Curley: House Majority Leader Joe Fitzgibbon’s drunken speech is nothing compared to Wilbur Mills

So Joe Fitzgibbon, don’t feel bad. Listen, he drank, had too much.

The story is that, apparently, he was drunk, and some friends drove him home, and people were wondering, how did he get back again? That is not confirmed. Those are just some pieces that are sort of coming together from people who are letting the news organizations know.

All right, so he’s there, and he’s making a long, rambling speech about really nothing.

“There is no state out of 50 that I would rather be a public employee, with my retirement system managed by state government, than this state,” Fitzgibbon said, slurring his words. “Because of the decisions of the legislature, making sure that that … that … the … those pension plans are fully funded and that are the envy of every state in the country.”

Joe spent his entire life working in the public sector. Used to be the biggest city planner, and now here makes $80,000 a year. He likes the fact that the government is taking care of him, has got the pensions. Best state to work in, if you like, that kind of thing.

The most powerful man in Washington

That aside, Wilbur Mills, an Arkansas congressman, served from 1939 to 1977. He became the most powerful man in Washington because he ran the House Ways and Means Committee.

House Ways and Means Committee, these are the guys — all guys in there at the time — who decide where your money, that you earned, is going to be spent by the federal government.

Mills kept this whole thing; nobody was allowed in. He would make sure that everything was aligned with what the IRS did. There were no exceptions to the exceptions, no loopholes, and stuff. He was locked solid, down, completely secret.

Lobbyists were allowed to know about where the money is. They couldn’t get in there. “Hey, could you do us a favor and, like, carve this out, or let us have this, or let us have that?”

Mills had everything locked down, and he was in total control, the most powerful man in Washington, because he controlled where all of our money went.

Southern Democrat, but racist, anyway, he was fiscally conservative compared to most. He had a lust for increasing the size of government. Started with Medicare, he got that going, which broke the medical marketplace. They also expanded Social Security. He was big on that.

Enter Fanne Foxe

His libido for taxes and the control of everything were second only to his love for Fanne Foxe.

Apparently, this Argentinian bombshell would often go to these sorts of seedy strip clubs there in Washington, DC, and Wilbur was like, “Hey, she’s a beautiful woman. I’d like to tax her if you know what I mean.”

Wilbur loved her. The fact that he was married, it didn’t bother anybody, because he said, “Listen, my wife and I, we’re trying to help her career along. We’re gonna make her famous. We’re working on getting her more famous.”

Here’s what happens, it’s two o’clock in the morning on October 7, 1974. Wilbur is in the car with Fanne and three other women.

The cops pull them over because it’s two o’clock in the morning, and they don’t have any headlights on. At this point, Fanne decides that she wants to save Wilbur Mills, the most powerful man in Washington, DC, from the cops having to question him. So she hops out of the car.

“Really, at that point, I want to get out of the car and talk to the police officer and tell him I was responsible for what happened,” she said. “I didn’t want anybody to get near the car and see Mr. Mills there, and he didn’t want me to get out of the car. But I did. I started talking to the officers, and they really ignored me completely.”

She’s not used to men ignoring her completely. So what’d she do?

“So I climb into this about five-foot-tall little wall around the bridge, and I jumped into the water,” she said.

She dives into the tidal basin. I don’t know. I mean, maybe she’s trying to distract the police away from Wilbur, but they get him. And two days later, he denies it for a little while, and three days later, he comes forward, says, “Yeah, OK, well, that was me, and, you know, I’m not proud of what was happening, but let’s get back to business.”

He was able to ignore the press and keep going because he had so much power there in Washington, DC.

It gets worse

He then decides, a month later, he goes up to Boston, because Fanne’s up there, and now she’s known as the tidal basin bombshell.

So Mills goes up to Boston, and she’s dancing on stage, and then she invites him on stage. She’s like, half-nude or something. He’s like, “Wow, I’m on stage with Fanne!”

The press wants to talk to him because this really is going to be an enormous story in Washington, DC. All the exits are completely blocked by all the reporters, so there’s no way Wilbur is going to get out of there with Fanne, who’s now known as the tidal basin bombshell.

So, the press caught him, and he announced he’s cancelling the show.

At this point, he’s standing there, the press is all around, and they’re like, “What’s going on?”

Because there’s supposed to be another show. Don’t forget, he’s handling her career. But he didn’t tell Fanne they were canceling the show, and they started to argue a little bit.

By the way, when they were in the car, prior to the cop stopping them, they got into a fight. She punched Wilbur a bunch of times, and he punched her, and she had two black eyes. So what Joe did there, getting drunk at 10 o’clock at night, is nothing in comparison.

The press asked, “Don’t you think this looks bad for you personally?”

Mills responds, “All I’m trying to do is launch her career.”

Is there another term for getting it on? Launch somebody’s career?

“As a married chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, though?” the press asked.

“My wife’s in on it,” Mills responds.

How it all fell apart

So he leaves. He gets reelected six months later, 60% of the vote, but it’s so embarrassing for the rest of his peers that they tell him to step down. So he does step down. He then joins AA, goes into the hospital, and is able to recover as best he possibly can from the addiction of alcohol.

He ends up not seeking reelection in 1976 — to think that he was going to be a possible presidential candidate in 1972 — but this whole thing falls apart.

So what happens is, after he’s out of there, the House Ways and Means Committee opens up, and lobbyists are able to come in.

Oh, by the way, Wilbur, the next year, comes in as a tax lobbyist. And at that point, it’s now completely open for everybody, to every lobbyist, to come in to pay these guys off, to be able to get their little loopholes, to get their little carve-outs to tax this person or tax that person. But before that, Wilbur had everything all locked down, and there was no way you could change it.

In fact, when a Republican was nominated for the House or got into the House, I think it was Archer. He said he wanted to return the House Ways and Means Committee to the way it was when Wilbur was running it, and they could never do that again.

So there you go. That’s the story again, in perspective, it’s nothing just to be up there, drunk off your butt, making some long monologue.

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