A Tart In The Oval Office–Joe Biden’s Sexual Epiphany

Joe Biden had always thought about ‘sexual congress’, a term he had first seen in a brief argued before the Warren court.  Something about illicit carnal knowledge, the freedom of choice, and national standards.  “Pornography?” Chief Justice Scalia had later commented. “You’ll know it when you see it”, and this judgment which referred to the sanctity of community values and the illegal federal arrogation of moral authority became the law of the land until the MeToo movement brought legal actions to protect women from men.

In any case ‘sexual congress’ had always been the President’s dream, giving sexual activity a judicial cover, and allowing him – at least in his imagination – a great deal of sexual license.  He could never actually act on his impulses like Bill Clinton, a cheap fraud, trickster, and cad.  

Biden never had liked Hillary.  Few Americans did, so the President, for all his moral rectitude, didn’t blame his predecessor for fishing in another stream.  God only knows what sex with that woman would have been like.

Sex in the Oval Office was nothing new.  Even Richard Nixon, the most sexually repulsive man ever to have taken residence in 1700 was reported to have had a lover.  Where could they have met? wondered Biden? In a Holiday Inn? In Bakersfield? Or in a suite at the Watergate? Nixon in his dark suit and tie, disrobing discretely in an anteroom, coming in with just his suspenders, garters, and Florsheims while his girlfriend was already perfumed, naked, and waiting. Even that was exciting for Biden to imagine, a man whose political ambitions, let alone his lack of sexual imagination, had restricted his sexual range. 

Not that he hadn’t thought about it.  In fact he couldn’t keep his hands of young interns and Congressional aides, hugging and embracing them as an older, respectable man could do, not much more than kissing babies he had reasoned, but without admitting the desire percolating and brewing in him.  

Once he got rapped on the knuckles for it, he kept his hands to himself, but his dreams became more fervid and impatient.  Oh, to be Martin Luther King, his hero, a Lothario of immense sexual appetites and satisfaction, an American hero and black Casanova bar none.

Here was the problem as the President saw it.  He, like most older men, wanted a young lover – that surprise gift, that early Christmas present under the tree, that soft, warm, wet and inviting sweet thing that reaffirmed everything, denied nothing and made sunsets more beautiful – but having staked his entire reputation on moral integrity, respect for women, and sexual probity, he felt he could not enjoy such delights; and so the fevered dreams.  

But why not, he thought.  I am the President, after all; and if Johnson, Kennedy, and King had hidden their affairs so neatly, why couldn’t he?  And even if he was caught, he could be as nonchalant as Sarkozy and Mitterrand, denying nothing, proud of it all, and all the more popular for it.  Even that old, ugly, dewlapped, misshapen Kissinger had has paramours – a lot of them, according to his biographers, acting as he did on his own adage, ‘Power is the ultimate aphrodisiac’. 

There was Jill, of course, who had kept her husband on a short leash all through his political career.  “Now, Joe”, she would say, “Mind your P’s and Q’s” and he knew that the love of this incredible woman was worth all the dalliances in Delaware; but as he grew older and began to resent her reins and halters, and grew restive as he saw his sexual opportunities fade, he thought it was about time to throw it all off, become his own man and plow new furrows.

The most sexually ambitious politician of all time, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, candidate for President of France and an unashamed philanderer refused to be put in the cage of conventional morality.  Neither proud of nor guilty about his infidelities or sexual appetites, he announced that immorality was other people’s problem, not his. When he flippantly rejected charges of procuring, he said that he had no idea that the women at a party he attended were prostitutes.  “All women look the same without their clothes”, he said.  

His wife stayed with her husband for twenty years less out of love than her desire to be First Lady of France.  Her fabulous wealth was not enough,  and only the position of La Présidente would satisfy her ambition.  She knew her husband well, and tolerated if not accepted his sexual profligacy because it was inconsequential and irrelevant given the intellectual brilliance and political savvy of the man.  Strauss-Kahn knew that his wife would never leave him.  

