Authors: Reed Sprague
“And the media uncovered the fact that my great–great grandfather was a member of the KKK, a fact that I was not even aware of. Imagine going that far back in my family to find dirt to use to ruin me,” Dominici said.
“The members of the media and the boys who were taking over my office in Tallahassee knew the rumors of bribery and bigotry weren’t true — in fact, there was no basis whatsoever for them — but they also knew that they would get me to resign, and that then those ole boys would simply walk in and take over. Once the new group did take over, they and the media blamed the rumors on the republicans. Nobody ever answered for those awful rumors. I was left out to dry.”
“Who are ‘they’?”
“Litten and the boys. They’re brutal. And that’s who you’re up against.”
“Why the fallout with you? Why did they not want you in that position?”
“I believed in campaigns like the one you’re trying to run now. They believed in the candidate of the media. They believed either that a candidate should be created by the media or that the candidate should be sold to the media. I believed that the media should report on the candidate, and that’s it. I was morally right, but that day was the beginning of the time in this country when moral rightness and fifty cents would get you a ten–minute phone call from a pay phone, but would not get your candidate elected.”
“There were not many pay phones around then, Mr. Dominici, and there are even fewer around today.”
“You see, son; that’s my problem. I live in the past. I always have. You’re a creature from the past, too. You won’t survive in politics today. Get out while you can.”
“I like you, Mr. Dominici. May I have your phone number?”
“Has anyone ever told you that you don’t listen well, you’re not realistic, and you’re annoying?”
“Yes, sir. I’ve heard it before.”
“You may have heard the words at some level, but I’m not sure they were absorbed by your brain. Here’s my phone number.”
All signs directed Alex to the road to surrender. If he hadn’t resigned his position at the FBI, he would have given up after speaking with Dominici. But he had no other options. He had to make it work. The campaign was his only choice.
Sunday, 26 January 2014. Day seven began no different than the first six days except that it was Sunday, so Alex and his parents attended sunrise mass before Alex hit the campaign trail. The disappointments on the campaign trail were the same as usual.
Alex headed down the same highway he was on when he happened on Dominici. He stopped along the way to Sanford to speak with several farmers and other people who lived in the rural areas between Gainesville and Sanford. It was 11:45 in the morning and he was approaching Dominici’s home. He was starving. He’d had no breakfast, in order to save a few bucks, so lunch was on his mind. Approaching Dominici’s house, he could see that Dominici was out again, working in his yard. Though unsure of his own reasons for doing so, Alex stopped again to say hello.
“Have you thought about my offer?” Alex said, calling out jokingly, as he got out of his car.
“What offer?”
“The offer I’m going to make to you to be my campaign manager.”
“Hilarious. You could do better. I’m not sure that I could, but you could definitely do better.”
“Do you mean a better joke or a better campaign manager?”
“Both.”
“Can I buy you lunch?”
“I don’t do power lunches anymore. Haven’t in years.”
“This won’t be a power lunch. It’ll be the special over at the truck stop.”
“You really are a pain, aren’t you?”
“Yes, sir. I am.”
“Give me a minute. I have to go clean up. I’m not used to going places. I leave this haven only occasionally to go to the market to get groceries.”
“Nobody calls them markets any longer. They’re now called grocery stores.”
“Hilarious.”
The ride to the truck stop was quiet. Alex’s car hummed, then clanged, rattled, slowed, turned sharply, pulled into a parking space, and stopped. The truck stop was huge—three restaurants, forty–seven gas pumps, four truck wash stations, two car washes. The entire complex was spotless.
The two sat down at a booth. Dominici ordered steak and eggs; Alex ordered a giant hamburger, fries, and a salad. Both ordered water to drink.
“I figured that I would eat steak, since you’re buying,” Dominici said.
“Glad I took you to lunch today rather than tomorrow, then,” Alex said.
“Why? You going broke?”
“Faster than I thought.”
“Good. Now maybe you’ll give up.”
“I won’t give up.”
“I can tell. What’s your strategy?”
