The Epic of @MayorEmanuel, Part One: The Adventure Begins

INTRODUCTION

This week and next, Epicenter is running excerpts from Dan Sinker's The F***ing Epic Twitter Quest of @MayorEmanuel, to be released September 13 by Scribner. The book collects and annotates the activity of @MayorEmanuel, a Twitter account Sinker created spoofing Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel, then the White House Chief of Staff turned mayoral candidate. The permanent archive of @MayorEmanuel's tweets end shortly after both he and the real Rahm Emanuel won their parallel elections to become Mayor of Chicago.

Throughout the campaign, Sinker carefully guarded the secrecy of his authorship. His tweets as @MayorEmanuel started as punchlines and in-jokes among friends, broadened to include general satire of the City of Chicago and its politics, and eventually became something else entirely, a mind-bending, fully-realized alternate dimension of characters and events both mirroring those of our universe and wholly unique to their own. The book is filled with allusions to real people and other fictional stories, rich in humor, unexpected emotion and unrelenting, inventive profanity.

*I was lucky to write some of the earliest notes on the last days of @MayorEmanuel. I have since met Dan and count him as a friend. I'm delighted to finally have this book, which includes both the original tweets and his copious notes, since even as a fully-devoted history-of-pop-culture fiend and one-time-Chicagoan, I never could have kept up with everything he put into it. *

— Introduction by Tim Carmody

RUMORS AND INNUENDO

Monday, September 27, 2010

fuck you right in your fucking face-hole. 09:52:09 PM

And so it began, late in the evening, as news organizations started publishing rumors that Rahm Emanuel would be leaving his position as President Obama’s chief of staff to throw his hat into the ring for Chicago’s mayoral race. It would be the first competitive race in 21 years, following the announcement by mayor-for-life Richard M. Daley that he would not seek another four years in office.

Someone tell those fuckwads at @politico to shut their fucking trap, or I’ll fucking END THEM. 10:11:12 PM

Politico was the first to break the story, followed quickly by the rest of the political press.

Hey you douchebags at @ChicagoTribune, I’ll fucking announce when I fucking announce. 10:22:18 PM

This was the first, and only, @MayorEmanuel Tweet that I retweeted via @DanSinker. It made its way around Twitter pretty quickly, and @MayorEmanuel’s follower count began to tick upwards rapidly.

Someone tell @joshtpm to shut his asshole before I have to hop an Acela Express and do it my goddamn self. 10:29:16 PM

Josh Marshall at Talking Points Memo had picked up the Emanuel rumor story, as it quickly spread across the news.

If the Bears fuck this up, my entire platform is going to revolve around burning that stadium to the fucking ground. 10:34:24 PM

Goddamn right Bears win. 10:48:25 PM

The Chicago Bears beat their archrivals the Green Bay Packers 20–17. It’s worth noting at this early point that I know nothing about sports. But if you’re running for Mayor of Chicago, you’d better, so I followed the outcomes of all the Bears games on—where else—Twitter. Thank god this wasn’t written in late spring, when I would have had to follow the outcomes of Cubs, Sox, Bulls, and Blackhawks games simultaneously.

Hey @jaketapper, you wanna talk “breaking,” how about I break my foot off inside your colon? 10:58:01 PM

ABC News’s Senior White House Correspondent Jake Tapper had just tweeted “BREAKING—Rahm Emanuel Likely to Leave White House This Week.”

I swear to god, if I never have to see another cherry blossom as long as I goddamn live, it’ll still be too fucking soon. 11:06:24 PM

Tuesday, September 28, 2010

Shit-screw you in your fucking cock-hole. 12:07:17 AM

Cocking shit-shiners it’s late. 12:43:32 AM

And with that, day one ended. The follower count was around 500. Up from zero in three hours.

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Gonna cram that sheriff’s star so far up Dart’s intestine that when he shits it’ll look like the constellation Orion. 07:35:32 AM

Mayor Daley announced that he wouldn’t run for reelection on September 7, 2010. By the 10th, news reports had Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart considering getting into the race. The Chicago Sun-Times quoted him as saying, “Voters know who I am; they appreciate a lot of the things we’ve done, so I think I do have the ability to have some ‘head start’ on some people.” Prior to Emanuel announcing, Dart was at or near the top of polls.

