Our very own Tom Sawyer

By Michael Moriarty
web posted June 14, 2004

Back in the Iron Age, when I used to be a naïve Liberal, I stared
at a liberal newspaper's photo of then-President William Clinton
in the Oval Office. By gum, if it didn't bring a Clintonian smile to
my face! There he was, in the heat of the World Series, holding a
Louisville Slugger as if he were clean-up hitter for the
Washington, D.C. Little League. Dreams of Babe Ruth's glory in
his puckish grin, all eager and ready to put that ball into the
bleachers.

There he is, I thought. Our very own Tom Sawyer.

Not since JFK and his Camelot in the White House have we had
such a lovable Democratic president. The rumors out of
Arkansas that he was really "One Slick Willy" didn't, in the least,
faze me or even America, for that matter. That label obviously
didn't alienate anyone with any influence. To most Americans, it
was small-time, state-sized southern mud that just didn't stick on
Slick Willy!

This 20th-century reincarnation of Tom Sawyer had the innate
ability to get all his friends to paint his own fence.

"This is fun!" cried Tom, as he passed his brush over the walls
and porches of the White House. "Do you wanna try it?," he
asked with his mischievous grin.

"Why?," the onlookers wondered. "Painting is for kids."

"Unless you become like little children," the President quoted
from the New Testament, "you cannot enter the Kingdom of
Heaven."

"He knows his Bible," said one onlooker. "Goes to church every
Sunday."

"Yeah," piped in another, "and he's got the Reverend Jesse as his
personal shepherd."

"Let's do it," they all cried.

Well, they went to work on the White House, but one of the
admirers noticed something unusual. "This isn't paint, Mr.
President. It's something else."

"Oh," smiled Tom Sawyer, "That's just the base coat. We'll put
the white oil-paint on after."

"Gee," said the admirer, still a bit confused by the rather stinging
odor of the base coat. "Okay," he added resignedly as he began
once again to swipe his brush on the porch fence.

"Oops," said one volunteer, "I spilt some on a patio chair."
"That's alright," grinned Tom. "We're paintin' them too."

"What?," the painters exclaimed.

"Oh, yeah," Tom sang. "Everything will be white. All perfectly,
pristinely white. And the minute there's any stain on it, we'll bring
in the steam cleaners."

This time, Tom's smile showed his teeth. He rarely grinned like
that. His amusement was more like the mysterious upturned
corners of Mona Lisa's lips.

Suddenly Tom's cell phone rang.

"Bill here," he muttered.

There was a pause, after which our hero exclaimed, "Oh, Jesse!
So good to hear your voice!" He then turned to his audience and
had them read his lips.

"It's Jesse Jackson," he mouthed.

They all smiled. We're one big happy family now. Rainbow
America.

"So, what can I do for you, Reverend?" The last word was
enunciated with the utmost respect, much to the satisfaction of
the onlookers.

While the reverend talked, Tom moved to an empty corner of
the porch.

"Not a problem," he said quietly. "Not a problem."

As expected, the volunteer painters — the VPs — smile. That
acronym made them feel like they were on the White House
team.

The VPs kept their ears cocked. They all wanted to be in on this
conversation.

Suddenly Tom burst out laughing. It was the first, real, big laugh
they'd ever heard from this man.

"Oh, Jesse," Tom said when he simmered down. "You still
believe in Santa Claus?"

All the VPs laughed.

Some painters, however, lowered their brushes. Tom noticed the
work interruption.

"Hold on, Jesse," he said, just before cupping the cellphone with
his palm. "Keep paintin'," he said to his now indolent crew. "We
gotta big house here, ya know?"

"The fun's startin' to wear off, Tom," one of the men said.

"Well, then, you won't be able to sleep in the Lincoln Bedroom,"
Tom reprimanded.

"What?" 

"Yep," he nods to them. "Anyone of you that helps paint the
whole house will have one free night in the Lincoln Bedroom."

The VPs were back so fast to their painting, Tom had to
chuckle. He just couldn't help himself from barking a big ole
Arkansas belly belch. There he was on the porch of his house,
his very own White House, enjoying himself as if he were around
a cracker barrel in Mena.

I'm here to make things work, he thought to himself. Yep, keep
the ole tractor on track.

"So where were we, Jesse?" he asks into the phone.

A small pause for listening.

"Oh, that," he guffaws. "Not a problem. Not a problem."

Again the VPs erupt into laughter.

