Pimps. Valentine's Day. America vs. Iraq. If you were listening to G.W. Bush's State of the Union speech on January 28, 2003, you got sick of him invoking all of these clichéd themes over and over again. "Blah, blah, pimps-and-ho's, blah, blah, Saddam Hussein, blah, blah, blah."

I did like, though, that part where G-Dub called out to that pimp, Willie Caldero, who was sitting in between a couple of his ho's, just behind balloon-headed and sleepy Senator Ted Kennedy (D-MA). G.W. learned the trick of singling out exemplary people in the crowd, of course, from Presidents Reagan and Clinton, who mastered that art. But those other two didn't ever publicly thank someone from the sex industry - you gotta hand it to the President for finally take what looks like, in retrospect, an obvious step.

You remember Willie from the speech, right? The tall guy with a feather in his hat, long leather coat collared with fur, chewing on a toothpick, with his alligator skin boots kicked up on the back of the seat in front of him? Remember his manicured fingernails, chunky gold rings on 4 different fingers, and sunglasses with big, round, dark lenses even at 9pm EST? Remember those looks (horror? desire? dental surgery earlier in the day and the novocaine hadn't worn off?) he got from all of the female Representatives and Senators in the audience?

I thought it was a bit much that Bush labeled him "one of the true entrepreneurs of the inner city, a man showing each day, with each ho and every trick, that the American dream is still a reality." But I had to give the President credit - he picked the right guy as a symbol for our country, especially on the eve of war, in these tough economic times. A pimp is self-made, ready to fight if necessary to defend his turf, flashily-dressed. He is . . . America.

We here at TRF had the honor of meeting the same Willie Calderon when we were doing the advance work for February's "Pimps" issue (which you're lucky enough to be reading now). We spent a Sunday morning with him near his home in Chicago last December.

He was dressed elegantly even on that cold day, in a gold sequined jump suit, wide brimmed fedora and knee-high black boots. He drove to pick us up at the Drake hotel, just off of the city's famed Miracle Mile of Michigan Avenue, in his light blue Cadillac. He didn't have winter tires, so we did skid around quite a bit on Chicago's icy streets, but the cologne wafting from his body toasted us up as soon as we climbed in next to him.

When we started talking, he couldn't have been nicer-he opened up about his mom (she still washes his hair each morning), his dad (also a pimp who left town when Willie was two when he heard he could make a lot of cash selling cheap booze on the black market in New York City), his dog (pure-breed Collie).

But we also saw the darkside of this pimp once other topics came up. Take a look at an excerpt from the transcript:

Willie: Pimpin' ain't easy!!

TRF: I'm gonna call bullshit on that. Pimpin' IS easy. You sell sex. Maybe you could say "Being a shoe salesman ain't easy" or "fixing cars for a living ain't easy" or even "being a philosophy professor ain't easy." But pimpin'? Shit. That shit is easy.

Willie: Man, what kind of bullshit interview is this? Man, get the fuck out of my car!! Fuck that!! Pimpin' ain't easy motherfucker!!

[CAR SCREECHES TO A HALT; WILLIE REACHES OVER PASSENGER'S LAP, FORCES DOOR OPEN, PUSHES EDITOR OF TRF ONTO ICY HARDNESS OF MICHIGAN AVENUE, DRIVES OFF, SPINNING ICE DUST AND HARD GRAVEL INTO EDITOR OF TRF'S FACE]

Get out of my face, motherfucker!!

I think you'll agree after even that brief look at him that Willie Caldero is a complex pimp, nay, a complex man. Find out what makes his brethren in pimp-ology tick by reading the rest of this month's issue.

Until then, we remain, as ever, your humble servant,

THE RAGING FACE