Learning the game

The President gets a brush-up

[The Oval Office. On a sofa: White House Chief of Staff MARK MEADOWS, in a nice suit, and TRUMP, in casual businesswear.]

MEADOWS: OK, Mr. President, let’s go over unmasking again. What is unmasking?

TRUMP: You got a little something on your teeth, Mark.

MEADOWS: Mr. President, I’m going to have to be insist that we focus, so you can make your case to the American people. A reporter asks you what unmasking is. What do you say?

TRUMP: That’s when the guy, he’s masked, because they’re spying on him and he doesn’t want the cops to know who he is, so he wears a mask.

MEADOWS: Mr. President, the NSA, the people who do the spying, are on our side.

TRUMP: Bullshit!

MEADOWS: I mean they’re a federal government body, like the FBI or the Post Office or the Bureau of Engraving.

TRUMP: See, all those guys are finks. What was that last one again?

MEADOWS: The NSA is looking for people who might do harm to the country, but in their reports to the Army or Congress they’re not supposed to tell the names of the people they’re looking at.

TRUMP: Oh, sure, because then they’d find out.

MEADOWS: Find out?

TRUMP: Find out that what the guy was doing, you know, spying or stealing or whatever he was doing, I’m sure it has nothing to do with us.

MEADOWS: Well, the idea is to protect the innocent.

TRUMP: Oh sure.

MEADOWS: You understand? Because a person is innocent until proven guilty.

TRUMP: I refuse to answer on the grounds it may tend to incriminate me.

MEADOWS: Well, okay. Anyway, the only time the NSA is allowed to reveal the names of the people they’re looking at — which is called what, now?

TRUMP: The Fifth Amendment.

MEADOWS: No.

TRUMP: Michael Flynn.

MEADOWS: No.

TRUMP: Unmasking.

MEADOWS: Right.

TRUMP: Got it in one!

MEADOWS: Uh — okay, the only time they can unmask a suspect is if there’s a strong national interest — not for purely political reasons. So when the Obama Administration asked to unmask this unnamed person, they said they did it because they suspected him of working for a foreign government while he was part of the United States government, but the theory is that they —

TRUMP: No theory. Obama and Biden and Hillary, Chuck Schumer, Nancy Pelosi, Haystack Balloon, Eric Bloom — they all knew we did it, but they didn't read us our rights and that means we don’t go to jail, they go to jail! It’s in the Habeus Corpus.

MEADOWS: Mr. President —

[Door opens and Russian diplomat SERGEY KISLYAK walks in, wearing a white bathrobe and gold chains, and crosses to the sofa.]

KISLYAK: Okay, little Carolina man, you can go back now to the barbecues.

MEADOWS: Excuse me? What —

TRUMP: It’s okay, Mark, I think we got it, I’ll have plenty to say to those bums from the press.

KISLYAK: [Pointing at TRUMP] You say nothing! Just say over the nonsense you have been saying!

[Makes shooing gesture at MEADOWS.]

Scoot, scoot!

[MEADOWS looks at KISLYAK, then at TRUMP, then leaves. KISLYAK takes his place on the sofa.]

You just say Obamagate over and over. Obamagate! Obamagate! Then the leetle gremlins come on the twitters and facebooks and the whole world say Obamagate with them.

TRUMP: You’re a helluva guy, Sergei. Hey, how’d ya like the soaps in the bathroom? Pretty rich, huh?

KISLYAK: Sure, I like them very much. Prostitute like them also.

TRUMP: I could see those soaps in the bathrooms in the Trump Winter Palace. What about you?

KISLYAK: I think our friend would be very interested.

[KISLYAK cackles as the CURTAIN falls.]