Like many graduates of Harvard College and the Harvard Graduate School of Business, John LeBoutillier is on the fast track. His field happens to be national politics. A top Republican fund-raiser in his college-sophomore year, author of a book taking his alma mater to task for its liberal leanings, he got himself elected to the House of Representatives at the age of 27. One can't help thinking that he, like any other ambitious MBA, has his sights set on the executive suite--in his business, that's called the Oval Office. Warren Kalbacker met with the Congressman on Capitol Hill and later in his New York office. "Some people may accuse conservatives of living in the 19th Century," Kalbacker told us, "but LeBoutillier thrives in our media age. At one of our meetings, he pulled out a tape recorder and made his own copy of our conversation. Then he gave me the cassette. He wasn't taking any chances that his words might not be coming through loud and clear."

Q 1

PLAYBOY: You were elected to the House of Representatives at 27. How does it feel to earn the title Honorable at such a tender age?

John LeBoutillier: It's kind of a joke. Actually, they don't ever call you the Honorable. They call you sir. I find men old enough to be my grandfather calling me sir. It makes me feel ill at ease and I always ask them to stop.

Q 2

PLAYBOY: How about telling us the real story behind "Mr. LeBoutillier Goes to Washington"?

John LeBoutillier: I went into my local Republican Party office on my hands and knees and asked if I could run. Politics is a young man's game. You can't wait for the call. Being drafted to run is the biggest bunch of malarky in the world. Parties don't draft anybody. Politics is like medical school or law school. If you don't know when you're about 18 that you want to be a doctor, you'll never be one. You've got to be excessively competitive from an early age, because the competition is so much stronger. It's the same with politics.

Q 3

PLAYBOY: You've received a tremendous amount of press coverage due to your remarks about members of the House and the Senate. You've called Charles Percy a wimp and Daniel Patrick Moynihan a drunk. Are you worried about your reputation or are you only concerned that reporters spell your name correctly?

John LeBoutillier: I enjoy the attention. But the press has tried to portray me as something I'm not: a vicious and angry young man who's upset with everything. I'm upset with lots of things; but I'm not angry. I apologized to Senator Moynihan only because the statement I made should not have been recorded. It was off the record.

Q 4

PLAYBOY: This is a Washington office, after all. Just how many records are being made of this conversation?

John LeBoutillier: Only two that I know of. By the way, this office belonged to Bruce Caputo when he was a member of Congress. He was the Republican pushing the big Koreagate investigation. He said that he had found bugs in the closet and that either the CIA or the Korean CIA had been bugging his office.

Q 5

PLAYBOY: Public officials are sometimes deft at evading unpleasant questions. Is that a skill taught in Washington?

John LeBoutillier: I learned it at Harvard. A professor asks an essay question and, of course, you don't know the answer. He probably doesn't expect you to know the answer. So you run off and write about something else, whatever you want. Professors don't grade you on what you don't know about the question. They grade you on what you wrote in the essay. It's the same in politics. You get asked your position on tax cuts. You don't want to answer that, so you talk about something else that has to do with the economy. People remember only your answer--not that you didn't answer the question. Reagan's very good at not answering questions. Either he says "I'm not going to answer," or he runs off and tells some funny story that gets the press mad but makes the public laugh and pay attention.