It was one of the president’s “quiet” periods and McCord ducked his head into the Oval Office. He was lucky. Corcoran was reading, not sleeping.
“Feeling a little better today, Jack,” the president said, motioning McCord to come in. “A bit more pep. I seem to go up and down, like a roller coaster. Sometimes I feel almost normal; other days I don’t want to get out of bed.”
“You’re doing fine, Mr. President,” McCord said. `You’re carrying on like a real trouper.” Buck up his confidence, McCord thought, keep negative thoughts far away. Now, back to reality.
“How are things with Lisa?” he asked.
Corcoran sighed. “The silent treatment,” he said. “I don’t think she’ll ever forgive me.”
“She’s not thinking of leaving, is she?”
“No,” the president said. “That would stab me in the back and I don’t think she wants to humiliate me, at least not in public. I think she still loves me, but she’s caught in the middle of some pretty conflicting emotions. She can’t believe I had an affair. Other politicians do that, she told me, not you. And then to get this. She thinks I got my just deserts. But I think she still cares for me and doesn’t want to see me—you know, like die. I see hints of affection there occasionally. I don’t know, maybe I’m seeing things. But I think she still cares.”
“The reason I ask is that we need to do something bold,” McCord said. “I’m not sure what, but may it could involve Lisa. People are noticing you aren’t yourself and I think we need to squelch it. Any ideas?”
“I know, I get these looks from people. `How you doin’?’ they ask and it’s not just polite conversation. You can see they’re concerned. Been whispers?”
“Yeah,” McCord said. “Cancer and weight-watchers gone amuck are most popular theories.”
The president laughed. “Maybe we should shoot a personal trainer at dawn to shut up the yappers.”
“We need a Hell-Mary pass, sir,” McCord said. “We also need to gear up for re-election.”
McCord knew the problem wasn’t just the president’s health anymore. It was his drive, his vision. He was reacting to events, not taking control of them. His presidency seemed to have slowed down. His plans, his agenda, were stalled in Congress and Corcoran was doing little to push them forward. There had been a crisis in Asia—Pakistan and India about to go to war, both talking vaguely of using their nuclear weapons. What did the president of the United States do? He asked the United Nations to handle it. Tom Corcoran had punted.
McCord had suggested a trip to central Europe: a tour of the former “captive” nations, a little saber-rattling toward Russia, rev up the ethnic folks back home, get the president’s mind—and the media’s—off the listlessness on the home front. A no-lose proposition. But the president had said no, he was too tired to undertake a big trip like that now. He wanted to feel better first.
McCord recognized the behavior. It was the bunker mentality. He remembered it from the late Nixon years and, more personally, during Reagan’s last years after Iran-Contra broke. The problem was, this threat was internal—in the president’s body, not the body politic. So to the outside world, the president’s passivity was uncharacteristic, unexplained, mystifying. Friends and foe alike wondered if he had lost the will to lead, to govern. And why.
The third year of any four-year term—be it for a mayor, a governor or a president—is a time to pile up accomplishments for the re-election campaign to come. The first two years are a time of trial and error, of finding the right mix of aides and agency heads. Time to do the unpopular things so that, hopefully, they are long forgotten by the time the next election occurs. But the third year—that’s when a president should hit his stride, become comfortable in his role and the people comfortable with him. “President Corcoran” was no longer an unfamiliar phrase on the news or with the public. The third year was a chance to set an agenda before the dynamics of the campaign become dominant, before everything a president does or says becomes overshadowed by re-election politics.
And, McCord knew, this president was blowing it. The conventions were more than a year away, the election almost a year-and-a-half into the future. Democrats were already setting up shop in Iowa and New Hampshire. And, of course, some Republican moderates were finding excuses to visit both states too.
McCord told the president that Washington gossip had it that if he were really sick, he may not run for re-election. Hungry politicians always sense an opening. Social media was buzzing with theories and speculation. Bloggers, right and left, were having a field day. One big public misstep, he said, and that trickle would become a flood and the White House would be inundated.
“You know, I’ve always hated exercise,” the president said. “But what if I did something, in a public way.”
“Clinton jogged…” McCord said.
“Maybe I could too,” Corcoran mused. “The symbolism would go right to the problem—my health, and could silence the other grumbling. What if I prepared for a marathon?”
