Who's Who

Aguilera, Christina, as latter-day Mouseketeer, 121

Andrews, Julie, as bargaining chip, 43

Austen, Jane, as runner-up, 149

Bayh, Evan, as future Democratic star, 36

Beers, Charlotte, as thwarted public- diplomacy czar, 47

Begin, Menachem, former Israeli PM, as man of the people, 40

Bell, Tim, British PR pro, as American propagandist, 173

Bellow, Rachel, executive coach, as introspector-for-hire, 126

Bloom, Harold, as slip of the tongue, 89

Bork, Robert, landmark rejection of, 51-52

Bremer, Paul, potholes and, 72; as lord of Cpathia, 72; conservative economic agenda of, 72-73; combat boots of, 72

Brennan, William, as liberal icon, 51

Brodie, Jean, prime of, 152-154; delusions of, 153; as fascist, 152

Brownback, Sam, as potential social-conservative standard-bearer, 36

Buffett, Warren, diverse holdings of, 104, 107; homespun thrift of, 104, 108; as vaudevillian, 104; meteorological unflappability of, 104-107, 112; as Daddy Warbucks, 106; as Jimmy Buffett kin, 106; Tiger Woods and, 106; as Will Rogers, 106-107; as Mark Twain, 106-108, 110; as Schwarzenegger adviser, 106; as moral J. P. Morgan, 106; collected works of, 107-110; as Jack Benny, 108; boastful self-deprecation of, 108; as Capra capitalist, 109; as tech-stock doomsayer, 106-111; as saint, 110; as Tom Sawyer, 110; as Bartleby, 110

Bush, George W., as-yet-unwritten political obituary of, 35-36; gifts received by, 46; as embattled political scion, 52

Byron, Christopher, business writer, as English major gone wild, 115

Card, Andrew, ornamental dagger of, 46

Cash, W. J., Southern mind of, 131-132

Cato, as crop scientist, 186

Chambers, John, Cisco executive, as world's, um, greatest CEO, 116

Chandler, Raymond, as Wodehouse schoolmate, 138

Cheney, Dick, as outsourcing beneficiary, 173; hideout of, 89

Chirac, Jacques, as prospective Algerian leader, 41; toiletries of, 46

Chomsky, Noam, as leading man, 116

Cockburn, Alexander, as Marxist, 138; as Wodehousian, 138

Conrad, Joseph, on anarchism, 16

Cronyn, Hume, as kiddie idol, 121

Dean, Howard, potential comeback of, 36

DiMaggio, Joe, as Warren Buffett of baseball, 106

Doo, Scooby, as insult to juvenile intelligence, 120

Dunlap, "Chainsaw Al," former Sunbeam chairman, psychological profile of, 115

Eisner, Michael, Disney CEO, pay package of, 113

Ellington, Duke, as burdened genius, 149

Ely, Melvin Patrick, as discerning Southern historian, 132, 134

Estrada, Miguel, would-be judge, ideological shyness of, 52

Fink-Nottle, Gussie, as textbook Wodehouse creation, 141

Fiorina, Carly, Hewlett-Packard CEO, as yachtswoman, 116; balls of, 116

Fleisher, Michael, former CPA official, as brother of Ari, 73; as anti-cronyism crusader, 73; irony and, 73

Forster, E. M., as executioner, 152

Frist, Bill, as Rove suitor, 36

Garner, Jay, Iraq administrator, as space cowboy, 72; as lord of the Orhanians, 72

Gatsby, Jay, management secrets of, 127

Grasso, Richard, glass house of, 112

Hassan II, Moroccan king, as rumored Mossad mole, 41

Hemingway, Ernest, cranky authenticity of, 107

Horner, Tim, security consultant, omniscience of, 128; on crazy nephews, 128

Hussein, Saddam, personal beatings administered by, 178; as antiquities dealer, 177-178; as al-Jazeera junkie, 42

Hussein, Uday, as barkeep, 62; as disco psychopath, 78

Insana, Ron, CNBC reporter, huggability of, 106

Joyce, William, as "Lord Haw Haw," 137; as wronged man, 137

Karloff, Boris, as cricketer, 138

al-Kasim, Faisal, al-Jazeera talk-show host, as Gore Vidal fan, 41; as relative progressive, 41-43; as Satan, 42; loneliness of, 41-43

Kerry, John, legal team of, 15; as-yet-unwritten political obituary of, 35-36; foreign friends of, 43; lamb policy of, 43; as Vegas act, 43; as Heineken man, 59

