Philip Roth: Our Gang

“Well, I was just standing here, minding my own business, trying to confess to an officer about murdering the President, when along comes this very fancy guy in a limousine and wearing a flower in his buttonhole, and he just steps in between me and the officers and he says he did it. And then the chauffeur gets out of the car and he starts pushing me back and saying let his boss do the talking, his boss really did it and he was a very busy man and so on and so forth and who did I think I was, acting so high and mighty. So then some colored guy comes up and I don’t have anything against colored guys, you know — but this one was real uppity and he starts saying we’re both full of it, he did it, and the chauffeur tells him to get at the end of the line and wait his turn, and that really starts the thing going, and the next thing you know there are fifteen guys all swinging at one another, claiming they all did it, too. Well, if it wasn’t for the officer, I’m not kidding, somebody might have gotten hurt. It could have been awful.”

“So you have nothing but praise for the police?”

“Well, yes — up to a point. I mean he broke this thing up one-two-three, but then when it was all over he still wouldn’t make any arrests. In fact, once he’d separated us, he just disappeared, like the Lone Ranger used to. I can’t find him anywhere. Some of the other guys want to find him, too. See, we gave him these confessions and all this incriminating evidence, and so on and you know what he did with it? He just tore it up, even while he was running away. Fortunately, I had my secretary xerox all this stuff at my office, so I’ve got a copy at home, but a lot of these guys were foolish enough to give him the only copy of their confessions that they had. About the only good thing to come out of this is the possibility that because the fifteen of us were seen all huddled together on the pavement here, pounding each other’s heads in, we might get picked up as a conspiracy. That is, if we can find a cop. But go try to find even a plainclothesman when you need one. Hey, you’re not authorized to make an arrest, are you, by your network or something?”

“—and so in they continue to come. And now they have told us why. They come not as they came to Washington to mourn the death of President Charisma. Nor do they come as came they did to Atlanta, to follow behind the bier of the slain Martin Luther King. Nor come do they as to the railroad tracks they did, to wave farewell as the tragic train that bore the body of the murdered Robert Charisma carried to its final resting place, him. No, the crowd that cometh to Washington tonighteth, cometh not in innocence and bewilderment, like little children berefteth of a father. Rather, cometh they in guilt, cometh they to confesseth, cometh they to say, ‘I too am guilty,’ to the police and the FBI. It is a sight, moving and profound, and furnishes evidence surely, if evidence there need surely be, of a nation that has cometh of age. For what is maturity, in men or in nations, but the willingness to bear the burden — and the dignity — of responsibility? And surely responsible it is, mature it is, when in its darkest hour, a nation can look deep within its troubled and anguished blah blah blah blah blah blah blah the guilt of all. Of course, those there are who will seek a scapegoat, as those there will always be, human nature being what it is instead of what it should be. Those there are who will self-righteously stand up and shout, ‘Not me, not me.’ For they are not guilty, they are never guilty. It is always the other guy who is guilty: Bundy and Kissinger, Bonnie and Clyde, Calley and Capone, Manson and McNamara — yes, the list is endless of those whom they would make responsible for their own crimes. And that is what makes this demonstration here in Washington of collective guilt so blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah. The blah blah of the spirit and the blah blah blah blah blah blah for which our sons have died blah blah blah blah blah blah reason and dignity blah blah blah blah blah dignity and reason. No, blame not those who gather here in Washington to confess to the murder of the President. Ratber, praise them for their courage, their blah blah blah, their blah and their blah blah blah, for blah blah blah blah as are you and I. We are all guilty. And only at the risk of blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah forget. This is Erect Severehead from the nation’s blah.”

“—the masochists, the mainliners, the minorities who think they are the majorities, the mashers, the masturbators, the mental cases, the misanthropes, the momma’s boys, the much-ado-about-nothing-ites, the milquetoasts—”

“Gentlemen, because of the developing interest around the nation in the situation here in Washington, we have decided to move somewhat faster than we had originally planned, and to release to you tonight the x-ray of the other hip. We hope that by releasing the x-rays of both of the President’s hips, the right virtually within a few hours of the left, we will be able to restore some perspective as regards this whole situation.”

“You mean by that the assassination, Blurp?”

“I don’t know if I want to use a highly inflammatory word like that at a time like this. It may not sell newspapers, but I’d just as soon, for the sake of accuracy, stick to ‘the situation.”‘ “In other words, you are now admitting that there is ‘a situation.’

“I don’t think we ever denied that.”

“What about the funeral, Blurb?”

“Let’s deal with the situation first, then we’ll get to the funeral. Any other questions?”

“Where is the President’s body right now?”

“Resting comfortably.”

“Comfortably in the baggie or out of the baggie?”

“Gentlemen, don’t push me. He’s resting comfortably. That’s the important thing.”

“Will he be buried in the baggie, Blurb? One report is that the First Lady has decided that given his dedication to the rights of the unborn, burial in the baggie would be fitting and proper. Like King’s body being pulled by a mule train.”

“Whatever the First Lady decides, I’m sure it’ll be in good taste.”

“Blurb, what about Mr. What’s-his-name? He’s still back of the podium saying it didn’t happen, that it’s a pack of lies. Do you have any idea what he’s talking about?”

“No comment.”

“Blurb, is it true that the oath of office has already been secretly administered to the Vice President between speaking engagements, and that he actually is the President at this very moment?”

“Why would we do a thing like that? Absolutely not.”

“Mr. President, can you tell us now why the oath of office was administered to you secretly between speaking engagements, so that actually you were the new President even while you went around claiming that the stories of President Dixon’s assassination were lies perpetrated by the enemies of this country?”

“I think the answer to that is obvious enough, gentlemen. You cannot have a country without a President any more than you would want to have a cackle-dooper without a predipitous, or, likewise, a caloodian without a pre-pregoratory predention. Of course, the dreedles, the drishakis and the dripnaps would give their eyeteeth to have it otherwise, but the sworn swaggatelle of this sirigible, and the truncation of our truthfulness will not be trampled and torn, so long as I, as President, vent such vindictiveness as the avengers varp.”

“President What’s-his-name, there is an admittedly ugly rumor to the effect that the reason you denied any knowledge of the President’s assassination was because you were fearful that otherwise the finger of suspicion might be pointed at you. Do you have anything to say about that admittedly ugly rumor?”