Page 2/The Battalion/Wednesday, June 1, 1988
Opinion
e, Nancy, and the White House Coffee Po
I have seen an
advance copy of
Wanda Grobnik’s
book “Me, Nancy,
and the White
House Coffee Pot”
and it will surely
be the next politi
cal blockbuster.
Wanda writes, ’’but I looked in the cof
fee pot and told her, no, your destiny is
to go to Hollywood, become an actress
and marry a movie star. Just don’t do
cheesecake. You ain’t got the legs for it.”
Wanda later joined the Reagans in
California where she resumed her oc
cult counseling.
Few people
know that Wanda
Gorbnik, an aunt
of my friend Slats
Mike
Royko
Grobnik, worked for many years in the
White House kitchen.
“I remember looking in the coffee
grounds one morning and I said: ‘Don’t
trust monkeys.’ Nancy asked me what
that meant. I said I didn’t know what it
meant. But that’s what I saw. Monkeys
are strictly out.
“Nancy didn’t tell Ron to do anything
without asking me to check the pot first.
She’d ask me: ‘Should he have a press
conference?’ I’d look in the coffee pot
and tell her: ‘No. It is a better time for
him to get a haircut. And not too long
on the sideburns.’ She’d say: ‘Is this a
good week for him to meet with the am
bassador from Russia?’ I’d look in the
pot and say: ‘No, it is a good week for
him to spend the afternoons drinking
Ovaltine and watching the soaps on
TV.’
She was listed on the federal payroll
as a cook, but the title was merely a
cover for her top-secret duties.
“So what does he do? He makes that
Bonzo movie, and sure enough, his ca
reer goes downhill from there. See, I
warned them not to trust monkeys.
“But sometimes we got our signals
crossed.
Her true job was looking into the fu
ture by reading coffee grounds, a rare
gift she was born with.
She would share the visions she saw in
the coffee pot with Nancy Reagan, who
would then use them to tell the presi
dent how to run the country.
“At that time, Nancy was worried and
asked me what they should do. I looked
in the pot and said he should find a new
line of work. She said he didn’t know
how to do anything. I looked in the pot
again and said: ‘OK, if he can’t do any
thing, he should go into politics.’
“Like the time he got his first nomi
nation and Nancy was trying to decide
who his vice president should be.
“Well, it happened that I had a hard
day. I mean, every time a problem came
up, I had to make a fresh pot of coffee
so I’d have new grounds to look at.
‘She wanted to become a beautician,’
And that, Wanda writes, is how the
Reagan political saga began.
“So Nancy come in the kitchen. My
feet hurt and my back aches and I tell
her: ‘I’m bushed.’
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BLOOM COUNTY
“She misunderstands me and goes
running out, and the next tiling I know,
there’s Ron holding up (George) Bush’s
hand at the convention.
to anyone else. Who knows, mail
crazy thing will work.’ ”
“And I remember when she came in
the kitchen while I was watching a ball
game on TV and there was a bad call
and I was really mad and yelling about
it. She goes running out. T hen I pick up
the newspaper and read where he called
the Russians ‘the Evil Empire.’
As Wanda says in her book:“1(1
tell that the coffee grounds givegi'l
sion because their first term wait
bad.”
j HOI S IX
man climbt
where a wor
last month,
traded gro
Bengal tiger
But like many of the recent it
authors, Wanda displays a certair,;
fulness in describing her eventual!
with the Reagans.
“1 asked Nancy why he did that. She
said: ‘You said you saw it in the pot.’ I
told her, no, I was just talking about the
umpire.”
“Another time, she comes in the
kitchen and I tell her: T seen Star Wars.’
She goes running out and all of a sud
den they come out with all their plans
for the goofy space defense system.
“I left after the first term and'!
started listening to those Califori
gazers. And look what happened^
his second term. The scandal abot
arms for the crazy ayatollah,ant
North and Meese, Deaver and No
the dope-pusher. What a mess 1
had stuck with my coffee pot
wouldn’t have all these troubles.
■I'l'lie inckf
jflrrified crc
rial Day spe
dav after t\v
were return
time since tb
of keeper Ri
Robert La
bui was cha
pass and jai
bond, police
“The next time she comes in, I tell
her: ‘Look, Nancy, 1 was just trying to
tell you that I saw a good movie, that
“Star Wars” thing, and I thought you
and the president might get a kick out
of it.
