1980–1
The heat wave of the summer had broken in late September and fall had come swift on its heels. Ronald Reagan had co-opted George Bush as his running mate and the Republican bandwagon was rolling towards inexorable victory in November. Mike had barely kept himself on an even keel, spending his days looking through the legal journals in search of a job but making no headway: every ad he responded to seemed to have been placed too late – he was sick of hearing the voice on the phone offering saccharin commiserations: ‘We’re so sorry, Mr Hess, but that position has now been filled . . .’
He was getting on OK with Bob McMullen but little more than that. Susan sensed the lack of warmth and told Mike she was worried she had put two of her friends in a situation that wasn’t working out, but Mike said everything was fine – he had far bigger problems to worry about.
On 4 November Reagan won in a landslide, condemning Jimmy Carter to the worst defeat of an incumbent president since Herbert Hoover. Mike met up with John Clarkson and they drowned their sorrows in the Numbers Bar on the far side of Connecticut Avenue. John was a committed Democrat – he had worked for a Democratic senator and seemed to take the defeat as a personal rebuff – so Mike made it his business to cheer him up with a constant and copious supply of drink. When Susan arrived she said she’d been trying to call Mike all day and gotten no reply.
‘I’ve been really wanting to find you, Mike. There’s been a couple of calls for you from Ron Kaufman at the Republican National Committee, and they sound urgent. He says he told his boss about you after that meeting you had. They just discovered you were fired from NIMLO and, well, it sounds like they want to offer you a job.’
Mike said nothing but John spluttered through a mouthful of beer, ‘What? Mike go work for the Republicans? You cannot be serious!’
Mike went to the meeting in a panic of indecision. He wanted a job – needed a job – but John Clarkson was right. On the Metro from Dupont to Capitol South he agonized and changed his mind a dozen times. The escalator carried him up from the subway into a wintry sun that wavered uncertainly above the Capitol. The row of low-built white-fronted offices across the street gleamed in the morning light, the headquarters of the Republican high command preening with the assurance of status and power. In the main lobby of 310 First Street Mike came face to face with a life-size image of Ronald and Nancy Reagan, waving and smiling with the Hollywood confidence that had charmed a nation. Mike shivered and asked the receptionist to let Mr Kaufman know he was here.
Kaufman came down himself, chatted in the elevator as if they were old buddies and led Mike through plush carpeted corridors where secretaries looked up from their keyboards to wave good morning and brass nameplates adorned oak doors. Mike thought how good it must be to have a brass nameplate . . .
‘Welcome to mission control.’ Kaufman laughed as he ushered Mike into a smallish office equipped with expensive-looking furniture and poured them both coffee. ‘I take it you know what we do – coordination for the party across the nation, development and promotion of the party’s political platform, fundraising, election strategy. High-powered and serious. But we also organize the convention every four years and now, praise be, the president’s Inaugural – that’s the fun stuff and that’s what we’d like you to come and help out with. How does that sound?’
Mike blinked. Kaufman was a fast talker and he felt maybe he hadn’t taken everything in.
‘Tell me again – you want me to work on the Inaugural?’ Mike wasn’t sure what he’d been expecting, but this sounded like a job labelling envelopes for invitations to a presidential party.
‘Sure. The Presidential Inaugural Committee’s being constituted this week and it’ll run for a couple of months – Reagan gets sworn in on January twentieth.’
Kaufman explained that the RNC needed volunteers to help with planning and staffing, arranging transport and staging the inaugural events like the parade and the ball, and marketing the official commemorative book and other souvenirs.
Mike gave a little laugh. ‘So it’s basically selling hot dogs. Is that what it is?’
Kaufman smiled.
‘That’s about the measure of it. But don’t forget the golden rule of politics: if you want to get on, you need to be in the right place at the right time.’
Susan Kavanagh and John Clarkson snickered when Mike told them what he had been hired for, but he worked his time, labelled the envelopes and shuffled the papers. His most arduous task was to help draft hire contracts for the eight ballrooms in DC hotels and convention centres where 50,000 Republicans from the nation’s four corners would gather to celebrate the inauguration of their man in the White House. On January twentieth his reward was a seat in the staff bleachers on the West Front of the Capitol. He was there at 11.30 a.m., as Reagan stepped up to be sworn in as fortieth president of the United States; and he was there at 11.35 a.m., the minute a UPI flash confirmed the hostages had taken off from Tehran after 444 days in captivity. Reagan’s triumph was Carter’s humiliation, and Mike felt both; his unease at the advent of the Republican right was attenuated by the exhilaration of the occasion and the sense that he was part of the machine which had put it in place.
In the evening he took Susan to the Inaugural staff ball at the Washington Sheraton. They floated through waltzes and jumped about to Kool and the Gang’s ‘Celebration’, which had hit number one in the charts. ‘There’s a party going on right here, / a dedication to last throughout the year,’ the young Republicans sang. ‘We gonna have a good time tonight; / let’s celebrate, it’s all right . . .’ Mike and Susan drank in the atmosphere and the free wine till their heads were light, their thoughts raced and their emotions were torn in a thousand directions. Mike smoked a joint in the men’s room, its effect infinitely magnified by the knowledge that he was doing it in the heart of the Republican beast.
On the stroke of midnight an excited young guy with a West Coast accent got up on stage and asked for silence, the ballroom lights dimmed and suddenly they were there: Nancy, slender and shimmering in her ten-thousand-dollar gown, and the Gipper himself, impossibly tall and erect with his glossy hair swept into its perfect quiff and his perfect teeth smiling from his manly actor’s face. Susan grabbed Mike’s arm and joined in the collective scream of excitement; Mike felt his body quiver with the warm, tingling pleasure of nervy anticipation. As Frank Sinatra sang, the president did his ‘Aw shucks’ routine, thanked his staff and kissed his wife. Mike’s head was spinning. The Reagans were among the crowds on the dance floor now, led this way and that by a beaming Ron Kaufman, who whispered the names of important staffers they needed to greet. Reagan’s head towered above the throng and Mike pictured him as handsome cowboy, a muscular doomed athlete – as his own lover. Kaufman was whispering again and Reagan was right there beside him, taking his hand in his and delivering perfectly the line he had been told to say.
‘Well, Mr Michael Hess, I presume. I’ve heard a lot about you and I would be honoured if you would give me your support, as a member of our young generation, in the efforts we’re making to ensure this country’s future. What do you say, young man? We’d sure like to have you with us.’