The Party of Compassion

I shall never forget the last time I saw Tip. In person, I mean.

It was on a chilly December evening, a few weeks after the 1980 election. I was in Washington, in a taxi, with three friends, rolling merrily from the bar of a posh hotel to dinner at a ritzy men’s club. Far be it from me to drop the names of the hotel, the club, or the friends. But little did I expect the evening’s most memorable moment to occur en route.