GOP Rep. Christopher Shays said that what happened at Abu Ghraib "wasn't torture"; it was merely a "sex ring." Today's Stamford Advocate reports that Shays made the comment during a debate Wednesday night with Dem challenger Diane Farrell. Here's what Shays told the audience: "Now I've seen what happened in Abu Ghraib, and Abu Ghraib was not torture. It was outrageous, outrageous involvement of National Guard troops from [Maryland] who were involved in a sex ring and they took pictures of soldiers who were naked."
-- TPM Cafe
"Daddy, what is sex?"
It was the conversation I was dreading, here at last. Every parent knows instinctively, when the question is asked, that there were a thousand better times and better days to bring the subject up, and once you have reached the point where it is the kid asking the question, instead of the parent doling out the little facts and idiosyncrasies of reproduction as tiny, preemptive strikes over the course of weeks or months, you know you have blown it, and the game is up, and there's nothing you can do but do what you've been honestly intending to do for some time. Tell the kid the truth.
I said nothing, and looked out the window, stalling for time. I wasn't due back on Capitol Hill for a few more hours: there was nothing in the morning worth showing up for, but there were some votes scheduled in the afternoon that I had promised Hastert I would be there for, and breaking a promise to Dennis Hastert is akin to wearing a "please break my legs and leave me in a ditch" T-shirt. And so my duties as a Republican congressman were temporarily on hold, and my duties as a parent were, for the moment, at the fore.
I sat my son down on the bed, and sat next to him. "Well, Timmy, that's quite a question. But you're old enough now for a straight answer."
I paused, here. OK, I told myself in a mental voice so loud that I was half afraid it would set off car alarms on the street below -- here goes.
"Timmy, sometimes... when two people love each other very much..."
Aaaagh. Ten words in, and it already sounds like an afterschool special.
"...when two people love each other very much, they... do things. To each other. As an act of love, um, to show that they care about each other."
Timmy sat at attention, waiting for more.
"You see, sex is something that people do when they want to be close to each other. I don't need to tell you, Timmy, that it is a dark and scary world out there, full of evil people. Some of them want to tax you, Timmy, or tell you what you can and can't do with your money. There are brown people out there, Timmy, that don't even speak English, and they've been migrating up through South America, breeding with other people to make sortof hybrid brown people, and they've reached the U.S. now, in places like Texas and California--"
Timmy looked exasperated. "Dad, you're giving the brown people speech again. And besides, I think you're getting them confused with killer bees."
"Right -- um, sorry. OK, I was telling you about sex... you see, sex is an act of sharing."
"But what is it? How do you do it?"
"Yes. Um, OK... OK, let me start over. Let me give some examples. You see, Timmy, when two people care about each other very much, they will do things to each other, for pleasure, and that's what we call 'sex'".
Timmy was listening, now.
"For example, if you cared about someone very much, one thing you could do is take a chemical light, break it, and shove it up their ass."
There was a long, uncomfortable pause. Timmy was staring into space, a puzzled expression on his face.
"Or, say, a broomstick, or a billy club. It doesn't have to be a lightstick, it could be pretty much anything that would fit up the ass."
"Like... a loofa?" Timmy asked.
"Well, yes, though that's pretty pedestrian. I'm more talking about things that hurt. It's the hurting that says you care."
He absorbed this, and I continued.
"Or, for example, you could strip them naked, then set dogs on them. In some circles, that's called "doggie style". The goal is to get the dogs to bite your partner repeatedly, enough to cause a lot of blood loss, but not enough to actually kill them. Here, I have a picture."
I went across the hall to my home office, quickly collected a few pictures that I had tacked up here and there, and returned. "Here, like this."
Timmy paused. "That's... sex?"
"Yes, Timmy, that's it."
"There's so much blood. I didn't know sex had so much blood."
"Oh, if you're doing it right it does."
Timmy fingered the picture.
