What Does Kevin McCarthy Have To Do To Get You Into An Aboveground Pool Today?

The future Speaker of the House tries out a backup career.

Hello! I see you’re eyeing that Summer Waves Inflatable Quick Set™ Ring Pool with Filter . She’s a beauty, isn’t she? Sets up quick, doesn’t take up a lot of space in the backyard, perfect for just splashing around with the kids on a lazy summer day.

Yes, I am Kevin McCarthy, can I interest you in an aboveground pool?

Oh, I know what you’re thinking. “Congressman McCarthy, didn’t your party just win a majority in the House of Representatives? Aren’t you going to be Speaker of the House if you can round up the votes? And shouldn’t you be out there rounding up those votes instead of trying to sell me an aboveground pool in winter?”

And the answers are “yes,” “yes,” and a whopping huge “Why not both?” Well, I’ll tell you. For one, I like seeing the smile on a child’s face when their dad says “Yes, we will take home this Summer Waves Inflatable Quick Set™ Ring Pool with Filter   so little Kayden can spend his summer luxuriating in its clear blue depths like some sort of Rockefeller.”

And second, how long do you think I’m going to last as speaker with that pack of feral coyotes otherwise known as the GOP caucus nipping at my heels? A week? A day? Until I even finish swearing everyone in on January 3? Shoot, I’m going to be a pile of steaming entrails but inexplicably perfectly coiffed hair before I get to the H’s.

Listen, you seem like a man who would like a little more space to spread out in his pool. Maybe you and the wife want room for a couple of rafts with those little drink holders you can lay on with a couple of cool cans of Bud right there? Well, let me introduce you to this bad boy!

That, my friend, is the Palisades Above-Ground Hard-Sided Pool Package . Eighteen feet around, plenty of space to spread out. ( Slaps side of pool) You can fit so many drunk wine moms in this baby! Room for twelve adults, stylish, comes with a wide-mouth skimmer, maintenance kit, sturdy ladder for getting in and out. It’s made of molded hard resin, which is better than steel because it doesn’t get hot in the sun and isn’t susceptible to rust. Not like a lot of these other products. To be quite honest, you really want a pool with hard resin sides.

Sure, it’s a little more expensive than these other models on our showroom floor, but—what’s that?

Oh no, I love serving in Congress! I want to be speaker. I’ve wanted nothing else since I was a kid. Literally, I have never had any other job in my adult life but elected politician. Except for a few years there at the beginning when I worked on the staffs of other elected politicians.

Listen, do you think I’d have spent the last fifteen years climbing the ranks of the Republican caucus if it wasn’t in service of fulfilling a dream? Do you think I’d have sat through I don’t know how many meeting with John Boehner while he swilled wine and blew smoke in my face and reminisced about his years of snorting nutmeg and going on RV road trips with Tom DeLay? You think I’d have sat through a gazillion meals and meetings with Paul Ryan while he droned on and on and on about budget projections and budget deficits and balanced budgets and budgets with, I don’t know, little goddamn wings on them that could fly off to Fiscal Responsibility Land, or whatever he was always yammering about?

Hell no, I did not spend most of my adult working life sitting through those interminable conversations and drinking at high-dollar fundraisers with wizened fossils like the Kochs and making nice with the likes of Louis Gohmert and Marjorie Taylor Greene just to give up when I’ve almost seized the brass ring.

Okay, I understand about the Palisades Above-Ground Hard-Sided Pool Package. That is a little pricey, I admit. Which is why I want to introduce you to this, the Intex Ultra XTR Pool Set with Sand Filter Pump . Also eighteen feet like the Palisades, but with fewer bells and whistles. Steel-sided, but coated with a powder that prevents rust. Not as much maintenance equipment included in the package, but it does have a sand filter pump. You want a sand filter pump, it's less maintenance because the sand only needs to be replaced every five years or so.

Personally, I really love the Intex Ultra XTR Pool Set with Sand Filter Pump. This here’s the eighteen-foot round model, but there is a rectangular model as well, if you want a more traditional pool shape. There’s a saltwater system option that you can upgrade to, and there are other sizes, if you want to go a couple of feet larger but still spend less than you would on the Palisades system. Because that eighteen feet? Sure, it sounds big. But it fills up fast if you invite a bunch of the neighbors on a hot day and everyone wants to hop in and cool off all at the same time.

Here’s the thing. If you saw the press conference we held on Thursday, you know where this is going . We’re talking two years of endless investigations of Hunter Biden for hanging out in Malibu mansions with hookers. Two years of endless wailing about Chris Wray leading a Gestapo that targets only conservatives. Two years of claiming carbon dioxide is not a pollutant even as the planet is literally either burning down or drying up. Two years of Marjorie yammering on and on about space lasers and Democrats giving Ukraine money that the Ukrainians then put into crypto that then makes Democratic donors even wealthier so they contribute more to the Democrat party. Or something.

No, seriously, that’s an actual theory going around.

And listen, I’m not saying none of this stuff happened. It probably did! I don’t know, I don’t read very much and I’m from Bakersfield.

Okay, yes, you are too. Which is why I’m talking to you! You live in the desert, so you understand the value of a good, solid above ground pool that you and your family can use year-round! Very much like that Bestway Steel Pro Round Above Ground Pool Set ! That’s a great model. Lightweight, easy to set up for a handy guy such as yourself, rust and corrosion-resistant frame.

I’ll tell ya though, this one has some drawbacks. That 3-ply PVC support band can puncture, and then you’ve got a problem. Imagine your kids are fooling around in it and one of ‘em puts a hole in the PVC and then they’re standing there crying while the water drains onto your lawn.

That’s the thing, your kids misbehave and destroy your pool and you can punish them. But me as speaker? If Jim Jordan goes a little overboard with investigating the Russia investigation or Lauren Boebert starts muttering about the Jews, I can’t really do anything without our voters screaming at me. And I tell you, I will do anything I can to avoid cheap gay-baiting from Tucker Carlson or angry calls from that Moms for Liberty group. Those people are nuts.

So I said to myself, Kevin, if God forbid you should get mauled into retirement by the kooks you have empowered in a desperate and grasping exchange for that gavel, what else do you think you’d like to do? And then I said, well, I’ve always liked water. And I live in a desert. Why not combine those two things somehow? And voila! A new career presents itself!

So, my friend, what do I have to do to get you into one of these fantastic pools today?

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