Authors: Reed Sprague
“I’m sorry, Mr. Danielson, what exactly do you do here in Washington?” Alex asked.
“You’re joking, right?” Danielson had enjoyed far too many drinks; he blurted out, “I give you money for your work, Mr. Congressman. That’s what I do in Washington. I pay your salary. I’m your boss, along with all the other bosses here in this room. Don’t worry about having so many bosses, though, because we’re easy to work for. All you do is take money and do what we need to have done.”
The waiter walked by carrying a tray of drinks. Danielson stumbled toward him and grabbed a fresh drink from his tray.
Matching Gregory’s social grace, Danielson turned to Kathy and said, “you must be Mrs. Alejandro, or maybe ‘Mistress’ Alejandro,” as he laughed awkwardly, stupidly. “Either way, I’m not your judge. Just keep smiling. No one here asks personal questions—if you know what I mean.”
“Please allow me to introduce my wife, Mr. Danielson. Her name is Kathy Dominici Perez. Kathy is Cole Dominici’s daughter. Kathy, this is Mr. Danielson, Mr. Drunkard Danielson, I believe is his full name,” Alex said.
Danielson didn’t get it. He knew something was wrong with the introduction and the conversation that had just taken place, but he couldn’t set it all together. He stumbled and stammered, slouched to the side, fell over his own feet, grabbed a chair, which prevented him from slamming all the way to the floor, then slithered off to another part of the auditorium.
The auditorium was filled with lobbyists. The hard liquor flowed freely throughout the entire place. Like drunk locusts the lobbyists swarmed over the new arrivals.
Members of the media were there as well—newspaper reporters, photographers, cable news program producers, including Thompston from Brighton’s program. A group of reporters had decided to sneak into the auditorium and work undercover. The politicians and lobbyists had no idea the reporters were in the room with them. Thompston couldn’t have been more satisfied. She and her photographer took a lot of pictures and some film footage as well. Alex and Kathy, the new Mr. And Mrs. Messiah, were caught on video cavorting with the dreaded D.C. lobbyists, lobbyists who were drunk no less, staggering around the room, “planning their next bribe.” At least that’s how it would play out in the next day’s newspapers and television news programs.
Newspapers across the country the following day carried articles and displayed pictures of the event. “Business as Usual in D.C., Even for the Sincere Florida Farm Worker,” was the headline on the front page of Jacksonville’s
Florida Times–Union
. The
Gainesville Sun
front page headline was not much better, “Farming for Gold” read the banner across the top of a picture of Alex and Kathy as they embraced well–known crooked, and clearly inebriated Washington lobbyists Sam Gregory and Timothy Danielson. “War Hero Fights the Crowds to Get Next to Lobbyists,” was the headline for the story on page two of the
Washington Times
.
Thompston and Brighton’s revenge was to be sweet. Thompston couldn’t plan fast enough to broadcast footage of “The King and Queen of District Three” swooning and rubbing elbows with the detested compromisers of D.C. politicians. She met with her boss, Brighton, and instructed him that that night’s show could not be nice. It had to be tough. Perez had to be exposed as a fraud. And so he was. Brighton was uncharacteristically tough that night, even brutal. His face was red with anger. Thompston’s words blazed across the Teleprompter and were read by Brighton just like the good parrot he was.
Hancock was enraged. He spent a full five minutes at the beginning of his program that night slamming away at Perez. Hancock reported that “Perez’s now famous campaign notes were obviously nothing more than meticulous secret code for where to go to get bribes as soon as Perez set his feet on the tarmac in D.C.”
“He probably went straight from his private jet — in his luxury limo, of course — to his luxury hotel suite, to his throne in the banquet room, hobnobbed with his media buddies, and picked up his checks from the thugs who will be pulling his strings for the next several years,” Hancock blasted out during his diatribe.
The whole thing was a media disaster for Perez, and there was no easy way out of it. It seemed that the Washington machine had consumed him as soon as he departed his plane a few nights before. It was as if he had been unable to avoid the machine’s influence because it seemed that he actually wanted to be consumed by it. Dom was not around to prevent this media disaster and he was not around to fix it. Alex and Kathy were on their own now.