Also, Sneed: stop talking about yourself in the third person or I swear to god, I will break my dick off and fuck you in the hair follicles. 07:37:46 AM

Michael Sneed is the leading political gossip reporter in Chicago. She writes about herself exclusively in the third person.

These people are fucking joking, right? Give me back my fucking house, or I will burn it down around you. 07:44:21 AM

When he left Congress to become Obama’s chief of staff, the Emanuels (he is married with two children) rented their home in Chicago’s Ravenswood neighborhood. That morning Sneed led with a report that the tenants in Emanuel’s rental house were refusing to break their lease and allow Emanuel to move back into his home.

You know who I’m not going to miss at all? Mitch McConnell. That guy is the king of the fucking pansy-shitters. 07:50:48 AM

Mitch McConnell is the minority leader in the US Senate. He’s the first of many Washington regulars that @MayorEmanuel realizes he’ll soon be free of.

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Some mornings coffee is like standing underneath a twat-rainbow while fucking a thousand puppies in the mouth. 08:22:32 AM

The first, and most graphic, of @MayorEmanuel’s many coffee Tweets. Over the course of the feed, @MayorEmanuel would tweet about coffee another 69 times. Some of this was character logic: he’s passionate about everything, so why not coffee too? Some of it was to help spread the account around Twitter: people would pass the coffee Tweets around rapid-fire. And part of it was that I really, really like coffee.

Jesus shit-Christ is it awkward around the office today. 09:24:03 AM

Wait a second: who the fuck holds a fucking election in Chicago in fucking FEBRUARY? 09:42:49 AM

We’re all supposed to go out there with our dicks swinging in the snow? 09:45:54 AM

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I will miss sneaking juice boxes with Sasha. 12:01:36 PM

I always liked the image of Emanuel and Sasha Obama sipping juice boxes in the White House Rose Garden.

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Most of the lunch briefing was spent deciding whether I should drive down K Street yelling “Sayonara, bitches!” Or “Fuck you very much!” 02:21:05 PM

K Street is the epicenter for lobbyists and think tanks in Washington, DC.

Christ, the fuck train got derailed on its way to bullshit junction today. I blame Duncan. 02:43:54 PM

That’d be Arne Duncan, former CEO of the Chicago Public Schools, who was tapped to join Obama in Washington as the secretary of education. Fun fact: Duncan used to play professional basketball in Australia.

Another thing about Duncan: for being so tall, that guy is a fucking pussy when it comes to the head-fake. Makes him jump every goddamn time. 02:50:11 PM

When you’re writing in 140 character bursts, visual gags work really well. The idea of @MayorEmanuel tossing out head-fakes was easy, visual shorthand for his aggressive personality.

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Axelrod tells me “Who replaced Chicago with this shitfest?” isn’t a good slogan. 03:32:45 PM

This was the first appearance of David Axelrod, who at the time was President Obama’s chief strategist, having architected his campaign for president. Before entering the national spotlight with Obama’s presidential campaign, Axelrod had been a longtime political strategist. Prior to entering politics, he was city hall reporter for the Chicago Tribune in the early 1980s. He also sports a sweet Chicago-style mustache, which was the real motivating factor in incorporating him into the story. Axelrod was not actually directly involved in the Emanuel campaign in the way portrayed in the @MayorEmanuel story. He stayed in Washington, DC, though was seen in Chicago regularly during the mayoral race (and moved back in January 2011 to set up the Obama 2012 reelection headquarters in Chicago). His former political media firm AKP&D Message and Media (he’s the “A,” but he sold his interest when he joined the Obama administration) was paid millions by the Emanuel campaign to provide both media strategy and campaign consulting.

