The Weed Agency (28 page)

Congressman Puga was among those most furious over the disputed 2000 election and recount, and he spent much of 2002 insisting Governor Jeb Bush would be defeated. Despite that erroneous prediction, he spent much of the next cycle assuring the Kerry campaign that Florida was in the bag. Meanwhile, his advisers were warning him that his district was growing tired of his relentless partisan fury. Shortly before a contentious resignation, one bald, glowering strategist bellowed, “Your mouth is writing checks that your district’s Cook Partisan Voting Index Score can’t cash!”

Bush won the state by five percentage points. Additionally, Puga’s outer suburban district decided it had tired of his politics of perpetual rage, as well as stunts like calling for a congressional investigation of allegations that the president had served a plastic turkey during a visit with the troops in Iraq. (“I think this is potential grounds for impeachment, Keith,” he had told the camera with a straight face.)

Puga returned to Florida, reopened his law practice, and waited for the local Democratic Party to beg him to run to win his old seat back. The state party officials seemed strangely unenthusiastic when he called, and those lunch meetings with the county party chairs kept getting postponed. He passed the time by blogging for
The Huffington Post
, doing the occasional television interview, and writing an angry polemic that didn’t sell.

He was an unexpected choice for Pelosi to nominate to the National Cheatgrass Disaster Commission; the closest Puga ever came to agricultural work was a lawsuit contending a local restaurant chain’s salad bars were insufficiently accessible to the handicapped. (They settled out of court.) But he instantly recognized that the commission was going to be looking at the disastrous performance of a federal agency on
Bush’s watch, and Javier Puga knew exactly where the buck should stop.

When Bader heard Puga had been selected to the commission, he kicked a wastepaper basket across his office.

He had already talked with the White House staff about their search for a chair; they had worried that the Cheatgrass Commission (CheatComm in White House memos) would turn into a witch hunt, and one more source of headlines designed to embarrass the administration. With Carrington on board, they felt they had at least one voice that would be focusing attention on the career employees of the agency itself, and not any of Bush’s appointees at the Department of Agriculture.

For a few weeks, Bader contemplated resigning his seat and leading the commission, leading his crusade right to Humphrey’s doorstep. But he knew that Reid and Pelosi would probably object, even if his resignation would open up a very competitive special election in a swing district.

The addition of Puga altered the equation and made Bader’s chairmanship an impossibility. Now the commission was indisputably politicized, and even floating Bader’s name would inevitably bring charges that the administration was appointing its allies to ensure a cover-up.

The administration needed someone who would ensure Puga’s runaway personality and showboating didn’t dominate the proceedings. They needed someone respected, someone who could command a room, someone who had the authority to shut up Puga with a glare but who wasn’t seen as a Bush administration ally.

Bader had just the person.

Bader found his man reading on his front porch.

Caleb Gunning Lyon was not a friend of Bader’s, but a constituent. Bader had known him for years, and been starry-eyed through their first meetings, but over time found Lyon’s personality inexplicably cold and prickly.

Despite his occasionally standoffish personality, Lyon remained one of Pennsylvania’s most popular residents.

As a young man, Lyon had served in the Marines, was deployed to Lebanon, and helped assist the victims of the barracks bombing. His picture appeared on the cover of
Time
magazine, helping carry a wounded man. After serving, he earned his PhD in American history with extensive background in classical history, after which he became a high school teacher. His memoir/history book,
Hard Times, Hard Decisions
, became a surprise bestseller, and he bought a small orchard in Washington Crossing. He had no interest in politics, but accepted an appointment to a gubernatorial commission reviewing the state’s education system. He was supposed to be a token teacher/celebrity, but wrote a scathing dissent to the main report, which he dismissed as “complacent bromides.” Lyon called for rigorous standards and an emphasis on values of the Founding Fathers, which proved wildly popular and had him on
Night-line
for several nights. The governor who appointed him was facing a tough reelection fight, and he begged Lyon to accept the nomination for lieutenant governor. (The previous lieutenant governor had announced a surprise resignation to deal with “personal matters.” Despite salacious rumors, the personal matter was that he had concluded he wasn’t making enough money.)

Lyon was credited with being a key factor in a narrow win, even if his speeches were derided as hokey and corny, punctuating his remarks with the recurring question, “What would
the Founding Fathers do?” He quietly served as lieutenant governor for two and a half years until the governor suddenly was invited by the president to Washington to accept a nomination to one of the nicer cabinet posts. Lyon became the state’s most unlikely chief executive, and was the subject of some jokes as “the accidental governor.” But after two months on the job, a Pittsburgh steel mill’s ceiling collapsed, trapping a dozen workers. Lyon raced to the scene and actually helped direct the rescue efforts—“this is how we did it in Beirut, boys”—and when all of the workers were rescued, Lyon’s approval rating hit 90 percent and stayed there for weeks.