“Mr. President — with all due respect — you couldn’t run 100 feet without falling on your face.”
“I know, I know, but what if I ran on the days I felt okay? The doctors are here to monitor me, make sure I don’t go too far. I don’t have to aim for a particular marathon. Just some point in the future.”
“A marathon may be a bit too much,” McCord said. “What about a 6K or 10K race? That would be doable.”
“What’s 6K?”
Oh boy, McCord thought, gotta ways to go here. “It’s kilometers, sir. Six kilometers are a few miles.”
“How long would it take to run that?”
“Depends how fast and how heavy you are,” McCord said. “In your case…”
“Okay, okay, okay. I don’t need an answer. But we need to do this in a public way.” The president thought for a second. “Could this backfire, Jack? Could this give the media the hook to write about my health that now is just whispers.”
“Possibly,” McCord said. “But the talk is out there already. We could use this to put a positive spin on it, say it shows there’s nothing wrong with you.”
“I need to do this publicly, too.”
“I don’t think you should train publicly, like on city streets or the White House grounds,” McCord said. “That didn’t work well with Clinton. The Naval base is the best.”
“But how would we get some PR out of it?”
“You could enter a scheduled 6K run. We’ll put it on your public schedule. Hopefully early some morning. Remember, we wouldn’t be interested in reporters, just the cameras. They’ll come.”
“Reporters will, too, Jack.”
“That doesn’t mean you have to talk to them. Remember, you’ll be running.”
“Okay. So how do we start training?”
“Let me talk to Elsner,” McCord said. “Perhaps we can put a treadmill in the private residence, build up your endurance, then go public.”
“Sounds fine. Do it. Now, how’s fund-raising going?”
“Well, we haven’t sold the Lincoln bedroom yet—”
“—That’s good,” Corcoran said. “I’m not sure I’d want strangers traipsing around the hallways. They might catch the chill between me and Lisa—”
“—but the early ads have started. Ruffalo and Greenberg are putting together focus groups to gauge their reaction. Soft and fuzzy stuff initially. Just image reinforcement.” Johnny Ruffalo was the president’s pollster; Jay Greenberg his media consultant. One was very tall, the other very short. Corcoran referred to them as his Mutt ’n Jeff team.
“The polls seem steady,” the president said. “Not great, but not terrible.” In fact, his approval rating seemed stuck around 45 percent. Not bad for a minority president—he’d been elected with less than 50 percent—but low enough to give opponents hope. If less than half of the country feels you’re doing a good job, then maybe the other half can be persuaded to vote for your opponent in the next election. Or at least so the Democrats hoped.
“Yes,” McCord said. “All the Washington gossip appears to be staying inside the beltway. No blips yet in the hinterlands. When, sir, do you think you have to decide you are healthy enough to run for re-election?”
“There is no `when,’ Jack. No ifs, ands or buts about it. I’m running,” Corcoran said. “If we dither on that, we will just fuel the skeptics and the gossips. I’m running and I plan to be here another five years. Until I can’t walk anymore, I’m running. Don’t think about anything else. If at some point I fall flat on my face and can’t get up, well, then we’ll rethink it. But we can’t let negative ideas infect our thinking.”
McCord was surprised—even delighted—by the president’s determination. Maybe talk of re-election had rejuvenated him, brought back his old spirit. “You know, Mr. President. You haven’t visited New Hampshire in a while. It might be good to remind any overly ambitious Republicans that they visit New Hampshire at their own risk. You might even do a morning jog while you’re there.”
“That has a nice ring to it,” Corcoran allowed. “Yeah, talk to the doctors. Set it up. Call it Operation Run for Daylight.”
“Then you know who Vince Lombardi was?” McCord said.
“Naw,” Corcoran said. “My daughter just read a biography about him. She’s crazy about pro football.”
As McCord walked back to his office, past the Roosevelt Room — did anyone ever use the Roosevelt Room anymore? — past the offices of the president’s aides and his own staff, his secretary ran out to stop him. The First Lady had called very upset, she said. Had to talk to him right away.
