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I had a meeting at the Pentagon with a Senior Defense Department Official as we in the National Punditry like to say. This is a continuing thorn in the side of the White House press corps when they will be briefed by National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice or Secretary of State Colin Powell but are permitted to refer to the briefer only as a "Senior Administration Official" or some variant on that theme.
There was a case not so long ago when a "Senior Administration Official" briefed and, at one point in the
transcript referred to him or her self saying "as the Secretary of State, I will ..."
Nevertheless, the niceties were observed, as they will be here.
A week or so ago I was in Oklahoma City to help film some commercials for the Lt. Governor of Oklahoma, Mary Fallin who is running for re-election.
Full disclosure: I am a paid advisor, but not much.
Have we had this discussion about the notion of being an "Advisor" in Washington? No? Good. If you walk around any building with any number of government employees - especially political appointees - you will see at least one sign outside of at least one door which reads:
In the 18-or-so months of this Administration I have never seen a sign outside a door which says just "Advisor," much less "Junior Advisor."
If there are no Junior or Mid-level Advisors, then how do the "Senior" advisors differentiate themselves between, say, Karl Rove who is, without questions First-Among-Seniors and some schlug in a minor agency who holds the same title, but doesn't get to ride in the front cabin of Air Force One that often?
This issue might well have existed in the Bill Clinton Administration, as well, but I didn't get to go into Executive Department buildings that often for about an eight-year-period.
Anyway, given how much I am being paid to advise the Fallin campaign, I can assure you the word "Senior" doesn't enter into it, other than when I'm making a hotel reservation and the phrase "citizen discount" follows it during the rate discussion.
I had planned to take a morning flight to New Orleans getting there around midday, but this Pentagon thing came up so I had to change the flight. Due to the unfathomable vagaries of airline fare rules, changing my flight to 5:40 pm only added about a hundred bucks to the ticket. Flying out any earlier would have cost about $800 more.
My dandy new Blackberry told me this Pentagon meeting was scheduled for 10:30 am. This is not the first time I have been in one of these meetings, so I have the drill down. I park at the Pentagon City Mall and take the Metro one stop to the Pentagon where I am met by a young enlisted man or woman and escorted through the many levels of security to the Senior Defense Department Official's area.
By the way, I am not going to say with whom this meeting was, so if you're clicking on "FIND" and looking for the obvious names, you will be disappointed.
I packed for New Orleans, got some cash out of the bank, and headed to the Pentagon City Mall. This mall has a Ritz Carlton attached which was infamous for being the location of one of the early meetings between the FBI and Monica Lewinsky.
I know that it is a looooooong walk from the Metro to the entry door that visitors have to use at the Pentagon. I also know that they like to have us there about a half hour in advance so, I arrived at the Pentagon City Mall parking lot at about 9:45, walked through the mall to the subway, bought yet another fare card because I, again, forgot to take one from the stack in my desk (I have just about enough unused fare cards to host a two-shoe game of blackjack) and made my way to the platform to await the short ride to the Pentagon.
The Washington, DC subway has installed new signs which tell you which train is coming next (Blue, Yellow, Green, Orange, etc.) how many cars are involved in that train (typically four or six) and when it will be arriving (in this case, four minutes).
The train came, I took it the one stop, got off and looked around for someone with my name on a sign which has always been the case in the past.
No someone. No name.
Ok, I can walk out of a subway station on my own, so I started hiking to the visitors' entrance which is about halfway to Afghanistan.
By the time I got to the entrance it was 10:00 o'clock on the nose and I was congratulating myself for m very excellent logistical skills.
D-Day? Hah! Gimme something difficult.
At the Pentagon you have to present two forms of ID, not just the one you have to show to those very excellent screeners at the airport.
As I said, I have done this before so I had my driver's license and my passport. Actually I always have my passport with me just in case if I'm, like, having lunch? In Old Town? And I'm needed in Singapore? I don't have to run home get it.
