A Woman First- First Woman

by Selina Meyer

  For a normal, rational person like me, counting on the Electoral College was like having to rely on some other inexplicable force, like gravity. Once you start thinking about it all the time, it becomes extremely nerve-racking. Not only that, although it wasn’t clear whether I was the president-elect, it was completely clear that I was still the president, and I was determined to continue to do that job as well as I could while there was still a chance I might remain in office. That meant coping with a financial crisis brought on by uncertainty over the outcome of the election, dealing with a deadly salmonella outbreak caused by Thanksgiving turkeys, and nonstop cyberattacks from the Chinese, who peppered my gullible staff mercilessly with notices of Irish sweepstakes winnings. Before long, the White House servers had more viruses and less privacy than one of those bathhouses where men go to catch viruses in public.

  It was a turbulent time in my private life, as well. Presidents have, well, certain needs, needs that are perhaps greater than those of ordinary people. One of the stories I used to enjoy telling visitors to the Oval Office was that the appetites of Louis XIV, France’s famous “Sun King,” were so enormous that when he died the doctors doing his autopsy discovered that his large intestine was twice as large as a normal large intestine. It was not simply a “large” intestine; it was a huge intestine.

  Though I have no reason to believe that my large intestine is any larger than normal, I share the tendency toward outsized appetites that distinguishes great leaders: Churchill’s love for cigars, for example, or Catherine the Great’s fondness for f-cking horses. During a (low-calorie) lunch with historians at the White House,* I was asked if a female president needed to be loved more than a male president. At the time I couldn’t think of a good answer. And then, after the historians left, I actually thought of a good answer. Not just a good answer, a great answer, and I thought immediately, “Sh-t! I should write that down so I don’t forget it.” But then something happened or someone came in and, sure enough, I forgot my great answer.

  The thing is that although the sexes are equal, women are much needier than men. We just are. And we might as well embrace it. No one likes a needy man. No one likes a needy woman, either, but they dislike her less than they dislike a needy man. The thing most people don’t realize is that neediness is actually a form of strength. In many respects, it is the greatest form of strength, because when you are needy, you make it clear what you need from others. And setting clear expectations for others is one of the most effective ways to assert power over them.

  With so much pressure and drama surrounding the election, it’s no wonder that I was feeling my special female neediness power extremely acutely at this time. My relationship with Charlie Baird, the white-haired wizard of Wall Street, which began in the fall of 2016, was a sophisticated executive decision on my part to address some of my needs in an efficient and professional manner. Charlie was smart, rich, and universally respected. He was also charming and funny and had his own airplane with a stand-up toilet. All in all, he was a suitable consort for a president. The sex was good, not great, due mainly, I think, to a lack of imagination on his part, which always surprised me considering how ingenious he was at inventing exotic derivative securities.*

  People always ask, “What’s it like to have sex in the White House? It must be really hot, right?” The answer is, “No. It’s not particularly hot. Do you think it’s hot to have sex in your grandmother’s house? What’s wrong with you?”

  Eventually, the relationship had to be sacrificed on an altar of political expediency, and we parted with no more than an ordinary degree of bitterness and recrimination. There was a lot of that kind of thing going on at the time, and worse: deviousness, scheming, plots within plots, the White House resembling nothing so much as the Vatican under the Borgia popes,* although I’ll always have a bit of a soft spot for Callixtus III for vindicating Joan of Arc, albeit posthumously).

  To the public, it must have appeared very confusing and yet not terribly interesting—sort of like a foreign film. But for us on the inside, well, we were fighting for our political lives, or at least I was. My trusted advisors seemed spectacularly unable to find a clear path to the victory that always seemed almost within my grasp. Others around me repeatedly let me down, either through sheer incompetence or a stunning degree of myopic self-centeredness that, considering the stakes, bordered on the unpatriotic—even treasonous. Chief among this latter group was my own daughter (speaking of the Borgias!). Catherine seemed to think that just when her mother was working as hard as she could to be president was an ideal time to tell me that she had decided that she was a lesbian and was dating one of my Secret Service agents.

  Those of you who have children know how they always seem to ruin things by demanding time and attention with no consideration for others. I think every parent will agree that children are “takers” not “givers.” Here was Catherine, twenty-three or twenty-six years of age, still sucking the life out of me just as she did during those nine endless months in the womb. Whenever she wastes my time with some petty concern of her own (and it’s still happening!), I think how grateful I am that she is an only child—though I suppose things might have been different if I’d had a boy, since they seem much more self-reliant.

  Am I right, moms?

  Ultimately, of course, as everyone knows, the election was stolen from me at the last minute through the sort of dishonest parliamentary maneuverings that we can also thank the founding f-ckheads for gifting us with.

  The Meyer presidency was over.

  * This was something we tried once, assuming it would be catnip for the press—and it was—but never did again after one of the historians ended up talking too much.

