Them Hustlers

by Jeffrey Manber

  Tanya felt part of the tribe like never before. She felt finally at home, her feelings matching everyone around her in the fever-pitched room. For once she was not analyzing or observing or calculating. Tucker’s high-pitched laugh, the laugh reserved for when he was really excited could be heard. Hearing Tucker made her even more comfortable. These were her people. She belonged here.

  The tuxedo-dressed gentleman standing right next to her impulsively threw his lit cigar onto the stage. “Whoowee!” He burst out.

  He grinned to Tanya by way of explanation. “I’m not throwing my Fruit of the Looms!”

  Others joined in.

  “Whoowee” shouted the office staffer for the most powerful Republican on the Hill.

  “Whoowee” cried out the junior congressman from a West Coast state.

  Thrown cigars by the dozens arced like roman candles through the thick haze before falling onto the blue carpet of the Oval Office, creating a sparkling ember pyre for the bodies now tangled on the blue carpet.

  Up front Al Goldstein jumped onto the stage, his arms raised above his head, his right hand clutching still his own cigar, as if a referee ready to stop the fight. Whatever one might say about Goldstein, he knew a thing or two about timing in the matters of sex, because as he strode across the Oval Office stage, the moan of the intern’s climax floated as a high pitch above the din.

  The moan flew above the hooting men and the screaming women.

  But it didn't stop there. Not at all. The moan, whether real or not, shot out onto Q Street where the first copies of the Washington Post were being dropped off this Sunday morning at the all night newsstand. Her cry of pleasure followed the paper delivery trucks as they barreled down Pennsylvania Avenue to the apartments of the congressmen and senators, and could be heard in the late night diners as the first readers of the Sunday newspaper gasped in disbelief.

  That scream transcended the normal laws of physics and could be heard the next day, when Phil and Herb sat down to read the Post in Ruth’s deli. The scream could be heard when Tanya, Tommy and Gigi, each sporting well-earned hangovers, opened their front doors to pick up a copy of the Sunday Washington Post.

  The high-pitched orgasm from the K Street stripper dressed as the young White House intern signaled the end of the evening's entertainment.

  In that regard Tanya Lyn had been right. The Saturday night party at the Mansion was a fin de siècle moment -- never again would the Republicans have the arena of public morality to themselves. In their lust to seize power an entire political party had gone too far and with no warning the most unlikely opponent had ridden to the rescue of Bill Clinton.

  Where a helpless White House, a disgusted public, and a frightened Democratic Party had been impotent, a wheelchair bound smut publisher unleashed in that Sundays' Washington Post a perfectly delivered counterattack to the Republicans and their hypocritical drive to make morality the signature issue for Clinton's impeachment and the 2000 presidential election.

  ~ ~ ~

  Chapter 18

  Phil didn't care about the pornographer-publisher and his counter attack against the hypocrisy of Washington. Nor about how the impeachment scandal was finally coming to a head. Phil never would have even seen the advertisement that saved the Clinton presidency had Herb not shown it to him. And not because of his usual disdain for politics. Phil was too busy having sex every day with the best of Herb's clients and too busy still hoping one of these women would make the perfect wife.

  By the time of their breakfast get together on the 4th of October, Phil continued to sleep his way through Herb's client list. He had enjoyed three nights with Kathy. Four days and nights with Liz. Two nights with Reinne. Four nights with a 35 year old Lockheed lobbyist named Susan. And one night with Andrea, a tall tomboy out of work Republican lobbyist who had risen during the Reagan administration from gofer for the first Reagan presidential campaign to an undersecretary at the State Department.

  Andrea interested Phil beyond the sex. She was interested in finding a husband who had little to do with policy or politics. That was fine with Phil. But he continued to move on with a one-nighter with Heather, a veteran on the Washington scene known as the go-to-girl for Middle East businessmen looking for a class escort while in town. That gave Phil some pause but even at 40 she was a hell of a knock out. And told great anecdotes about the politics of the men of the Middle East while they sat on his front pouch drinking wine. Her basic problem was like that of Tanya. The men in Heather’s world were powerful, and she wanted part of that action, not as an escort but as a Washington player. She had experienced the allure of power and wanted more.

  And finally Phil was ready to rest.

  In the past three weeks Herb had unleashed onto Phil fifteen days of sex with six beautiful women.

  Even more amazing to both men was that there had not been a single turn down. Not a single one of these woman introduced by Herb had said no. Phil had dutifully followed the fortune tellers’ instructions and each and every woman had stayed at least one night. And not only that, all subsequently arrived in Herb’s shop glowing with excitement. The physical pleasure was light years removed from a bar pickup.

  Each woman gushed to Herb how Phil was the first man who cared more about their lives than getting laid. Now they begged to know if Phil played a role in their future - -what did the cards say?

  So far, the cards were not optimistic. Liz was certainly the most fun. But the others were in the Washington game in some way. For Liz, it was purely about the pleasure, though two days ago she had called him out of the blue, wanting to get together. Had Phil been ten years younger the hot looking Scot would have been someone that would have kept him out of the bars every night. But now he wanted a different sort of woman.