Wednesday, September 29, 2010

I really fucking hope that I get to stay on hold with Comcast Chicago all goddamn day. Yes, please, transfer me again. 09:31:31 AM

So Axelrod is blathering on about a “new Burnham plan” and I just look him square in the eye and say, “Fuck you, you fucking mustache-face.” 10:02:20 AM

I’m not a motherfucking giant Snoopy balloon, so I will not appear at your motherfucking parade. 11:00:51 AM

This little trio of Tweets showed the challenges of moving back to Chicago and running for mayor beginning to come into focus for @MayorEmanuel: dealing with strategy sessions, being asked to appear at civic events, and hooking up utilities. All treated with equal amounts of disdain.

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Geithner never stops talking. You can be standing there, double birds in his face and your cock hanging out, and he’s all blah blah blah . . . 12:04:28 PM

Timothy Geithner is the US secretary of the Treasury.

I would rather lick the balls of the entire Chicago city counsel than have to deal with the fuck-nuggets in the House for another 10 minutes. 02:25:23 PM

Thursday, September 30, 2010

Shitting cock-face, I stayed up way too late watching “Must Love Dogs” again. And I gotta deal with fucking Vilsack in the morning. Fuck me. 12:33:06 AM

Tom Vilsack is the US secretary of agriculture.

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Cock—06:36:17 AM

—a-doodle-doo, assholes. Wake the fuck up. 06:37:11 AM

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If Dick Mell leaves another VM promising to be a “kingmaker,” I’m going to pry all the keys off this phone and stuff them up his urethra. 08:13:03 AM

Dick Mell is a longtime member of Chicago’s city council. He was elected in 1975 and continues to serve on the council. Fun Fact: Mell’s daughter Patricia is married to embattled former governor of Illinois Rod Blagojevich.

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I walked into the briefing today, birds up, and said “Hey snatch-warblers, you’ve only got one day left with this bitch.” It’s official. 12:06:38 PM

News reports had confirmed that Emanuel would be leaving the White House to run for mayor of Chicago. He’d be replaced by Pete Rouse, a senior advisor to the president and, up until news reports named him, someone whom many casual political observers had never heard of. I know I never had.

Jesus fuck-Christ, I told them that if they’re going to go with Rouse, they’ll have to find another billion in the budget for donut runs. 12:19:10 PM

Apparently they went with Rouse because the potted fucking bamboo in the fucking East Room was too busy. Too bad, the bamboo says more. 12:32:25 PM

Another thing about Rouse: hope you like your morning briefings around 11:45, because cock-asses that motherfucker can sleep in. 12:48:03 PM

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Gibbs keeps looking at me and his eyes well up, like he’s eating the dong-berries right off the pussy-bush. 02:15:30 PM

Robert Gibbs was the White House press secretary.

I would rather slam my dick in a door than look at the motherfucking yard sign samples Plouffe just e-mailed. 02:59:58 PM

David Plouffe, who was a chief campaign manager for Obama’s election, appeared exclusively in this story in e-mails, faxes, and texts. This reflected the way many people experienced Plouffe: as a name in their in-box during the 2008 presidential campaign. Searching my Gmail, I had over 100 e-mails from Plouffe. In thinking about staffing up @MayorEmanuel’s campaign, I decided that Plouffe would remain a virtual presence, just as he had for many of us in real life. To the best of my knowledge, Plouffe was not involved in the Emanuel campaign in real life, though he is the “P” in AKPD Message and Media, David Axelrod’s consulting firm.

Salazar just came up with a fruit basket. Ken, unless you want me to insert these into your colon one-by-one, get the fuck out of my face. 04:58:37 PM

Ken Salazar is the US secretary of the interior.

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Been eating Fiber One all day so I’ve got enough shit to go around tomorrow. Lieberman, be sure to check your mail: you just got shitboxed. 07:52:26 PM

Joe Lieberman was a formerly Democratic senator from Connecticut who ran as an independent after losing the 2006 Democratic primary.

