Rumplestiltskin's Revenge

By Dan Mulhollen

Despite all odds, President Darry Jay Rumpelstiltskin found his base did not decrease all that much from his violent outbursts during his divorce. Many shared his view that "the slut had it coming" (or words to that effect). They did not mind his tax-payer funded golfing outings -- which became an almost daily thing. They did not mind his doctored reports on his finances and both physical and mental health

Even Evangelical support was not badly hurt by his changing laws and customs dating back to the days of Lot and his daughters in order to marry his recently-divorced daughter Darrya (some turning to secular Bible scholars to point out it was simply a way of justifying the slaughter of the Ammonites and Moabites.)

"I told you, I know my base," the President chimed. "Darryl Junior and Elrich hunt wild animals as trophies for their wall. I collect women as trophies for my bed. And let me tell you, Darrya is my prize trophy!"

No one said a word, fearing the President's wrath.

"So what about my opponents? Uncle Joe? Moving kinda slow and cursed by chronic foot-in-mouth disease. Mayor Pete? The first gay candidate since James Buchanan -- or so I'm told? Little Beto? An Irishman who fancies himself a Mexican?

"I still say we should have bombed Budapest over your ex," always-say-die National Security Adviser John Bullton said.

"Inadvisable," Secretary of State Mike Pompous said. "A NATO ally. And we're lacking a reasonable causus belli -- not a good idea."

"Causes what?" The president asked., scorn masking ignorance. "And NATO? Give me a break! I've heard about environmentalists. Sacajawea, and those idiots influenced by that loud-mouth kid Alicia Ortega-Lopez."

Treasury Secretary Steve Munchkin, a man whose name appears on as many Hollywood blockbusters as serial-creep Harry Weinberg smiled. "The first law of capitalism is if the environment interferes with profits, screw the environment."

"A war is still a good idea," Education Secretary Betty Devious said. "And we do have a long list of potential targets. Cuba, Iraq, Mexico, Venezuela, Norway, Ireland, even Canada. My brother-in-law's mercenaries are chomping at the bit for some action."

"What about this 2050 thing?" Interior Secretary Rex Carbon asked.

"I was in college during the '60s," the President said. "A lot of people tell me they were surprised we survived that decade. So Dick Nixon hit those filthy hippies where it hurt -- FDA Schedule One."

"A big lie," Bullton said.

"The best kind. That Herman Goering guy said something about how to start a war. Good advice coming from a pilot who was not shot down. Besides, the economy is booming."

"I've been taught," the President's latest chief of staff said, "That long-term stability is preferable to windfall booms and sudden crashes"

President Rumpelstiltskin stood up and pointed to the door. "You question my knowledge of how the economy works? You're fired! He looked at his list of potential replacements. "This will be my forty-fifth. Good number."

"We may need the CIA for any military action," Secretary of State Pompous said.

If need be," the President said, sounding tired. "But I'd put my own intelligence over any of those elite globalists any day. I am a stable genius, you know."

"We do need allies," Munchkin stated. "We don't have the resources to build computers on our own. Unless you're suggesting returning to room-filling tube powered things lacking the power of a 1995 cell phone."

"We do need the Internet," the President admitted. "We have to create divisions again. Black versus white. Women against men. The have-nots versus the haves."

"We're in luck there," Mrs. Devious said. "Any white male candidate is likely to cause most libs to sit out the election."

"And if they sit it out, I win!"

"They do prefer idealism to pragmatism," Bullton said. "The more rabid, implacable idealism, the better."

"Then in my second term," the President said, "I can work on my pet project to overturn the twenty-second Amendment. Four more years? Why not forty?"

"A grand idea," Betty Devious said, smiling, thinking about the money her family would make with forty years of continual warfare.

"Given your ... er ... spare tire," Acting Defense Secretary Mark Shannon said, while super-centenarians do exist ..."

The President pointed to the door. "Such disloyalty. You're fired!" Shannon whimpered as he left.

"Now," the President said, "I've hired a Russian scientist to build a self-contained travel device for me. In it I'll be able to function as President and still get in a game of golf And forty? Why not four hundred.? Four thousand? Four million! Come election time, let them have their convention. Let them nominate another opponent. I will crush their party! I will exterminate all rivals! Exterminate!"