Paulie Five Fingers

Editor’s Note: The following notes are, of necessity, in a rough and unpolished form. It is clear that Mr. Jamieson was a deeply disturbed individual, suffering from bouts of paranoia and depression, and these came to affect his work intermittently as his disease progressed. It’s fortunate that the taping was able to demonstrate that Mr. Jamieson, in fact, had become delusional and apparently was aware of, and deeply troubled by this affect of the mental problems that eventually led to his suicide. It is a measure of his greatness as a writer and courage as a reporter that he was able to review his dissolution at the end with an objective and honest eye, and report, as he always had before in his Pulitzer_studded career, the power of simple truth.

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Zepp: Right, Hang on. Is this goddam thing on? BANG! BANG!

Voice [background]: I don’t think hitting the mike on the edge of the table is going to help, Zepp.

Zepp: Cheap frigging [unintelligible]. Why he can’t buy me decent equipment...oh, ok. Here we go. I can see the squiggly things moving. It’s recording. OK.

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Zepp: Good evening. Tonight, "Zepp’s Commentaries" is honored and privileged to have an exclusive interview with the newest addition to the Supreme Court, Justice Paul [unintelligible], known to the world as "Paulie Five Fingers". First, Mr. Justice, why "Paulie Five Fingers."

[Pause]

In case the camera isn’t working again, the Justice is waggling his right hand at me. It appears to have five fingers. He is grinning. Now he’s only waving one finger at me. Perhaps it’s just as well the camera isn’t working. Justice ....

Paulie: Paulie is fine.

Zepp: OK. Paulie. So, Paulie: How do you account for your Supreme Court nomination, given that your total judicial experience was that of Night Court in Fresno?

Paulie: Or Paisan. You can call me Paisan if you want.

Zepp: Paisan, Paulie, Judge. You’re the Supreme Court Justice.

Paulie: That’s right. A little respect, here.

Zepp. Um. Sure. So: Paulie, you don’t seem to have the conventional background that your fellow justices...

Paulie: Or you can call me Tony, Jr. That’s kind of an inside joke on the court.

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Zepp: Good evening. Tonight, "Zepp’s Commentaries" is honored and privileged to have an exclusive interview with the newest addition to the Supreme Court, Justice Paul [unintelligible]. Mr. Justice, how does it feel to be on the highest court on the land?

Paulie: Fuckin’ GREEAAAATTTT!!!!

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Zepp: Good evening. Tonight, "Zepp’s Commentaries" is honored and privileged to have an exclusive interview with the newest addition to the Supreme Court, Justice Paulie Five Fingers. Mr. Justice, how does it feel to be on the highest court on the land?

Paulie: Well, Zepp, it’s an extraordinary honor, and I am deeply humbled and indebted by it. As you know, I have great love for this country, and cherish and respect its laws – the greatest legal system in the world – above all else.

Zepp: But Paulie, your first ruling with the court was to write the opinion for the majority on a 9_0 vote permitting President George W. Bush to run for a third term. Wasn’t that a flagrant violation of the 22nd Amendment?

Paulie: Oh, yeah. That. [raises voice] Did I tell you guys he was going to complain about that? The Constitution thing? Do I know this guy or what? [Voices, presumably agreeing with the Justice, are heard in the background.] Look, the Constitution is great, it’s a good guideline, it gives us an idea of what all those old dead white guys wanted way back when. But it’s only a guideline. If we got hung up on every little nit_picking little detail, why, we would never get any work done. Take this last election, for instance. What with commanding our brave troops in China and Iraq and Columbia and Syria and Quebec, and getting a handle on the $40 trillion in national debt the Democratic Senate racked up in ‘01, he was too busy too think about politics, and so he didn’t announce he was even running again until April of ‘08. By then, of course, the primaries were all over, and the conventions were only two months away. We couldn’t bring chaos to the country and do irreparable harm to his career just on some stupid technicality now, could we?

Zepp: Do you actually think that if there had been an honest election that year, he would have won it?

Paulie: Oh, sure. Hell, it was such a foregone thing that the candidates for the Greens and the Democrats both committed suicide!

Zepp: Yah. That was really something. Same city, same building, same bathroom, two days apart. Both shot themselves in the head fourteen times, pausing only twice to reload. Pittsburgh is getting a reputation for that kind of thing.

Paulie: Aw, that’s just internet gossip. Don’t go casting aspersions around. Just because the owner of the building is a bit rough on you liberals and your bullshit doesn’t give you the right to treat him with disresepect.

Zepp: Fine. Suicide. Whatever. OK, what about the ‘04 election? Any thoughts on that?

Paulie: I’ve never given that election any thought. As a jurist, I feel it is my duty to remain as aloof as humanly possible from partisan politics, and my only response was joy that in the world’s greatest and oldest democracy, the system still works after 204 years.

Zepp: Paulie, you’re on the court. The Senate is done with you, and voted. You don’t have to claim you’ve never given a thought to politics, or abortion, or anything like that.

Paulie: Oh, right. Force of habit. Yeah, that election was a real kick in the pants, wasn’t it? [Chuckles].

