<MSTing? Pt4/8 "Windmills"
the...@my-dejanews.com
> Pete Connors was black-Irish, a stubborn bulldog of a man, hard-
>drinking and fearless. This was his last year with the CIA. He faced
>compulsory retirement in June. Connors was chief of the
> counterintelligence staff,
TOM: Shouldn't counterintelligence be a polite word for stupidity?
MIKE: One would think.
>-the most secret, highly compartmentalized branch of the CIA.
CROW: Except for the branch that makes Waffle Crisp cereal.
> He had worked his was up through the various intelligence divisions, and
> had been around in the good old days when CIA agents were the golden
> boys.
MIKE (as a wrestler): Da Golden Boys will take all comers! Our labors
will not stop until the Tag Team belt is ours!
>Pete Connors had been a golden boy himself.
TOM: You can't be a golden boy in the dark branch, it's
counterintelligent!
>He had taken part in a coup that restored the Shah to the Peacock Throne
> in Iran,
MIKE: And look how great that turned out!
>and had been involved in Operation Mongoose, the attempt to topple
> Castro's government in 1961.
CROW: He also fired Archibald Cox, designed the Denver Airport luggage
system, and ran safety inspections for Space Shuttle Challenger.
> "After the Bay of Pigs, everything changed," Pete would mourn from
> time to time.
TOM: Record buyers became more susceptible to fads, and less loyal to
particular artists.
>The length of his diatribe usually depended upon how drunk he was.
MIKE: In direct or inverse proportion?
TOM: Algorithmic or linear progression?
CROW: Could we run a Fourier analysis on that relationship?
> "The bleeding hearts attacked us on the front pages of newspaper in the
>world. They called us a bunch of lying, sneaking clowns who couldn't get
> out of our own way.
CROW: Espionage is a dark, dark circus.
>Some anti-CIA bastard published the names of our agents, and Dick Walsh,
> our chief of station in Athens, was murdered."
MIKE: Greek dancing accident... took a plate to the head, poor bastard.
> Pete Connors had gone through three miserable marriages because of
> the pressures and secrecy of his work, but as far as he was concerned,
> no sacrifice was too great to make for his country.
CROW (as secretary): Pete, we're out of coffee.
TOM: What?! Screw this, I'm defecting!
> Now, in the middle of the meeting, his face was red with anger. "If
> we let the President get away with his people-to-people program, he's
> going to give the country away.
MIKE: Wow, that's the congregation's best church raffle prize ever!
>We can't allow-"
> Floyd Baker interrupted. "The President has been in office less
> than a week. We're all here to carry out his policies and-"
> "I'm not here to hand over my country to the damn Commies, mister.
TOM: I'm here to hand it over to McDonnell Douglas!
>The President never even mentioned his plan before his speech. He sprang
> it on all of us. We didn't have a chance to get together a rebuttal."
> "Perhaps that's what he had in mind," Baker suggested.
> Pete Connors stared at him. "By God, you agree with it!"
> "He's my President," Floyd Baker said firmly. "Just as he's yours."
MIKE (Minniwegan mom): It's so nice the kids have learned to share their
President.
CROW (same): Oh yah, ya know Margie and Frank's kids fought so much they
wound up buyin' each of'em their own President. That put a pretty crimp
in their budget, I tell ya.
> Ned Tillingast turned to Stanton Rogers. "Connors has a point. The
>President is actually planning to invite Romania, Albania, Bulgaria, and
> the other Communist countries to send their spies here posing as
> cultural attaches and chauffeurs and secretaries and maids.
MIKE: Russia's notorious covert temps.
>We're spending billions of dollars to guard the back door, and the
> President wants to throw open the front door."
TOM: Close that door this instant young man! American taxpayers are not
working ten hours a day to heat the outside!
> General Brooks nodded in agreement. "I wasn't consulted, either.
MIKE: And I'm lonely!
>In my opinion, the President's plan could damn well destroy this
>country."
TOM (singing as Groucho Marx): Whatever it is, I'm against it!
