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By Lloyd Grove
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, January 23, 2001 ; Page C01
The Purloined Letter (Chris's
Note: this is the funny article, the others are amusing, but this one is
really funny)
Incoming staffers of the Bush White House are apparently victims of a practical joke perpetrated by their predecessors. Bush aides settling into the Old Executive Office Building have discovered that many computer keyboards in their work spaces are missing the W key -- as in President Bush's middle initial.
"There are dozens, if not hundreds, of keyboards with these missing keys," a White House aide told us yesterday, speaking on condition of anonymity to confirm reports from two Republican sources. "In some cases the W is marked out, but the most prevalent example is the key being removed. In some cases the W keys have been taped on top of the doorways, which are 12 feet tall. In other cases the key is just damaged, with the spring broken or removed."
The Bush aide added that the damaged keyboards are being found "in any number of different offices and divisions at the Old EOB. It has the technical and computer support people very busy. They already have quite a lot to do. I don't believe they expected to be coping with this as well. I think they're working to repair or replace the equipment, whatever they can do."
Our efforts to reach former staffers of Al Gore and Bill Clinton were mostly unsuccessful yesterday, but Gore campaign press secretary Chris Lehane, tongue in cheek, fielded our request for an explanation: "My guess is that the White House did not have many reasons to use the letter W over the last couple of years. It's possible they just fell off because of sheer atrophy." Lehane added: "I think the missing W's can be explained by the vast left-wing conspiracy now at work."
Chavez: No Cat Got Her Tongue!
• Remember Linda Chavez? She was President Bush's choice
to head the Labor Department before her nomination went splat with the
news that she gave housing, work and money to an illegal immigrant from
Guatemala. Yesterday Chavez phoned us to offer room and board -- and, yes,
employment -- to yet another refugee.
"I'm happy to offer a home to Socks," she told us from her nine-acre farm in Loudoun County that she shares with husband Chris Gersten. "There are plenty of mice here, so I would expect him to catch a few mice to earn a place here. I've got three aged and decrepit dogs, two lame horses and a middle-aged parrot, so I guess an old cat would just about round out my menagerie."
Chavez -- who writes a newspaper column, runs the Center for Equal Opportunity and gives speeches (her lecture fees have jumped since her nomination misadventure) -- said she's making the offer because she's worried about Socks. On leaving the White House last Saturday, Bill Clinton and Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) ditched the 9-year-old family feline, depositing him with Clinton White House secretary Betty Currie because he can't get along with pet Labrador Buddy. But it's unclear if the arrangement is temporary or permanent, and Chavez stands ready to fill the vacuum.
"When I heard the Clintons weren't taking him with them, either to Chappaqua or their new house on Embassy Row, it just broke my heart," she said. "I assume he's neutered. I wouldn't want any unneutered Clintons in my house."
THIS JUST IN . . .
Sarah Rivera Scott and husband Ivan: a Texas treat at
the Watergate. By Todd Cross - The Washington Post
• Having refreshments Sunday night at the Watergate Hotel
bar, WTOP Pentagon correspondent Ivan Scott and his producer-wife, Sarah
Rivera Scott, admired the handsome Stetsons being worn by a group of Texans
in town for George W. Bush's inauguration. "What beautiful hats," Scott
told them, marveling at the $180 pressed beaver chapeaus, the same headgear
favored by President Bush at his Crawford ranch. When it was time for the
Texans to leave, Fort Worth restaurateur Michael Thomson and physician
Mark Bussell stopped by the Scotts' table and settled two of the hats on
their very surprised heads. "Take 'em," Thomson said. "After all the hospitality
we received in Washington, we just wanted to show you some Texas hospitality."
• The way Mica Mosbacher describes the clutter of private jets owned by rich Texans trying to hightail it out of town Sunday, we immediately thought of the movie "Giant." The wife of former commerce secretary Robert Mosbacher e-mailed us yesterday: "The waiting room [at the Signature Jet terminal at BWI Airport] was standing room only and the pilots were assigned numbers for takeoff similar to those given at fast-food restaurant. There was also a first come first serve sequence for the de-icing trucks called 'Frosty.' Unfortunately Frosty 1 and 2 were not operational. Traffic control would periodically read off all the tail numbers of planes and what their number was for takeoff. Each time the long list was read, some plane would be left off the sequence and irate pilots, and at one point someone's irate wife, would come over the radio and begin complaining. By the time we were able to take off -- over 2 hours on the ground -- we had over 50 planes on the list waiting to take off after us." The Mosbachers made it safely home on a friend's Sabreliner.
• The Bushes and the Cheneys liked the 200-year-old blue plates that graced their table at Saturday's lunch at the Capitol -- so much that they've asked for reproductions of the porcelain dishware first used at Thomas Jefferson's 1801 inauguration. New York history film producer Barry Landau, the collector who loaned 12 original plates for the head table (for decorative purposes, because they're too delicate to eat off), told us he'll happily provide the first and second families with what he'd already given to the 220 other lunch guests -- their own reproductions. But don't go asking for any more: "I'm a historian. I'm not in the china business."
With Beth Berselli
© 2001 The Washington Post