"Or, for example, if you have a lot of people you care about, you might forcibly strip them naked at gunpoint, a dozen at a time. Maybe smear them with feces."
"Um... OK. Does it have to be at gunpoint?"
"Well, tasers or clubs would be OK too, but absolutely, Timmy -- guns and sex go together like, well, guns and lawsuits. Or sex and lawsuits. Or sex, lawsuits, and having your own television show. Or drugs and having your own radio show -- hey, you know Rush Limbaugh, right?"
"Sure, I listen every day while you're on the Hill."
"Well, this is how he has sex, every day. Ann Coulter, too. And don't get me started on O'Reilly. They all have sex in a big pile, mostly covered with feces."
Timmy studied the pictures closely.
"All right, here's another example. If you care about someone quite a bit, and you want to show them they're special, one thing you can do is put a bag over their head and deliver electric shocks to them. If you're doing it during peak hours, you might just tell them you're going to shock them without doing it -- no sense paying high utility bills just for a little sex."
"Or here's a good one. You can just beat the crap out of your partner until he's dead, then take photographs of the body."
Timmy was visibly uncomfortable now. When he finally spoke, his voice wavered, and it was not simply the normal vocal skips of a pubescent boy, but nervousness. "Dad... um. I think there's... I think... there might be... something wrong with me."
"What do you mean, Timmy?"
"Well... I... I don't really find these pictures very sexy. I mean... they're not the kind of things I think of as sex, I guess."
My heart skipped a beat, but outwardly, I remained composed. "Well... Timmy, I... I wouldn't worry. You are still very young, and at your age, a lot of boys are confused."
He looked unconvinced. "I... I mean, I know I'm supposed to find these sexy, but... I just don't feel it. They're kind of gross."
The slightest glimmers of urgency in my voice, now: "No, Timmy, they're not gross. This is grownup stuff, and I don't think you need to worry about not understanding it all, but it is not gross. This is a natural part of being an adult, and a very, very important part of being a Republican."
"I... I guess."
I realized that perhaps I had started off with a bit too much, and was blowing it. Thinking fast, I decided on another approach.
"My point, Timmy, is that there are a lot of ways to have sex. Some of them are a bit more, well, hardcore than others, but as long as somebody involved is getting seriously hurt, it still counts as sex."
He nodded.
"OK, let's see. Here's an example I was just reading about, from a book by a great American patriot. Let's say your partner is very young -- like your age. One thing you might do, just to be sexy, is lock her in a cage with a live bear, and have the bear repeatedly rape and sodomize her until she becomes so inured to it that sex loses all meaning for her."
"Really."
"Absolutely, if she's young enough. That'd be quite a turn-on, right Timmy?"
He looked unconvinced, but nodded again. "I guess."
"Sure it would be. Good, Timmy, I think you're starting to get it."
"You mean, you can have sex with animals too?"
"Absolutely. One of my colleagues, a great man in his own right, said it perfectly when he said that down where he comes from, every boy's first girlfriend is a mule."
He contemplated this.
"I realize that living in D.C. is a pretty bad environment, for a child your age, and I'm sorry for that. I think maybe rural kids have it easier. Would you like us to get you a mule, Timmy?"
"Um -- no. No, dad, I don't think so."
"Well, the point is, animals by definition don't enjoy sex, so pretty much anytime you have sex with an animal, you're doing it the Republican way."
"I don't have to kill the animal or anything, do I?"
"Well, no, but you should at least attach electrodes to it somewhere."
Again, a voice in my head said I was moving a bit too fast. "All right, let's back up again. There is one element of sex that is very, very important. This is the most important thing I can tell you, the one thing you should remember about good, wholesome, Republican sex."
"Yes?"
"It can't actually be with someone you care about. It has to be with someone else you don't really care all that much about."
"Um, what?"
