Thursday, June 13, 2013

Potus Rewrites

In the section where Potus and Johnson meet in the limousine:

“So you guys protect the president, no matter what?” asked Potus.

“Well, Sir,” said Johnson, “The Secret Service also protects the currency.”

“Well done,” said Potus. “I need currency to fund my army."


The infamous fart scene needed some expansion:

Potus sat for a long while to let the director cue the Potus graphics and signal the end.  Finally receiving the signal, he stood and put his hands behind his hips, stretching his back.  "Oof," he said, gripping the edge of his desk and bending forward.  The distinct sound of a deep-note kettle whistle could be heard.  "Aah," cried Potus, stamping his feet.  He gripped the edge of the desk more tightly and let another lengthy one rip.  The Chief of Staff who had approached waved his clipboard to fan his face with a grimace.

"Still rolling," called a technician from somewhere behind the lights.

"With sound?" asked another.

"Negative," the first answered.  "But I think it's obvious."

"Cut the feed, cut the feed," cried the director.

"Excellent job," exclaimed the Chief of Staff kneeling to get to face level with Potus.

"Yes, yes," said Potus talking to the floor and gripping the edge of the table.  "We have given the common every-person what they want.  An honest assessment of the state of affairs of the nation."

“Did you fart, Sir?” asked the Chief of Staff.

“Of course I farted, asshole. My ass is full of gas!” exclaimed Potus.

"It smells like natural gas," said the Chief of Staff, wrinkling his nose.

"It is natural gas." agreed Potus.

"Yes, Sir. I think we should stand now," said the Chief of Staff.

"In a minute," growled Potus.

And more expansion before the "Go Fuck Yourself" scene:

"A rider?" asked Potus.

"You know, some pork.  Some grease."  The Speaker of the House smiled mischievously.

"A metaphor for money?"

"Exactly."

"No way.  It is my way or the highway.  Getting rid of Daylight Spending is its own reward."

"I don't follow," frowned the House Speaker. “You have to have some give-and-take in this city, it’s how things get done around here.”

“OK, I’ll play your game, but only because I don’t want to kick your ass. I’m tired and I already kicked four asses this morning. What do you suggest?” asked Potus.

“That’s not how it works, Sir,” said the House Speaker.  “You have to mention something you’re willing to give and how much you’re willing to spend (so to speak) and we come to an arrangement.”

"Never mind," said Potus.  "Do it or don't, nobody cares.  The common every-person is fed up with the nonsense coming out of Washington.  As a representative of the common people, I’m empowered by myself to tell you to go fuck yourself. Speaking of which, my staff spent a lot of time trying to come up with really good ways to say 'go fuck yourself' to Congress and I wanted to run those by you."

"Um..."

"Sit back and relax.  Here we go." said Potus, picking up a piece of paper and putting on his reading glasses.  "Let's see.  'Go have sex with yourself', that is pretty basic.  Not very imaginative.  'Go autonomously into coitus'.  I like that, but I don’t know what it means.  'Go masturbate selfishly', you see because it's go fuck yourself by yourself."

"Sir," objected the House Speaker.


Wednesday, June 12, 2013

Potus rewrites

A new excerpt for the scene after Potus gets the shoe thrown at him.

Potus tilted his head away.  "I'm fine," he said.  "You should see the other guy.  I nailed him, mano-a-mano with his own shoe."

"I saw it on the TV.   I don't think you hit him," she said doubtfully.

"Tell her, Johnson," said Potus proudly.

Johnson shook his head.

The First Lady shoved Potus' shoulder.  "You and your stories.  Always trying to be a bigger man.  Speaking of which, you need more potassium and fibre.  I'm going to tell the doctor and the chef to get you more vitamins and minerals."

"Aw," complained Potus.

"After this we can go upstairs," said the First Lady.  "I want to show you the drapes." The First Lady strode out of the clinic purposefully.

“Let me ask you something,” said Potus to Johnson. Potus sat on the crinkly paper with his legs dangling.

“OK,” said Johnson.

“Let me ask you a personal question,” Potus repeated.

“No problem, Sir,” answered Johnson.

“Once when I was young and single before I met the First Lady, I had an incident with a tornado. It was late spring and some college buddies and I stayed out late after finals. We went down the local DQ and were hanging out causing trouble. One of us had some dope and most of us had beers. I think it was Barnyard beer.

“One of my good friends had his girlfriend with him and we secretly thought he didn’t deserve her because she was too pretty for him. There had been reports of a storm coming in but none of us wanted to leave and the guy who had the fake ID had already bought a 24-pack of Barnyard or whatever it was. We were sitting around and talking when all of a sudden we see that the place is completely deserted.

“We didn’t think anything of it until the tornado sirens started. As you can imagine, we started running around like chickens without heads. None of us could drive because we were all pretty messed up. Anyway, we each scattered in different directions and I ended up behind the liquor store next to a trash bin. Not a trash bin, a dumpster. I looked around and the guy’s girlfriend was looking for him. I called her over to the trash bin just as a gust of wind almost knocked her down.

“She came over with me and we jumped inside the trash bin. It was filthy, but better than being out in the exposed elements. The rain and wind were fierce and it kept getting darker, like really, really dark. It was almost night at one point. The girl and I were holding onto each other for dear life. I kept thinking that I was holding her arm, but after a while I realised I was holding her tit meat. I thought it was her bicep, so I kept squeezing it to reassure her. But it was her tit.

“When the tornado came by about a mile east of where we were, the wind blew the so crazily that the dumpster lid closed and we were blown across the lot into a field. I heard a lot of screaming from the girl, and I grabbed her bicep even tighter. Then I realised I was the one screaming and she had passed out from the pain, probably.”

Johnson stood quietly for a second, then asked, “Sir, you said you were going to ask me a question?”