McCord grimaced. He had barely talked with Lisa since the president was diagnosed, preferring to let the president handle her as best he could. He knew she was the linchpin of any cover-up strategy—she could, of course, end his presidency at any moment. But her role as First Lady and as angry wife were one in the same and this was too personal a combination for McCord navigate. Yes, they had been friends for many years. But they weren’t so close that he could avidly recruit her to his cover-up plan. Neither he nor the president was sure where her feelings really lay. The truth was, he wasn’t sure he could trust her anymore, whether her anger and pain were greater than her political loyalty. So instead he had kept his distance and hoped that her love for Corcoran, however wounded, would override her feelings of betrayal and allow the Corcoran presidency to continue.
Now, he feared, he was about to be thrown into the middle of the emotional vortex he had sought to avoid. First he called the Oval Office. Perhaps the president knew what this was about. He didn’t, though, and all McCord did was alarm the president that something could be amiss. He couldn’t put it off any longer. He asked his secretary to get the First Lady on the phone.
“Lisa—I heard you called,” McCord said, upbeat as possible. “What’s up? How’d your lunch go?”
“Fine, Jack, until I left,” she said. Her voice betrayed no emotion. She was not in a good mood. “Then some reporter asked me about Sally Winters. Who else knows about her? How did he find out? I don’t want my personal troubles all over the front pages.”
McCord exhaled slowly. How did a reporter find out about Sally? Was news seeping out? “Do you know who the reporter was or what he looked like,” Jack asked.
“I’d never saw him before,” Lisa said. “He was tall, dirty brown hair that looked as if he hadn’t washed it in weeks. Casually dressed. He looked more like a biker than a reporter.”
McCord’s eyebrows picked up. Schwartz. Scuzzy Schwartz. Had to be him. Looking for a reaction, a revelation to help along a story he probably did not have nailed down.
“I think I know who it was,” the chief of staff said. “And I don’t think he has anything.” Then he told Lisa who Scuzzy was and about the encounter in Kansas City. “If he knew anything, he would have printed it by now, not ambush you. I think he’s trying to egg us into a reaction to give him what he does not have.”
“But how did he find about this Winters girl?” Lisa asked.
“I don’t know,” McCord said. “But we’ve made sure he won’t get to her. She’s in a more secure location. He won’t find her now.”
“But what if he prints something about her?”
“If he had anything, we would have read it by now,” McCord said. “He’s fishing. He might know something, but not enough to go into print. And for a supermarket tabloid, you know, they don’t need much. Just ignore it. We’ll handle it. I don’t think he has anything.”
“Still, I’m nervous,” the First Lady said. “Jack, I don’t know how I feel these days. I admit, I go back and forth. One day I feel sorry for Tom. The next day, I feel like throwing him off the South Portico balcony. How he could have done this to me and the girls! Possibly gotten us sick as well. He’s so selfish!”
“He’s a politician,” McCord said, relieved that Lisa was opening up to him. Maybe she was on board after all. “It’s always his career first, you know that. You’ve lived with it for 20 years. It’s just the stakes are higher now. Much higher.”
“I know,” she said. “But I can’t seem to separate the personal from the political. It all seems jumbled up in one.” She paused for a second to gather her thoughts. “Do we have anything to worry about from this Top Star reporter?”
“Not yet,” McCord said. “I have a tail on him. Maybe we could step up our surveillance. But as I said, if he had anything, he’d be writing about it, not asking you about it. I think we’re safe for now.”
“We need to know what he knows, Jack,” she said. “We can’t let him out of our sights. I want my family protected. Do whatever you need to keep on top of him.”
“Will do, ma’am,” McCord said, intrigued that the First Lady was giving him orders. That hadn’t happened since the campaign. It was a good sign, he thought. She was still on the team.
His next call went to Joe Crane. The order: tap Schwartz’s phones at home and his office.
“I can’t do that, Jack,” the FBI director said. “There’s no evidence of a crime. A judge would never approve it.”
“This is national security, Joe,” McCord said. “Find a judge to go along. I’ll give you a list of those we appointed here in the district and in Florida.”
“On what grounds?”
“Say he’s been making threats toward the First Lady,” McCord said. “He approached her after a lunch here in Washington today and upset her with his questions. Say you have info—national security info—that you can’t divulge in court. We need to keep track of this guy.”
“This is getting a little scary, Jack.”
“Let me worry about that. Get those taps. I want to know what this guy is up to.”