Last goddamn night in this fucking shit-coffin of a town. 10:19:44 PM

Friday, October 1, 2010

Thank god it’s motherfucking shit-scratching cock-bleeding Friday. 07:40:47 AM

This was it, the morning of Emanuel’s departure from the White House. He met privately with the staff (where he was presented with a dead Asian carp wrapped in newspaper, echoing a mythic Emanuel moment, when he mailed a dead fish to a pollster who made him angry) and would then be publicly feted by the president himself. This was also the first of dozens of posts celebrating Friday—they would soon shift to end-of-work-week posts, usually tweeted right at 5:00.

Dear Washington Press Corps, suck it out of my asshole, you fucking third-rate, cock-handed, twat-cobbler hacks. I will miss you not at all. 08:58:44 AM

“Suck it out of my asshole” was a nod to the Fake Steve Jobs character penned by tech journalist Dan Lyons—his character used the phrase so often he shortened it to “SIOOMA.”

Hey Steny Hoyer, check your mail today: You just got shit-boxed. And I’m sure there’s enough in there to pass around. 09:04:13 AM

Steny Hoyer was House majority leader from 2007 to 2011.

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LaHood just pulled up in his fucking electric clown car. This fucking ceremony is going to last a dong-capping lifetime isn’t it? 09:15:12 AM

Ray LaHood is the US secretary of transportation.

Rouse just waddled up, panting like a leg-fucking schnauzer. “Sorry I’m late.” Yeah, you fuck-hat, I’m sure you are. 09:32:43 AM

Only thing getting me through this fucking thing is knowing my shaking hand is covered in cock sweat. 09:45:33 AM

Vilsack’s halitosis is like breathing through a scuba tank full of dongs. 10:01:05 AM

DCA > OR-MF-D. 10:37:31 AM

Presidential speech out of the way, Emanuel was off to Chicago.

Continue reading "The Epic of @MayorEmanuel, Part One: The Adventure Begins... "

__Sweet Home __

There is a pothole on the fucking Kennedy Expressway that I swear just made me cough up my sphincter. 03:47:15 PM

23 cock-socked, twat-fingered voicemails from Plouffe. In two hours! How many more before he figures out I’m not fucking answering? 04:26:44 PM

“Hey Rahm, David. I was thinking about strategies for the 32nd ward . . .” Fucking dick-trimming shit-sorcerers, I’m going to toss this phone. 04:32:18 PM

Home. I’m going to crack open this Half Acre tallboy, pop in Serendipity, and put my feet up. Fuck all of you in your cock-soaked armpits. 04:58:04 PM

Friday, October 1, 2010

Muff-shitting fuck-towers. 09:46:05 AM

It’s @MayorEmanuel’s first full day in Chicago, and many local political figures are stopping by his house, trying to catch a meeting. I have no idea if this is how the real Rahm’s first day was, but I’m sure there were a lot of meetings over the first few days.

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Thing I like about Quigley: that the dong-fountain calls me “sir.” Thing I don’t like: motherfucker thinks Saturday is a good day to drop by. 10:00:01 AM

Mike Quigley won Rahm Emanuel’s vacated congressional seat in 2009.

I would rather snap a mousetrap inside my own asshole than take a meeting with Jody fucking Weis. 04:12:01 PM

Jody Weis was the superintendent of police for Chicago.

The top-fucking fuck-topper: Burke. 05:21:31 PM

Ed Burke is the longest continually serving alderman from a single ward in Chicago, having first been elected to office in 1969. He is the chair of the finance committee, and an extremely powerful and influential figure in the city council. But this was probably my least favorite Tweet of all of them. The concept was that Burke just shows up and @MayorEmanuel is immediately filled with dread, but it just didn’t work—it fell flat. Capturing emotion in 140 characters was difficult at first.

Saturday, October 2, 2010

Axelrod has been standing outside my house in the rain all fucking day. Stopped knocking hours ago. What a shit-sad mustache he’s got on. 08:18:12 PM

A cold, rainy October night? Someone tell Axelrod to pack his charts and head fucking home, I’m watching “1408.” Boo, you fucking cock-tards. 09:05:37 PM

Every film referenced to this point was a lesser-known film from John Cusack’s catalog. This was a very early attempt at Chicago-related— Cusack grew up in the Chicago suburb of Evanston—character development.