> Stanton Rogers said, "Gentlemen, some of us may disagree with the
>President, but let's not forget that the people voted for Paul Ellison to
> run this country." His eyes flicked across the men seated around him.
CROW: Mike, I don't get it. Where's the mad German scientist in the
wheelchair?
TOM: Welcome to the master's chambers, we've gathered for our feast.
Steely knife?
>"We're all part of the President's team, and we have to follow his lead
> and support him in every way we can."
MIKE: Hoo boy, this is where he sells chocolate bars for his kids at
>school.
>His words were followed by a reluctant silence. "All right, then. The
>President wants an immediate update on the current situation in Romania.
>Everything you have."
> "Including our covert stuff?" Pete Connors asked.
CROW: Well seeing as how he's President and all...
> "Everything. Give it to me straight. What's the situation in
> Romania with Alexandru Ionescu."
TOM: He's insisting we call him Al.
MIKE: Commie bastard. I say we nuke him back to his full name!
> "Ionescu's riding high in the saddle," Ned Tillingast replied.
> "Once he got rid of the Ceausescu family, all of Ceausescu's allies were
>assassinated, jailed, or exiled.
CROW: Or forced to listen to Dr. Laura Schlesinger.
>Since he seized power, Ionescu's been bleeding the country dry. The
> people hate his guts."
> "What about the prospects for revolution?"
All (rock their heads and sing): All right! All right!
TOM (as Monty Python): One dozen Communist revolutions!
> Tillingast said, "Ah. That's rather interesting. Remember a couple
> of years back when Marin Groza almost toppled the Ionescu government?"
MIKE: Oh, you mean when he pulled the cigarette lighter instead of a gun
and the cabinet almost laughed themselves to death?
> "Yes. Groza got out of the country by the skin of his butt."
CROW: His silky smooth, lusciously tight butt. Mm!
> "With our help. Our information is that there's a popular ground
> swell to bring him back.
TOM: So they can tape a "Kick Me" sign to his back and expel him again.
>Groza would be good for Romania, and if he got in, it would be good for
> us. We're keeping a close watch on the situation."
> Stanton Rogers turned to the secretary of state. "Do you have that
> list of candidates for the Romanian post?"
CROW: Why isn't Secretary of State capitalized?
TOM: It would remind us that he should outrank Stanton Rogers. And this
cannot be so.
MIKE: Yeah, you may be Secretary of State, but I'm Stanton Rogers pal!
Did I tell ya I could have been President?
> Floyd Baker opened a leather attache case, took some papers from it,
>and handed a copy to Rogers. "These are our top prospects. They're all
>qualified career diplomats. Each one of them has been cleared.
TOM: Each one has been hand-painted with the care of a craftsman, numbered
and signed by the artist.
>No security problems, no financial problems, no embarrassing skeletons in
> the closet."
MIKE: All their skeletons are proudly displayed on their coat of arms.
CROW: Now these skeletons they don't have, are they John Tower skeletons,
Clarence Thomas skeletons, or Zoe Baird skeletons?
> As Stanton Rogers took the list, the secretary of state added,
>"Naturally, the State Department favors a career diplomat, rather than a
>political appointee. Someone who's been trained for this kind of job.
TOM: Nah, too expensive. We'll just get some student au pair from
England.
> In this situation, particularly, Romania is an extremely sensitive post.
> It has to be handled very carefully."
> "I agree." Stanton Rogers rose to his feet.
MIKE: Couldn't he just stand? Show-off.
>"I'll discuss these names with the President and get back to you. He's
>anxious to fill the appointment as quickly as possible."
> As the others got up to leave, Ned Tillingast said, "Stay here,
> Pete. I want to talk to you."
TOM: Whoap, a first name! I feel palpable homoerotic overtones here!
> When Tillingast and Connors were alone, Tillingast said, "You came
> on pretty strong, Pete."
CROW: You used to talk to me like that. What happened to us, Pete?
Where'd the love go?
> "But I'm right," Pete Connors said stubbornly. "The President is
>trying to sell out the country. What are we supposed to do?"
MIKE: Make a midnight run on the waffle house?
> "Keep your mouth shut."
