Tip have got important things to do also. So I'll let you attend to those things. Best of luck to you all,
and good night."

The Tuscola feed cut back to the long shot of Cozzano's house,
now just a silhouette against an indigo sky, lights shining warmly
from every window.

In the press room, Zeke Zorn was standing on a table shouting.
Important blood vessels were showing on his forehead, which, like
the rest of his face, had turned red.

"This is an absolute disgrace!" he screamed. Then he took a deep
breath and got himself under control. "This is the most dirty,
underhanded, filthy campaign trick ever devised."

Al Lefkowitz, the President's chief spin doctor, was calmer,
paler, seemingly almost distracted, like a man who has been hit on
the head with a two-by-two and whose consciousness has with
drawn into a deeper neurological realm. He was speaking more
quietly than Zorn, with the result that reporters, fleeing in fear of
being struck by a loose drop of saliva ejected from Zorn's mouth, had clustered around him. "It's very disappointing. It's an act of political vandalism, really. If he just wanted to withdraw from the
race, that would be one thing. But he went beyond that and
attacked the candidates. And more importantly, he attacked the
American electoral process itself. It's very sad that his career has to
end this way."

Zeke Zorn suddenly grabbed the floor by howling. "THERE
HE IS!" and pointing toward the entrance. Cy Ogle had just
strolled into the room and was now blinking and looking around
himself curiously, as if he had wandered in while searching for the
men's room, and could not understand all the commotion.

Zorn continued, "Maybe you would like to explain how you're
going to get Cozzano's name off the ballots in all fifty states in just
four days!"

Ogle looked perplexed. "Who said anything about ballots?"

"Cozzano did. He claims he's withdrawing from the race."

"Oh, no," Ogle said, shaking his head, and looking a little shocked. "He never said anything about withdrawing from the
race. He just said he didn't want any more
campaigning."

Zorn was speechless.

Lefkowitz was not. "Excuse me, Cy, but I think we have a
problem here. We negotiated the terms of this debate in good faith. Then you came in with a last-minute change. You said you wanted
some free time for Cozzano to speak from Tuscola. And your
excuse was that he wanted to make an important announcement. Am I right!"

"Yes, you're right. These were my words," Ogle said.

"The only reason that Cozzano was granted that free time was
because of this important announcement. He wouldn't have been
given that time if all he wanted was to make editorial comments."

"True," Ogle said.

"So we all construed his words to mean that he was dropping out
of the race."

"Oh, I'm sorry," Ogle said, "he didn't mean to say that."

"But if he wasn't dropping out of the race," Lefkowitz said,
"then he wasn't making any important announcement - which means that you obtained that free air time under false pretenses.
You committed a fraud against the American people! And I am
sure that this fraud will be covered extensively by those here in
the press room, and that you and Cozzano will be judged for it
by the American people, who have grown sick of dirty
campaigning."

"But he did make an important announcement. Just as I said he
would. There's no deception here," Ogle said. "Just a mis
understanding.

"What are you talking about?" Zorn shouted.

"You heard him," Ogle said, "he announced that his son was
publishing a book. Doesn't that seem like an important announcement to y'all?"

PART 4

Resurrection Symphony

57

Four days after Cozzano's landslide victory, the Speaker of
the House suffered a stroke during a party in a private Washington
' club, while sitting on the toilet in the men's room. On the recom
mendation of the President-elect, the Speaker's family sent him. to
the Radhakrishnan Institute for therapy.

The house across the street from the Cozzano residence in
Tuscola had become vacant a couple of months previously, and the
Cozzanos had bought it. Cy Ogle and some of his best people now
moved into it and made it into the headquarters for the transition.
If the Cozzano house was the Tuscola White House, then the place
across the street was the Tuscola Executive Office building.

Cy Ogle had a big leather La-Z-Boy set up in the living room
and spent much of mid-November lying in it "like a sack of shit,"
as he put it, recovering from a cold, watching TV, and enjoying his first chance to relax in the better part of a year. It was a wonderful
time for him. He had devastated not only the opposition candi
dates, but also his competitors in the election business. Even the
fearsome Jeremiah Freel was in jail. And besides, he was a sucker
for Christmas.

After Election Day, Ogle, as leader of the transition team,
declared a three-week moratorium on all official activities for the
President-elect. Eleanor Richmond likewise stuck close to home -
her Alexandria apartment - attending a couple of T.C. Williams
football games (Harmon, Jr., had become a star punter) and
shopping for inaugural clothes with her daughter, Clarice.

At the beginning of December, Ogle issued a press release listing
the members of the Cozzano transition team. Ogle claimed, of
course, that he had hand-picked these men, but nothing could have
been further from the truth. Whoever
had
chosen them had done
an excellent job: they were professional, experienced, nonpartisan,
and classy in a nonintimidating way. They had impeccable
credentials and were universally regarded as ethical and trust
worthy. It was claimed that these people had spent the last year behind the scenes, working on position papers for the Cozzano
campaign. This was patently untrue, but Ogle had to admit that it
sounded great. All the serious press agreed, and praised the skills of
the Cozzano team. The rest of the media was content with photo-
ops of Cozzano and his family and entourage shoveling snow in
Tuscola.

Ogle knew that the people, whose consciousness he had
pummeled and abused so relentlessly for the previous year, needed
a rest. They needed to concentrate on the NFL, sitcoms, and
Christmas. They needed to recharge their batteries because what
was to come in the Cozzano administration would be tough. A
quick glance at the aforementioned position papers proved that
much. The waffling and pathetic efforts of the previous
administration were to be replaced by calm, cool decisiveness. No one knew what the plan was, beyond the endless evocation of the return to values, and its fiscal corollaries: cut the deficit, pay back
every penny on the debt.

Ogle knew that his role in this operation would end as of January
20. He had two major tasks left to organize, and this was the kind
of thing he liked best - public displays without elections.
Spectacles. On December 1 he gathered his staff together to launch
the final push on the Cozzano Family Christmas Special. The buildup for the special would run until December 21. He would
drop names out in the media like lures for hungry trout. Names for potential cabinet officers, names for White House staff. Names for
possible judicial appointments. The idea was partly to show what
fine people would be working for Cozzano, partly to build up
suspense for the Christmas Special, and partly to avoid the tedious and demeaning sight of wannabes trudging back and forth between
the Champaign-Urbana airport and Tuscola.

Instead he had a parade of foreign dignitaries make the same trip.
It looked more impressive, and the sight of Brazilians and Saudis
making snowmen on the front lawn was great television. Ogle
toyed endlessly with the sequence of their arrivals. He also found
ways to make use of the soaring stock market, inspired by the
Cozzano victory, the knowledge that the debt would not be
forgiven, and all of the feel-good symbolism that was radiating from
Tuscola like heat from an old-fashioned wood stove.

Starting on the twenty-first he would begin to throw more logs
on the fire. Mary Catherine had taken a job at Brigham and
Women's Hospital in Boston, and Dad was giving her a cozy
brownstone apartment to move into; while its exact location was
not mentioned,
Today
show viewers were given a video tour of the
place, complete with blazing fires, oriental rugs, and antique
furniture.