He, then, had it all.  He was wealthy and powerful on his own merits, was awarded even more wealth and status because of his wife’s family, and free to be as licentious and sexually active as he wished.  The French knew him, accepted and admired his voracious sexual appetites.  Why, thought Joe Biden, can’t I be like him?

There was the coming election, of course, and he would be a dead duck if caught in flagrante delicto given the punishing censoriousness of the country; but then again, what did that matter?  He, like most men over eighty, regardless of position, fame, or importance, turn more to what comes after death, not how to fill the few years remaining before it.  

Eternity, except to fools, is what matters.  And couldn’t eternity be squared with a nice meal or a tart in the Oval Office?  There, he said it.  And his resolve was fixed.  Sex was a perk of the office, always had been and always would be.  Men will be men, and that too has been predestined; and in the final accounting, notably expressed in Francois Villon’s famous Ballade des Pendus, we all end up in the same place, in a pile pêle-mêle, indistinguishable and undistinguished; so why the debate?

Easier said than done. Where would he start?  Of course he was the President, and if access to everything Top Secret meant anything at all, he could find out how to begin his sexual escapades.  Jeffrey Epstein and his pimp Ghislaine came to mind.  Yes, they ended up badly, but there is always room for improvement. 

Former New York Governor Eliot Spitzer hired high-class, top-of-the-line K Street hookers because, as he said, “I’m too busy to go looking”.  He too fell on hard times, but those fancy-dancy call girl rings still existed.  For any man well past his sexual pull-by date, pay-as-you-go sex was the only opportunity left for the President – an easy way to personal satisfaction, beyond the watchful perimeter of his wife and MeToo aides, and given Donald Trump’s legal troubles, his dalliances would certainly be overlooked.

But the laws of inertia apply not only to falling bricks.  They govern human behavior.  It is very hard indeed to teach an old dog new tricks or for a leopard to change his spots.  Intent is one thing, action is another, and the President was caught between a rock and a hard place.  He wanted, more than anything in the world, to have a final sexual fling; but found himself unable to take the first step.  The more he imagined the wildest, most unthinkable things, the less he could get off the mark, make a move, take a decision.  

He wrapped himself in briefing papers, policy initiatives, and ribbon cuttings; but fluttered and stumbled about because his mind was on only one thing – indescribable sex with a tart.  Why had it been so easy for MLK, JFK, and LBJ? Why had they not been timorous, recondite, and counselled?  

He had picked up the secure line to the Secret Service time and time again – just as Johnson had done when he wanted them to arrange an assignation – but put it back down.  He was doomed to be the first old maid president.

As time went on and his mental wobbliness increased, his sexual obsession withered and died.  He could no longer remember where he was let alone what had propelled him to such sexual madness. There were those niggling, upsetting dreams of hot young women, but he could only recall fragments and sadly the most inconsequential of them all.  And so it was despite the President’s sexual epiphany that he ended up far around the bend before he could do anything about it.  The country perhaps was better off, for a scandal with the likes of this poor, overmatched, diminished president would be ugly. 

Blaze O'Glory - A New White House Diversity Queen Struts The National Runway

President Biden was under pressure for not doing enough to show the flag – to demonstrate before the American public his commitment to LGBTQ+ rights.  Although he had hired an openly gay Press Secretary, and recruited a transgender woman as one of his key advisors, progressives on the Hill and in the Executive Office Building insisted on more.  

No one could tell that the Press Secretary was gay until she was encouraged to express her pride publicly.  The public health physician on the other hand, needed no introduction or public display.  Despite the earrings, tailored Chanel suit, and page boy, she was as male-looking as a Redskins linebacker. 

The Press Secretary, many gender advocates thought, was too cute and girly girl to be the poster child for the lesbian community.  Yes, her prettiness did counter the tough girl image of Bernal Heights that the Administration sought to avoid.  The White House had demurred when it came to jackboots, flannel shirts, and butch haircuts – but the Press Secretary was not sending the message that these advocates felt was needed in their program to recalibrate the nation’s sexuality.  Not exactly festoons, banners, and flags but something more, well, bold.