  Phil didn’t share with Herb all his mixed feelings but Herb seemed to understand. Phil was like the uncertain bride in the dress shop, confronting dozens of choices that were far more than different colors or cuts or types of fabric. It was holding in your hands, for the first time, the dream of happiness. That’s what the wedding dress meant for a bride. Herb had explained this to his wife. “He’s a kid in a whole bunch of ways,” he had said while they were watching the evening news. “He’s loving what I’ve given him, all this choice. More than any man not rich or famous could have. But, he is still looking for his dream.”

  His wife again asked why he was helping. Herb certainly didn’t want to explain about his own feelings of a loss youth; his ill wife had enough issues on her plate. But it was also hard to convey his worries that something evil was stalking Phil. The cards were very clear and so too Herb’s premonitions. Something big was soon to hit the guy. And Herb couldn't turn away. Not his style.

  As they got together for breakfast Herb studied the face of the luckiest guy in town because of him. “You want to call the game off. Had enough?”

  It was to Phil a precipitous moment to decide what to do. Last night not only had he forgotten who he was sleeping with, whether it was the lobbyist from Lockheed or the one from the Reagan administration, but lying there, with some woman’s brunette head resting on his right arm, he did the math. It was six women, over 21 days, with 15 nights of sex. Add that up, 6 plus 21 plus 15, that comes to 42.

  And he was now 43 years old. It must mean something. Maybe one more woman? Or one more night with one of these women? But he still had no wife. And what guy could turn down the opportunity to sleep with yet another woman? Not Phil Greene.

  Herb understood and was ready with the next name. “A napkin was produced. “This here is a woman from somewhere down south. The name is Lucie Welcomme. Believes in the tarot cards. I have to say,” said Herb sounding jealous, “the cards love her. I’ve done two readings and it’s as if my cards know her.

  “And she lives her life by the numbers, with astrology, just like you. Came to Washington looking for work on a boat. Loves the waters. Sexy woman. A change from all the Washington-insiders.”

  Phil took the napkin scrap
e and stuffed it for safekeeping into his bulging wallet. The well-worn black leather wallet bulged with pieces of papers, some light green, some white, torn off match covers, crumpled business cards, the debris washed ashore in Phil’s relentless quest to somehow find myself through the perfect wife. There must have been a hundred names packed into that wallet.

  * * *

  Herb wanted to raise one more subject and it wasn’t about his lonely customers. He had discussed with his wife just what he should say and do about Phil. In the last few days the tingling in his side had returned. Herb knew something ominous was approaching and was sure it concerned Phil. But the guy was happy. Working like a madman at his warehouse, running home for another rendezvous. Maybe this wasn’t the time to raise any bad feelings, especially when he had nothing concrete.

  In surrender McDermott just waved his hand in resignation. “Nothing else for today. Have fun you damn lucky Casanova."

  And with that the fortune teller opened the Sunday Washington Post.

  ~ ~ ~

  Chapter 19

  Phil would forever mark his life by the time before he met Herb McDermott and his harem of clients, and the time that came afterwards. The fortune teller changed his life forever, no doubt about it.

  And for years Washington insiders marked their own lives around the October 4th, 1998 appearance of the advertisement in the Washington Post on that Sunday morning.

  The whole decade had been a golden age for Republicans. America was captivated by Newt Gingrich's "Contract with America," the campaign promise to reduce the budget and bring back good old-fashioned values. Being Republican in the mid-1990s meant being on the right side of national security, taxes and cultural values.

  Right to life.

  Strong on the military.

  Ownership of guns.

  Lower taxes.

  And above all else, family values.

  It was not unreasonable in 1998 for politicians like Newt Gingrich and Tom Delay and John Boehner and the other creators of the Contract with America to imagine generations of Republican dominance in national politics, beginning with the removal of the cheating president.

  But the advertisement unleashed by Larry Flynt set into motion a series of events that crushed the ambitions of Republican congressional insiders to take the moral high road in national politics and allowed the son of an ex-president from Texas to grab the leadership of the party instead.

  The ad itself was not much to behold. Few printed documents are. Yes it was a full page. But it was stuck on page eleven in the first section of the Sunday paper, surrounded by the usual unattractive newspaper ads for supermarket specials and furniture sales.

  The ad cost Larry Flynt $85,000. That sure was a lot of money. But it was only the beginning. The Hustler publisher had evolved his thinking from the time of the meeting in New York with Goldstein and decided to announce an offer of one million dollars to whomever had information exposing the hypocrisy of the Republicans attack on Bill Clinton.

  First to capture the reader’s attention was the stark heading:

  Larry Flynt and Hustler Magazine

  Announce A Cash Offer Of Up To

  $ 1 Million

  * * *

  What followed next were two questions contained in a simple black box:

  * * *

  Have you had an adulterous

  sexual encounter with

  a current member of the

  United States Congress

  or a high-ranking

  government official?

