Page 20 - Unlikely Stories 4

The President’s New Birthday Suit

“You know what I want.”
In the Oval Office chorus of sycophants, those who did not know
what he wanted would find their musical chair missing at the next
cabinet meeting. The president, considering his final remark
sufficient motivation, dismissed his bearers of hollowed-out
portfolios, scattering them into the hallways of the White House with
the example of the previous Secretary of the Interior rattling in their
capacious skulls. That exile from the charmed circle had pointed out
logistical problems in adding a bust of their boss to Mount Rushmore
during the remaining months of his term in office. Clearly more time
was needed to move Mammon to the mountain: at least a second
term in office. And the president’s own mock-granite façade had
recently been showing cracks. Support was leaking out of that
monolithic image, suggesting all was not well in his campaign.
Every policy initiated or terminated in his first three years in office
had been aimed at re-election. Following years of cultivating celebrity
for the sake of celebrity, he had made an easy transition to power for
its own sake. Navigating the treacherous waters of that oceanic ego
required a crew with strong sea legs, cast iron stomachs and a
powerful desire not to be pitched over the side by violent storms of
temperament and unpredictable cross-currents of reality welling up
from the depths of delusion.
Among this group of apparatchiks those with the most politically-
sophisticated sensibilities immediately set about contacting their well-
paid opposition research contractors for ideas to fill their own mental
voids. As usual, the vast quantities of dark money and bright people
brought to bear on insoluble problems inherent in a purportedly two-
party system produced strategies to convince the uncommitted voters
stubbornly refusing to put party over persona. The resulting new
media campaign would have to cast the incumbent in a far better
light than his opponent.

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