> "Ned, we're trained to find the enemy and kill him. What if the
> enemy is behind our lines, sitting in the Oval Office?"
CROW: Makes our job a hell of a lot easier, ay?
> "Be careful. Be very careful."
> Tillingast had been around longer than Pete Connors.
TOM: And he's starting to turn. Pfew!
>He had been a member of Wild Bill Donovan's OSS before it became the CIA.
MIKE (Old West drawl): When it was still Old Timer Billy Slater's Junior
Rodeo.
>He too hated what the bleeding hearts in Congress were doing to the
>organization he loved.
CROW: No land mines, no chemical weapons, no selling drugs to Los Angeles
schoolkids, it's a madhouse I tell ya!
>In fact, there was a deep split within the ranks of the CIA between the
> hard-liners and those who believed the Russian bear could be tamed into
> a harmless pet.
TOM: Hm, Machiavelli meets Tomagatchi.
>We have to fight for every single dollar, Tillingast thought. In Moscow,
> the Komitet Gosudarsetvennoy Bezopasnosti-the KGB- trains a thousand
> agents at a time.
MIKE: Now that's hardly an efficient class size, pedagogically speaking.
CROW: If I had a class of a thousand students, I'd give them a
take-home test on their ability to write a personal check for $100.
> Ned Tillingast had recruited Pete Connors out of college, and
> Connors had turned out to be one of the best. But in the last few
> years, Connors had become a cowboy-
CROW: Oh, so that's where all the cowboys went!
TOM (sings): I will do the dishes, while you swipe Castro's beard.
>-a little too independent, a little too quick on the trigger. Dangerous.
> "Pete- have you heard anything about an underground organization
>calling itself Patriots for Freedom?" Tillingast asked.
TOM: Sure. Parcells founded it so he could coach the Jets.
> Connors frowned. "No. Can't say that I have. Who are they?"
> "So far they're just a rumor. All I have is smoke.
CROW: Oh, Ned. Admitting you have this addiction is the first step
towards getting help!
> See if you can get a lead on them."
> "Will do."
>
> An hour later, Pete Connors was making a public phone call from a
>public booth at Hains Point.
> "I have a message for Odin."
> "This is Odin," General Oliver Brooks said.
MIKE: Well this is your neighbor. Your damn kid threw his hammer into my
yard again!
> Riding back to the office in his limousine, Stanton Rogers opened
> the envelope containing the names of the candidates for the
> Ambassadorship and studied them.
TOM: Luscious Vixxxen? Candi Cantalopes? Sighs O'Plenty? What the
hell?!
>It was an excellent list. The secretary of state had done his homework.
CROW: In ebonics. They're looking for one phat homeboy diplomat.
>The candidates had all served in Eastern and Western European countries,
> and a few of them had additional experience in the Far East and Africa.
> The President's going to be pleased, Stanton thought.
TOM: Ba-da-da-dup, ba-da-dup, da-da-dup, ba!
MIKE: Gilligan, I'm not pleased!
> "They're dinosaurs," Paul Ellison snapped. He threw the list on his
>desk. "Every one of them."
CROW: Sabertooth tiger's a mammal, sir.
MIKE: Shut up!
> "Paul," Stanton protested, "these people are all experienced career
>diplomats."
> "And hidebound by State Department tradition.
TOM (as Topol): As shaky as a fiddler on the roof!
>You remember how we lost Romania three years ago? Our experienced career
>diplomat in Bucharest screwed up and we were out in the cold.
MIKE: A clueless inexperienced jerk like me would never have made that
mistake!
>The pinstriped boys worry me.
CROW: Yeah, the Yanks lost two games last week. Torre's gotta go.
>They're all out to cover their asses.
TOM: Asses should fly free and proud! Rogers, drop your pants!
>When I talked about a people-to-people program, I meant every word of it.
> We need to make a positive impression on a country that at this moment
> is very wary of us."
MIKE: Yeah, let's allay their fears by giving this vital post to someone
they've never heard of.
CROW: No, he's gonna send effervescent children's television host Xuxa!
MIKE: Well, you know, like I said.