“My strategy? Well, um. I, um, well, you know… I uh, well, I’ll go door to door, get commitments for votes, uh… debate. I’ll debate Jennings. Campaign heavily in Gainesville and Jax. And, that’ll wrap it up.”
“You really are naive, aren’t you. Listen, let me give you some more free advice.”
“Let me guess. I need to get out now?”
“No, I mean, yes, that’s still a good idea, but for whatever reason — apparently known only to God and you — you’re going to stay the course. No, my advice for right now is that you get realistic about all this, and that you do so in a hurry.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means that you have to engage Jennings, you have to do so soon, and you have to be careful how you go about it.”
“I’m not going to trash him, if that’s what you mean.”
“No. That’s not what I mean. Your listening problem just kicked in again. Anyway, he’s the front runner, and that’s an understatement. He’s bought and paid for the media. Those boobs have done what they always do wrong. They’ve jumped on board. He’s their boy. They can’t back down. He’s got them because they’ve demonstrated that they love and adore him. He’s their messiah. They’ve made him that, so if they back away, or if they even begin to act independent, they lose face. They’re not going to do that.”
“So what does all that mean?”
“What it means is that you have to engage him by challenging him, but again, you have to be very careful how you do that.”
“Challenge him to a debate?”
“Yes, but not right away. Eventually, yes. But not now. You don’t want him to take you seriously until it’s too late. You don’t challenge him directly, you do it through the media.
“Our goal is not for you to trash him, it is for you to become the media’s new messiah. You see, if the media leave one messiah for another, they save face. It’s an even exchange. They can’t leave a messiah to side with a regular candidate, but they can exchange messiahs. If they should decide to exchange his messiahship for yours, they’ll do the dirty work for you.”
“I have no interest in being a savior. I want to be elected because I want to do a good job of representing my constituents.”
“Have I told you that you’re naive?”
“Have you thought anymore about my offer?”
“What offer?”
“My offer to you to serve as my campaign manager.”
“You didn’t make me an offer.”
“That’s because I have nothing to give you in return for your services. I’m nearly broke, remember?”
“And you need to remember that I’m no longer in politics.”
“You can win, Mr. Dominici; you can still win. And you see that I have no idea what I’m doing, except that I want to win. I really do want to win.”
“You can’t win. It’s just not possible.”
“Do you have a family, Mr. Dominici?”
“Do you have ears?”
“Yes, I have ears. Do you have a family?”
“I’m estranged from my daughter.”
“Why? You’re so personable. I can’t imagine that there’s someone you don’t get along with. What’s the problem?”
“Why are you prying?”
“This is a job interview. I have to make sure that you have no personal skeletons before we agree that you’ll be my campaign manager.”
“My wife, Joan, gave birth to my daughter, Kathy, late in our married lives. Joan died in the birthing room, just as my daughter was being born. I raised my daughter on my own. She’s a good girl, but somehow she blames me for bringing her into this world without a mother. She can’t forgive me for that and for leaving her with one sitter after another while I was on the road getting politicians elected to office. When she was only in the sixth grade, she suffered through the embarrassment and humiliation of the bribery accusations against me.
“When she was little we were close. She adored me. Things changed after the bribery accusations. We haven’t had a close relationship since then, and now she holds me in absolute disdain and she believes that I feel that way about her. I don’t; I love her dearly, and I miss her. But she will not talk to me. She’s thirty–one now.”
“I am so sorry to hear that you went through all of that, first with your wife and then having to raise your daughter on your own under those circumstances only to have your relationship with her sour. Will you ever speak to her again?”
“I doubt it. Last I heard she’s doing well.”
“Does she have a family?”
“No. No family. Several broken relationships.”
“Do you fear success again, Mr. Dominici?”
“I fear nothing that I will not encounter. I will never face success again.”
“I am absolutely serious about you managing my campaign. Would you?” Alex asked sincerely.
“No. You need to win. The odds against you are already overwhelming. You don’t need to make them worse by having a has–been for a manager.”
“You told me directly that you believed that I am naive and unrealistic,” Alex said.
“So you were listening after all.”
“I told you I was.”
“Good for you.”
