Obama, Act I

Sometimes I wonder what would happen if Shakespeare were alive today? Would he write sitcoms? Probably. But let’s assume he felt inspired to write drama. And let us suppose that within the walls of the White House, gather Obama and his courtiers, Bidenio, the Mountebank of Delaware, and Rahm, the good Lord Chicago. They ruminate upon palpable bad news. Ladies and Gentlemen, the Tragedy of Obama, Act I.


Enter Obama from the balcony, having orated a gathered crowd. Restless voices murmur below.

Obama (boastful): All the world’s a stage, and all the men merely players, and I, a man, who plays many parts in his time. Give every man thy voice, but few thy ear, my good sirs.

Rahm: My Lord, the people are disquiet. Now is the winter of their discontent.

Obama (angry): How sharper than a serpent’s tooth it is, to have thankless children!

Rahm: I fear, in their anger, they may seek the comfort of Republicans.

Obama: Misery acquaints a man with strange bedfellow, my Lord Chicago, but fear not, for love is blind and lovers cannot see the petty follies that we may commit.

Bidenio: Sire, we have most horrid news. Friend Stimulus failed his appointed task, and has perished.

Obama: Alas, poor Stimulus! I knew him Bidenio, a fellow of near infinite proportions, of most excellent fancy. He hath borne my ratings on his back a thousand times, and now, how abhorred in my imagination he is!

Bidenio: Neither a borrower nor a lender be.

Obama: There are more things in Heaven and earth, Bidenio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.

Rahm: Hark, Lady McNan approaches, and with her McReid, Harold of the Senate. My, but there is a foul air about her. She will be incensed for the recent vote.

Obama (to self): By the pricking of my thumbs, something wicked this way comes.

Obama (to Rham): Something is indeed rotten in the State of Denmark.

Bidenio: Denmark? Is that perchance one of the missing seven?

Rahm: Be still they tongue fool.


Enter Lady McNan and McReid the Harold.

Obama: Hail Harold, how goes the health care bill?

McReid: The attempt and not the deed confounds us. I sent you a copy.

Obama: It was Greek to me.

Lady McNan (angry): Sire, you must cry “Havoc” and let slip the dogs of war! Appeal to the people, let them know this is thy will!

Obama (to self): Is this a dagger which I see before me, the handle toward my hand? I shall decline this danger.

Obama (to McNan): The better part of valor is discretion, in the which better part I have saved my political life. To be, or not to be: that is the question. Whether ‘tis nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, or to take arms against a sea of opinion.

Lady McNan: Cowards die many times before their deaths.

Obama: There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.

Lady McNan (to McReid): The fool doth think he is wise, but the wise man knows himself to be a fool. He knoweth not.

McReid (to McNan): Though this be madness, yet there is method in it.

Lady McNan: My lord. . .

Obama: The lady doth protest too much, methinks.

Lady McNan: This will raise the ire of my caucus!

Obama: I must be cruel, only to be kind. This is the short and the long of it.

Rahm: But soft! What light from under door breaks? It is the east wing, Lady Obama approaches.


Enter Lady Obama.

Lady Obama (singing): This throne of kings, this sceptred chair, this earth of majesty, this seat of Mars, this other Eden, demi-paradise, this fortress built by Nature for us, how goes it my husband.

Obama: My wife, perchance you recall Lady McNan and Harold.

Lady Obama: Of course, I come to say good night, good night! Parting is such sweet sorrow, that I shall say good night till it be morrow. And Air Force One. . . I may borrow?

Obama: I see you wear your heart upon your sleeve.

Lady Obama: Would that I wear sleeves.

Obama: What’s mine is yours, and what is yours is mine.

Lady Obama: Good night sweet prince.


Exit Lady Obama.

Obama (turns to address Lady McNan and McReid): To what issue will this come?

Lady McNan: That which we call a vote, by any other name would smell as defeat.

Obama: I shall shower you with my wishes, but I will not speak on thy behalf.

McReid: Fie, my lord, fie! A ruler, and yet a feared? What need we fear who know it, when none can call our power to account? Think of this good peers.

Obama: Be contented with my gifts.

Lady McNan (angry): Rich gifts, wax poor. Betrayal comes easy for some.

Obama (angry): Out, damned spot! Out, I say! A plague on both your houses.

Lady McNan: I implore you. Speak my lord, or thou art slain; no medicine in the world can do thy administration good. In thee, there is not three years life, never to rise again, lest you speak.

Obama (to himself): I sense a treachery, but also opportunity to rid myself of this petulant Lady, for ‘tis the sport to have the engineer hoist with her own petard.

Obama (to McNan): Very well. I shall lend mine voice to yours.

Obama (to Rahm): Lord Chicago, a teleprompter! A teleprompter! My kingdom for a teleprompter.


Exeunt.