> "But if you put an amateur in there-someone with no experience-
> you're taking a big risk."
> "Maybe we need someone with a different kind of experience.
ALL: Ewwww!
>Romania is going to be a test case, Stan. A pilot run for my whole
> program,if you will."
TOM (laughing): And you won't.
>He hesitated. "I'm not kidding myself. My credibility is on the line.
> I know that there are a lot of powerful people who don't want to see
>this work.
CROW: Shaquille O'Neill, Cory Everson, Pocket Hercules...
>If it fails, I'm going to get cut off at the knees.
TOM: That's a foot below where they cut you off, Stanton Rogers! Ha ha!
MIKE: Very funny, old friend President Paul Ellison sir.
>I'll have to forget about Bulgaria, Albania, Czechoslovakia, and the rest
> of the iron curtain countries. And I don't intend for that to happen."
CROW: I'm going to shop at Gum, damn it!
TOM: No, that's "Dad-gummit".
CROW: Oh.
> "I can check out some of our political appointees who-"
> President Ellison shook his head. "Same problem. I want someone
> with a completely fresh point of view. Someone who can thaw the ice.
> The opposite of the ugly American."
MIKE: A beautiful Swede?
TOM: Oh, the bikini team from the beer commercials!
CROW: That's the bestest idea in history ever, sir!
> Stan Rogers was studying the President, puzzled. "Paul- I get the
>impression that you have someone in mind. Do you?"
> The President took a cigar from the humidor on his desk and lit it.
>"As a matter of fact," he said slowly, "I think I may have."
TOM: I believe you know him as- Biz Markie!
> "Who is he?"
> "She. Did you happen to see the article in the current issue of
>Foreign Affairs magazine called 'Detente Now'?"
> "Yes."
> "What did you think of it?'
CROW: She uses polysporadic-- poblybuslabbic-- she uses big words sir.
> "I thought it was interesting.
ALL (as Arte Johnson): But stupid!
>The author believes we're in a position to try to seduce the Communist
>countries into coming into our camp by offering them economic and-" He
> broke off. "It was a lot like your inaugural speech."
TOM: Except for the words and the concept and she wasn't wearing a
propeller beanie.
> "Only it was written six months earlier. She's published brilliant
>articles in "Commentary" and "Public Affairs".
CROW: And just check out this letter to Penthouse!
> Last year I read a book of hers on Eastern European politics,
MIKE: "Dick and Jane and Crime and Punishment"
>-and I must admit, it helped clarify some of my ideas."
> "All right. So she agrees with your theories. That's no reason to
>consider her for a post as imp-"
CROW: How can you post a position for an imp?
TOM: Maybe she gave one HELL of an interview! HELL! Ha! Cuz' it's Satan
and imps and...
> "Stan- she went further than my theory. She outlined a detailed plan
>that's brilliant. She wants to take the four major world economic pacts
>and combine them."
> "How can we-?"
> "It would take time, but it could be done. Look. You know that in
>1949 the Eastern bloc countries formed a pact for mutual economic
> assistance, called COMECON, and in 1958 the other European countries
> formed EEC- the Common Market."
> "Right."
MIKE: Then Umbrella Man left the grassy knoll, but not before being
caught by Zapruder's camera...
> "We have the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development,
>which includes the United States, some Western bloc countries, and
>Yugoslavia. And don't forget the Third World countries have formed a
> non-aligned movement the excludes us."
TOM: And don't forget the Maine! And don't forget the Alamo! And don't
forget Pearl Harbor!
MIKE: Don't forget your wallet! Don't forget to write!
CROW: Don't forget the thing by the place with the stuff and the... thing.
>The President's voice was charged with excitement. "Think of the
>possibilities. If we could combine all these plans and form one big
>marketplace- my God, it could be awesome!
CROW: EXTREME CAPITALISM! WHOOOOO!
>It would mean real world trade. And it could bring peace."
> Stanton Rogers said cautiously,
TOM: You've got the IQ of a DOG TURD, you flatulent PRAT! I should be
president, not a half-witted French cheese of a brain like you! Shut up
shut up SHUT UP!!!
