Political Satire: Having trouble surviving these times? You’re not alone. Join us in columnist John F. Di Leo’s exploration of an alternate universe, where we imagine the impossible:
An aging, corrupt old fool somehow becomes president in his basement, and every night, an aide has to bring him his soup and discuss the events of the day as he prepares to receive his nightly meds…
Dateline, January 29. Begin Transcript:
“Hey Up There! Is Anybody Up There???”
“Yes sir! Coming sir! Be right down, sir!”
(sound of clatter of china and silverware, then footsteps hurrying down stairs)
“Just a moment, sir, I’m on my way!”
“Better be. You’re awfully late tonight. I was thinking you weren’t coming…”
“No sir, no problem sir, wouldn’t forget to bring you your soup, sir.”
“Did you remember everything?”
“Yes sir… that’s what took so long, sir. We were out of crackers so I had to run out to get them. But here we are… soup and crackers.”
“What is it?”
“Clam Chowder, sir.”
“What kind?”
“The white kind, sir.”
“That’s good, cause the blacks really dropped the ball in November. Damned #WalkAway movement. Lousy traitors…”
“Um, no, sir, I meant the white kind of clam chowder. You know, New England style. Because it’s Friday, sir.”
“Oh. Okay then. I win New England, don’t I?”
“Yes sir.”
“Okay then. I’ll try it. You were supposed to do something else. Don’t remember what. What the heck else were you supposed to do…???”
“Spoons, sir. You asked me to bring you an extra box of spoons. I went to Walmart and bought a dozen soup spoons for you to put in your drawer, in case you ever misplace one again.”
“I’ve never misplaced one, boy! They keep TAKING ’em!”
“Yes sir. If you say so, sir.”
“Hmm… not bad. Hope it wasn’t too expensive.”
“The spoons, sir?”
“No, the chowder. I bet it cost a lot of clams…”
“Oh. Heh heh. Good one, sir. I must remember that, sir.”
“Been telling that one since the 50s.”
“You really wouldn’t know it, sir.”
“Thanks. Yup, good old political fundraising banquet jokes. They go back a long time.”
“I’ll bet they do, sir. Umm, while you’re eating, could I ask a question, sir?”
“Go ahead, son. This is good. Might ask you to get me another bowl in a minute.”
“Yes sir. I’ve been wondering, sir. You know how you ordered that they stop construction on the wall, sir?”
“No I didn’t. It’s still up there.”
“I beg your pardon, sir?”
“All around the White House. Over ten feet high. Nice tall wall. Walls work, you know. They keep out the enemy.”
“Oh, no, sir, I was referring to the border wall.”
“What? We can’t build a border wall! Do you know how BIG Canada is? I mean, I know the Great Lakes help, and all, but … from Minnesota to the Pacific is 2000 miles… and then the crazy border between New England and the Maritimes is another thousand… not as the crow flies, of course, but as the map takes ya… Nope, it’s just too long a border for a wall. I don’t know what your teachers taught ya, son, but that’s just an impossibility.”
“Uhhh… yes, sir, I know… I wasn’t talking about our border with Canada, sir.”
“No?”
“I was referring to the border with Mexico, sir.”
“Oh. Well, we’ve got the Rio Grande down there, you know. And the Gulf of Mexico… there’s no need for a wall down there either. That’s fourteen hundred miles of pure heat. Cooks ya. Hot sun, heavy humidity, nahh, you’d never make it. City kid like you. Heck, neither would I, and I’m from Scranton. … ahhh, did you know I’m from Scranton, son?”
“I think you’ve mentioned it once or twice, sir, yes.”
“Oh. Well, anyway, we don’t need a wall with Mexico, so there’s no point.”
“But sir, there are tons of illegal border crossings every day in areas where there’s no wall, sir. That’s why Trump set out to rebuild it, remember? To stop the illegal border crossings.”
“Well, ya don’t need a wall for that. Just make ’em legal, then it won’t matter if they come in. Problem solved.”
“Umm, I don’t think that will do the trick, sir.”
“Why not?”
“Well, sir, people don’t want all immigration to be legal. The people want at least some, reasonable restrictions on immigrants.”
“Just as well. Darned foreigners. Come from South America. Jungles and deserts. They probably don’t even bathe.”
“I beg your pardon, sir?”
“Ah, you don’t have to say you’re sorry, son. I KNOW you bathe. I’m talkin’ about those Mexicans and Hondurans and El Salvadorans… Some of ’em probably don’t even bathe when they’re at home, let alone when they’re walking along the Sierra Madre.”
“Sir, I think you should probably get out of the habit of talking about whether or not people take showers. It gives people the wrong idea.”
“How do you figure that? Most people stink, you know.”
“Okay, I was mistaken. It doesn’t give people the wrong idea.”
“Well, then, how about this, boy… instead of having a wall on the border, we just dig a canal!? You know, like in Panama? If it were lakes and rivers and canals the whole way, then they could just pour on some soap and shampoo and dive in. By the end of their swim, they’d be clean!”
“Sir, I’m afraid you keep forgetting about why we have the wall controversy in the first place. Because so many immigrants keep coming in. And some of them are great, and some work hard, and some get jobs… but lots of them end up on welfare, or turn tricks, or join street gangs.. actually, lots of street gang members come up that way. That’s how MS-13 grows.”
“Hmm… so you’re saying, a lot of them can’t afford soap, so my little bath crossing idea won’t work on them?”
“Ahh, no sir, that’s not what I meant. Just that your constituents would probably like you to leave the wall up, that’s already there, they don’t want you to tear it down. Just don’t build anymore, for PR purposes, you know? Stop it to make the base happy, but leave up what’s there already to make everyone else happy. Win-win, as they say, right? And with the wall being so expensive, we’d save a lot of clams.”
“Ooh, that’s a good idea, son!”
“Leaving up the portion of wall that’s already built?”
“Huh? No, a lot of clams! I’d love to have a lot of clams. How about another serving of that clam chowder, eh?”
“Oh. Oh well. Yes sir. Coming right up, sir.”
“Good, because I’m hungry. Bring crackers too! Oh, and a spoon! Hmmm… coulda sworn there was something else. Oh well. Clam chowder. Yum!”
copyright 2021 John F Di Leo
Excerpted with permission from “Evening Soup with Basement Joe, Volume One,” from Free State West Publishing, available in paperback or eBook exclusively on Amazon.
John F. Di Leo is a Chicagoland-based international transportation and trade compliance professional and consultant. A onetime Milwaukee County Republican Party chairman, he has been writing a regular column for Illinois Review since 2009. His book on vote fraud (The Tales of Little Pavel) and his political satires on the current administration (Evening Soup with Basement Joe, Volumes I and II) are available only on Amazon
If you enjoyed this article, then please REPOST or SHARE with others; encourage them to follow AFNN. If you’d like to become a citizen contributor for AFNN, contact us at managingeditor@afnn.us Help keep us ad-free by donating here.
Truth Social: @AFNN_USA
Facebook: https://m.facebook.com/afnnusa
Telegram: https://t.me/joinchat/2_-GAzcXmIRjODNh
Twitter: https://twitter.com/AfnnUsa
GETTR: https://gettr.com/user/AFNN_USA
CloutHub: @AFNN_USA