The Rudygiuliani looked down his crusty snout at the 35 legal dinos squatting before him in a conference cave adjacent to the Oval Dwelling.
“We’re looking for a few good legal dinos. Hell, who am I kidding? We need a lot of legal dinos. Here’s how this vetting process is gonna work. I’ll be asking a series of tough, very tough legal questions. 17 of you will be rewarded with a position as legal dino to the Oval Dwelling. Very prestigious. The remaining dinos, that is, the 18 who score higher than the Oval Dwelling 17 will be legal representation for the T-Rump and working closely with me.”
The Rudygiuliani paused, surveying the crowd for some kind of favourable reaction. Any. None came.
“Alright then. No time for names, you won’t be around long enough for that. So, I’ll be referring to you for now as LD#1, LD#2, etc. … Legal Dino and a number. Remember it. That’s who you are. Just a number. What’s at stake here? The goddamn Milkanhoney Preservation!”
He laughed nervously, raking his hand over his balding scalp.
“Okay, now that I have your attention.”
LD#1, can you tell me what exactly collusion is?
“Collusion. That would be like when a pair of angry dinosaurs charge at one another and hit each other, like head-on?”
“Uh, no. Welcome to the Oval Dwelling.”
“LD#2, what is conspiracy?”
“Isn’t that when two or more well-meaning dinos help elderly dinos across the busy path during Brachiosaurus rush hour?”
“O-k-a-a-a-a-y. Does anything bad happen?”
“Only if they don’t look both ways first.”
“You’re up, LD#3. Can you give me an example of transparency?”
“Sure. Trans–parency. That would be when your mom looks like your dad.”
“No, it isn’t. Next! LD#4, lucky you. Get this and you’re with the T-Rump. What is a witness?”
“That would be when you don’t have a clue. You are witless.”
A deep sigh from the Rudygiuliani.
“Helluva try, kid. LD#5, a big concern around here, because — hint, hint — we can’t afford to let the T-Rump answer questions from the Muellersavus, is the perjury trap. What is …”
“A per-Jerry trap?”
“Do I detect an accent?”
“Are you discriminating against me?”
“Oh, no. Of course not. Go ahead.”
“Well, you see, a per-Jerry trap would be like, if you had a friend named Jerry and he told you about a trap, right? So you knew about it per Jerry. That makes it a per-Jerry trap.”
“You sounded so convincing and you probably believe it in your heart, but no. … Where are we? LD#6, you work with this all the time. What is evidence?”
“You know how, when you are like stuck — kaput! — in zee fog?”
“Yes, yes?”
“Mais, oui. It is ‘eavy, dense. ‘eavy, dense.” He nodded for effect.
“Over to you LD#7. Help me help you. This next issue may come up. It has for the past 3 weeks. Shutdown. What is it?”
“A wall.”
“Finally. A correct answer.” The Rudygiuliani’s feelings of hope were dashed however as he moved onto the next word. “We didn’t do well with evidence. Which gives me little confidence, LD#8, with this next one. Circumstantial.”
LD#8 gulped.
“Would that be when you stand in a circle?”
“No.”
“You make a stand in a circle?”
“No.”
“Circum … um … you don’t know you’re in the circle?”
“No! There’s no circle!”
The Rudygiuliani composed himself. This was tougher than he thought. The Ricksantorum was right. No dino in his right mind wanted to work for the T-Rump.
“Okay, LD#9. Your turn. Sneak up on this one, would you? This is, after all, what we may be preparing for. What is a trial?”
“Try-all. That’s when we’re all gonna try. Try-all. Real hard,” he said proudly.
“Oh, you did alright. To no avail. … LD#10, can you please stop my heart by using the word ‘redaction’ correctly in a sentence. Any one will do.”
“Okay. I hope there is no reduction in my chances of working with you.”
“I’m afraid there is. … LD#11, what is a ‘stay of proceedings’?”
“When everybody proceeds home to stay in their caves?”
“So close. LD#12 … You’re going to be saying, “Objection!” a lot. Like, uh … when?”
“When I’m hungry?”
The Rudygiuliani nodded thoughtfully.
“Okay, that would probably be often enough. … LD#13, can you tell me what executive privilege means?”
“Sure. That is your right to be a bigoted, racist misogynist.”
“Nope. LD#14, something else we need to pound into our thinking. What is innocence?”
“In a sense?”
“That’s right.”
“In a sense of what?”
“Innocence of anything!”
“I’m sorry,” LD#14 said indignantly, “but I’m afraid you’ll have to be more specific.”
“LD#15, you’re up. What is truth?”
“Truth is revealing exactly what happened.”
“No. No. No. Do you even know why you’re here?! Note to self. We’re still working on truth. LD#16, just so there’s no confusion, I’ll just spell this one out for you. J-U-S-T-I-C-E. Please explain.”
“Hmm. Well, you know when it got cold last winter and some of the neighbours froze? My wife, Mildred, I call her Millie for short, she looked at me and said, George, those used to be our friends and now they’re just ice. That’s just ice for you.”
The Rudygiuliani’s nostrils flared and his shoulders slumped.
“Okay, that’s it. Nobody passes. … This just in. Per usual, there’s been a change of plans. We need to avert a disaster. That is, we need to manufacture a crisis at the Great Tex-Mex Divide so you’re all heading for the southern border. Everyone of you. Now. Move on out. Let’s go.”
LD#17 raised his hand.
“For the national emergency, right?”
“Are you kidding? The real national emergency is that we can’t find a lawyer for the T-Rump!”
David Belisle 