Although the President’s wife counselled him against what she called ‘in your face’ candidates for the position of National Gender Diversity Advisor, he was tempted by his advisors to go rogue.  The media had been all over Drag Queen Storytime much to the delight of the President’s detractors, and it was no time for the President to give in to such retrograde notions.  Proudly putting a real woman – i.e. a sequined, bejeweled, tarted up, super drag queen – front and center as the image and voice of the Administration would finally make the long overdue statement of gender commitment

Of course such a proposition was at first dismissed by the White House.  As much as the President saw gender fluidity as a national priority and appreciated the appeal of the catwalk and spotlighted runways of Vegas and the Castro, he demurred.  The American people were still in denial of their destiny, prisoners of old, outdated, primitive views of sexuality.  There were enough sharp criticisms of the more genial faces of diversity within his Administration to risk the surefire cannonades of the Right if he recruited someone from the sexual avant-garde.

He was surprised, then, when Blaze O’Glory, hottest ticket in South Beach, icon of the glitzy edge of transgenderism, femme fatale, and sublime actress came into the Oval Office.   Here was a gorgeous, full-bodied, even luscious example of Delaware womanhood standing before him in full but tasteful feminine regalia.

He was smitten, blindsided by Blaze’s beauty and allure.  While she was no demure cashmere-sweater-and-string-of-cultured pearls matron from the Main Line, she was no floozy.  Nothing of the seducing hooker about her.  And there before him on the Lincoln desk was her vetted security bio.  Blaze, formerly Jack Bolton, had been a fire fighter in Staten Island Fire Station No. 4, a unit known for its conspicuous bravery and aggressive response to danger.  Bolton had received the highest citation of honor from the Mayor of New York, and went on to be the face of his campaign to revitalize the city. 

 

As a briefing paper included in Bolton’s dossier suggested, such transformations from macho man to femme was not only not unheard of but common.  There was something about bursting at the seams – the longer a desire for an alternate sexuality was repressed, the more exaggerated its final expression.  Pretty gay boys who went the final yard were too routine to mention, but the radical outing of the likes of Bolton were items of professional interest.

The President couldn’t believe his eyes.  ‘This is a man?’ he said to himself as Bolton extended her hand, lightly scented and perfumed, for a kiss.  Now this, was what he had been looking for since taking office.  All this tamped down, reserved, high-toned sexual duality was missing the point.  If the country was to turn gay, it had to begin now. She was stunning and sexually appealing in the old way – a slight sashay of the hips, a come-hither pout, jangling but tasteful bangles – and the President knew in an instant that she was for him.  Nothing personal of course, faithful to Jill as he was in heart and soul, but in other weather, on golden sand beside turquoise waters, he just might succumb to her charms.

“Hired”, the President said, initialed the document in front of him, handed it to his Chief of Staff and said, “Get cracking”.

Now, the former Jack Bolton knew nothing about policy, the ins and outs of political diversity, the catfights and internecine squabbles of East and West Wing, and the perennial squabbles on Capitol Hill.  He had been scooped up, recruited, and briefed by one of the President’s closest advisors who had been a frequent patron of Blaze’s club, friend and confidant of its star, and promoter par excellence of this certain to be a hit on Pennsylvania Avenue. So, Blaze, aka Jack, would need considerable briefing and in-service training which, thanks to the President’s imprimatur, he would assume.

Bolton, who never attended college, but who was gifted with a natural intelligence and an uncanny ability to read the room, was a quick study.  He charmed the Cabinet and Presidential aides and advisors no matter where they sat on the gender spectrum.  He was friend to all, easily seductive, persuasive, and genial with all.  At his public introduction to the press corps, he was a stunning success.

Dressed to the nines, not everyone’s cup of tea in his revealing shift and Lady Gaga lipstick, but still within the bounds of propriety and respectable if not good taste.  The applause was loud and heartfelt.  Even the correspondents from the conservative press were charmed, dropped their guard, and the next day wrote glowingly about him/her.