“Now, I would like for you to listen to me. You’re afraid of winning, Mr. Dominici. You really are. You have created a cocoon to live in, a cocoon with walls and a roof constructed of bitterness, resting on a foundation of cynicism. Winning would make you rid yourself of all that crap. You want to cling to it all because you can’t imagine how to live without it. That’s sad. The first time I met you I thought that it was impossible that anyone could be so cynical, but you are. You really are.”
“When I was your age, I was hopeful. Now I’m pessimistic.”
“Are you pessimistic about our country?”
“No. I have no doubts about our country. We will continue to be the greatest nation in the history of the world. I’m pessimistic about our political process. We have got to do better.”
“Then help me do better. What do you have to lose? Your bitterness? Your cynical view? Why would you miss that crap? If, as you say, I’m doomed to lose this race anyway, how can it be worse if you’re on board? Will you at least think about it?”
“Yes. I’ll think about it, but that’s all I’ll agree to do right now.”
By late afternoon of day eighteen, Alex had lost all hope. He hadn’t heard from Dominici, but he hadn’t called Dominici either. He would try to talk with him today, and if Dominici refused to manage his campaign, Alex would throw in the towel and return to the FBI to beg for his job back.
As he approached Dominici’s driveway, he noticed a large panel truck and several other cars parked there. He could see Dominici clearer as he approached the drive. He was also able to see an old–fashioned giant campaign banner hung across the front of Dominici’s small wood frame house, “Alejandro Perez, Jr., for U.S. Congress — Integrity and Honesty — A True Representative for the People of District 3.”
Dominici, clean shaven and wearing a business suit and tie, was hardly recognizable. It appeared that he was giving an interview to several reporters, including a television news crew from a Gainesville TV station. The reporters were clearly interested. Alex stopped his car in the driveway to sit quietly from a distance and just observe. It was obvious that Dominici had set up a full–fledged news conference.
“So, Mr. Dominici, you are back in Florida democratic politics?”one reporter asked.
“I am managing Alejandro Perez’s campaign for the U.S. Congressman’s seat in this district,” Dominici said, succinctly. “Mr. Perez stands for ethics in government, fiscal responsibility, and he stands proudly on a platform of dignity for all. He respects the rights of all citizens—the religious and the atheist, the farmer and the farm worker, the business owner and the employee, the retiree and the young family, gay and straight, rich and poor.”
“Sounds as if Mr. Perez is planning to tell everyone what they wish to hear,” another reporter said, signaling that if Dominici was considering plans for his candidate to become the replacement messiah, he would face an uphill battle.
“My candidate, the next U.S. Congressman from this district, Alejandro Perez, Jr., will represent the people of this district. That will be a welcomed change,” Dominici said.
“What about Jennings?” a reporter asked. “Is he not the presumed democratic candidate, the frontrunner, the heavy favorite, chosen by the democrats? Why don’t you just go along with the previously chosen democratic candidate? You’re not exacting revenge for the past, are you?”
“Mr. Perez is proud to be a democrat, he presumes nothing, but he plans to be the next member of congress from this district. We have nothing against the other democratic candidate. Mr. Jennings has a right to try to pull off an upset if he wishes, but we believe we’re going to win.”
“Win?” a reporter asked, as another called out, “Upset? What upset? Your candidate is unknown. Jennings is showing a ninety percent chance of winning the seat.” Another called out loudly, “How’s Perez doing in the polls?”
It was time for Dominici to end the interview. Perez didn’t register in the polls. As far as poll results showed, not only was Jennings the front runner, Perez didn’t even exist. No one knew who he was. That was about to change.
Dominici changed the subject. “My candidate is known to the people in the rural areas. He began his campaign by traveling door to door, meeting people and writing down their needs. Specifics. The other two candidates began their campaigns with huge billboards and a blitz of TV ads in Gainesville and Jacksonville.”
“But no one knows who your candidate is. No one’s ever heard of him,” shouted out yet another reporter.
“Few know the others either, except through huge portraits on the side of the road and nonstop television ads. Think about it,” Dominici reminded the reporters.