Washington is chock-full of sociopaths, thieves, and drunks—and certainly mutant combinations of all three. But you probably wouldn’t know it by the looks of the well-dressed, old men, chatting and smiling in Statuary Hall just hours after the Inauguration. The Joint Congressional Committee on Inaugural Ceremonies has hosted the post-inauguration luncheon for more than a century, and by the general jolly ambiance of the crowd here at noon on a Tuesday, you’d think at the very worst you were at some two-faced, slightly twisted Bradbury-manifested carnival in rural Illinois. The truth of the matter is that most of Washington is so far removed from the common folk, they’ve forgotten what it’s like to bleed. Don’t get me wrong: I’m not an anti-statesman—not officially anyway. I love this country and consider myself a true, blue-blood patriot. But when the nation is led into a war for no good damn reason that actually exists, and when bank reps hustle people into signing loans worth less than the ink of their signatures, and when some schmuck in New York with ties to the highest levels of the SEC steals 50 billion and no one bats an eye for ten years, I start to wonder about the fortitude of our free world. Perhaps that’s why I’ve bought into the crude national conception that our new Head of the Union can bring some “change” to the Capitol. It’s a long shot, but a real and decent American hope… Or maybe I’m fooling myself into some new national pipe dream after a long and wretched double-term fuck up. God knows anything seems better than the last eight years. I figured the only way to find out was to get a private moment with the newly elected president, maybe shake his and ask him a question or two, and see what sort of energy I get in person, what his eyes tell me, what his three-piece, million-dollar smile has to say up close.

We’re getting ready for the next issue of Forth. It will come out in March 2009. I’m very excited to have the photography of Guru Thapar in it. Here is a peek at his amazing work. You will have to get a hold of the next issue to see the rest.

Ink on Paper by Dianne Crame

Digital Photography by Phoebe Joy Chuason

“Intimate Pipes” Sculpture by Billy Pacak