You could hear the rain pouring mercilessly outside in the low ceilinged, utterly nondescript Collingswood office where the men slumped in chairs in front of phones and a coffee pot on a table sat against the back wall.

Alec Baldwin walked in and said to Lou Greenwald, “Are they all here?”

“All but McCabe,” was the reply.

“Well, I’m going anyway,” said Baldwin.

As he started talking, Craig Coughlin pushed back his chair and walked toward the coffee pot. He had heard it before, the slick talking Tony Robbins-type who had never written a bill or taken a constituent service call, yet felt compelled to come in act like…

“Put that coffee down,” said Baldwin, pronouncing each word slowly and clearly, enunciating with a very hard and menacing edge.

“You call yourself an assemblyman, Coughlin? Coffee is for closers.”

Coughlin had been trying for a week to shut down Vincent Prieto, but he lacked the leads to get the last few votes that would eliminate the sitting speaker, and so he shot a dead gaze back at the magnificently malevolent and unsmiling Baldwin.

“The leads are weak,” Coughlin said.

“The leads are weak? You’re weak.”

Sitting near the windows, John Burzichelli – fed up – started to rise from his chair.

“I don’t have to listen to this,” he grunted.

“No, you sure don’t, pal,” Baldwin said. “Because the good news is, you’re fired. Oh, do I have your attention now?”

Burzichelli stared grimly at the rapidly approaching and intimidating figure in front of him.

“You – you’re such a big shot – why do you come down here and talk to a bunch of bums?” The veteran assemblyman said, not looking away as he threw the challenge in Baldwin’s face.

“You see this watch?” the actor said to the assemblyman. “This watch costs more than your car. I made $970,000 last year, how much did you make? You see, this is what I am, and you’re nothing.”

Out of the corner of his eye, Baldwin noticed Jerry Green shaking his head in disgust and immediately rushed over to to him and got in his face. “You think this is abuse? You think is abuse? If you can’t take this, how are you going to take what Prieto has in store for you out there?

“Oh,” the handsome actor added. “Have I got your attention now?”

He headed for the door past Greenwald, and said over his shoulder on his way out to Burzichelli, but really to the room in general, “And in answer to your question pal, ‘Why am I am here?’ I’m here because George Norcross asked me and I’m doing it as a favor.”

Editor’s Note: Sorry, I couldn’t resist. This piece is a joke and written only for all you Glengarry Glen Ross fans out there, of whom there are many in New Jersey politics.