Khurana, Rakesh, business analyst, as cut-rate Tolstoy, 113

Kimmel, Jimmy, late-night funnyman, on paste-eating, 119

Kirchner, Nestor, Argentine President, as lambassador, 46

Kucinich, Dennis, as logical extreme, 56

Lange, Dorothea, sensitive eye of, 133

Lay, Kenneth, disgraced Enron CEO, as preacher's son, 113; as marshmallow man, 114; as Elmer Fudd, 114; as interior decorator, 114

LeRock, Mandy, as adult-film alias, 160, 165

Lindbergh, Charles, as counterfactual President, 144-146; as actual anti-Semite, 144

Mack, Connie, IV, political progeny, as brawler, 52; Hooters and, 52

Mandela, Nelson, as Enron honoree, 114

McCain, John, Manchurian candidacy of, 101

McGuire, Lizzie, über-tween, meteoric rise of, 122

Mikey, cereal spokesboy, as Pop Rocks casualty, 187

Mitchell, William A., food chemist, as father of Tang, 186; Cool Whip and, 186-187; as tapioca tinkerer, 186; as Martha Stewart nemesis, 186

Moore, Roy, Ten Commandments judge, as Rove-slayer, 98

Morissette, Alanis, as Green Zone chanteuse, 65

Murkowski, Lisa, Alaska senator, as nepocrat, 52

Mutschmann, Martin, Nazi functionary, lacy underthings and, 136

Nabokov, Vladimir, as control freak, 152, 155

O'Brien, Michael, Southern intellectual historian, towering achievement of, 134; occasional wrongheadedness of, 134

Orwell, George, on "Boys' Weeklies," 136; on comic sacrifice, 142

O'Toole, Peter, prettiness of, 32

Perot, Ross, on pet-rock corporate governance, 113

Portnoy, Alexander, "irrepressible schlong" of, 148

Price, Richard, novelist, as bard of New Jersey, 148

Richards, Ann, as Rove adversary, 101; Kenneth Lay and, 113

Riefenstahl, Leni, orgasmic cinematography of, 144

Rilke, Rainer Maria, on solitude, 159

Robertson, Pat, as alarmist, 50; as non-negotiable proposition, 122

Roosevelt, Franklin D., as court-packer, 51; as coup target, 116

Roth, Philip, as ringmaster, 143; insecurity and, 143; cultural sweet spot occupied by, 149; torn conscience of, 149

Rove, Karl, future scapegoat potential of, 36; close races and, 92-102; as cherry picker, 98; as stamp collector, 100; lifetime batting average of, 96; "animal ferocity" of, 96; tomato cans and, 96; Lone Star myopia of, 96; Napoleonic code of, 98; as Bush's brain, 98; as Bush's backbone, 98; as whisperer, 101-102

Rukeyser, Louis, financial guru, flowing mane of, 109

Shostak, Seth, astronomer, as intergalactic cold-caller, 58

Sloan, Alfred, unsavory business partners of, 116

Souter, David, as ideological letdown, 51

Spade, David, stiletto wit of, 118; as programming exec, 118

Spark, Muriel, God complex of, 152; as foreshadower, 153-155; Calvinist corset of, 157; as bully, 155

Spears, Britney, as latter-day Mouseketeer, 121

Spode, Roderick, Wodehouse character, fascist shorts of, 136

Sultan of Brunei, as confectioner, 46

Sweeney, Anne, ABC head, as second most powerful woman in Hollywood, 119; as David Spade sidekick, 118; as superhero, 122; Rupert Murdoch and, 120-121; improv skills of, 125; tweendom and, 122

al-Thani, Hamad bin Khalifa, Qatari emir, Oedipal coup staged by, 41

al-Tikriti, Jaber, Iraqi museum official, as cartoon villain, 177

Welch, Jack, Caligulan retirement package of, 115; as victim, 115

Wharton, Edith, as media critic, 40

Wilde, Oscar, as man from U.N.C.L.E., 139

Winchell, Walter, as presidential candidate, 146

Wodehouse, P. G., cultlike following of, 136; as Nazi collaborator, 136-137; as "bloody fool," 136; as shock jock, 136; overstayed welcomes of, 136-137, 141; as gelding, 137; as screenwriter, 138; as master of American vernacular, 138; astonishing similes of, 142; venereal disease and, 142; utter sexlessness of, 137, 139, 141-142

Yassin, Arshad, Saddam in-law, as international man of mystery, 177-180