Marshall Ramsey

“Um, Mr. Barbour, may I have Christmas Day off to spend with my family?”

“Bawwwl Huuumbuuuuug.” Replied Haley Barbour as he grabbed his hat and coat from the door. “Yoouu need to get to work on that Bud-get, Phil Bryant.  Next thing you know, you’ll be wantin’ to sit behind my governor’s desk again. Now get busy cuttin’ Medicaid or education or somethin’. That budget MUST be balanced.”

“God bless you, Mr. Barbour, said Phil Bryant.  “And Tiny Tim Ford also wishes to say the same.”

Barbour walked out of the door and looked up at the sign over his business: Barbour Griffith & Rogers.  It was just him now. On his own and now the Governor of his home state, Mississippi. “I should go have Christmas dinner at a casina,” thought Barbour, as he shuffled down the street. Christmas was such a bother.  People singing. People laughing. Meet the Press rescheduled because of the Rankin-Bass classic “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer”. Even the State plane was grounded.  “Bawwwl Huuumbuuuuug,” he thought, as he came up to the Governor’s mansion’s front door.

He looked at the mansion’s door knocker and suddenly the lion’s face was replaced with the face of Cliff Finch.  “YOU WILL BE VISITED BY THREE GHOSTS TONIGHT!” said the former governor-now-spirit.  “WHAT!” Barbour blurted out. “Dang it. I need a Maker’s Mark.”

Sleep came easily that Christmas Eve.  It had been a busy fall, with all the talk of potentially running for President and all.  Suddenly the chimes from St. Andrews’ Cathedral woke him with a start. “I’m gonna to shoot those, some day…” mumbled the groggy governor.

Then with a crash, a huge spirit came bounding into the room with a dog and a pistol.

“KIRK FORDICE?” Barbour screamed with shock.

“I’ll WHIP YOUR ASS!” the former governor now ghost belted out. He then looked at the stunned Governor, “Oh, you’re not Bert Case. I’m the Ghost of Christmas Past. Damn glad to meet you.”

“Kirk, it’s me — Haley Barbour,” Barbour plead as he scrambled to put on his elephant slippers.

“I’m supposed to show you your past at Ole Miss and Yazoo City, but screw it.  Let’s go haunt Bert Case and make him pee his bed.”  Barbour, a literate man, had seen the Disney movie of Christmas Carol and knew this wasn’t how the story was supposed to go. “Aren’t you supposed to teach me some kind of lesson?”

“Hell no.” blurted Fordice.  “If you ain’t figured it out by now, you’re  screwed. You think I’m one of those sissy Compassionate Conservatives?!?”

The ghost of Governor Fordice and his dog Lance floated out of the room, on toward the WLBT anchor’s house.

The chimes of St. Andrews’ Cathedral rang once again, waking the Governor from a deep sleep.  As he opened his puffy eyes, he noticed a strange little man standing over him.

“You’re the Ghost of Christmas Present? You have to be kidding me.”

“You need a hug.” said the spirit of Frank E. Melton, former Mayor of the City of Jackson.

“Um, no, I don’t,” replied Barbour.  “What lesson are you gonna to teach me?”

“Lesson?!?  Nah, I’m just here to tear down the mansion. I heard it was a crack house.”

Governor Barbour ducked as Frank swung a sledgehammer, nearly hitting the Governor up the side of the head.  Barbour looked over at his drink glass and swore, “No more of those.” And he rolled over and went back to sleep.

St. Andrews’ chimes rang yet again and Barbour, being a literate man and having seen the Disney version of Christmas Carol, woke up in a sweat. Who would the third scary ghost be?!? A slumped man in chains and hands held high over his head answered his question.

“I am not a crook.” Replied the ghost of Richard Nixon as he floated across the room toward the quaking Governor.

“What have you come here to tell me? That I should put special needs kids back on Medicaid? That I should embrace public education? That I should change my ways?”

“No,” said Nixon. “You should run for President. The power is AWESOME. And you get a house upgrade and a big-ass jet. Make sure you have an enemies list, too.  Those are really fun.”

Barbour blinked.  Did Nixon just say “big-ass”and “AWESOME?”

It all had to be a bad dream, bad bourbon or bad fish or something. He looked out the window and the buildings of Jackson and envisioned the skyline of Washington D.C. in its place. He then put his head back down on his pillow and smiled.  “Runnin’ for President will make this the Merriest Christmas for me EVER.”

The End.