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SANDY: He had a weakness. Which was exploited by unscrupulous people; Yes. But.
Acting on those appetites made him terribly vulnerable, and therefore made
us less safe.
SAM: So you’re saying…? He has no right to what? To human…?
SANDY: (Over Sam) Look at the cost! Look at what it has cost!
KATIE: No, Sandy! It seems to me that this is the language of
shame, you get taught to deny your basic appetites, as though desire were filthy.
SANDY: But. The President does not have the luxury. Did he? Of indulging?
BURT: Sandy is right. He gave his enemies an opening. He made us vulnerable.
KATIE: If only he had said, “Yes, I did this thing, I am human, I am human, now leave me alone. You puritanical, witch-hunting psycho-sexual hysterics, can we shut up now…and get on with trying to make America actually
better?” I mean, better…
ANTON: Yes. “Can we please get on with real life?...”
SAM: Sandy, don’t get distracted by Judeo-Christian bullshit. Does anybody thin that this country is actually functioning, working? You know, where I teach, what I see in the school, these kids.
That’s the issue. This is the only issue: the horrible inequities. The abandonment of basically sacred duties – And that the political class is just, you know, bizarrely fixated on this blow-job and nobody is saying –
KATIE: (taking over from Sam) Nobody is saying…”You life-denying, sexless Cotton Mathers, you joyless Washingtonian
hypocrites. Get over it!”
ANTON: Right! He should have stood up on the desk in the oval office and declared, “Hey, I like
pussy and I like watermelon, so sue me!”
BURT: (laughing) You think those are the exact words he should have used?
SANDY: What he did to his family! Unforgivable. That kind of lying, the humiliation. No. He wanted to get caught.
“Please take me down – I am a fraud.”
SAM: Hey, look, once they start, this sick, moral policing, I know, in my queer heart, I know they’re gonna come after us too sooner or later.
KATIE: Well. It makes me want to leave the country. Close up this restaurant, head for Barcelona.
SANDY: (ruefully) No, Katie: Your country is Manhattan.
(He kisses Katie.) You’re safe here.
KATIE: (Shaking her head) This doesn’t feel like the age of safety. Everything in this city – has changed – sex, food, food – my god, how it has changed! – power, it’s all so much bigger or deadlier…when did the stakes get so high? I’ll tell you; when cafeterias went out of style.
BURT: Well. To me, right now, in here, it feels pretty safe, and the food – hey; if one’s home were actually the most comforting place in the world, this is what dinner there would taste like. How do you do it?
KATIE: Butter. Lots of butter.
-- Jon Robin Baitz, The Paris Letter
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