Heave a ho

Some advice for the Prez from Will Durst:

I'm only guessing, but a major problem with being president has to be people around you being more likely to stick their face in a cast iron oscillating fan than tell you the truth. Let's say you slip and fall and rip a hole in your pants down to your ankle while spilling hot coffee on a little blind girl in a wheelchair in front of a nationally televised audience. The worst you could expect to hear from a staffer is "Well, that could have gone better."

First thing. Don't worry so much about the Republicans. They're going to do what they're going to do. You don't even enter into the equation. [...]

It's your so-called friends you need to watch out for. The ones who smile and nod and laugh at your jokes to cover the slip of a shiv between your third and fourth ribs on the left side. Trust me, with friends like these, you don't need Richard Shelby. Unfortunately, most of your buddies are Democrats. Which is a lot like saying most of a general's fighting force is terra cotta. The difference being terra cotta soldiers don't cut and run so fast they leave little puffs of cartoon smoke.

The second thing is, you need to develop an "or else." Work with you, or what? Or Joe Biden sits next to you in the Congressional dining room and cuts your meat every day for a week? Lyndon Johnson plucked at the horsehair holding up the sword of Damocles for his "or else." Walk the line or find yourself whisked back to your home district as a clerk in Park and Rec's lost and found. His idea of compromise was letting you use his pen to sign your vow of allegiance.

Finally, your people have lost all sense of urgency. You got to fire somebody. You know -- ax. Can. Dump. Sack. Pink slip. Terminate with extreme prejudice. Discharge. Unassign. 86. Downsize. Furlough. Ease out. Make redundant. Perform a bum's rush. Give the boot. Hand someone their marching orders. Assist in an accelerated career-development shift. Impose a synergy-related headcount restructuring. Heave a ho.

Go see who he thinks Barry should fire to make a statement. Heh.