A Revolt Among Equals: A Play in One Act

The curtain opens to reveal a dark, window-less chamber where a dozen recognizable faces are seated around a large, pentagon-shaped table. The walls of the chamber are paneled in a dark wood, perhaps mahogany. Framed posters of faces by Shepard Fairey provide a bit of color on an otherwise drab background. The posters are red (Lenin), yellow (Stalin), purple (Khrushchev), white (Castro), green (Ahmadinejad), brown (Che) and others who we cannot so easily identify.

James Carville (sitting near the center of the stage, gravely bangs the gavel, then intones): "I call this, the seventy-eighth Plenary Planning Session of the Democrat Party, to order!"

Katie Couric: "In the interest of expediting our first order of business, I move that we forego the reading of the minutes and the review of the agenda."

Tom Brokaw: "I second."

Carville: "So moved. All in favor, say aye." (a chorus of 'ayes' are heard). "Any nays?" (silence -- the gavel sounds) "The motion carries."

Carville: "Comrade Obama, the floor is yours."

Obama: "Thank you, Comrade. As many of you know, the Clinton wing of our party appears to be staging a revolt against the Obama wing --" (a chortle is heard from the area where Bill and Hillary Clinton are seated. Obama glares in their direction, and after a pause, continues) "Dammit! My iPad Prompter app is out of synch now." (he slides his hand back and forth a few times on the iPad)

Hillary: "Comrade Barack, you have no evidence to suggest that there is any form of revolt brewing in our party of brothers and sisters, unified as one in our fight to advance socialism."

Obama: "Then, what the hell is... this?" (He rips a computer page, a printout of a website, from the binder in front of him, and holds the page up for all to see.)

Obama: "This, comrades, is an article by Lee Cary of The American Thinker that accurately describes what you and your sorry band of nineties nincompoops are up to."

Hillary: "American Thinker? Why not just rip a page off Free Republic or, better yet, Michelle Malkin's site?"

Obama: (slams hand down on table) "That's enough! I have hard evidence, and I do mean hard. Emanuel, unleash the tape."

(a loud click is heard and the scratchy voice of Bill Clinton sounds, seemingly from all over the room): "...Dammit, girl, stop ticklin' me... I'm tellin ya' for real... we're running in '12... and I'm gonna sneak your cute little behind into the White House and show you the old cigar trick...")

Hillary (unflustered): "That's proof of absolutely nothing. Any computer technician could have simulated that voi--"

Obama (soberly raises a wrinkled, size sixteen black cocktail dress on a hanger. A prominent beige stain can be seen at center body mass).

Hillary (glares at Bill and her eyes, at least for a moment, appear to glow red. Maybe we imagined it. She shrieks, a horrid, terrifying noise): "Son of a---!!!" (Calmer) "Fine. Yes, we're running, you clueless n00b! You've come as near to destroying our roadmap as anyone since the Rabbit Killer..."

(All eyes turn to Jimmy Carter, who is asleep in a rocking chair in the corner, the floor around him covered with peanut shells).

Obama: "What the hell are you talking about, you wrinkled, old shrew? I passed more of our agenda in 18 months than you and Lester did in 8 freaking years!"

Hillary: "You sure did, and look where it got us. We're in for an utter disaster in November, thanks to your complete lack of diplomatic skills. Not only that, people are talking about the Constitution and the Declaration! They're forming grass roots armies of voters to turn back the clock on the New Deal and our entire agenda!"

Hillary: "You didn't even try to pretend to tack to the center, like Bill and I did. What's the harm in inviting a few Republicans into some committee meetings? Would it hurt you to stop campaigning and vacationing for a week or two? And actually govern? Didja learn that at Community Organizer school?"

Obama (his eyes are cold and his face filled with disdain): "I passed socialized medicine. I passed the Stimulus and Omnibus spending bills that will bankrupt our country, just as Cloward and Piven instructed. I passed --"

Hillary: "You did no such thing. Pelosi and Reid did all the heavy lifting. You just bloviated. It's apparently your only skill. And besides, we're the ones that touched off the housing crisis. It's beautiful. No one ever suspected that Jamie Gorelick, Andrew Cuomo and Janet Reno were put in place to detonate the biggest economic meltdown in history."

Hillary: "See, Community Organizer, that's the way you do it. You overwhelm the system, the way Cloward and Piven laid it out. But you don't get your entire party destroyed!"

Obama: "Why you little Madeline Albright look-a-like, we'll take you apart in the primary -- "

Hillary: "With what? The nine people left in Organizing for America?"

Carville (sternly bangs gavel and everyone jumps in their seats): "Shakespeare wrote, 'The course of true love never did run smooth.'"

Carville: "We all have the same mission. True, we diverge on the approach to dismantle the Constitution. We shall resolve this quibble as we did the disputes between Bill Clinton and Vincent Foster... as well as Sandy Berger and Ron Brown."

Carville (He opens up the box resting in front of him and displays two fine dueling pistols) "Gentlemen, we shall resolve this situation in November."

(The curtain is closed).