Of course there were the right wing naysayers who shouted ‘tricked out, tarted up fake’, ‘our children’s worst nightmare’, ‘cock and bull story in Dior’ and much more inflammatory, condescending, and hateful invective; but all in all her accession to national office went far more smoothly than anyone had ever thought.  

In fact, she became to President’s go-to advisor on issues totally unrelated to gender.  He wanted her take on Kim Jong Il, for example and carbon admissions.  She was savvy and kind enough to refer the question to her more competent colleagues, and so gained the reputation of being one of the most honest, trustworthy, and loyal members of the Administration.  No knife in the back from her.

As she gained the confidence of all around her, she felt sure enough to edge out of the rather confining persona with which she had gained admission to the Oval Office; and slowly began to revert to her runway self.  The whole White House, Capitol Hill, K Street thing had always been the biggest ticket in vaudeville, especially during the Donald Trump years, so why not test its plasticity – how far could she stretch the truth without censure.  How far could she fool these fools?

And just as Donald Trump had never really wanted the Presidency and turned the whole Washington establishment into the greatest burlesque show on earth, so could she, perhaps without the impact of the former President, but enough to roil the waters, stir up the swamp, and swim in the waters of the Potomac.

It was The Emperor’s New Clothes all over again.  Biden and his advisors saw the new, sparkled, sequined hussy emerging before their eyes but chose not to see it.  She was and would always be the image of White House diversity and commitment to LGBTQ+ causes.  

It was only when the one of the straightest of the straight, a lower echelon aide in a basement office of the Executive Office Building cried foul, did anyone at 1700 take notice; and when they did and saw the pimped, trampy, outrageous figure sashaying up to the Rose Garden podium, they scrambled for cover. Back to demurely cloaked, mildly forthright diversity.  Her firing only accelerated Blaze O’Glory’s South Beach career and before long she was performing in Vegas and LA, a star. 

“I Am A Black Man!” Said The President Whose Racial Wannabe Became Real

Reality and fantasy were fungible as far as the President was concerned, and in his ninth decade he began to lose the distinction between the two.  The more his mind became disoriented, the more his aspirations became challenges, then appeared as real opportunities.  For decades he had been an advocate for racial equality and justice for the black man, but now found himself as far from the real thing as ever before. 

The black ‘thing’ was always on his mind.  For most of his political career he had supported liberal causes and civil rights was one of them; but unlike Clinton, he could never think black, nor even imagine any part of the black experience.  Despite his liberal political agenda and his longstanding progressive commitment to the black cause, he always felt removed – not exactly a poseur or dilettante, but far from the action.

He wanted to walk, talk, and act as black as the men whom he secretly admired.  He was no Condoleezza Rice, Colin Powell, Clarence Thomas fan.  They had been laundered, bleached, and whitened beyond recognition.  If you shut your eyes when they spoke, you would swear that they were white.  No, he wanted the true black experience, but didn’t know how to get it.  

He wanted to be ghetto, down with the street, a pimp-walking, pimped out, gold-grilled stone cool black dude, but that hope seemed vain and impossible.  He was doomed to be the white man that everyone hated, locked into a plaster-of-Paris cast, stiff, without joy or rhythm and fated to forever to have dry, soulless sex. 

Oh, to be black, he dreamed.   He wanted to sit, drink malt liquor, and smoke Kools with his bro's in West Baltimore, talk black talk, street talk, real talk; but he never could manage, and his barmy, goofy hitched smile never worked there.  He would always be whitey in a serge suit, coming downtown for votes.

Of course, growing up in Delaware, he had no chance to associate with black people let alone become like them.   The 40s and 50s in Wilmington were still socially segregated; so he played ball with white classmates in white neighborhoods, went to a white church and white schools, and  never saw a black person except through the windows of the crosstown bus. 

Yet, now 80, he knew that he would always be just a black wannabe.  No hot, black women in his bed, no malt liquor on the stoop on hot summer nights, no spinners, pimped out rides, and fur coats.  It was a sorry consignment.  Worse, the whole White House thing looked like a charade.  He had plugged racial types into his Cabinet like pegs, entertained young black Congressional radicals with a smile, talked up Black Lives Matter, condemned systemic racism and championed Critical Race Theory; but felt he was a stick figure propped up in the middle of a bad soap opera.

