Thursday, October 28, 2004

Dinner for former U.S. Representative Charlie Wilson

Yesterday evening, thanks to the good offices of his friends T and E, El Jefe had the privilege of attending a private dinner party for former Congressman Charlie Wilson, (once known as “Good Time Charlie”) -- twelve term veteran of the House of Representatives, liberal icon, hard drinker, skirt chaser, party boy and genuine patriotic HERO of the 20th Century.

Very few people are privileged to do as much damage to the enemies of the country as was Representative Wilson, who made it his personal business to make sure that plenty of bullets found their proper billets in the bodies of the Soviet soldiers who invaded Afghanistan. His struggle against assorted bureaucratic time-servers, idiots and abominable no-men on behalf of the Afghan guerrilla resistance, together with some tales of his most interesting life, has recently been documented in George Crile’s Charlie Wilson’s War, which you would be well-advised to run to your nearest book emporium and purchase.

More stories about Good Time Charlie can be found in an article in the June 2004 issue of Texas Monthly: “The Rehabilitation of Charlie Wilson” by John Spong.

El Jefe had of course heard of Representative Wilson before, but had never seen him personally. He is an excellent speaker who managed to neatly sum up the war in Afghanistan in about seven minutes, certainly a better performance than most current politicians or university professors. El Jefe is most grateful to T and E and their family for arranging his attendance.

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