Sunday, October 3, 2010

Holy fuck-smacks, where’s the shit-coughing coffee? 08:33:44 AM

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183 e-mails from Plouffe later, and the suck-fucking webtards still made a site that looks like Barack’s. 01:30:32 PM

Emanuel’s campaign website, chicagoforrahm.com, debuted and its color scheme and font choice made it look very similar to the Obama 2008 campaign site.

Axelrod’s shooting my “special video announcement” (WTF?) for tomorrow. Wants me to say “Daley’s stewardship” and I keep saying “sewer-shit.” 01:47:54 PM

If Axelrod says “. . . and action!” one more time like he’s Martin fucking Scorsese I’m going to cram his Flipcam into his fucking colon. 02:43:55 PM

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If Axelrod doesn’t get back here with a Home Run Inn deep dish before the game starts, I’m going to dunk his fucking head in the fuck-tank. 06:36:59 PM

I received approximately two dozen Tweets in response to this one, pointing out that the Home Run Inn, a longtime Chicago pizza place on Chicago’s Southwest Side, doesn’t actually serve deep dish. Totally caught doing shitty research, the only reply I could come up with was “maybe not for YOU.”

Solis just stopped by and was all, “Oh, you guys are watching the game?” Now I’m chucking my chicken wing gristle at his huge fucking head. 08:25:29 PM

Danny Solis is an alderman in Chicago, and the head of the zoning commission.

Jesus fucking Christ-on-a-Cock, could this Bears game be any more fucking boring? Helen Shiller plays better motherfucking ball than this. 09:00:37 PM

Helen Shiller is one of the more vocal left-leaning aldermen in Chicago.

Plouffe e-mailed to say that even if my listening tour tomorrow is spent listening to cock-bulbs complain about this game, I still have to go. 09:19:03 PM

Fucking dong-choke, if I was invited to a zoning board meeting right now I’d go in a heartbeat—has to be more exciting than this game. 09:26:03 PM

Fuck this game right in its fucking shit-sack. Axelrod had the right idea: He fell asleep in the middle of the first quarter. 10:32:43 PM

The Bears lost to the New York Giants 17–4 in a game that the Chicagoist called “the ugliest game we’ve ever seen.”

Continue reading "The Epic of @MayorEmanuel, Part One: The Adventure Begins... "

Listening Tour

Monday, October 4, 2010

I’m going to have to drink an entire fucking bottle of Purell when I get home from all this shit-blasting hand-shaking. 10:33:41 AM

This was the first day of Emanuel’s “Tell It Like It Is” tour of Chicago. Even though he was sent off from Washington in style—a hug from the president, even—he didn’t actually announce that he was running for mayor. This listening tour was the first event in a very orchestrated run-up to an official announcement.

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Jesus shit-painting nut-Christ, February is way fucking far away. 04:08:05 PM

What I learned on today’s listening tour: You know what’s wrong with Chicago? Every fucking motherfucking thing. 04:32:28 PM

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After consulting with this four-pack of Gossamer Ale, it’s decided: Axelrod’s mustache can do the fucking listening tour on its own tomorrow. 07:39:42 PM

Gossamer Ale is brewed by local Chicago craft brewers Half Acre. It is delicious.

Frick-fucking crimp-cramming dick-jammers. 08:26:45 PM

Tuesday, October 5, 2010

Jesus fuck-chomping Christ, everything’s shit-shape today. 08:32:32 AM

Text from Plouffe: “Try to grimace less when shaking hands.” One of these days I’m going to give that motherfucker a reason to grimace. 08:47:01 AM

Who the fuck is in charge of cleaning the CTA stations? Because at this point I wouldn’t mind taking a fucking meeting with that asshole. 09:18:37 AM

The actual Rahm Emanuel visited every single CTA L station (the L is the public train system in Chicago, so named because much of the line is elevated aboveground) during his campaign, many of them multiple times. Most of them are not very clean.

