An attorney I work with, Ed, celebrated his 20th year with the firm this week. In his honor, the firm held a dinner tonight at the Cedar Ridge Country Club where the LPGA just played. Ed is one of the most intelligent people I've ever met and definitely the most intelligent attorney I've ever known. He's also a liberal...a far left, radical, liberal. But, unlike most liberals who annoy me, Ed is awesome in that he can intelligently and rationally argue his points without resort to emotional feel-goodism that so permeates most of liberal arguments. I could debate him for hours, unfortunately, the demands of our jobs prevents all but the most occasional dip into unbillable intellectual repartee.

Because of my well known political enthusiasm, I was asked to write a tongue-in-cheek speech poking fun at Ed's liberalism. I chose the format of a fictional letter from President Bush recounting their long history together. For Ed's benefit, I also took a few jabs at President Bush. I found the picture on the internet a few years ago and held on to it for an appropriate moment. It is not Ed, but bares a certain comical resemblance. We had it blown up to poster-board size and revealed at the appropriate moment during my speech. After the jump is the text of the speech I delivered which went over quite well...much to my relief.

(I left out Ed's last name as well as my firm's name. They are both easily Google-able and I have nothing to hide, I just didn't think my little blog should turn up on a search for either.)

Jim, Mike and Roger really wanted to make Ed's twentieth anniversary with the firm special and so, for the past year, they have been going through all the official channels and using all their high-powered connections...they invited President George Bush to be here with us this evening.

Unfortunately, the President was unable to attend. Although we understand he was going to be here but, at the last minute, he went looking for weapons of mass destruction in the corner of the oval office and hasn't been heard from since.

The President was, however, kind enough to send a personal message to Ed...and now I'd like to read that:

From the office of the President of the United States of America, George W. Bush.

Dear Ed,

Congratulations on your 20 years with [Firm Name]. It must seem like a long time, I know my 8 years as President have seemed like an eternity...and I'll bet you agree.

I had my lovely wife, Laura, do some research and she tells me when you started with your firm in 1988:

• a first class stamp cost 22¢
• The average price for good old leaded gasoline was 98¢
• The Last Emperor won 9 Academy Awards including Best Picture beating out Broadcast News, Fatal Attraction, Hope & Glory and Moonstruck
• The Summer Olympics were in Seoul, South Korea
• The Winter Olympics, still held the same year as the summer games, were in Calgary, Alberta, Canada
• Notre Dame won the college football championship with a 12-0 record
• Kansas beat Oklahoma for the college basketball championship
• The Chicago Cubs played their first ever night game at home in Wrigley Field
• United States Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy is appointed (big mistake)
• Lieutenant Colonel Oliver North was indicted on charges relating to the Iran-Contra Affair
• Sonny Bono was elected mayor of Palm Springs, California
• After 8 years of fighting the Soviet Union Red Army began withdrawing from Afghanistan [hand written note: that don't make no sense]
• The U.S. Navy guided missile cruiser USS Vincennes shot down civilian Iran Air Flight 655, over the Persian Gulf, killing 290
• Pan Am Flight 103 was blown up by Libyan terrorists over Lockerbie, Scotland, killing 270 people
• Of course, I'll always remember it as the year my daddy George H.W. Bush and Dan Quayle beat Michael Dukakis and Lloyd Bentsen in the presidential election

So much has happened in the last 20 years, but it seems just like yesterday that we were both working on Richard Nixon's 1960 campaign together...I remember snack time the most and that you always made the best brownies. I think that if you had come up with Nixon's 1968 slogan "Nixon's the One," a few years earlier, we might not have had to suffered through those horrible Kennedy years.

I asked Senator Hillary Clinton to go through some of the FBI files she keeps laying around and, as luck would have it, she found a picture of you at a recent John McCain rally. [reveal picture]

You and Hillary Clinton sure have one thing in common...you never quit.

I want to especially thank you for your tireless work over the years on behalf of the multi-billion dollar international insurance conglomerates. Thanks to you, their profits are as high as you and I back in our National Guard days. Speaking of which, I never understood why you felt it necessary to always report to duty when ordered, I thought all that was optional once you signed up.

You have single-handedly done more for the insurance industry than Dick Chaney and I have done for the oil industry. I'll bet you've saved insurance companies even more than I've spent in Iraq. Ed, you are truly a man after my own heart: I veto appropriations to keep money from being spent on injured veterans and you keep money away from injured plaintiffs. We're kindred spirits, you and me.

I know we've lost touch these last few years, I don't think we've seen each other since the Strom Thurmond fundraiser.

Laura sometimes reads briefs you have written to me, especially when I have trouble sleeping. And, although I don't always understand all the big words you use, your brilliance and passion always comes through. Clearly, you haven't wasted a terrible mind, or however that saying goes.

As you know Karl Rove is the brains behind the White House and I know you will take this as the highest compliment, you, are the Karl Rove of [Firm Name].

In closing, I just want to say, that if your desire upon entering law school as a wide-eyed, hopeful, idealist, was to promote capitalism and keep money out of the hands of widows and orphans then Ed...MISSION ACCOMPLISHED!

Very truly yours,

George Bush