Sensing the President’s new, increased sensitivity to the black experience, his aides suggested that he go deep into the heart of the DC inner city to the ghetto of all ghettoes, the only completely black place in the capital where the expression of blackness was at its most visible, salient, and real.

As his limousine wound its way through Anacostia, past shambled row houses, trash, and burned out, abandoned vehicles, he said to his wife, “I didn’t know it would be like this”.  Nothing in his sheltered, insular, white life had prepared him for such a sight.  Ordinarily, he would have stepped out in a crowd to get votes, but this was different.  Even with the extra security added to be on the safe side, he would never leave the car.

So he contented himself with addressing black congregations, meeting with the Congressional Black Caucus, having tea with flower-hatted elderly black matrons, and inviting sports champions (usually all black) to the White House.  “Still not black enough”, he said to himself, looking for a way to appeal, to belong.

Yet when he gave it a try and attempted to adjust his longstanding, instinctive white prose and make it at least poetic and symbolic, he failed miserably.  He stumbled, smiled in the wrong places, misread the teleprompter, and sounded like a fool. He was no better at the Divine Light of the Cross storefront church in Brentwood.  The singing, chanting, dancing, and speaking in tongues were simply not for him, too foreign, too removed from the simple Catholic parish of his childhood.

“It’s going slowly”, he said to Jill. “Too many bumps in the road”.

Yet the President was no different from millions of Americans who were convinced that identity was no harder than changing hats or hairdos – a matter of choice and preference. Saying “I identify as a black man” was easy enough.  Bill Clinton had done it and was the first black president.  Obama, the real thing, was a letdown.  He was as white as the driven snow, never knew fatback and corn pone, tarpaper shacks, tenant farming, and picking cotton.  

He was whiter than white.  His own Vice President was no different, a half-breed identifying as black but more white than black or Indian, and the black part not even real black but Caribbean black, foreign to the American inner city, privileged and above it all just like Obama.

Identifying as a black man was not enough, he had to be one, heart and soul; but of course, locked into that old white man’s body with nothing but pretty white girls in his past, he could not.  His dreams were of Anacostia, sitting on the stoop with a tall one, shooting the shit with his bro’s, watching and whistling, smoking a fat boy, dreaming of sex and Africa, only to be recalibrated and reset before the butler knocked with bed tea.

Sex change would be a lot simpler, the President considered.  Gender was a fluid thing, not like blackness or whiteness, markers for life, live, cultural memes.  One day you’re Lance Studley, Mr. Machismo, Casanova, and the Lothario of Washington; the next you are frilly, girly-girl Bettina Blossom, belle of the ball, sweet and tarted up, all Scarlett O’Hara and Mata Hari.  And everything in between.  At that particular thought the President smiled and imagined the sexual smorgasbord in front of him.  Trans this, cis that, do whatever with whomever then trade in your old self for a shiny new one.

This was why the President was becoming so distracted on the podium, forced into little White House boxes, obliged to speak of Crimea, Pyongyang, and Qom not knowing what they were let alone where, forced to make step-by-step sense when his mind was in another orbit.  

Far closer to the end of his life than the beginning, he focused on existential questions; and given the state of his current confusion, rather than reflect on his immortal soul or the coming journey beyond the grave, he still saw himself in Compton, West Baltimore, or Detroit as a black woman.  The fantasy had become complete, race and gender were now as inextricably wound together as strands of DNA.  In his mind at least he was both at once and forever.

All of which led to his withdrawal from the Presidential race of 2024, whisked into the political shadows by Kamala Harris and the radical young things in Congress.  “It is a far, far better thing that I do, than I have ever done; it is a far, far better rest that I go to than I have ever known” he remembered Sidney Carton saying, unsure why or what it meant, but there was a certain resonance in the words.  Off to some place good at least, the President mused.