ARF!

Bo here, the conservative dog in the White House. I’m in the Oval Office with Barry and the boys while they decide on a strategy for the State of the Union speech. They can’t make up their minds. Big surprise, huh?

It’s been quite a week here since the Massachusetts senate race, all of them whining and moaning like a litter of pitbulls finding out they’ve just been sold to Michael Vick. Barry, of course, has been hardest hit. A retiree in Pompano Beach, Florida, gets bit by a sand flea, and Barry is hardest hit.

Still, the Scott Brown victory was a genuine blow to the faithful. Barry thrives on self-delusion, so the team here firehoses him with flattery non-stop. The One. The Lightbringer. Captain Smooth. Except for Rahm, the only guy who can tell Barry the truth. The only one who actually enjoys telling Barry the truth. Teleprompter Jesus. President Fist Bump. Harry Reid’s Immaculate Negro. Barry doesn’t appreciate it, but Rahm doesn’t care. Anyway, Scott Brown’s election really shook the place up. I was there. I smelt the fear…

“Now what?” Barry kept saying as he flipped through the channels looking for good news. “Now what?”

On CNBC, Norah O’Donnell woodenly read the latest vote tallies, mascara running down her cheeks like Chuckie the killer klown. Keith Olbermann was in the background, loudly vomiting into a waste basket.

Me, I was doing backflips and barking happily.

“The Kennedy seat,” Axelrod kept muttering. “We just lost the Kennedy seat.”

“What do you mean we?” said Barry.

“Yes, yes, that’s right,” said Axelrod. “It wasn’t a vote against you. No sir, not at all. It was anger, undifferentiated anger. Had nothing to do with you.”

Barry looked at Rahm.

“No, it was you,” said Rahm, grinning.

“We need to completely rewrite your State of the Union Address,” said Axelrod. “Listing your many accomplishments and your unique place in history to thunderous applause is probably not going to work right now.”

So here we are now, flopped in the Oval Office a day before the speech, and they’re still trying to decide whether to go “scorched earth” or “my people messed up, but you can still trust me.” Barry’s got his chair tilted back, feet up on the desk. Axelrod is sitting on the edge of the couch, sweating profusely. Rahm paces.

Axelrod pulled a newspaper clip out of his notebook. “I think last week’s David Brooks column gives us an insight into how to shape the speech.”

A year ago, the country rallied behind a new president who promised to end the pendulum- like swings, who seemed likely to restore equilibrium with his moderate temper and pragmatic mind. In many ways, Barack Obama has lived up to his promise.

“You see,” said Axelrod, “we stress your serenity under pressure, your calm demeanor as you look out on an economic landscape of total destruction–”

“Great, the old Marie Antoinette strategy,” grumbled Rahm, “that should thrill the voters while they wait in the breadline.”

“I don’t appreciate Brooks saying that in many ways I’ve lived up to my promise,” said Barry, toying with the Texas snow globe that Chavez gave him; shake it up and the oil companies are expropriated. “Sounds like faint praise to me.”

“Sir,” sputtered Axelrod, “later in the piece he compares you to Lincoln.”

“That’s better.” Barry looked at me. “I wonder if Lincoln had a dog too.”

I barked. Made Barry laugh.

“With this Brooks guy on board, maybe we should postpone the State of the Union address a few months,” said Barry. “Let the press write more columns about my steadiness and nice clothes, do some TV interviews, and people will forget about Massachusetts.”

“We can’t postpone it,” said Rahm. “Our media wall is cracking. Last Sunday Valerie Jarrett went on Meet the Press and got her ass handed to her by David Gregory.”

“David Gregory?” said Barry. “I gave him a one-on-one.”

“The man’s disloyal,” said Axelrod. “Valerie was doing her usual fine job shoveling the storyline that you had turned the economy around when David Gregory interrupted her–”

“He what?” said Barry.

“He interrupted her,” said Axelrod, head nodding. “Then he said:

I’m sorry – you can’t say you’ve turned the economy around when there are four million jobs that have been lost on the President’s watch, when the debt is higher, and the stimulus did not produce the jobs the administration said it would.

“Did she tell him it was George Bush’s fault?” said Barry.

“She did,” said Axelrod, “but he looked like he didn’t believe her.”

“Let’s face it,” said Rahm, “when we’ve lost David Gregory, who’s next? Oprah?” He jabbed a finger at Barry. “Time to bust some heads. You stand up at the State of the Union and start naming names, all the folks who have let you down, who have let America down–”

“I think a more… nuanced approach is required,,” said Axelrod, digging into a box of peanut brittle that John McCain had sent over. “You stand up at the State of the Union, acknowledge the applause, maybe flirt a little with Pelosi, and then you say, `I get it, Mr. and Mrs. John Q. Citizen. I understand why you keep rejecting everyone I campaign for. I’m doing all the right things, all the good and just things, but I’ve moved too fast–”

“Yeah, I’ve moved too fast for you iceberg lettuce eating, community college morons to keep up with,” said Barry. “I should have explained things in one-syllable words. Maybe put up some graphs–”

“Um, that might be a bit too confrontational,” said Axelrod, peanut brittle crumbs quivering in his moustache. “The main point you should stress is that you have heard their voices, and you intend to do better. Of course, you haven’t and you won’t, but it sounds good. I can send out a blast-memo to the usual stooges at the networks.”