Zepp: But Bush was declared the winner.

Paulie: Yes. It was a proud moment for all Americans.

Zepp: He only carried five states.

Paulie: And fine, upstanding states they were, too.

Zepp: They only had 80 electoral votes.

Paulie: So? He made it up on the recounts in the other states, didn’t he?

Zepp: Mr. Justice, I was in California the night of the election. At 8:30, over 15 million votes had been counted. George W. Bush had two million of them. Even the Green candidate was leading him, and the Democrat was so far out in front they weren’t even bothering with the percentages. When I woke up the next morning, George W. Bush had two point one million votes, and the Green had one point three million, and the Democrat had two million. I thought that was very suspicious. Don’t you find that odd?

Paulie: No. You have to remember that those early "returns" were just projections by a Democratic_controlled media who were pushing to try to de_legitimize President Bush, just like they did at the turn of the century. So they put up all these misleading numbers to try and make the public believe that in an election that was actually quite close, it appeared that the Republicans were trying to steal the election. It was really clever of them.

Zepp: By "Democratic controlled media", you mean Rush Limbaugh, Chris Matthews, Matt Drudge, Sean Hannity, Ann Coulter, people like that, right?

Paulie: Um, yeah. Whoever.

Zepp: Or the Washington Times or the Wall Street Journal or the...

Paulie: There is no need to belabor the point. Obviously, the media is in the grips of a liberal cartel. For instance, you are a liberal, are you not?

Zepp: Um, yeah. But there’s only one of me...

Paulie: And you are the only one in this room. So by a random sampling of journalists in this room, we find that the media is 100% liberal. I rest my case.

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Paulie: Here is some water. You should really see a doctor about those coughing fits.

Zepp: OK. I’m fine. Let’s get back to the ‘04 election.

Paulie: If we must.

Zepp: Overnight, California had 13 million votes invalidated due to voter error.

Paulie: The land of fruits and nuts. Those wacky Californians!

Zepp: That was more vote invalidations than California had in all of its past elections, combined!

Paulie: There are now more Californians voting than there were before, too?

Zepp: Yeah, but the rate of invalidated ballots....

Paulie: So it stands to reason that there would be more invalid ballots. [Sound of hand slapping table], Case closed! Damn! I wish they were all that easy!

Zepp: What about the other 34 states where the Democrats were leading, usually by huge margins?

Paulie: Media projections, nothing more. The fact that Bush actually won all of them is proof that the media counting system is flawed.

Zepp: They were using data direct from the Secretary of States’ offices.

Paulie: Incomplete figures. Didn’t mean a thing.

Zepp: Well, I agree they didn’t mean a thing. Sure were a lot of ballot invalidations in all those states, though. Almost as bad as California in some cases.

Paulie: You should remember that the ballots, which were designed by Democrats in some states, caused some confusion.

Zepp: Oh. Yeah. Right. Bush didn’t announce he wanted a third term until May of that year, and the court ruled that because he entered so late, it would be unfair to have ballots with his name added at the bottom, so everyone got a blank sheet of paper to write a candidates’ name on.

Paulie: What could be fairer?

Zepp: Especially when your name is George Bush, and you’re running against candidates named Vladimir Chobloweski and Eduardo Montoya de la Carlos de Reinoso y Montalban. Requiring correct spelling of the full name was pretty inspired, wouldn’t you say?

Paulie: You know, it’s one thing to ask questions, but another to make accusations. I will have to remind you at this point that I am a Supreme Court Justice, and that it is my considered opinion that your innuendoes are right on the edge of permissible speech as defined under the Freedom of Speech Act of 2006.

Zepp: [Laughter] The one that forbids me from mentioning [unintelligible] in public? But I can still say "rubbers". That’s legal. What a law.

Paulie: You should not be showing disrespect for the law in front of a Supreme Court justice.

Zepp: Can you defend that law?

Paulie: I am only a judge. It is not for me to defend the law.

Zepp: Speaking of which, there’s the matter of your qualifications.

Paulie: The Senate covered that in their deliberations.

Zepp: Was that in the first minute, or the second minute? You know – the two minutes of deliberations that occurred before the vote of acclamation?

Paulie: This type of talk does not reflect well upon you as a purveyor of truth. Truth cannot ride on the shoulders of cynicism. The Senate studied my qualifications prior to their deliberations.

Zepp: And what were those qualifications?

Paulie: I would ask that you base your evaluation of my job on my actual actions, rather than...

Zepp: You graduated from high school in 1969. You went to a community college for two years, and then spend a third year at a cow college in Nebraska, majoring in animal husbandry. That seems to be the extent of your formal education. You returned home to Perth Amboy, New Jersey, where you took over the family-owned construction firm. You became a multimillionaire building over 12,000 low-income housing units. In the 16 years since they were made, over 4,000 have been condemned as unsafe and substandard.

Paulie, this looks like a fairly good background for a contractor, but your resume doesn’t scream "Supreme Court Justice" at me, if you know what I mean.

