By Drew Nederpelt

No Dockers, No Peace!
A lesson in tolerance, care of the Fabiani Society.

"I’m so proud to be here on the day that we were able to take down CBS’ broadcast of the Reagan biography. Maybe next we can take down Dan Rather’s newscast!"

So barked Rich Lowry, looking down his oval specs at the 100 assembled suits and pant-suits. The room broke into cheers and applause. What, no joke to ease us into the evening?

Little did I know that neither National Review editor Rich Lowry nor the hundreds of Republicans in attendance had much use for jokes. Making fun of people, sure–but humor, what was the point?

I looked around the opulent Princeton Club as the rain pelted the poor sods scrambling across 42nd St. on a wet Tuesday eve in early November. I swilled back my Heineken and dropped another smoked-salmon ladyfinger down the pipe. I’d been invited to this two-hour open bar and finger-food fiesta by my attorney. He called at five o’clock and asked what I was doing that evening.

"Nothing," I said.

"Why don’t you drag your Canadian leftist ass with me to the Princeton Club for the Fabiani Society shindig."

"The what?"

"They’re a group of conservative journalists and authors and creative types," said David. "Pretty intense. It’s usually full of the city’s intelligentsia."

"No thanks," I said.

"Free food and booze," said my attorney.

Thirty minutes later I was making my way up 6th Ave. trying not to get my eye poked out by a six-foot umbrella. As I passed Bryant Park, I noticed that I was wearing jeans. Surely they wouldn’t exclude me from their get-together because of this? They were imported dungarees, after all, bought in Frankfurt on my way to Israel in the turmoil that was the spring of 2002–certainly they would see the pedigree of my pants, or at least their West Bank DNA. These were intifada-fighting jeans. Arafat-Barricaders. And besides, these were journalists, literati and other creatives.

I approached the Princeton Club and made it safely through the lobby without seeing anyone of import. I was already getting into their mindset–dividing people I saw into those who mattered and those who didn’t.

I found my host and lawyer standing reading a newspaper. After we arrived upstairs and filled out our name badges (a surprisingly socialist convention) we moved into the main room.

"Welcome to my club," David said.

We settled into a nice comfy couch by the fireplace at the back of the room and were approached with extreme caution by a few attendees who smiled uneasily while they scanned our badges for any clue as to which emotion to snap into. As they whooshed up like sharks to the cage and flashed away just as quickly, David and I chatted about our work. As the room began to fill I noticed that there was absolutely no one arriving in any type of casual wear–let alone jeans. I also noticed eyes unblinking a few seconds too long when directed my way. It was official: The collective had begun to stare.

Several minutes and two drinks later, I watched the wobbly-heeled twentysomething hostess announce there was a change in the cast for the evening’s performance and that Rich Lowry would be subbing for a reporter from Court TV who was "having the time of her life in Modesto covering the Laci Peterson case."

And then it came.

"Before we begin, I want to remind everyone of the dress code. It has come to my attention that there are those here tonight with ripped jeans and other unacceptable attire and I want to remind everyone that as Conservatives we want to make sure we look our best when we’re around others. And without further ado, here’s Rich Lowry…"

I stopped with sandwich in mid-delivery as my attorney turned beet red. The only people in the room who didn’t turn to look at me were Rich Lowry, who was already facing in my direction and couldn’t see over the stack of his own books piled in front of the podium, and the woman who had just castigated me for wearing dungarees to this, her monthly junior-high sock-hop fix.

My attorney looked at my pants and pulled them this way and that.

"What are you doing?" I asked, trying not to spill my beer.

"I’m looking for rips."

"There is not one iota of a rip in these jeans. In fact, they have less hanging threads than 80 percent of the suits in this room."

He shook his head and looked up. "Why would she say that?"

As Lowry had taken the podium in front of the cozy roomful of adoring fans, I noticed the attendees settle into their loveseats and folding chairs as though preparing for a feast. Lowry peppered CBS in his opening, and it became clear that tonight they would indeed gorge.

He unleashed invectives about the "smart" and "brilliant" and "likeable" and "intelligent" and "smooth" and "suave" Bill Clinton and his wife. Horrible attributes all, Lowry concluded for us. Then someone asked why Lowry thought everyone hated Hillary so much but didn’t mind Laura or Barbara Bush.

"It might have something to do with the word that rhymes with witch."

As the laughter and applause died down, another stoker rose and asked a question: "Why is it that while the hatred against Clinton was pretty bad, the hatred against Bush is so full of vitriol and venom?"

"Because the left is so elitist!" Lowry declared, without missing a beat. "It’s because they think Bush is a moron and they can’t stand that he’s commander-in-chief."

Lowry took a sip of water as the crowd sat rapt. I stopped Alfonse on his way past. Alfonse, in his white dinner jacket and club-issued sans-a-belts, was now very happy to pass judgment on me. I had been so unceremoniously outed, and he–Oh, Alfonse!–was now one of them. With my admonishment, the assembled mass had welcomed the help into their group; he was properly decked-out and dressed for success. That is, at least, until there was a need for more cocktail sauce.

"Clinton was…a worthless leader," Lowry hissed. "He may have launched a few Cruise missiles but he didn’t have the right intentions."

And then he began his sweep to victory. He unsheathed the heat-seekers, the ICBMs: "Clinton was all about feelings and emotions."

He said feeeeeelings and emoooootions as if repulsed by a dirty diaper hanging on his ear.

"It was like having a teenager in the White House. Clinton talked to Monica Lewinsky back and forth on the phone for five months before they had sex in the White House. It was like a bunch of 22-year-olds in charge."

And then he ended as abruptly as he had started–with a solicitation to come forward and collect a little piece of conservative nirvana in the form of a signed copy of Legacy: Paying the Price for the Clinton Years.

My attorney and I said our so-longs to our couch partners and went for the exit without a contribution to the Lowry Family Trigger-Guards-Are-for-Wimps Campaign Fund.

Walking out, I waved goodbye to the woman who had introduced me to the group as a sartorially stunted clown who didn’t know how to behave around civilized people. She raised her arm, smiled and with no sense of irony whatsoever, mouthed the big, beautiful words, "Come again."