“I don’t like the idea of admitting that I was wrong,” said Barry.

“You’re not really admitting–”

“If I say I intend to do better, that implies I haven’t achieved perfection,” said Barry.

I barked.

Barry patted my head. “See, Bo understands Euclidean Logic. Bo doesn’t like your non-confrontational approach.”

I barked again.

“Done deal,” said Barry. “No backing down. No wee wee.”

“It’s not backing down, sir, it’s triangulation,” said Axelrod. “Triangulation saved Bill Clinton’s presidency. You go along to get along, and you still get to fly Air Force One when you pick up the Nobel Prize for Literature for your next autobiography.”

“Look where triangulation got him,” said Barry. “A library the Saudis paid for, and an office in Harlem. No, thanks.” He pounded the desk. “Bill Clinton is not a world historical figure. I am.”

“Mr. President,” Axelrod said gently. “Your whole agenda is collapsing. Senators are panicking. Ben Nelson is afraid to go out to a restaurant for dinner –”

“We don’t need Ben Nelson anymore,” said Rahm. “Send him a gift card from Dominos and he can order in for the next year. It’s time to play hardball, Slim. No retreat, no surrender, you’re on the bus or under the bus.”

“Sir, with all due respect, this is exactly the wrong approach,” said Axelrod.

Barry glared at him. “It’s decided. Tell the speechwriters that I want the word `fight’ used in every paragraph of the State of the Union Address.” He smacked his fist into the palm of his hand, winced. “I’m a fighter, fighting the good fight for you.”

I bared my teeth in approval.

“Yeah, you’re Spartacus,” yawned Rahm.

“Okay. so, who can we blame?” said Barry. “Who’s the bad guy? Other than Bush? How about those ungrateful, right-wing hicks in Massachusetts?’

“Probably not a winning strategy,” Axelrod said gently. “Better to go with the I’m one of you crap. When the mob is approaching with torches and pitchforks, the smart move for Frankenstein is to pick up a torch and try to blend in.”

I growled at him.

Barry patted my head again. “Forget it, Ax, Bo and me, we don’t turn tail.” He stroked my ears. “So who do we blame for the country being worse off now than when I was elected?”

“Uh… racists?” said Axelrod.

“We’re not running against the Klan,” said Rahm.

“Unconscious racists,” said Axelrod, “That could be anybody.”

“Big banks,” said Rahm. “Big banks and the fat cats.”

“Great idea if you’re willing to write off New York City,” said Axelrod, “and about fifty million dollars in campaign contributions from Goldman Sachs and Lazard…”

“You boys have to think bigger,” said Barry. “I say we go after all of them.” His eyes were bright. “Fat cats and bankers, obstructionist Republicans and unconscious racists. Gun nuts in pickup trucks and ungrateful soccer moms who don’t want to grant citizenship to the illegals that mow their lawns and clean their houses.”

“Sir,” said Axelrod, his face red as a balloon about to burst. “Sir, when you pick a fight with over half the country, who’s left to vote for you?”

I licked Barry’s hand.

“See that?” Barry said to the two of them, pointing at me. “See that? Bo loves me. That’s where charm comes in. I could pick a fight with the whole darned world and people would still love me.” He waved at the door to the Oval Office. “You boys take off now and get to work. Me and Bo are going to relax. It’s been a long, hard day.”

Axelrod sighed, slumped toward the door. Rahm followed, shaking his head.

“If I had known being president was this tough, I’d have stayed an adjunct professor,” said Barry.

I howled in sympathy.

As you can tell, my role is to encourage Barry’s worst instincts. I was the one who had him insult the Cambridge PD when his buddy, Skip the Scholar, threw a hissy fit. I was the one who got him to hand over the Christmas Bomber to Eric Holder, so they could tuck him into a comfy bed with the Bill of Rights wrapped around him. It’s not really that difficult. Insecure narcissists look for affirmation in their bowl of Wheaties. A few months ago when Barry was getting dressed for some speech, I grabbed his tie and ran away with it. He thought it was cute. That’s when he started showing up for major events in slacks and an open-necked shirt, like every day is casual Friday, even when responding to the latest unemployment report or a terrorist tries to blow up an airplane…

So if he makes the State of the Union address in a bathrobe and slippers, you can thank me.