Tom is so bolstered by this approval he continues, hunting for
another laugh. "So, help me Santa Claus!!!"

Again another laugh.

"That's what I'll mean when I have to say..."

Tom stopped. So did the VPs. Tom noticed the sudden silence.

"'Scuse me, I have to take the rest of this in the Oval Office."

Tom hurried through the French doors. Three of the VPs
followed him in. They started painting the walls of the Oval
Office.

"Now, gentlemen…" said Tom to the three of them, "Excuse me
Jesse. You don't have to begin in here yet."

"You said the whole house," replied one, already working on the
leather sofas.

"No, it's top secret. This phone conversation has to do with the
Middle East… and terrorism!," he added with an ominous,
wide-eyed and utterly southern salesman's grin.

"Oh," said one. "Right, Mr. President. We'll be outside if you
need us."

"Good," said Tom. 

The painters left, leaving the door open a crack.

"Okay," Tom said to Jesse. "This crap comin' out of all the
nervous nellies in my party jes' has to stop!"

A pause.

"Nonsense!"

"Ridiculous!!"

"Impossible!!!"

Tom's voice was rising until the Pentagon could hear him.

He became aware of how loud he'd become, so whispered,
"Jesse, God is Santa Claus!"
 
Objections from the other end of the line.

He continued to whisper into the phone, articulating the
consonants fiercely. "An opiate of the people, remember?"

Tom heaved a number of sighs, paced around his desk a few
times and then finally came to a stop.

In a very muted but angry tone he said, with ultimate finality, "I
can lie to Santa Claus any time I damn well please."

With that, Thomas William Jefferson Clinton Sawyer slammed
down the phone.

"Damn," he muttered. "Cowards."

"Anything wrong, Mr. President?," asked one of the painters as
he peeked around the door.

"No," said Tom, collecting himself. "No, not in the least. Oh, by
the way, do you believe in Santa Claus?," he said with a wink
and a smile.

"Oh, I get it," grinned the VP. "Sure. I believe in Santa Claus."

Then he winked right back at the President.

A few years after that photo was taken of our Tom Sawyer in
the Oval Office, I began to think of leaving the United States.
With his grand jury testimony, I started realizing that William
Jefferson Clinton's base-coat to the painting of the White House
was lye.

Lye eats at things eventually, you know. You can cover it up for
a while but the paint starts chipping very quickly. Conveniently
for the Democratic Party, the topcoat didn't start peeling until
President George W. Bush took office.

What I thought would be our new Camelot ended up as "Come-
a-lot" and then turned out to really be "Lie-a-lot."

Since former President Clinton treated an oath before God as if
it were a promise to Santa Claus, I've taken the Clinton St.
Nick's name literally. The God I was raised to believe in is a kind
of Santa Claus. He's not the terminator portrayed in the Old
Testament because the jolly ole man I know is very slow to
anger. If we're reasonably nice and not naughty, He rewards us.
However, if you push Him by lying to Him, by using His name
for sin and vanity, and by making it internationally fashionable for
the entire human race to do the same, well, He tends to get a
little riled.

"How sharper than a serpent's tooth it is to have a thankless
child."

That's out of the mouth of King Lear. That Shakespearean
monarch should have raised a set of children who tell him that he
never existed in the first place. How's that for ingratitude?

I've a hunch that President Clinton has been missing more than
just a few presents under his Christmas tree. This year, a
neglected back-up pitcher named Senator John Kerry swept out
of the Democratic bullpen to dampen Tom Sawyer's dreams of
bunting his wife Hilary into the Oval Office. The Santa Claus I
know forgot more about baseball and politics than the former
President ever learned.

There's always 2008, of course. However, that would be my
Republican consolation from a Democratic victory in November
2004. Mrs. Tom Sawyer is not likely to unseat an incumbent
from her own party.
 
Perhaps 2012. However by then, Tom's wife will be getting a
little long in the tooth.

For now, I'll just hold my nose and vote for George. War is hell
and the sulfur rises from both sides.

When all is said and done, however, who could possibly have
imagined that the best imitation of Tom Sawyer would be tossed
off daily by our very own Billy the Kid?

Michael Moriarty is a Golden Globe and Emmy Award winning 
actor who has appeared in the landmark television series Law
and Order, the mini-series Taken, and the recent TV-movie The 4400.
 In May, Moriarty won a Leo Award (celebrating excellence in British 
 Columbia film) for best supporting actor for his role in the 
 TV-movie Mob Princess.
 
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