An Untitled Interview With Thomas Cletus Jefferson
(This unpublished interview was obtained without the author's consent. We had to petition a common law court for a subpoena to obtain it. The magazine did not publish the article and has since fired the journalist. Since Thomas Cletus Jefferson was its subject, we thought it appropriate to print here…)
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On December 18, 1998, a CD was brought to my attention that really hit home. It was called "Militious - Redneck Roulette" and featured rocking songs by three members of Michigan's unorganized militia. Of these members, I was most intrigued by Thomas Cletus Jefferson, the guitarist and principal songwriter on the tune that intrigued me the most: "Living in a Trailer Park". I was lucky enough to run into a compatriot of Mr. Jefferson's while on a writing assignment in Walkerville, Michigan. This friendly chap directed me to the trailer owned by "Cletus" (as he is known by his friends) who was hard at work on his Monte Carlo when I arrived…

Journalist: Can I give you a hand?

Cletus: Clap all you want. I'm getting used to it.

Journalist: No, I mean can you use some help?

Cletus: Not unless you're a member of Jeff Gordon's racing team.

Journalist: I'm an Earnhardt fan, myself.

Cletus: Well if I need any help slowing this car down, I'll give you a call…

Journalist: No, seriously, my name is (name withheld by request) and I'm a huge fan of yours!

Cletus: (pulls his pistol) Stalker…

Journalist: No, I'm a journalist. And I was just wondering if I could interview you for our magazine?

Cletus: (holsters his gun) And what magazine is that?

Journalist: (name withheld by request)

Cletus: I wouldn't wipe my ass with that magazine.

Journalist: Excuse me?

Cletus: Magazine paper just smears it around… I only wipe with newsprint. 'Course these days I've got so much money I can buy one kind of paper for wiping and another kind for blowing. They also got these little wet papers for when your fingers get sticky -

Journalist: It sounds like you're -

Cletus: They even got this soap you can buy that doesn't require any water…

Journalist: It sounds like you're enjoying the extra money your CD is bringing in!

Cletus: It'd be better if the CD had gone out like it was recorded.

Journalist: Oh, right… I read about that... Did Sovereign Society manipulate "Trailer Park" at all?

Cletus: They added a toilet flushing sound for some reason. I think they wanted to lighten it up, especially with the Sheriff's hanging coming up in the next verse.

Journalist: I also read that the songs on the CD were based on true stories. Is that true?

Cletus: If you read it, it must be true, right?

Journalist: I'm really interested in hearing about you before the band: Where you're from, what you did before, that kind of stuff…

Cletus: I'm not up for talking about that right now. Would you pour this out over there? (Cletus handed me his oil pan, which I poured out into the storm sewer for him)

Journalist: How about the Militia? What are your thoughts on the Militia?

Cletus: The Michigan Militia is the single most important thing in my life. The sooner people recognize who is really fighting for them and who is ripping them off... I mean, if we could just pull our heads out of our asses long enough to see that the federal and state governments are too big and too far away to do anything for us… I mean, think about it, 99% of our problems are right down here at the local level, but we're forced to look to the feds for solutions. Why? Because we know the solutions cost money and they have all our money!

Journalist: Right.

Cletus: But the real problem is we're tired… We're not lazy, but when you've gotta get the kids to school, then work ten hours-a-day, then fix your own car, then shovel dogshit, well, you don't have much energy left to run your local government. So what'd we do? We let the feds bamboozle us into believing that if we sent all of our money to them, they'd fix our problems. They'd salary people to do nothing but solve our problems, 8-hours a day, 40-hours a week. These people would be called "politicians". Well, let me tell you, these politicians, they're in their own world. They don't know what we're facing. They just make up over-generalized laws that get turned into micro-managed regulations that cost us all of our money and personal freedom. Does anyone in Walkerville want the regulation that is preventing me from filling the swamp that my trailer is sinking into! Couldn't Walkerville have its own regulations for swamps in Walkerville?

Journalist: You're quite passionate about that topic.

Cletus: Topic? This isn't just a "topic"! This is everything that's wrong with our country! Listen, for once in your goddamn life! We are the people. We pay our government to provide services to us. It's our government. We own it. We own the feds, the state, the city, the county, we own it all. But the problems WE face are right here. They're in our city. They're not in Bosnia. They're not in California. They're right here, in Walkerville! But 99% of our taxes go elsewhere. And that 0.1% that does come back goes through the federal government first, and it gets a hundred million strings attached to it! This is what's wrong with America. And this is what the Militia wants to fix!

Journalist: Going back to "Trailer Park" -

Cletus: Did you hear a goddamn thing I just said? Does anyone listen to me, or are you all just humming the dumb choruses the Colonel comes up with?

Journalist: The Colonel came up with the chorus to Trailer Park?

Cletus: That's it, interview over. You've got exactly five seconds before I shoot you for trespassing…

A few weeks passed before I had the chance to play back the interview tape and really think about what Cletus was saying. To this day, I'm still fascinated by the insight I was able to glean from Cletus' anarchistic diatribe. After all, how else would I have known that the Colonel was such a superb lyricist!
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(FACTOID: The Colonel's contribution to Trailer Park was as follows: "And ya can't pitch a tent cuz yer impotent". This chorus was subsequently deleted by Sovereign Society on the CD, although the lyric sheet still shows it.)