And why did Nancy abandonk
her longtime adviser?
As Wanda explains in the core
of her book:
■Lavoie w;
intoxicated ;
foi his actic
was on druf
by police a:
by zoo emj)l
■ “He was
down to the
Bavating <•
“She said they were switching!
slant decaf. My coffee was keepirj
nie awake all af ternoon.”
‘She said: ‘Oh. Well, don’t mention it Copyright 1988, Tribune Media Senmi
.s.
indu
Old poor Aunt Fanni
loses all her dough
to religious vultures
iOVI
Aunt Fannie,
who’s 90, never
got married and
never had any
children. For the
past several years,
she has lived as a
T"i
recluse
apartment in
Charleston, S.C.
you, who can I talk to?”
AUSTI
tst, a Lai
World W;
fecently i
nous vet<
Soviet Un
The h<
Jjven For
fto the Stn
■’ears afte
fliers bef
pilot dm
pays.
The letter continues with a did
of how Feed My People needs
to pay off a contractor who
something called an Emergency]
Headquarters. ..,1 u
“Now, here is what 1 am asking'
do,” Stewart’s letter goes on.
Relatives tried
to visit, but Aunt
Fannie would re-
Lewis
Grizzard
fuse to open the door for them.
“Rush $300 back to us today foil
need. Just think, your $300 w
working for you long after you'
gone to heaven.
“She was living,” said a grandniece,
Beth Speaks, of Stone Mountain, “on
powdered milk and cereal. A man who
lived next door to her called and said
when she walked to the mailbox, she was
in shreds.”
“. . . if yon don’t have $300 noj
can use your credit card . . . U
could talk to you. You love thechiij
just as much as 1 do, don’t you
Fannie?”
t he Fn
forest’s ]
lear the I
lis crew s
bets, wh
threw ni|
honor an
srs-in-arr
As a si
soviet m;
oly and
jresentet
is he bo;
^cription
icy back
ilecloth.’
Forest
iprized r<
forged it
Iflict.
Beth Speaks’ father, Aunt Fannie’s
nephew, finally talked to her landlord
and was able to get inside the apart
ment, which he found in shambles.
“Those letters made Aunt K
think the entire cause depem
her,” said Beth Speaks.
He also found that Aunt Fannie, who
was thought to be quite comfortable fi
nancially, was nearly broke.
Aunt Fannie’s situation got wore!
cently. She fell and no Ion get can'■
care of herself. She has been placed.;
nursing home and faces welfare.
“She had been eaten up,” said Beth
Speaks, “by religious vultures.”
Beth’s father obtained power of attor
ney for his aunt and found she had been
giving away to $500 a month in dona
tions to religious organizations.
“I don’t know,” said Beth Spij
“Maybe she felt she needed to maw
for something by giving this way.
don’t know how those people can!
on old folks the way they do.”
Forest
eled to 1
shevnikc
1945. r
around,
ing the
annual P
with a p
| dox mo
bows wi
lishers ai
“Frier
I tries has
let it be i
Most of her money had been sent to
Feed My People out of Phoenix, Ariz.,
which is headed by a Rev. Don Stewart.
What Eline Conley of Feed Myf
pie said was, “We’re sorry, but wet
no way of knowing the condition of
people we send our letters to. We
chase our lists of names.”
I HOU5
agents si;
the Paki
“Aunt Fannie still thinks this Stewart
is the most wonderful person who ever
hit this earth,” Beth Speaks explained.
Beth Speaks’ father called Feed!?
People and demanded they send!
more mail from her belovedDonf
art.
grestaurai
Bee is H
ployer of
“What
larrv G
Here is a part of the sort of letters
Don Stewart has been sending out to the
Aunt Fannies of the world:
“Dear Fannie:
By the way, Don. New, AuntFaf
needs your help. Right now. Send!
her money back.
“I must talk to you. I must talk to you
NOW. Please listen. If I can’t talk to
Don’t have the cash? Use yourc
card. Slick.
Copyright 1988, Cowles Syndicate
rant own
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service
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