Kathy began to plan.“Go directly to Hancock. Avoid Brighton and Thompston. Ignore them. They’ll get angry and report things that are untrue, and, when they do, we’ll expose them. They’ll be easy. They’re not very smart. We’ll get them.
“The one we have to deal with is Hancock. He’s filled with righteous indignation, but not blind anger. There is nothing that speaks louder than righteous indignation. You don’t refute righteous indignation. You don’t deny it. You join in. You become indignant yourself. Nothing will disarm the indignant against us better than becoming one of their own,” Kathy said while she and Alex tried to enjoy dinner at their townhouse.
“We have to use them, even Hancock. We have to use him. We know we’re right, that we did nothing wrong. We have to explain that without coming across as victims. We were caught off guard, and we were taken in because of our naivete, but Hancock will never allow us to be the victims. He’ll eat us alive if we explain things in that context.”
“What do we do then?”
“We — rather you alone — go on his show and simply tell the truth. That’s all we can do. He’ll continue to blast away at us if we just try to ignore him. We have to engage him.”
“What’s with engagements in your family? Your father used to talk about engaging all the time, too.”
“Well, it works, doesn’t it? So maybe we should stick with it.
“Here’s what we’ll do. You have to meet with Hancock first to give him a chance to blow off at you. He’s got to let the steam off at you privately. That way he will have gotten most of it out of his system before you go on his show for a live interview. I’m not saying that it’ll make the interview a piece of cake, but I do believe that it’ll give you a chance at a reasonable interview, a less confrontational interview,” Kathy explained.
“You do know that to Hancock ‘letting off the steam’ means he’ll blast me. It’ll be abusive,” Alex said.
“Yes, and you’ll take it. You’ll just sit there and take it. Then you’ll go on the show — that same night — and you’ll calmly walk Hancock and the rest of America through the events of our orientation night, about how you and I take full responsibility for being there, that you’re sorry, and that you assure the American people that you will not be controlled by lobbyists. You’ll bring Hancock and America back to your side. We’ve got to do it soon, though. We can’t make it look as if we’re hiding.
“You need to fly to New York Monday morning, meet with Hancock in the early afternoon, and go on his show for the live interview Monday night. It’s that simple, and it will work. For good or bad, you’re big news right now. He’ll make room for you Monday night if you just show up.”
Perez flew to New York and showed up in Hancock’s office to talk and to ask to be interviewed. Before there would be a civil conversation, though, there would be venting, just as Kathy had predicted.
Hancock flew off the handle, but not out of blind anger. He was truly indignant. “What in the hell are you trying to pull, Congressman? I gave you honest and straight–forward coverage during your campaign. I believed that you were sincere. Then you pull a stunt like this. Do you know what I look like now! Do you realize what a fool you’ve made of me? The American people embraced you as a sincere politician because of my show. My reputation was on the line, and you smeared it with your filthy mud that you gathered when you rubbed bellies with your swine lobbyist buddies.
“You show up here and ask to be interviewed, but the real question you need to ask is, Do you have the guts to come on my show and have it out with me? Not just a standard interview, but an old–fashioned slugfest! Do you, Congressman? And I mean without the gloves, Congressman. I’ll have you on tonight, if you’ve got the backbone to do it. Do you?”
“Yes. Set it up and I’ll be there. No limits. You can ask me anything you want and I’ll answer honestly and directly. I have one request, though.”
“You’re not in any position to be dictating the terms of the interview, Congressman.”
“I’m not asking to dictate anything. I simply have a request of you. I would like to read a prepared statement — eight minutes tops — after which you can ask questions for as long as you wish.”
“Prepared statements are risky. Typically they don’t contain facts. Typically they contain carefully–chosen words that are selected by a person who is trying to get out of trouble. Words on paper don’t fly with me, Mr. Perez. And how do I know that you won’t get up after reading the statement and walk off the set and refuse to answer questions?”
“Because I give you my word that I won’t do that. You can put it in writing and I’ll sign it in front of a witness.”
“You’re on. You’ll have five minutes for your propaganda statement — that’s it, not eight — then I’m moving in on you with tough questions. And I will receive a copy of your statement at least one hour before you go on. And you will agree that you will not deviate from the written statement I receive from you in advance.”
