Wanker of the House

Because if you’re addicted to pornography you definitely want to expose your underage child to the most graphic elements of that addiction in real time.

Speaker Mike Johnson. Image: Jabin Botsford / The Washington Post via Getty Images

by Rich Herschlag

Recent revelations that newly anointed Speaker of the House Mike Johnson uses an app to monitor his phone’s porn content raised both eyebrows and blood pressure in Washington. By downloading CovenantEyes.com, a user and his “accountability partner”—in this case, the Speaker’s 17 year old son—are made aware on an hourly or more frequent basis of any porn on their counterpart’s device. Because if you’re addicted to pornography you definitely want to expose your underage child to the most graphic elements of that addiction in real time and make him or her personally accountable for it.

So, say you’re in AP Chemistry lab performing an acid-base titration, you certainly want to know right there and then your middle-aged dad is viewing four naked sorority girls dry humping on a sheepskin rug. In that case hopefully you’ll do the right thing by putting down the test tubes and immediately calling your father who is at that very moment leading a House Ethics Committee hearing and explain he has exactly two choices—one, delete; two, spend taxpayer dollars verifying all the girls are over 18.

Or say you’re on a date with that cheerleader you’ve had your eye on since Bible class in Sunday school third grade and things are finally starting to get a little hot and heavy in your 2006 Ford F-150. You definitely need to be alerted that your dad and Satan have locked horns over a six-minute homemade video of a pizza delivery dude nailing a mother-daughter team on a mahjong table. In that case your only truly righteous option is to take your date and drive over to the basement of the Capitol building where you will hold an impromptu intervention by reading Luke 4:13 over and over as your father struggles to release his phallus and shut down the iPad.

While these unsettling experiences might otherwise scar you for life, render you permanently impotent within the context of all future meaningful relationships, and land you on Megan’s list by association, there is of course a bright side. For starters, you’ll get to see the inner workings of our government firsthand. Second, you may become eligible for college credit as a sex therapist. Third, you may be hired as a Congressional page. Fourth, you’ll have the opportunity to pay it forward one day with your own underage Congressional children, as grooming pubescent sexual watchdogs has always been a multigenerational affair. Finally, you’ll make countless millions as creator and co-executive producer of the most watched reality series since the Duggars hit the scene—Growing Up Johnson.

In season one, your door-to-door campaign for Jesus with the Jehovah’s Witnesses is rudely and repeatedly interrupted by texted images of your dad yanking it in a Pentagon laundry closet. While it is your duty according to the Gospel to preach self-restraint to your morally compromised father, it is also your duty under the Constitution of the United States to inform the CIA that sensitive classified documents may have been leaked. This critical internal conflict drives you to the Washington Monument where you gaze upward suggestively at the giant erect obelisk in search of a sign from God and pray for personal growth.

In season two, turnabout is fair play as dad is alerted to a rugged photo of Jason Momoa on your iPhone 15 and is convinced you’re gay. While you explain to your father you are not gay as far as he knows but rather just a run-of-the-mill fanboy of Aquaman, Dad has already commissioned a team of Seventh-day Adventists to accost you at the Starbucks where you’re a barista and perform conversion therapy. Though you object at first, you and one of the Adventists fall in love and honeymoon in Las Vegas just in time for Lady Gaga’s residency.

Season three takes a dark turn as you accept an immunity deal and agree to testify against your father, who is facing charges of statutory rape, possession of child pornography, and indecent exposure. While you are sympathetic to your father’s plight, you are also keenly aware that thousands of illicit photos downloaded to your phone via CovenantEyes—some dating as far back as your dad’s days hanging with Jeffrey Epstein—make you a key government witness. In the season finale watched by over 20 million domestic viewers, Growing Up Johnson fans are treated to a guest appearance by Mariska Hargitay of Law and Order: SVU, who presents to the jury forensic evidence that the House gavel was swabbed and came up positive for semen from Mike’s Johnson.

Rumored to be the final season, season four is shot mostly behind the walls of the Allenwood federal penitentiary, where your dad is serving seven consecutive life sentences for sexual assault plus 90 days for insurrection. While prison trysts both voluntary and involuntary are everyday occurrences, your dad still insists on monitoring your phone from inside to make sure you and your husband aren’t casually viewing suggestive photos of activewear from the fall Nordstrom catalogue. Meanwhile, the possibility of a Growing Up Johnson season five is left open by a single, almost surreal plot twist—your father, Mike Johnson, federal inmate 86038-112, continues to serve legally as Speaker of the House. And so does his cellmate, former and current President of the United States, Donald J. Trump.

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