“Right,” said Potus. “The question is, I’m still pretty manly right? I’m a goddamned hero in that situation, right?”

Johnson stared at Potus through his dark glasses for a long time. Then he said, “That’s classified, Sir.”

Tuesday, June 11, 2013

Potus rewrites

More rewrites for Potus. The section from the first press meeting:

"Ladies and gentlemen of the press," Potus began.  "I use the terms lightly of course:  few of you are ladies and even fewer of you are gentlemen."  Some polite laughter flitted among the reporters.  "This is our first press meeting and I'd like to keep it brief.  As you know, I am the busiest leader of the free world so my time is very valuable. However I gladly share it with you. Politicians like me are rarely treated with respect but I ask that you treat me with respect. Politicians are people too. They’re just corrupt people who deserve respect. Um, I might have that wrong, but you get my drift.  You there, you have a question?"

Later, during the cutbacks from Congress cutting off Potus' funding:

"Yes, Sir?" snapped the Head of Homeland Security chief suddenly awake and reading his notes.  "We're well ahead of schedule to increase body scans and intrusive pat-downs.  Nearly four trillion pairs of shoes have been inspected in the most successful security detail of all time," he said.

"Bullshit," said Potus.  "Taking off shoes is bullshit.  What is your department doing about cutbacks?"

"Cutbacks, Sir?"

"Yes, reductions, layoffs, forced retirement, no more internal office email.  Things like that.  I’d say we don’t need to look at the common every-persons’ shoes anymore.  I mean, what kind of threat could a shoe produce?" asked Potus.

“A shoe could be very dangerous, as you know very well, Mr. President.  Your eminence has even had one thrown at him recently,” said the head of Homeland Security.

“Don’t call me ‘your eminence’ you pansy,” said Potus.

The head of Homeland Security squirmed in his large leather chair. “Yes, Sir, your em… Sir,” he said.

“Anyway, you’re Quite right, I did have a shoe thrown at me as the office representitive.” said Potus.  “But an Office is invulnerable to shoes.  You can’t throw a shoe at an Office. I guess you could, technically. Not a glass office, of course. You shouldn’t throw shoes in a glass office.  What Enough about that, what do you hope to find anyway, looking in at all those shoes?”

The head Head of Homeland Security paged through his notes.  “Sir, I have a list here of threats we’ve recovered from shoes just last year.  We protected the flying every-person from the following threats.  Let’s see.  31,000 pounds of chewing gum, over 200,000 grams of tiny gravel and pebbles, um… fifteen pieces of very sharp broken glass.  Let’s see.  Well, let’s just say there were various other threats to passenger safety.”

“I’m not buying it,” frowned Potus.  “We need to chop the deadweight and protecting people from little bits of gravel isn’t enough to justify the cost.”

And later in the same meeting:

Potus waved at his protest.  "Just make sure you document all these threats and tell the Vice President to do his job over there in the House of Representatives.  Make sure they keep these safety issues first and foremost in mind.

“Speaking of the House,” continued Potus, “the states have to cut back. We could chop some of the fat around this country. We have fifty states, for example. Do we need all fifty?” Potus looked around the conference room. No one spoke.

“I say we don’t need two Dakotas,” said Potus. “That’s one example. You don’t need a North and a South Dakota. You just have one. Instant savings!” Potus clapped to drive the point home.

“Sir,” began Chief of Staff, “we can’t just get rid of states. They’ll be upset about the cutbacks and they could threaten to leave the Union.”

“I hate Unions, as you know,” retorted Potus. “In any case, I’m just brain storming. Nobody else has good ideas here. How about the timezone problems? We really need to get rid of daylight saving! That’s quite a saving in itself. Imagine all the cutbacks we could avoid by not setting our clocks ahead and back two times a year.”

Chief of Staff spoke up. “Sir, two states already ignore daylight saving. Arizona and one other. I’m not sure.”
“New York,” said the Head of Homeland Security.

“New York?” asked Potus. “That’s a city.”

“It’s also a state,” said the Head of Homeland Security meekly.

“Well, that’s good. Arizona and New York City get medals. Let’s think of more ideas.”

The room was silent for a long while. A sound of paper ruffling was heard. Another sound of someone coughing politely into their fist was heard. A door opened somewhere out in the hall and people came in and went out beyond the door.

Potus finally spoke up. “Listen everybody. We need to have deep cutbacks. Everything should be on the table.”

“What if the table isn’t big enough, Sir?” asked the Chief of Staff.

“We’ll make a bigger table,” exclaimed the Labour Secretary.

"That’s the thinking I like! Meanwhile," Potus said, smirking and rubbing his hands together gleefully.  "Meanwhile, it's time for some cutbacks here in the White House.  I don't think we need so many maids and menservants do you?"

And at the end of the meeting:

Potus put his hands down.  "Layoffs?" he prompted.

"Ah yes, layoffs.  My favourite topic.  When I was a young lady working under Number 40, we once had to..."

Potus raised his hands to stop her.  "Ok, reduce staff by 60%.  Got it.  Someone write that down. Now,” said Potus standing to make his point. He leaned on the large wooden table with his fingers. “You’re either with me or against me. I need only the most loyal people following me. The times will get tough and I need people I can trust behind me. Anybody worried about their jobs, get the fuck out now.”

Several moments went by. Two staff members stood up and left quietly. A few more followed from the other end of the table. A group of six staffers suddenly got busy gathering up papers, books and briefcases. They filed out quietly.

“Good,” said Potus firmly. “What time is it?"

Everyone A few of the staffers and Cabinet members left in the room checked his or hertheir watches and their phones.

"12:45," said one.

"12:40," said another in quick succession.

"1:30," said a third down the table.

"Close enough," said Potus.  "Time for lunch!"

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