That’s Jack over there, offstage. You should see him right now, doing all these crazy hand signals, all red in the face.  I like Jack, and I wish he’d calm down, because he’s gonna give himself a heart attack.  Then he can forget about being White House Chief of Staff.

Jack, don’t worry about it.  They like me.

You do, don’t you?  The whole idea here is that you’ll like me so much, you’ll vote for my dad.  Of course, if you’re here you’ve probably decided to vote for him already.  But if you’re watching on TV, maybe you haven’t.  And if your kids are watching on TV, and they like me...well, never underestimate the power of nagging and whining.  See, Jack used to be in advertising, and he knows how important it is to appeal to kids.

Well, Jack, that’s what I’m trying to do!  If I just read the dumb speech you guys wrote, anybody my age is gonna see right through it.  They probably don’t think I’m being spontaneous now, even though I am.  They probably think it’s all a show.  Do you?  Is that what you all think?

All I can say is, trust me.  My dad says that’s what it’s all about, facing the voters and saying, Trust me, and then being worthy of that trust.  That can’t be easy, day after day after day.  I mean, come on, everybody lies sometimes.

(She looks offstage.)

You can’t see what’s going on offstage, so I’ll tell you.  My dad, my mom, the speechwriters, the spin doctors, the media consultants and Jack are in a total panic trying to figure out what to do.  I think Jack wants to send my dad out here as quickly as possible to make some joke, tell me to go to my room or something like that.  But there’s disagreement.  Ruth --she’s one of the media people, and my best friend on the entire campaign -- Ruth thinks I’m doing just fine.  And Jack’s listening to Ruth now.  Jack’s a good listener.  I can’t hear what Ruth is saying, but two of her favorite words are “ironic” and “post-modern,” and she’s probably using them now.

(Waving to the wings:)

Yeah, hi Ruth.  I’m talking about you.

(To the audience:)

See, Ruth thinks it’s okay for a campaign to have a sense of humor about itself.  She says voters are cynical about politics, and the only way to deal with that is to give the voters something to laugh at.  Make them scratch their heads and wonder if we’re not just pulling their leg.  You know, the Letterman approach?

I don’t know, Ruth.  I’m not sure what post-modern even means, but it’s not what I’m trying to be.  And if someone’s being ironic when they say “Trust me,” they just sound like...

Like my dad.  Not always, but lately.  Yeah.  Like my dad.

(To the wings:)

Don’t come out here, dad.  Not yet.  Let me finish.

(To the audience:)

Do you want me to finish?

(To the wings:)

They want me to finish.  It’s not gonna look good if you cut me off.