Paulie: The role of a judge is not to know the technicalities of the law, but to give out justice. Surely this is obvious. The Supreme Court doesn’t not involve itself with torts and carman mirandas and the like, and it doesn’t care if the eyes are dotted and the tees crossed. It is there to make sure that the deserving get what is coming to them.

Zepp: Like the R.J. Reynolds vs. Carlin case, where the Court ruled that corporations can sue any citizen who makes a statement that can adversely affect profits.

Paulie: Exactly. It is time, the court felt, that corporations, who are the driving force behind our economic success, should not fall prey to every mean-spirited so-called "comedian" who wants to make jokes about cigarettes killing you.

Zepp: So in effect, it’s illegal to say that smoking is bad for you.

Paulie: Wrong. Where do you get these ideas? You can say smoking is bad for you all you want. You just may not say it to anyone ELSE, is all.

Zepp: Right.

OK. Let’s get back to your background. You became a millionaire in the construction business, and were indicted 43 times for substandard materials, improper business practices, and racketeering.

Paulie: You will note that there are no convictions in all those cases. It was just bureaucrats, envious of my success and angered that my ability to do the job properly showed them to be inept and incompetent. Not one of those FBI clowns could make it in the private sector.

Zepp: There was also an incredibly high rate of suicide among former construction workers, too, I notice. Even those in the Witness Protection Program.

Paulie: Yes. It is very sad. Some guys, when they retire, they find they have outlived their usefulness, and give up.

Zepp: Most of them were in their thirties and forties. Let’s move on.

It’s rumored that you have ties to organized crime. At least three of your work associates are presently in prison on racketeering and tax evasion charges, and six others have been pardoned by President Bush. Two of them are now on his cabinet.

How do you respond to such reports?

Paulie: As you know, I am open to such charges because liberal fascists are bigots who assume that anyone of my alleged ethnic background must be a member of this so-called "mafia".

Zepp: Wait a minute. "Alleged ethnic background"? Your name ends in an "O".

Paulie: And yours ends in an "N". Does that proximity in the order of the alphabet mean that you have ties to organized crime?

Zepp: No, and I wasn’t saying yours did, either. I was just asking why your refer to your background as "alleged".

Paulie: "Alleged" means "irrelevant".

Zepp: Um, no it doesn’t. It means "accused".

Paulie: That is not what my lawyer described it as meaning. No matter. Our Thing...this so-called Mafia, which does not exist, has no bearing on my placement upon this august body of the court.

Zepp: OK. So you are saying unequivocally that you have no ties to organized crime.

Paulie: I will refuse to dignify that with an answer.

Zepp: OK. You are supposed to be politically non-partisan. Let’s look at your ties to the Republican Party.

Paulie: Just a minute. It is one thing to say that I’m a Wise Guy, but just because you think I am a mobster does not mean you have any right to accuse me of being a Republican. I know that the Mafia is accused of doing things like drug trafficking, and engaging in unfair business practices, and running rivals out of business through tawdry methods, and hurting anyone who gets in their way, and so people think they are Republican, but that is just not true. We...that is, they, are fine, upstanding people who sometimes do hard things for business, and not for pleasure.

Zepp: I’m tired of these non-responses, Justice [unintelligible]. Now, I have here a list of donations you gave in the past twelve elections. All republican donations. You supported Bush in the past three election cycles. Over three million dollars. Could you explain that?

Paulie: How did you get those?

Zepp: You know better than to ask a reporter that.

Paulie: You have broken the law if those are the actual numbers. The law specifies that campaign donations are confidential because it is felt that if your political contributions are made known, it could infringe upon your right to free speech. A minimum wage earner should not have his employer knowing who he donated to in a campaign.

Zepp: You mean corporations shouldn’t reveal which politicians and judges they own, right?

Paulie: You have gone entirely too far, Mr. Jamieson. This interview is at an end. Boys, show Mr. Jamieson to the door.

[sounds of a scuffle]

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This is Bryan Zepp Jamieson speaking. If my voice sounds odd, it is due to a bad case of laryngitis I seem to have acquired overnight.

I wish to make clear the events following my disgraceful performance in my meeting with Paulie Five Fingers last night.

Just as I was reaching the door, Paulie asked me to come back, and extended to me the hand of friendship. He and the boys (Guido Smith and Luigi Jones, they are named) took me to a fine Italian restaurant, where we dined on scampi and fettucine alfredo. I had rather a lot of wine, and we took a walk along the beach so I could clear the fumes from my head.

Paulie explained to me how the left wing socialists had inculcated my head with fear and loathing for the moderates of America, and how I was permitting my fear to cloud my vision. I should have recognized that the business leaders like Paulie had been the guiding force of America all along, and that it was foolish of me to claim that the same forces that made America so rich and free in the past would now want to damage her in any way.

Upon reflection, I realize that I have been wrong all this time, and wish to renounce and abjure all my previous writings about the Republicans, the religious community, and our fine leaders of industry who have made America so great. I was wrong, so very wrong.

I am nothing more than a lying socialist weasel, and I do not deserve to pollute the world with my presence. Give my love to my wife and children, if any, and please let everyone know I am sorry I misled you for so long.

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