Kim Robinson - Sixty Days and Counting

“Yes,” Charlie said, and thought of what Drepung had said on the river. “It was a new incarnation for him.”

“And then he got so much done. There were five separate New Deals, did you know that?”

“Yes, you’ve told me about that.”

“Five sets of major reforms. Diane has done a complete analysis of each.”

“He had huge majorities in Congress,” Charlie pointed out.

“Yeah, but still. That doesn’t guarantee anything. You still have to think of things to try for. People have had big majorities in Congress and totally blown it.”

“That’s true.”

“What would he do now?” Phil asked. “I find myself wondering that. He was a pretty creative guy. The fourth and the fifth New Deals were pretty much his own ideas.”

“That’s what you’ve said.”

Phil was standing before the statue now, leaning a bit forward so that he could stare right into the stoical, blind-seeming face. The current president, looking for guidance from Franklin Delano Roosevelt; what a photo op! And yet here were only Charlie and the Secret Service guys to witness it, as well as a runner who passed through with a startled expression, but did not stop. No real witness but Charlie; and Charlie was about to jump ship.

He was feeling too guilty to let the walk go on any further without reference to this. So as they moved to the next room of the open gallery he tried to change the subject to his own situation, but Phil was absorbed in the Depression statues, which Charlie found less compelling despite their inherent pathos: Americans standing in a bread line, a man sitting listening to a fireside chat on a radio. “I see a nation one-third ill fed, ill housed, ill clothed.”

“It’s almost like the problem is the reverse now,” Phil observed. “I see a nation one-third too fat, too clothed, too McMansioned, while the third that is ill fed and ill housed still exists.”

“And they’re all in debt, either way.”

“Right, but what do you do about that? How do you talk about it?”

“Maybe just like you are now. These days, Phil, I think you get to say what you want. Like on your goddam blog.”

“You think?”

“Yes. But look—Phil. I asked for some time today so I could talk to you about my job. I want to quit.”

“What?” Phil stared at him. “Did you say quit?”

“Well, not quit exactly. What I want is to go back to working at home, like I was before.”

As Phil continued to stare at him, he tried to explain. “I want to take care of Joe again. He’s having some problems getting along at the daycare center. It’s not their fault at all, but it just isn’t working very well. I think it would be better if we just stayed home for another year or so, until he gets to the normal preschool age. It would be better for him, and the truth is I think it would be better for me, too. I like spending time with him, and I seem to do better with him than most people. And it won’t last long, you know? I already saw it with Nick. It just flashes right by. A couple of years from now everything will be different, and I’ll feel better about leaving him all day.”

“These are critical years,” Phil pointed out.

“I know. But maybe they all are.”

In the memorial they were moving from the Depression to the Second World War, as if to illustrate this thought. In this open room there was a different statue of FDR, bigger and in the old style, draped in the dramatic sweep of a naval cape, free of glasses and looking off heroically into the distance.

“I don’t want to stop helping you out,” Charlie said, “not at all, but the thing is, most of what I’m doing I could do over the phone, like I did before. I thought I was doing okay then, and you’ve got all the technical advice you could ever want, so all I’m doing is political advice.”

“That’s important stuff,” Phil said. “We’ve got to get these changes enacted.”

“Sure, but I’m convinced I can do it over the phone. I’ll work online, and I’ll work nights after Anna gets home.”

“Maybe,” Phil said. He was not pleased, Charlie could tell. He approached the big second statue, which included, off to one side, a statue of the Roosevelts’ dog, a Scottie. Phil scolded it: “And your little dog too!”

The bronze had gone green on this version of FDR, everywhere except for the forefinger of the hand stretched out toward viewers. So many people had touched it that it was polished until it looked golden.

Phil touched it too, then Charlie.

“The magic touch,” Phil said. “How touching. Every person that touches this finger still believes in America the beautiful. They believe in government and justice. It’s a kind of religious feeling. Do you think any Republicans touch it?”

“I don’t think they even come here,” Charlie said, suddenly gloomy. He recalled reading that FDR had been pretty ruthless with aides who no longer served his purposes. They had disappeared from the administration, and from history, as if falling through trapdoors. “We’re two countries now I guess.”

“But that won’t work,” Phil said, holding on to the statue’s gleaming finger. “May the spirit of FDR bring us together,” he pretended to pray, “or at least provide me with a solid working majority.”

“Ha ha.” Again Charlie marveled at the photo ops being missed. “You should bring the press corps down here with you, and invoke all this specifically. Why is this not the great moment in American history? You should say it is—up until now, anyway. Give people a tour of FDRness, and a look into your thinking. Into what you admire about Roosevelt, and America in those years. Remember the time we were at the Lincoln Memorial with Joe, and that TV crew was there for some other reason? It could be like that. For that matter you could do Lincoln again. Do them both. Take people around all the memorials, and talk about what matters to you in each of them. Give people some history lessons, and some insights into your own thinking about where we are now. Keep calling these years now another rendezvous with destiny. Call for a new New Deal. These are the times that try men’s souls, and so forth.”

“I don’t think there are any monuments to Thomas Paine in this town,” Phil said, smiling at the thought.

“Maybe there should be. Maybe you can arrange for that.”

“In my copious spare time.”

“Yes.”

Phil slapped hands with FDR and moved on. They went around a corner into the final room of the gallery, where an amazingly lifelike statue of Eleanor Roosevelt stared out from an alcove embossed with the emblem of the United Nations.

“The UN was his idea, not hers,” Phil objected. “She worked for it after it was established, but he had the idea from even before the war. World peace, the rule of law, and the end of all the empires. It was amazing how hard he tweaked Churchill and de Gaulle on that. He wouldn’t lift a finger to help them keep their old empires after the war. They thought he was just being a lightweight, or some kind of a card, but he was serious. He just didn’t want to come off as all holier-than-thou about it. Like his lovely wife here used to.”

“But he was holier-than-thou, compared to Churchill and de Gaulle.”

“No, de Gaulle was the holy one in that crowd. Roosevelt was an operator. And everyone was holier than Churchill.”

“This is what you should be saying. So—what do you say?”

“About becoming a memorial tour guide?”

“No, about whether I can do my job from home again.”

“Well, Charlie, I think you’re doing good work. We need to get to sustainability as fast as we can, as you know. There’s a lot riding on it. But, heck. If your kid needs you, then you’ve got to do it.”