Jay Leno called. The president called.
60 Minutes
called. Everyone adored him … and then Lyon announced he had no plans to run for reelection. Declaring that he believed in the American tradition of citizen-statesmen, he said his modest future plan was to return to his orchard in Washington Crossing and teach in the local high school again.

Cynics mocked the decision as a pose. The national party chairman had visited him and begged him to consider running for president.

But it wasn’t a pose; Lyon shared the public’s innate suspicion and distrust of the political process.

Time went by. Caleb Gunning Lyon became just a fond memory for most. President Bush called regularly, and Lyon turned down just about every invitation to every cabinet post, ambassadorship, or other bauble offered by ambitious politicians hoping some of Lyon’s popularity would rub off on them.

Bader’s Lincoln Town Car drove up the driveway of Lyon Orchard. He emerged, but Lyon remained sitting on the porch, barely glancing at his visitor.

“Do you prefer to be addressed as Governor Lyon or Captain Lyon?” Bader asked, smiling.

“Depends upon the culture,” Lyon said, not looking up from
his book. “Colin Powell preferred to be introduced as ‘Retired General Powell’ on diplomatic missions to the Middle East, because that title carried more weight in Arab cultures. Secretaries of state, like governors, know how to talk. Retired generals, like captains, know how to fight.” He finally looked his visitor in the eyes. “What do you want, Nick?”

Bader stepped up onto the porch.

“I hear Karl Rove asked you to chair this new Cheatgrass Disaster Commission,” Bader said.

“Yup.” Bader waited for more, but Lyon just continued reading and ignoring him.

After an awkward silence, Bader cleared his throat. “You probably feel like you don’t need that kind of grief and aggravation. And you don’t. But I’d like you to think about something before you decide.”

Lyon finally looked up with something resembling actual attention.

“You sense that cynicism out there. Everybody’s wailing about Iraq and Abramoff and Katrina, but it’s been out there for a long while—the Chinese money in Clinton’s coffers, Sandy Berger stuffing classified documents in his socks, Enron, Torricelli, the pardon sales. Iran-Contra. The Keating Five. Abscam. The bounced checks. Everybody thinks the federal government is packed to the gills with crooks and morons.”

“Everybody might be correct, Congressman,” Lyon said tersely.

“Well, I know it’ll never get any better if we never demand any better,” Bader shot back. “You know, everybody thinks you’re so frigging terrific, sitting here on your porch and quoting George Washington. I think you love this precious little reputation, a hero beloved by all during a divided time, and you’re scared to get your hands dirty.”

Lyon reacted like he had been slapped. He slammed down
his book and his eyes glared with indignation. “Are you questioning my courage, son?”

“Yes,
Governor
, I am,” Bader said. “Last year we watched a federal agency completely fail in its core mission. There’s an opportunity, right here and now, to get answers, to hold people accountable, to make sure it doesn’t happen again, to fix something so that government works the way it’s supposed to!” He pounded a porch strut. “Everybody thinks I’m some sort of antigovernment ideological nut-job. I just want government to do its job! Sometimes I’m not even sure if I count as right-wing anymore; I still have this naïve idea that the federal government ought to do what it’s supposed to do, considering what we pay for it.”

Bader looked away, unsure if his brief flaring of temper was persuading Lyon or just alienating him.

“I hear from so many constituents how they wish you would run for something—governor again, or senator, or president,” Bader continued. “I tell them I agree. But if you won’t do this—one chairmanship, of one commission, to conduct one investigation, to try to solve one problem … well, I’ll start telling people what I really think. That you can’t be bothered with this country anymore.”

That was enough to get Lyon out of his chair.

“Hold it right there, you son of a bitch!” he growled, jabbing a finger right at Bader’s face in a dramatic manner that would impress veteran emphatic pointers like Harrison Ford. For a moment, Bader wondered if he was about to be decked by a retired Marine captain. Lyon stepped uncomfortably close, glared, and looked up and down at Bader.

“You have a hell of a lot of nerve coming here and talking to me like that,” Lyon fumed.

“It is … probably not one of my better days for constituent outreach,” Bader quipped.

Lyon’s stern face cracked, and he unleashed a roaring laugh so deep it made James Earl Jones sound like Woody Woodpecker.

“Bader, I pretty much want to deal with politicians and Washington like I want a case of the crabs,” he hoisted up his belt. “But I’ll do this. One year. I’m not relocating to Washington; I’ll commute on the train. And then I’m done with you people for good.”

Bader smiled and extended his hand. “Let me be the first to thank you for this service,
Captain
.”

Wilkins stared at the computer screen headline on
The Drudge Report
, and physically backed away. He zombie-walked over to Humphrey’s office, knocked, and opened to see Lisa and the administrative director attempting to organize a small mountain of paperwork they would soon be releasing, 8½-by-11 photocopied chaff to distract and disorient the heat-seeking missiles of the press and commission investigators.