Five minutes didn’t seem like enough time. Alex had no options, though. At least he would have some time to make his case. He relented without even letting Hancock know that he felt the terms were unfair, and without trying to negotiate. “Okay,” he replied simply.
Perez left Hancock’s office shaken but satisfied that he would have his chance to set this trouble behind him so he could get on with serving the people of his congressional district. He went to his hotel room, napped, showered, ate a bite for dinner at the hotel restaurant and returned to Hancock’s studio, written statement in hand.
Kathy had done a good job writing the statement, except that it was a full eight minutes long. Perez knew that Hancock’s time limit of five minutes meant exactly five minutes, and not one second more, so the statement would have to be edited.
Kathy had stayed behind in D.C. She had not been feeling well, so she stayed in D.C. to see her doctor. She planned to fly to Jacksonville to meet Alex at the airport there after Hancock’s show. Alex had no time to go over the statement in detail with Kathy over the phone, so he cut it himself.
As always, Hancock’s show was live. Hancock went through his normal beginning–of–the–show stuff, and then he addressed his viewers directly. “Congressman Alejandro Perez, Jr., of Florida’s third congressional district was featured on this program several times during his campaign last year. I presented him as a refreshing figure in politics—a genuine, sincere and caring candidate who wanted to represent the needs of the people of his congressional district rather than to arrogantly allow them the privilege of being his subjects. I believed that I was telling a story of a contrast between today’s stereotypical egocentric politician and a candidate who wanted to become a true representative of the people.
“My coverage of Mr. Perez was borderline favoritism, and I am fully aware of that. I believed that I was careful enough to present him as sincere without siding with his beliefs or his stand on any particular issue. My coverage was biased, though. I realize that now, and I realize that I made a big mistake by not challenging Mr. Perez on the issues and on his integrity. I promise you, though, that I did my homework to verify that his hard work, done during his campaign, was real. I verified that he went from door to door to get to know his future constituents and to try to understand their needs. Still, I was guilty of biased reporting. I detest biased reporting, regardless of who it is that is guilty of it, including me. The only thing I know to do is to try to set the record straight by interviewing Congressman Perez on tonight’s program.
“I don’t have to tell you all that Mr. Perez is now in hot water with the American public and with me, and also with other members of the media. He deserves to be in that hot water. To his credit, Congressman Perez showed up in my office today — without a formal request from me that he do so and without preconditions — to ask to be interviewed by me on this program. He asked to first read a statement to you. The congressman and I agreed that his statement will be limited to five minutes. If it runs longer, you will not hear anything after exactly three hundred seconds. I’ve instructed my producers to cut his mic after five minutes. He and I further agreed that at the conclusion of his statement I will ask him any questions I choose, for as long as I want to, and that he will answer each question truthfully and directly.
“Congressman Alejandro Perez, Jr., welcome to the T’kina Hancock Show. Thank you for coming on.”
“Thank you for having me.”
“Okay, you heard my introduction, please read your statement and then let’s get on with the interview.”
Looking nervously at his written statement, Alex began to read, stumbling at first, then a bump here and there, but ultimately smooth reading and clear proclamation without the jitters, and with full confidence that comes only with truthful confession.
“On January 8, 2015, my wife, Kathy, and I flew to Washington, D.C., so that I could begin my work as a congressman, representing the people of Florida’s third congressional district. We arrived at the airport, took a cab to our townhouse, and stayed there for a few hours before attending what we believed was an official orientation session at the Mark Williams Military Sacrifice Memorial Auditorium. Upon arrival there we soon realized that the event was not ‘official’ by any definition of the word. Still, I believed that attendance was, officially or unofficially, prerequisite to my work in Washington. I was wrong.
“The event was, quite simply, a drunken party. And it was a drunken party put on by lobbyists. The lobbyists spent thousands, perhaps hundreds of thousands, of dollars in order to inculcate junior national politicians in the way they — the lobbyists — want to conduct Washington’s business. They want to conduct that business as it has been conducted for decades: by and for the benefit of lobbyists. These lobbyists view America’s elected officials as their personal puppets, and they dismiss as irrelevant the electorate whom the elected officials are sworn to represent.