Loverboy comes to Washington

Everyone's watching, to see what you will do
Everyone's looking at you, oh
Everyone's wondering, will you come out tonight
Everyone's trying to get it right, get it right

Everybody's working for the weekend
Everybody wants a little romance
Everybody's goin' off the deep end
Everybody needs a second chance, oh
You want a piece of my heart
You better start from start
You wanna be in the show
Come on baby lets go [Loverboy, Working for the Weekend]

It has been said that art is how we interpret reality, that we cannot contextualize actuality without filtering it through a process of simplification and reconstitution (no, I can't find a reference, but that sentence sounded appropriately weighty and deep). I think many of us eagerly await a time when creative minds sift through the wreckage of the Bush presidency and fit it into a larger picture (Neocons: The Opera - no, darn it, Wagner already wrote that one).

Little did we know that the extraordinarily prescient Calgary rock band Loverboy already created the quintessential piece of music to explain the Bush years, the song Working for the Weekend - and they wrote it way back in 1981 (coincidence that it came out the first year of the Reagan presidency - I think not).

To go through the above lyrics line by line is unnecessary. Every single line reveals important clues to the administration's actions and policies - the remarkable use of "everyone" to reflect the American people (though this remarkable work later changes the context of "everyone" - Bush is us, we are Bush), as we watched to see what Bush would do, hoping he'd come out; in desperation, the country moved to the right in hopes that something would happen. Then we went off the deep end by giving the president a second chance (read, term). We wanted him to start from start (actually, I have no idea what that means, though I suspect it has something to do with arms negotiations).

But the most important and straightforward clue, provided a full 20 years before Bush took the oath of office, is contained in the title. Working for the Weekend, of course, in the context of the song, implies that the singer is working hard so he might enjoy his weekend. And that, apparently, is the Bush motto.

Let me set the stage. A large investment firm has invested billions in high-risk securities, and their investors, having realized at last that Brian Williams really means it this time when he says there are economic problems, decide to cash in their chips. Given the intricate, interlocked, and almost totally unregulated financial system of today's United States, this can cause a real problem - other institutions might collapse, taking the real economy down with it.

But, darn it, this crisis is coming to a head at the end of a workweek. What ever will we do? "Can't it wait until Monday?" "No, Mr. President, it can't. Extraordinary measures are needed." "OK, we'll do whatever it takes, no matter how difficult, no matter the political risk. I'll ask Hanky-Panky to work over the weekend; I hope he doesn't have too many errands that he'll have to put off."

And this is no quiet request, made in secret. Though it may panic the country to learn that Treasury Secretary Paulson had to work on a weekend, the Chief Executive is going to give credit where it's due:

In some ways it was a throwaway line, the kind of praise a boss tosses out casually. But as the economy teetered Monday, President Bush's words to Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson struck many as discordant and disengaged.

"I want to thank you, Mr. Secretary, for working over the weekend," Bush said as he met with his economic advisors at the White House. "You've shown the country and the world that the United States is on top of the situation."

Now, lest you think Secretary Paulson was taking it easy, copying his tax returns, making long distance calls while no one else was in the office, don't worry. He was, in his own words, "very involved, you know, been on the phone for a couple days right now helping to work through this." Not only that, but, "Paulson appeared on ABC's 'This Week,' 'Fox News Sunday' and 'Late Edition' on CNN." So we had someone doing the heavy lifting, and we join the president in thanking this public servant for his effort. Henry, take a couple of extra days, you've earned it.