  Can you provide documentary

  evidence of illicit sexual relations with

  a Congressman, Senator or

  other prominent officeholder?

  Assuming the answer was yes, the ad then laid out the conditions for payment.

  Larry Flynt and HUSTLER Magazine

  will pay you up to $1 million if we

  choose to publish your verified story

  and use your material.

  CALL OUR HOTLINE

  1-800-687-XXXX

  All calls and correspondence will be

  Kept strictly confidential.

  Paid for by Larry Flynt and Hustler Magazine

  The phone lines begin ringing in the empty Beverly Hill offices of Flynt Publications as soon as the midnight edition of the Post hit the streets. Readers who more than likely were not at the Mansion were probably the first to call. But given this was Washington, there may well have been a few calls from upset lovers and scorned staffers who were also at the Saturday night event.

  By Monday morning the Associated Press, UPI, Reuters, the Los Angeles Times, the Washington Post were reporting that over 2,000 messages had been left, each from a person claiming to have factual information exposing a married congressman or senator or senior office holder in an unethical sexual relationship.

  Think about that. Two thousand people took the effort over the weekend to call into the 800 number, and leave their own name and phone number. That suggests the callers were sincere. But let's say only half the calls were real--I know we are sounding like Phil himself now, but let’s continue down this path.

  To start, unknown is the universal ratio of phone-calls-to-expose-an-affair-with-a-national-politician vs. the actual affair. And, it is possible, even probable, that a single married politician could have more than one lover.

  So let's assume a 50% ratio. That means in the first days after the ad was published that somewhere around 1,000 affairs with married politicians were revealed.

  Going deeper into the numbers, we need to realize that there are at any one time 435 folks serving in the House and 100 senators holding elected office. That's a total of 535 national politicians. Given the high incumbency rate, if we look at, say, a ten year period that means that about a thousand politicians served in Congress between 1988-1998.

  Most of these politicians were married. Most were men. So the 2,000 phone calls representing about 1,000 real affairs would mean that each and every congressman had an affair.

  That must be wrong. Even for Washington.

  Some politicians are too busy and maybe a handful have moral principles. So instead, let’s assume that some of the congressmen had multiple affairs. Let's put the number of affairs that each cheating congressman had at, let's say, two. That means that about oh---50% of married politicians had affairs based on the phone calls coming into Hustler magazine.

  Rough numbers. Maybe still too high. So let's halve it again. Make it 25% of politicians. Okay--make it 20%. Now we are being as conservative with our numbers as any Congressional Budget Office study should aspire to match.

  So, what we have is that the Flynt ad seems to have smoked out that one in five married congressmen have had at least one affair.

  That's fine.

  That's cool.

  That's their business.

  Who really cares?

  But here was the political question of 1998: what number of those politicians having these extra-marital affairs was also attacking Bill Clinton for his affair with Monica Lewinsky? When the driving political force to impeach the president of the United States is one of behavior towards a sexual affair, then the morality and behavior of the accuser is fair game.

  What if the judge and prosecutors at the Salem witch trial were also warlocks and witches?

  Politicians like Newt Gingrich and Bob Barr were whipping up the American public not in the name of biblical righteousness, but in their own primal hunt for power at whatever cost. And each of these politicians failed the very litmus test they were holding up for the president.

  And it took a publisher of the most graphic pornographic magazine to reveal the truth.

  * * *

  When Tanya saw the advertisement the good feelings of the evening before from the to-do at the Q Street Mansion instantaneously evaporated. In a worried flash she picked up the phone and called Tommy.

  “I’m reading the paper this morning and Tommy,” she began, but the congressman was ready.<
br />
  “I was just about to call you darlin', I’m looking at this advertisement myself right at this very moment. What sort of garbage is this? Can you believe this idiot?”

  Tanya chocked on her coffee.

  Tucker kept going. “Not to worry ‘bout a thing. This ad got plenty of caveats. Notice how it writes ‘if we choose’ and ‘verified’ and the like. Lots of legal mumbo jumbo language here.”

  It was necessary to knock some sense into the conversation. “Tommy, it don’t matter whether it is garbage or not. Or whether Larry Flynt is an asshole. Or whether the rumors are even verified. It’s a one million dollar jackpot for dirt on politicians who’ve been foolin' around. You got that Tommy?” Her voice rose in exasperated strength. “A reward if you got dirt on affairs with congressmen. The press will have a field day with this. You telling me that Newt and all those boys attacking the White House got nothing to fear? You got nothing to fear? That what you telling me this morning Tommy?”

  Tucker seemed to receive the incoming message. “Tanya, darlin',” he began, with a false bravado, “ ‘scuse me while I make a few calls.” And with that the phone line went dead.

  * * *

  Over breakfast it was Herb who caught sight of the ad. Judy had poured their first cup of coffee. Judy had just told Phil that there was no chance he was going to get her daughter's phone number. Phil was laughing; saying well, in that case, give me your phone number.