The Age Of Odin

Ted Keener: I won't lie to you, Pete, took some getting used to, to begin with. At first I was thinking, 'I can't do this.' I had to give up my chain of car dealerships. I had to say goodbye to all my bass- fishing buddies and head off to DC, where I knew nobody. I was a mite anxious. How am I supposed to fill my time? What's the president's consort actually meant to do? But there's plenty here to be getting on with. Brian and Carol Ann have become my priority. I look after them while Mom's off doing president stuff. Take 'em to school, fetch 'em back. Make sure they're eating right. It's a full-time job! Brian's off to college in the fall, so maybe my life will get easier then, but I wouldn't bet on it.

Makepeace: Does your wife find it hard finding time for you, with her schedule?

Ted Keener: Her schedule. Her crazy schedule. Well, we make time for each other. We have to so we just do. I'll admit I don't see as much of her as I once did, and that's a crying shame. But it ain't a surprise, considering. And it ain't for ever, neither. Three more years, and then she's out. So I can bear it. Grin and bear it.

Makepeace: Would you say the job has changed her? Is she still the Lois you used to know? The woman you courted and married?

Audio Description Commentary: Ted Keener spends a while pondering this, gazing out of the window.

Ted Keener: Well, sir, there ain't a simple 'yes' or 'no' answer to that. The Lord came to her, and that's gonna leave a mark on a person, you know what I'm saying? There's been distinctively two Loises in my life — the Lois she was before her vision and the Lois after. She's a more focused, more passionate woman since then. The old Lois wouldn't have recognised the drive the new Lois has. Sometimes I look at her and I think to myself, who is this lady? It's like I've had to discover, no, rediscover…

Audio Description Commentary: He gazes out of the window again.

Ted Keener: I don't feel like I've lost something, if that's what you're getting at.

Makepeace: 'More passionate.' In her book she says you two have a hotter love life than ever before.

Ted Keener: Oh, now, sir, you're going to make me blush!

Mrs Keener: We have something in this country, I don't know if you've heard of it, Pete, but it's called Manifest Destiny. It's the belief that America ain't just the greatest country in the world, but that we Americans have a moral obligation to bring our way a life to every corner of the planet. It's what lay behind our forefathers' urge to push west during frontier times, hauling civilisation with them in their covered wagons, and it's been a cornerstone of our domestic and foreign policy ever since. All the great presidents have believed in it — Lincoln, Wilson, Reagan. Manifest Destiny. This nation has been chosen by God to be the pinnacle of all nations, the standard bearer for democracy, the greatest force for good the world has ever known…

Makepeace: And that's the justification for all the military invasions you've instigated during your tenure as Commander in Chief.

Mrs Keener: You say invasions, I say interventions. Tomayto, tomahto. Yes, I've been sending our GIs into global trouble spots, and you know for why? 'Cause it needed to be done. Take North Korea. She was becoming a royal pain in the sit-upon, and our friends the Japanese were getting more and more alarmed by her behaviour, with good reason. So I bit the bullet and sent the boys in. Wasn't an easy decision, nor an easy victory neither, but it had to be done, and now there've been democratic elections just this year, the DMZ between North and South Korea is no longer a minefield, and we have a brand new ally in the Pacific Rim. Same goes for Taiwan. The islanders were kinda concerned about a certain neighbour of theirs across the Taiwan Strait wanting to bring them forcibly into the fold, as it were, but we've taken over the place and fortified it and shown that neighbour we mean business, and sure, there was some grumbling about that, but now everyone's pals again and we have one of the economic powerhouses of the Far East onside.

Makepeace: That's quite some euphemism for threats of all-out war — 'grumbling.'

Mrs Keener: Grumbling, is all. There wasn't nothing going to come of it.

Makepeace: How about the Ukraine? That was a, for want of a better phrase, bold gamble on your part.

Mrs Keener: Daring, I'd call it, but it paid off. There was a move there to go back to communist rule. Most Ukrainers didn't want that. We helped 'em resist the political pressure.

Makepeace: By bombing Kiev.

Mrs Keener: Worked, didn't it?

Makepeace: Cuba?

Mrs Keener: Just helping along an inevitable process. The regime there was on its last legs. Like a racehorse that couldn't run no more, it needed putting out of its misery. So we did that, and now Cubans are happier and better off they ever were, and what's more, any American can spark up a nice fat Havana cigar these days without guilt or shame.

Makepeace: Beirut? Jordan? Equatorial Guinea? Kashmir? The Basque region?

Mrs Keener: What's your point here, darling? What are you trying to say?

Makepeace: Nothing. I'm just listing all the sovereign nations which have been exposed to the Keener brand of, er, intervention in the past few years. It's quite a lengthy list. In fact, there hasn't been a single day since you took office when US military personnel haven't been engaged in active service somewhere or other in the world.

Mrs Keener: You say that like it's a bad thing. I know a number of five-star generals who'd think different. What's a standing army for anyway if it ain't for mobilising and deploying? It sure ain't there just to stand. Manifest Destiny, Pete. Manifest Destiny. It's like in my home. If I see some dirt somewhere, why, I'm gonna fetch my broom and sweep it away. It's called doing your domestic duty.

Makepeace: I suppose one might reasonably ask, where's next? Who's Mrs Keener got lined up in her sights next? Have you spotted another patch of dirt that needs attending to?

Mrs Keener: Your country, of course. The motherland, the guys we kicked into touch back in 1776, the good old UK. I'm visiting next month, ain't I? And your Prime Minister Clasen has been pretty blunt about his dislike for me and what I get up to. He's forever running to the UN and griping about me like the preppy little schoolkid that he is. Maybe I'll use my state visit to Britain next month as an opportunity to launch regime change there. Clasen ain't so popular, is he? He's been trying to handle y'all's discontent over food shortages and the high mortality rate among the elderly and the hospitals not coping and the trains not running and all of that, and he ain't been making that great a job of it. I've heard his approval ratings are abysmal, like, the worst ever. Maybe I should come along and bump his sorry backside out of Downing Street. What do you think to that?

Makepeace: [voiceover] She's joking. At least, I like to think she is. It's apparent that my line of questioning has irritated her. She told my producer originally that no questions would be off-limits, but I seem to have overstepped an unspoken boundary. Some sort of mollifying gesture is in order.

Makepeace: I spoke to Ted earlier today. He told me he's looking forward to 'date night' tonight.

Mrs Keener: Oh, that Ted! I tell you, we're like two teenagers sometimes, courting all over again.

Makepeace: I get the impression he thinks you've changed.

Mrs Keener: For the better, I trust.

Makepeace: He used the word 'rediscover.' In this context, what does that…? I'm not sure if I…

Mrs Keener: That's what I meant — two teenagers courting. Perhaps what he was saying is he feels he doesn't know me quite so well any more, on account of I'm so goshdarn busy all of the time. Just makes it all the more fun getting reacquainted, though, doesn't it?

Makepeace: [voiceover] We're in Marine One, flying over the Potomac river to the Pentagon. The president is off to one of her regular meetings