Evening Soup with Basement Joe, Episode 38

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:

Joe Buckstop, 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, April 3. Begin Transcript:

“Good evening, boss! How’s your Easter so far?”

“Come on, man! Pay attention! Any fool can see I’m in an executive chair, not a sofa1”

“I beg your pardon, sir?”

“Why’d you say I was on a sofa? Actually made me look down and double check, thought I was losing my mind…”

“Too late for that…”

“What’s that?”

“I’m sorry, sir, I’m just baffled I came down here with some soup and asked how your Easter’s been, so far…”

“It’s not Easter, it’s Saturday.”

“Well, sir, with the Easter Vigil, for Catholics, Easter basically starts at night on Holy Saturday, sir. Didn’t mean to upset you, sir.”

“Well? Do you have soup or don’t you?”

“Yes sir. It’s called Neapolitan Easter Soup, sir. The cook found it on the internet, sir.”

“She finds a hell of a lot of things on the internet. You sure she’s not a spy or something?”

“A spy, sir? She’s never even been down here to see you, sir. She’d be a lousy spy. If anyone were to be a spy, it’d be me. I talk with you for an hour every night. I could be a spy.”

“Well? Are ya?”

“I beg your pardon, sir?”

“Are you a spy? That sounded like a confession.”

“Umm, no sir…. for starters, if I were a spy, I don’t think I’d admit it to you. And second, you know all about me. I’m a law student just here on a part time job, sir.”

“How’d you get this job again, son?”

“My law school professor just said he was asked to find somebody for this job, and he recommended me. Said I’d learn a lot, sir.”

“Mmm. so what’s the soup?”

“It’s Neapolitan Easter Soup, sir. Lots of meats, lots of veggies, lots of green leafy things, sir. Colorful and rich, sir.

“Hmmm…. are there crackers?”

“Right here, sir.”

“Hmm. Okay… mmm… not bad… not bad. I see what you mean. More filling than it looks at first.”

“Glad you like it, sir.”

“So, did you go to the Easter Vigil service, sir?”

“Huh? Me? Oh, no, been here. Working. Might go in the morning. I don’t know. Up to my staff.”

“Oh, well, I just figured you might have gone to the Vigil, sir, because, you know, it’s usually the favorite of Catholics, sir.”

“Oh.”

“And you say you’re a Catholic, sir.”

“Oh.”

‘You know, sir, this being Easter weekend and all, sir, I’d like to ask… are you familiar with what’s been going on at the UN this week, sir?”

“The what?”

“The UN, sir? The United Nations?”

“Oh. No. This is good soup though…”

“Well, sir, this week they’ve been talking all about so-called women’s rights, sir, so they call it – equity issues, sir – but in reality it turns out, your UN mission has just been pushing something called ‘sexual rights,’ sir.”

“What does that mean?”

“Well, sir, as I understand it, it’s the 1960s, sir.”

“The what?”

“Well, sir, basically, it’s the 1960s, sir. It’s a combination of pushing ultra liberal sex education in the schools at an absurdly early age, pushing for free contraception and government funded abortion on demand and all sorts of radical things, sir.”

“Oh.”

“That’s the USA mission pushing all that at the UN, sir.”

“Oh.”

“That means, it’s YOUR appointees pushing it, sir.”

“Oh.”

“Well, sir, do you, umm… well, I don’t mean to be disrespectful, sir, but do you realize what that means, sir?”

“Huh?”

“Well, it means that your administration is making all this stuff US policy, sir. If the US pushes something at the UN, then that’s saying that this something is official US policy, sir.”

“Oh.”

“Sir… it’s Holy Week, sir. This particular article I read, well, it hit the presses on Good Friday, sir. On Good Friday, the US government going on record calling for taxpayer funded abortion to be made an international standard, sir? I mean, doesn’t your office have anyone even talking to your UN mission, sir? Keeping them in line, sir? Because, well, this is simply outrageous, sir!”

“Oh… I’m not, uh… I have people who handle that. I’m uh… I’m not up to date on that sort of issue.”

“Sir, you have been running for office as an Irish-Catholic for 50 years. Your administration can’t be the one to make the UN adopt things like this, sir!”