>"It's an interesting idea, but it's a long way off."
> "You know the old Chinese saying, "A journey of a thousand miles
> must begin with a single step.'"
MIKE: Isn't that, "The crushing of a thousand heads begins with a single
tank"?
TOM: Well, it depends on the translation.
> "She's an amateur, Paul."
> "Some of our finest ambassadors have been amateurs. Anne Armstrong,
>the former ambassador to Great Britain, was an educator with no political
>experience. Perle Mesta was appointed to Luxembourg, Clare Booth Luce
> was ambassador to Italy. John Gavin, an actor, was the ambassador to
> Mexico.
CROW: But those are countries we don't care about!
TOM: We're America, damn it! Name a country we do care about, including
our own!
>One third of our current ambassadors are what you call amateurs."
MIKE: And what the world calls flunkies!
>"But you don't know anything about this woman."
TOM: I know she's stacked.
> "Except that she's damned bright and that we're on the same
> wavelength. I want you to find out everything you can about her." He
> picked up a copy of Foreign Affairs. "Her name is Mary Ashley."
MIKE: Oh man, it's so awkward when the President's in puppy love.
CROW: Passing notes about her in Cabinet meetings, staring deep into Tony
Blair's eyes and wistfully telling him about how perfectly small her nose
is.
> Two days later, President Ellison and Stanton Rogers breakfasted
>together.
MIKE: Waiter, a pitcher of Bloody Maries please, and a Sam Adams. Oh, and
bring the wine list!
> "I got the information you asked for."
> Stanton Rogers pulled a paper from his pocket. "Mary Elizabeth
> Ashley, Twenty-seven Old Milford Road,
CROW: Shouldn't there be something for addresses like the phony 555 prefix
for telephone numbers? Whoever lives at 27 Milford Road's gonna be
awfully ticked.
>-Junction City, Kansas. Age, almost thirty-five,
TOM: Thirty-four. Damn it, thirty-four! No impersonal government profile
says "almost thirty-five"! (starts crying) I mean, does Sheldon even care?
Are we nothing to him? Are we just a bunch of bumbling, barely sentient
tamarinds who happened to randomly walk into a bookstore and accidentally
have $5.95 fall out of our wallets to buy a copy of... of...
MIKE: Tom?
TOM (blubbering): WINDMILLS OF THE GODS! AAAAAUGH! (hysterical sobbing)
CROW (breaks down like young warrior in "The Seven Samurai"): Nooooo!
Dead, all dead!
MIKE: Guys, c'mon! We're almost to the break! Crow, tell Tom it's gonna
be all right.
CROW (unsteady, regaining composure): It's all right, honey-bunny.
MIKE: Tell him you love him.
CROW: I love you, honey-bunny.
>-married to Dr. Edward Ashley- two children, Beth twelve and Tim ten.
MIKE: Just keep riffing. Like: Beth Twelve? What, are these Harry
Mudd's android servant children?
CROW: Heh. OK- Um... How are you today, Beth Twelve?
TOM (robotic): Suboptimal, Mother Unit Mary Two. Please inform Brother
Unit Tim Ten he is a boogerbutt.
MIKE: See, Tom? You can make it!
TOM (weakly): Hahahaaa, it's fun!
>Chairwoman of the Junction City Chapter of the League of Women Voters.
>Assistant Professor, East European political science, Kansas State
>University.
CROW: Featherweight champion in mud wrestling... I think we've found our
diplomat, sir!
TOM: Thank god, we can go! What happens in the League of Women Voters
anyway?
MIKE: I think they play the League of He-Man Woman-Hater Voters in
November.
CROW: Seven-game playoff, I'm guessing.
>Grandfather born in Romania." He looked up thoughtfully. "I must admit
> she sounds interesting."
> "I think so too. I'd like to have a full security check run on
>her."
> "I'll see that it's done."
Logo. Commercials. 10-321 has changed to 10-10-321, but nothing's really
changed- ain't that the truth.
<< End Part IV >>
Mom always did like your e-mail best!
peasporr...@hotmail.com
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