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Shitting-fuck-sausage. How do you fucking people eat like this? 11:58:00 AM

The early days of Emanuel’s listening tour seemed to be exclusively focused on public transportation and lunch places.

Please, fucking pretty please with fucking sugar on top, stuff your camera into my face again, you fucking snatch-hole. 01:28:15 PM

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Just fucking perfect: Axelrod’s Civic just broke down in Chinatown. Again. Cock-stump. 02:21:26 PM

This was the first appearance of Axelrod’s trusty 1994 Honda Civic. I have no idea what kind of car the real David Axelrod drives, or ever drove, but I owned a white ’94 Civic for years. This fictional car was based on that real one.

Manny Flores just drove by and chucked a can at me while Axelrod’s trying to change this tire. Fucking. Worst. Fucking. Day. Fucking. Ever. 03:10:45 PM

Manny Flores is a former alderman who now serves as the director of the Illinois Department of Financial and Professional Regulation. He was another early name in the mayoral race, going so far as to collect signatures for the ballot.

Christ, when this day is over, I’m going to devour an entire Eli’s fucking cheesecake like I’m a motherfucking Cathy cartoon. Ack! 03:32:51 PM

When the Emanuel campaign released its campaign finance records in January, it turned out they’d spent almost $15,000 on Eli’s Cheesecake.

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Shrimp-sock fish-cock. I’m done with this fucking day. 08:12:30 PM

Continue reading "The Epic of @MayorEmanuel, Part One: The Adventure Begins... "

TALK TO THE COCK

Wednesday, October 6, 2010

Whichever one of you motherfuckers got me sick, you can go vote for Rickey fucking Hendon. To the rest of you—who’s got some fucking soup? 07:10:01 AM

Former State Senator Rickey Hendon was another early name in the mayoral race. Hendon, a longtime presence in the local and state political scene, resigned his seat in February 2011. On a national level, he’s probably best known for getting into an argument about a vote with Barack Obama, when they both were state senators, that reportedly ended with Obama having “to be physically restrained.”

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Sick, wearing nothing but a fucking bathrobe, going to meet with the Tribune Editorial Board. “That’s their dress code,” e-mails Plouffe. 10:10:17 AM

The same day that Emanuel was scheduled to meet with the influential paper’s editorial board, the New York Times dropped a major story about the Tribune Company, “At Flagging Tribune, Tales of a Bankrupt Culture.” It was a greatest-hits collection of sordid stories from the Tribune Tower, many circulating around the boorish behavior of then-Tribune company CEO Randy Michaels.

Apparently it’s just me and Randy Michaels in bathrobes at the Tribune Tower. The king of the fucking ass-clowns. Great. Thanks, Plouffe. 11:25:48 AM

Michaels keeps interrupting the board’s questions by standing up, opening his bathrobe and yelling “TALK TO THE COCK!!” Fucking fuck fuckers. 12:34:47 PM

I would rather punch myself in the cock every hour on the hour than have to sit through something that humiliating again. Fucktard Tower. 02:53:57 PM

Fucking fuck-shitting motherfucking shit-fuck motherfuckers. 03:17:34 PM

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Yes, alderman, I am fucking delighted to have dinner at Harold’s Chicken Shack. These motherfucking arteries aren’t going to clog themselves. 05:54:01 PM

Waguespack keeps jogging by my house. Little short-shorts. I’m just standing in the front yard, birds up, waiting for the motherfucker. 07:49:31 PM

Alderman Scott Waguespack was another early contender in the mayoral race. In all, Progress Illinois, which tracked early movement in the race, had more than 40 names on its list of potential candidates.

And there he fucking goes a-fucking-gain: jog-jog-jog. WHAT THE FUCK?! 07:56:15 PM

I’m going to go for a jog up Waguespack’s motherfucking colon if he comes back around again. 08:03:52 PM

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Fuck it. I’m fucking sick. I’m fucking tired. It’s a fucking “America’s Sweethearts” kind of night. 09:59:54 PM