  * I’m sorry if this is “too much information” or “TMZ” as it’s called. The manuscript of the book that I submitted to my publisher was short of the contractually mandated amount by about twenty-six words, and I had no choice but to add an assessment of my sex life with Charlie Baird to make up the difference. I was under incredible deadline pressure and it’s the only thing I could think of.

  * Who were as nasty a pair of pontiffs as you’ll ever meet.

  EPILOGUE

  A Woman in Full: Full Woman

  Or was it?

  Yes, it was.

  The measures of a successful presidency are straightforward: a strong economy, a country and a world at peace, and enlightened initiatives to secure a better and brighter future for all Americans. The measures of a successful post-presidency are less clearly defined. A PPOTUS is supposed to retire gracefully from the stage and spend the rest of his (or her!) days in relative seclusion doing good works and turning up in the newspapers only when another PPOTUS dies or when he (or she!) gets into a fight with a fast-food employee or flight attendant that someone records on their cell phone.

  Not me.

  I have a phrase I use—it’s kind of silly but I made it up years ago, and I still say it to myself softly, under my breath, when the chips are down—“Nobody puts Baby in the corner!” What I mean by that phrase is that I am “Baby” and nobody can push me aside and put me in some kind of corner. I used to use an earlier version of the phrase, which was “Nobody puts the baby in the corner!” but it evolved over time and eventually the article disappeared and “baby” became capitalized. Anyway, I don’t want to lose track of what I’m trying to say, which is that nobody puts Baby in the corner, not before Baby was president, not when Baby was president, and not now when Baby has had the presidency stolen from her.

  A very small number of activities are deemed appropriate for a PPOTUS. Unlike a former sports star, a PPOTUS cannot open a chain of affordable family-friendly steakhouses called “Meyer’s Flaming Pit,” star on Broadway in D-mn Yankees or even A Night with Selina Meyer, or become a Las Vegas casino greeter, despite the fact that Gerald Ford did it for many years. A visiting professorship at a great university, some similar post at a think tank or nongovernmental institution, the leadership of an international
body such as the World Bank or UN, delivering speeches around the world, appearing in a prerecorded message at the Oscars introducing a nominated song with an anti-bullying message . . . these are the sort of things that a PPOTUS is expected to do.

  And, of course, there is the obligatory book, which you are reading now.

  There is also one’s presidential library, and I expect that by the time you are reading this, mine has been built. In order to accomplish that, I hope that you read this book quite slowly or pick it up now and then and don’t read this part until several years after it is published. I want a really good presidential library—one where people can get really up to their elbows in the Meyer presidency—not one that feels slapdash, cheap, superficial, or impulsive like so many others. Scholars are fortunate that I myself expect to be around for many years to assist them firsthand with their research into the Meyer Era. They will have to make an appointment, though, because I don’t plan to just hang around my library waiting to be recognized. That would be pathetic. If I do do anything like that, it would be in disguise.

  Thanks to some pioneering work by my recent predecessors, it is no longer necessary for a president to participate in the good works of others. He (or she!) can do her (or his!) own good works through a process that begins with the identification of a problem, continues with the good works themselves, and ends with the problem being solved. I think that some of the efforts of past presidents to solve world problems (I won’t name names, but I’m sure you can figure out who I’m talking about) have been tainted by their committing to merely a disengaged figurehead role, by delegating excessively, or by attaching themselves, leech-like, to some existing charity like UNICEF and that kind of thing rather than taking the time and making the effort to really do something personal and original.

  Hence the Meyer Fund, my new global initiative that will tackle some of the world’s most intractable problems. People may love me or hate me, but I think everyone will agree that when it comes to overcoming the biggest challenges we face in the world today, there is no one better suited to lead the effort with imagination, insight, hard work, and untiring devotion to improving the lives of others. For my whole life, underlying everything I have done, is one overarching principle: love for my fellow man. I am not a religious person, per se. I consider myself more “spiritual,” in the sense that I believe that there might be a Higher Power in the universe that holds certain opinions about how we should conduct ourselves down here on Earth and judges us constantly for our adherence to the ideal. And I have always believed that this Higher Power, call him (or her!) what you like—Jesus, Buddha, Muhammed, Islam, Moses, etc.—wants us to treat each other with care and respect regardless of our station in life.

  It’s one thing to talk about these fine, noble sentiments. It is very much another thing to attempt to live by them. I believe that, through the Meyer Fund, I will be “walking my talk” as no PPOTUS, living or dead, has ever done before. The Fund is fortunate that, at its head, it will have someone with a deep understanding of the world’s problems and a strong sense of priority in terms of how to address them. First up: adult literacy.

  There is an epidemic of adult illiteracy out there that simply doesn’t get written about because the illiterates lack the necessary skills to describe their own misfortune. The Meyer Fund will reach out to those who suffer from this dreadful condition and hear from them in their own words or, if not words, gestures and expressive noises, what they need and want in order to become literate. That’s what will set the Meyer Fund apart: It is need-based. We don’t plan to patronize those we help by explaining to them what they need. We want to hear from them and then act upon the data we gather. Simple but highly innovative.