This does not happen as often as you might think. Every time I've been needed in Singapore I've actually had enough time to pick up my passport.
Ok. I've never been needed in Singapore.
Happy now?
I have been through the first screen at the Pentagon and before I walked through the magnetometer I called the public affairs office to ask where I should go.
The young woman on the other end sounded surprised, which I took to mean surprise that no one had been out to meet me which had been a surprise. She said she would send someone out to get me in a few minutes.
Almost 20 minutes later - now 10:20 - a young woman in civilian clothes and an Air Force Sergeant arrived, asked for me by name, and after a third check of credentials, we were in the Pentagon proper.
I had the usual chit-chat. She is a student here on a summer internship ("my second summer") majoring in public affairs with a minor is something else. She was very nice and wanted to be very helpful.
The Sergeant has been in the Air Force for 12 years and wants to be a full-time public affairs officer. He has been stationed at the Pentagon for about six months but is on his way to Florida to take up PA officer duties there.
We wound around to the area of the Senior Defense Department Official's office and the Sergeant told me that the conference room wasn't quite ready yet so I would be parked in the Protocol Office.
I expected to see a bunch of other people in there, but I was first. An Army Captain had her desk in the same office as the sitting area and I apologized for invading her space. She, being in the Protocol Office, assured me this was the high point of her day.
She was very good, because I believed her.
Waiting for everyone else to arrive - for anyone else to arrive - I strolled into the hallway and began looking at a display in honor of the aforementioned D-Day. There were maps, and photographs, and there was a hand-written note on white lined paper which said the following:
Then, in a different handwriting on the same sheet just below:
GCM would be George C. Marshall, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs and Eisenhower's boss.
Oh. And the word "immediate" in Roosevelt's order was an afterthought. The order originally read:
"The appointment of General Eisenhower ..."
But Roosevelt added the word "immediate" above the words "The" and "appointment."
Reading that note made the hair on my arms stand straight up.
Have 15 words ever carried more weight? Have 15 words ever placed more weight on one man's shoulders?
As I walked back across the hall to the Protocol office I suddenly realized why no one else was there: The meeting was scheduled for 11:00 o'clock. I had put 10:30 into my Blackberry to note the time I was supposed to be there.
As usual, not paying any attention to the world around me, I subtracted a half hour from what was on my calendar and had arrived a full hour prior to the meeting.
I'm surprised they didn't send me home.
The meeting happened. Then it was over.
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It is shorter to walk from the Pentagon to the Pentagon City Mall so I did that and walked through the mall to retrieve the Mullmobile.
I walked passed a store named "Victoria's Secret Beauty" which was a store of perfume, bath stuff, and so on. But that's not what caught my eye. There was a poster in the window which had a photo of a pretty woman holding a bottle of what looked like perfume.
The copy beneath her read: "Very Sexy for Him. The first men's fragrance collection from Victoria's Secret."
Ok. I'll admit there are times when I'm getting made up for a TV appearance that I enjoy, well not enjoy exactly, but I don't mind the experience.
I know Father's Day is coming up. There is nothing from Victoria's Secret you can buy me that I would put next to my body. Period. Full stop.
I think I'm plenty sexy without "Very Sexy for Him," in a short, fat, bald, middle-aged sort of way.
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I arrived at Dulles Airport which is about a 45 minute trip from the Pentagon at about 1:00 o'clock. I had called Delta to find out what my options were. They said I could stand by for a 2:45 flight which, as luck would have it, had plenty seats left but which, as luck would not have it, is three-and-three from front to back. No first class.
Decisions, decisions.
I got to the ticket counter, was assured that I would make the flight and the connecting flight on the New Orleans which would get me in at about 6:00 pm instead of the Nine-something I had booked.
I decided to get something to eat and, because I'm trying to be on my very best behavior, went to the Chinese food stand rather than either the deli or the Burger King which bracketed it.
I ordered and got my General Tso's chicken and fried rice and went to look for a place to sit.