"Mistresses, Timmy, I'm talking about mistresses. Now, at every point, every Republican has to get married. I know, I know, you think it won't happen to you -- it will. I didn't think it'd happen to me, either, but boom -- someday, you'll find your career just can't get much further without a nice Republican wife, and there you'll be. Don't get me wrong, your mother is a godsend -- but the point is, you'll need a mistress."
"Um... OK."
"And that leads us back to the core of it all. Sometimes, when a man and his mistress love each other very much, and the man is through-and-through Republican, perhaps the Speaker of the House or some other suitable position, the man will convince his mistress to give him a blowjob in the car outside his kids' school. This is a good and natural thing, and not a problem."
"What's a blowjob?"
"I'm not sure, Timmy, I'm not sure, but I think it involves feces and electrodes. Pretty much every act of sex I know of involves feces and electrodes, so it's a safe bet. But the point is, good Republican sex usually involves a mistress, or an intern, or a page, or someone in a lesser position of power. For example, one thing you can do, with someone you care about that happens to work for you, is repeatedly call them at home while masturbating, and tell them sexually explicit things you'd like to do to them. We call that 'pulling an O'Reilly.'"
"That's weird."
"A little. You see, by calling them at home, you're not physically hurting them, which is a bit odd, I must admit. But you're really screwing up their lives and, if you're doing it right, careers, so it's still OK."
He nodded again. I was beginning to make real inroads here, I could tell.
"Of course, the right thing to do with your mistress, if you really care about them, is strangle them."
"What?"
"Strangle them. I was talking to a fellow congressman, he couldn't recommend it highly enough. Don't need electrodes, don't need the feces, don't need the hood. All you need is your own bare hands. It's a bit of an anti-consumerism approach, since there's no equipment to contract out for so there's not really profit potential there, but it'll really do in a pinch, and the point is, you manage to combine the sex act with really, really hurting someone, which is what makes it sex."
Timmy sat on the bed, staring at his feet. The photographs I had brought in were on the bed next to him, face down.
"I know, Timmy. This is a lot to absorb."
"Yeah."
I patted him on the shoulder, and stood up. "Let's just leave it there, for now. I think we've talked enough for today. Besides, I've got to get to the office."
"I thought you didn't have to be there until afternoon?"
"Yeah, I have a... meeting. Yeah, that's it, a meeting."
"OK. Dad?"
"Yes, son?"
"Thanks."
I smiled. "Tell you what, you keep those pictures. Just don't tell your mom I gave them to you," I winked.
"OK. Dad?"
"Yes, son?"
"Do you think... I mean... do you think I'll be normal, when I grow up, like you? I mean, do you think I'll grow up and be able to look at pictures of guys being bitten by dogs, and people who have been beaten up, and people who died, and think of them as sexy, like you do?"
I smiled again. "Sure I think that, son. You're a good Republican from a good Republican family. Someday, you'll be able to look at these pictures like a grownup, like Rush Limbaugh or anyone else, and you'll learn to appreciate the sensuousness of taking someone, beating the crap out of them, maybe killing them. Power is a great aphrodisiac, son. Maybe the best."
He looked a little relieved. "Dad? Well... thanks again. I think I understand, or I will, anyway."
By this time, I was beaming. "Don't worry, son. It'll happen to you, sooner or later. I know you don't get it now, and when you're your age, nobody does. But it'll happen. Someday, I promise you, you'll meet a fifty year old Republican congressman who will make you very, very happy."
"Thanks, dad."
I packed my briefcase and set out, invigorated, for the short walk to the Hill. It was a crisp autumn day, the kind of day when the sun was a bit too warm, and the breeze was a bit too cold, but the combination of both conspired to make the skin tingle and the heart glad. I was a damn good father, I thought to myself. I was a damn good Republican father, and with enough Limbaugh, enough O'Reilly, enough Gingrich, and enough of my fellow congressmen, we were paving the way for a whole new generation of kids to understand sex the old-fashioned way.
The Republican way.