  Another global problem we will be addressing is AIDS, the dreadful disease that has taken so many lives. The Meyer Fund will be leading the fight against AIDS and the search for a cure. With luck, AIDS will be cured within our lifetime, if not sooner.

  Undoubtedly there will be other causes upon which the Meyer Fund turns its powerful spotlight of attention. Mine is a restless, questing intelligence unwilling to shrug my shoulders in the face of any problem. When I see something wrong, I want to fix it. I simply cannot respect people who “pass the buck” and leave messes like homelessness or Ebola (not that the Meyer Fund is working on those right now—we can’t do everything!) for others to clean up. While I often find those kinds of people charming, and enjoy their devil-may-care attitude more than the scolding, sanctimonious posture of the type who will not “pass the buck,” I don’t really respect them.

  I have never been a pessimist. Maintaining a positive attitude has gotten me through so many dark and difficult times. I truly believe that, like America, my best days are ahead of me. Fitzgerald famously said that “Every life has many acts.” While, of course, I think most people agree that everyone who lives a full life does many acts in the sense of “actions,” I prefer to interpret “acts” as referring to the acts of a play. If my life were a play, by my count I would currently be at the end of act 8 and looking toward the start of act 9. How many acts will there be in the drama of Selina Meyer? Only time will tell.

  For now, I want the world to know both that it will not have Selina Meyer to kick around anymore and also that it has not seen the last of Selina Meyer.

  Selina Meyer

  Manhattan, fall 2018

  APPENDIX I

  Legal Notice

  Editor’s note: As the consequence of a legal settlement with Catherine Meyer, Abrams Press is obligated to include the following statement in the Second Edition of A Woman First: First Woman by Selina Meyer.

  This book is a crime against history and a crime against humanity.

  My mother, Selina Meyer, has always been dishonest to a truly pathological extent. She is one of those people who can rewrite an account of an event in her mind moments after it happens that is totally at odds with what actually occurred, and then pass a lie detector test on her own version. These revisions of history are invariably made in order to flatter herself, to put herself at center stage, shift blame to others, or erase some embarrassment.

  To correct the record as regards myself: I am not a selfish, spoiled brat who committed treason by telling her mother she was a lesbian at an inopportune moment, which is how I am described in this book. That is just the pot calling the kettle black—although my mother is not a lesbian. But I am not the only person defamed here. In virtually every case, my mother’s descriptions of people and both her descriptions and perceptions of events are completely at odds with either what I observed directly or heard from others. In many cases, she describes events out of order or with key elements missing; in a few she invents something that didn’t happen out of whole cloth.

  I do not believe that this is the result of a deliberate, well-thought-out plan. My mother simply did not devote enough time and attention to this book for that to be true. After aggressively shopping a memoir for weeks, she was forced to accept a modest advance from a second-tier publisher. She then procrastinated for months and finally managed to deliver a manuscript, which she had dictated to her long-suffering press aide, Mike McLintock, over a weekend while she was under the influence of prescription drugs, nonprescription drugs, or alcohol, or some combination of all three and had recently returned from a stay in a mental hospital (or “spa,” as she would have it). The result you have before you.

  It has taken me many years of therapy to begin to be able to process the countless traumas my mother inflicted upon me during my childhood. My therapist believes that by airing her needling criticisms of me in public, this book may have set me back a decade in terms of dealing with my mother’s damage and becoming a semi-functioning adult. The unexpected love of a good woman has been the biggest help in my healing process, and I am infinitely upset to see Marjorie Palmiotti pulled into the black hole of my mother’s hatred. By buying and possibly reading this pack of lies, you are complicit in what is, quite simply, a case of child abuse.
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  Shame on you.

  APPENDIX II

  Tibet

  The one thing I thought I made clear to everyone involved with this book was how important it was to be accurate and comprehensive—to “get it right the first time,” as it were. This is not some book about how to organize your sweater drawer, though I hope to Chr-st it sells like one. This is a history.

  But somehow things fell through the cracks, and crucial details were omitted despite my clear instructions. And not just “details.” In fact, there is no mention anywhere in the book of what most people, including myself, regard as the most important achievement of my presidency, the freeing of Tibet.

  Yes, Tibet. Mysterious snow-capped land of monasteries; of intriguing Lhasa; of the city that time forgot, where daily life is still conducted according to the ancient rhythms of past millennia; of dignified lamas who live in both the world of the here and now and the world of the eternal spirit; of the yak, that great domesticated bovid with the beatnik hairdo; of mountains that literally scrape the sky, true pillars of heaven including the highest and noblest of all, Everest. It is a land of great joyous festivals and silent solemn prayers—a place, it is said, where the Buddha still walks among men as long as they are willing to walk with him.

  Tibet—peaceful, happy, minding-its-own-business Tibet—is also a land enslaved or, at least, it was until I freed it. Tibet’s enormous neighbor, the insatiable, relentless, ruthless China, had had its billions of eyes on Tibet for hundreds of years and, once the Communist government consolidated its power in the mid-twentieth century, it began to chip away at Tibet’s independence.