All the tables were taken, but one woman was at a table for two by herself and was reading a book.
I rolled up my stuff and asked if anyone was sitting there.
"I prefer not to share," she said.
I said that was fine with me, and proceeded to put my food, plastic utensils, napkins, diet Pepsi and a book on the table while I took off my suit coat and put it over the back of my chair.
She looked at me with that disbelieving stare that women do. At least that's the way most women look at me.
"I said I preferred not to share," she growled.
"And I said," with a smile "that that's find with me. Have a nice flight."
"I don't want you to sit there."
"Is someone else sitting here?"
"No."
"Are you eating?"
"I have eaten."
"Does this look like a Starbucks where you can eat and then sit around all day? I promise not to talk."
She sniffed - literally - she actually sniffed and went back to reading her book which, although I couldn't see the title or the author had the words "Oakland Public Library" stamped on the page edges.
I carefully got everything organized and then began cutting my General Tso's very - too - vigorously. I mean I was hacking at it with my little white plastic knife, humming the "I'm a Lumberjack" song from Monty Python. And I wasn't just cutting into bite-sized pieces. I was dicing those babies. I thought the table was going to tip over from the action.
She ignored me, refusing to acknowledge such childish behavior.. Then she pulled out a pencil and circled the page number at the bottom of the page she was reading and was beginning to write a note in the margin when she noticed I had a tiny piece of General Tso's on my white plastic fork frozen two inches from my lips.
"I know you're not writing in a library book, are you?"
She snapped the book shut and left, as Groucho once said, not just in a huff, but in a minute-and-a-huff.
The couple sitting next to me started laughing and the man stuck his hand out in a "gimme-five" motion, which I did.
Memo to anyone working at the Oakland Public Library: Be on the alert for a book with the number on page 46 circled in pencil. Then fine her butt!
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As usual, when they called the flight I waited until someone went ahead of me to the jet way so that guy would be pulled aside for a random check. The first person in line is always pulled aside which is why it looks like a bicycle race - everyone waiting, studying their shoes, looking at their ticket surprised they actually have a seat in first class, until someone else goes, gets pulled out of line, and the rest of us crowd up to the ticket agent like kids on free ice cream day at the Good Humor stand.
I had worn a suit to the Pentagon. This is not something I do every day. This is, if I had my druthers, not something I would do any day. It was my second-best suit. I forget now what brand. Robert Hall, I think. No. They went out of business about 40 years ago:
I don't know. My favorite suit is from Steve the Sikh from Bangkok about whom we have spoken before. Anyway I was wearing this suit and a yellow Dunhill tie (purchased by the Mullings Director of Standards & Practices because I have never spent more then $7.35 for a tie in my whole life - maybe $7.35 total on ties, white button down shirt, my favorite Cole Haan shoes which I have just had resoled so I can run fast, jump high, stop on a dime and give you nine cents change and I was lookin' good.
As I was gracious (and clever) enough to wave a person of the female persuasion into the line ahead of me, and as she was then at the head of the line, I was the first person actually on the plane.
One of the flight attendants looked at me and said I looked very handsome.
Well, let me just tell you something. The last time a flight attendant said something like that to me ... well, suffice it to say she is now the Mullings Director of Standards & Practices.
After I got into my seat a young woman - about seven, I would guess - but with the presence of a 30-year-old came up the jet way and was greeted by the same flight attendant.
"What's your name?" the flight attendant asked.
"Rebecca," the young woman answered sticking her head into the cockpit.
"Would you like to visit the pilots?"
Rebecca entered the cockpit and looked around.
Her mother came up behind her and told her to come along.
"She likes to be called Rebecca," the mother said.
"What's her name?"
"Miranda."
"Is it Miranda Rebecca?"
"Nope. No Rebecca anywhere."
As the little girl walked past me I said, "Miranda, I'm warning you."
But, as she was only seven and had not yet completed law school she did not laugh.
Then I flew to New Orleans.
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