“I’m, uh… I’m really getting into this soup, son. This is good soup.”

“Yes sir, I understand. You’re certainly in the soup, sir. But that’s the point, sir. However many votes you got, a heck of a lot of them were because they wanted America to have a real Catholic president. You’ve always said you were, sir.”

“Oh, yeah. I am. Raised in a Catholic family. In, umm… uhh… small town… up north… couple hours north of uhh… umm… Philly. Couple hours. Small town. It’s called, umm.. uhh… oh, you know the thing!”

“Scranton, sir?”

“Yeah, that’s it! Scranton. Sure. Catholic. Yeah.”

“Sir, You really can’t say you’re Catholic and then push the entire world to teach deviancy to kindergartners and push abortion on demand everywhere, sir. It’s a bridge too far, sir. Maybe a hundred bridges too far, you know? Surely you understand that, sir!”

“Well, see, that’s out of my hands. I uh, I uh, I’m not briefed on that sort of thing. That’s handled by, uh…. I don’t get involved in those meetings.”

“It doesn’t matter if you’re not in the meetings, sir, you can just issue an order that says No, sir! Or you can fire the UN ambassador, sir.”

“Oh, no, I can’t do that.”

“Why not, sir?”

“Well, for starters, umm, I don’t know who it is…”

“I have no response to that.”

“This is good soup.”

“Sir, I just… umm… oh, excuse me sir, I just got a text.”

“A text?”

“A message, sir… on my cellphone… umm… hmmm… wow… give me a moment, sir… just gotta send this…”

“This is good soup.”

“Sir, that was my sister.”

“Oh?”

“Do you remember how I mentioned yesterday that she’s going to Australia because she got a job as an assistant choreographer in a musical, sir?”

“Oh?”

“We talked about it last night, sir. How theater works, how the whole industry has been shut down for a year, how, she got a job so she’s flying to Australia to work again, sir?”

“Oh?”

“Do you remember ANY of that, sir?”

“Umm… No?”

“Of course not, sir.”

“This is good soup.”

“Yes, sir, I know. That’s about all I can ever count on you remembering in our little talks, sir. And sometimes not even that.”

“Not even what?”

“Yes sir. Well, that’s that then.”

“What’s what?”

“My sister just told me that there’s room in her show for a comic bit part for a guy who can sing, act and dance a little, and be her assistant.”

“Oh?”

“And she talked to the director about it. And they’ve offered me a job.”

“Oh?”

“So I’m taking it, sir.”

“Oh?”

“She asked if I was interested at lunch… and I’ve been thinking about it all day.. I can slow down my law school to just one class a quarter and work remotely online… fly to Australia and do the show… and be myself again. Earn a living, without a mask. Free of your corrupt governors and crooked mayors and their illegal, unAmerican restrictions on movement and daily life. I’m sick of it.”

“Um, but I thought you liked this job?”

“It’s an easy job, sir. That’s really not enough, sir.”

“It’s not?”

“No, sir. A job needs to be rewarding, sir. Fulfilling, sir.”

“Oh.”

“A job needs to be something you can be proud of at the end of the day, sir.”

“Uh….. Oh.”

“I think I finally decided on Holy Thursday, sir.”

“Oh? When was that?”

“Holy Thursday, sir. The day before yesterday?”

“Oh.”

“It hit me during the reading of the Passion, sir.”

“The what?”

“I can’t work for you, sir. I can’t be part of this, sir. I can’t take your damned thirty pieces of silver anymore, sir.”

“Did we pay you that much?”

“I thought all day about this. If I take the job, how should I quit… I should make a speech, sir, a terrific, powerful parting speech, shouldn’t I?”

“Huh?”

“And then I realized it would be pointless, sir.”

“Why?”

“There isn’t a chance in hell that you’d remember a word of it, sir.”

“Huh? Remember a word of what?”

“Oh, brother…. So, well, sir, this is it, sir. This is goodbye. You won’t be seeing me again.”

“But … who will bring me my soup?”

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, II, and III), are available in either eBook or paperback, only on Amazon.

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