In the early nineties, Jim Riggins became a conservative on a bet. He didn't expect to enjoy the ruse but did. Years later, he found himself in the White House working for George W. Bush. Life was good for the GOP, but thanks to the Right's fealty to authority, the party stumbled. As a result, a plan to win back the hearts and minds of America was devised. Along with chicken-hawks like El Rushbo, Glen Beck, Sean Hannity and, of course, Sarah Palin, Forty-Three enlists in the Army after his two terms. He does so at the direction of Dick Cheney who also orders Jim to enlist and run interference for the former president. But there's a problem. Americans are dying in Afghanistan and Iraq. Then Vietnam attacks a neighbor and provides the group a warzone where Americans aren't dying. Trained up, the "flock" deploys to Vietnam Part II where Charlie attacks its vehicle and throws its members into a POW camp. Starved and sick, the group is forced to survive in the jungle under the ideological Colonel Mai. But the group can go home if it agrees to do one thing.

The Accidental Conservative

The Improbable Story of My Time in the Echo ChamberBy Jim Riggins

AuthorHouse

Copyright © 2011 Jim Riggins
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4634-0761-2

Chapter One

A television at the foot of my bed blinked to life and Nora O'Donnell stared at me with those blue eyes. "Early this morning," said the attractive brunette, "Vietnamese forces shot down a Thai helicopter that Hanoi says crossed into Cambodian airspace or what Hanoi now claims as its own since it took control of its western neighbor three months ago. Details are sketchy at this hour," continued MSNBC's chief Washington D.C. correspondent, "but one source stated that at least three Thai soldiers died in the attack. As a result, Thai leaders have issued a formal complaint with the U.N. and recalled its ambassador to Vietnam. A spokesman for the communist government in Hanoi had no comment except to say that his government will take all measures necessary to protect its borders."

I go by a lot of names—Jimmy, James, Riggins, Riggs—but sign my checks Jim Riggins. The night before, I went out with friends and got carried away. I'd been doing that more and more—the getting carried away part, not the going out with friends.

Usually, I was too tired to go out after work and, like Mr. George Thorogood, preferred to drink alone. It had gotten to where I needed seven or eight beers, sometimes more, to muffle the voices. I say muffle because even deep inebriation was no match for the constant nagging in my head. Go now! Drop everything and run! What are you waiting for?

But I had attained a bit of respectability in my life. As an aide to the president, I had responsibilities to him and to the country and even to myself. I never was the poster-child for responsible behavior, but I was trying. Unnerved by Nora's report, I crawled out of bed and stumbled into the bathroom.

Breakfast was cold cereal and banana, and as usual, I sat on my tattered couch in the small living-room of my tattered apartment to watch news. Snippets of the broadcast forced me to pause with my spoon in the air.

According to one, parts of the Eighty-Second Airborne Division had been called up after being home from Iraq for only three months. Unsurprisingly, several top Republicans—none of whom had ever served in the military—chimed in to signal their support for defending Thailand against the scourge of communism.

These same men and one woman also brushed aside calls for an exit strategy or timelines. Sending troops to Thailand, the Republican members claimed, would show the terrorists in Afghanistan that they couldn't win.

In response, Democrats on the Armed Services Committees in both houses asked the Bush Administration to go slow. They didn't want the president to send more of America's children into harm's way without exhausting diplomatic efforts.

But a spokesman for the administration pushed back with the argument that defeating one rogue regime would create a domino effect in the region. First Vietnam then North Korea and possibly even China would topple into obscurity.

Familiar with the debunked claim, I pulled the door shut ten minutes later and walked two blocks to the Van Dorn Street subway station on the southern outskirts of Washington, D.C.

I heeded the weather guy's warning to bring an umbrella but didn't need it. The temperature was only around forty but any rain had decided to hold off. Five minutes into my silent vigil, a train clattered up to the platform and eased to a stop. Pairs of doors slid apart and my little group of fellow commuters boarded the last car.

Allergic to eye-contact so early, I took a molded, plastic seat next to a window and withdrew into my thoughts. The doors swooshed shut then the dozen or so of us in the back car jostled up to speed.

I purchased a paper from one of those spring-loaded boxes outside the station but didn't feel like reading. Instead, I stared out the window at nothing and wondered where it was that I had taken a wrong turn in my life. I couldn't say for sure, but getting involved in the Republican Party had to be near the top.

I sat and stared without seeing until Arlington National Cemetery came into focus on my left. I gave a cursory glance for visitors among the rows of white head-markers and green foliage but it was still too early. The day needed a couple more hours before mostly tourists, but also friends and family members, trickled in to pay their respect to America's fallen.

As usually, I tried not to think of all the Americans who had died needlessly during the Bush Administration. I had long ago lost the ability to rationalize their deaths.

We raced passed the rolling hills and deciduous trees of the cemetery and I drifted out again. I was vaguely aware of the next stop on our route then sort of watched as we first approached then rumbled over the Potomac River. Below and in the distance, Jefferson's bulbous memorial sat in a layer of fog and also waited for visitors.

The train stopped one more time then slowed for Farragut West. That was my station and by then I had worked myself into a frazzle. A familiar headache—one of the low-grade kind that hammers away at its victim throughout the day—woke up and said good-morning.

According to the doc, stress and probably alcohol caused mine but who really knows? I was a victim of my own stupidity.

Head in an invisible vice, I languished over the addition of more headstones to an already crowded Arlington, and for a moment, entertained the idea of not going to work. Not that I had a choice. Mine wasn't a job one called into and said that he wasn't going to make it.

Oh, good-morning, Betty, I'd say lightly. I'm not feeling so hot and can't make it in today. Could you let somebody know for me? You can? Gee, thanks. Oh, I'm sure I will by tomorrow. Alright. Take care. Bye-bye.

Resigned to the day ahead, I stepped from the car into the cavernous station and followed the muted crowd up an elevator to the surface. An old, black guy in a red beret and white beard stood under an overhang near the exit. He and his dented saxophone showed up most mornings to earn a few bucks entertaining passersby.

By their general state of scruffiness, the two might have been together for years if not decades. Eyes closed and cheeks round, the skinny man played something jazzy that I would have enjoyed in another place and time.

The stooped musician had opened his instrument's case and laid it on the ground in front of him. A few coins and several dollar bills lay scattered over the case's red felt bottom. But with no change or bills of any kind, I slinked by the old saxophonist without slowing.

A coffee joint with a name that doesn't rhyme with barfucks lay on the way. I often stopped in when I wasn't running late and bought a large latte instead of one of those venti things that piss me off so much.

Inside the trendy nook, I got in line behind a nervous little man who kept staring at his watch. Two skimmed-milk, nutmeg, artichoke, sides-of-beef lattes later, I stepped up and flirted with the barista behind the counter.

I went through my entire ten-second repertoire with the chesty, little blond then mumbled something stupid about the weather. The young woman was polite enough to smile but couldn't find the energy for anything more. My flirting always needed work and weather isn't funny.

I paid for...