Chapter 18: I Am a Smart Man and You Are Not

Chapter 18

I Am a Smart Man and You Are Not

            “What do you mean Adams wasn’t arrested?...What do you mean the planes were shot down?...Do you know how to run a god damn military unit? How did you rise the ranks of the Air Force?...You are damn right this won’t happen again. Because if it does there will be hell to pay. And trust me, that payment will include never seeing you in an Air Force uniform for as long as you shall live which may not be long after your next failure. I hope you do fully understand me.” President Smith slammed the phone as he hung up. Holding his face in his hands, Smith contemplated to himself. Looking up his eyes caught the eyes from his Presidential portrait.

            “You. You were the man with the dream. The dream that you could one day run this country. You were the man that rose the ranks of the Republican Party. Became a major player in southern politics. You were the man that put Mississippi back onto the political landscape. You were the one who became governor of the state. You were the one to give the south their voice back. When the Democrats and Republicans became too stale, you helped to create the Peace Party. You helped form the grassroots campaign to help combat the Republicans and return them to Conservatism. And then when they didn’t us to play in their reindeer game, you led the Peace revolution and formed the movement into a true political party. You led the way for conservatives to leave the moderate Republicans and join the Peace party and let their true beliefs be heard. You gave Conservatism a newer and stronger voice.”

            The President stood up and walked over to the portrait. “You were a smart man. You always talked loud enough to be heard, but not too loudly to become the object of ridicule from opponents. You were the face of the party, only you were smart enough not to be the skin that everyone sees. No, instead you were muscle underneath. You were the unseen strength of the party. You let people like Mitchell Davis and Matt Adams run their mouths and create newspaper headlines, while you took a step back were the man whom everyone in the party conferred with before taking any sort of stance on any issue. You set policy. You set the platform. When the Peace Party won control of the House, they elected you to be the new Speaker even though you hadn’t been the previous party leader. You led your own way into power. You commanded respect. Your views set the tone for the whole party. Without you there was no People’s Party for Perpetual Peace. God what a farce of a name. You knew that people could be fooled and led to follow your new party. You knew fancy lingo and nice sounding words would make the party more appealing to people. People are so gullible. If they only knew half of the things that we allowed them to know or even if they knew that half the things that we actually did tell them were lies. You were a smart man.” A smirk grew over his face as he traveled through the recesses of his memories. Admiring himself. President Smith was his own top admirer. He was his own role model, his own mentor, and his own superhero.

            Just as quickly as that smirk had appeared it had vanished as the President quickly got hot under the collar. “If you were such a smart man, then why the hell couldn’t you see the California secession coming? You thought that you had everything planned out. You had cemented the Peace Party into a position of power, a position that could not be overcome. You thought that the Democrats would just roll over to you. You thought that they were weak. By far and away you thought you had dealt a death blow when their party split. You never thought their party could survive being split in two; being split across the country in two different geographic regions. You never would’ve thought that would become anything more than a thorn in your side. The Peace Party controlled the nation which meant that you controlled the nation. You forced their political leaders back into hiding within their own states. You forced the Progressives and the Radical Dems to send nothing but their freshmen and weakest politicians to Washington. It was nothing more than a formality to you. Nothing more than the byproduct from a now obsolete system. Never would you have thought that those politicians you thought had gone into hiding would ever try to defy you. Never did you think that they would or could fight back.”

“If you were so smart why didn’t you see this coming? Why couldn’t you see California pushing itself further and further away? You thought that you had everything figured out. You thought you could just waltz in and stage a state level coup d’état of the California government. You thought you could topple California and then once you did that the rest would fall. All you had to do was cut the head off the dragon and the rest wouldn’t function. Why couldn’t you see that California had a little more weight behind it? Why couldn’t you see that they would fight back? Why couldn’t you see that they would find an ally in Canada’s ruling Liberal Party?”

“Now I have to clean up your mess. You didn’t see this happening, so now I have to clean it up. I have to solve the problem. I have to lead the Peace Party to arms. I have to reunite this country. I have to crush the California resistance. I have to deal with a California-led Progressive secession movement, because in your world there was no chance of secession. In your world, California would just lie down and take what was coming to them. In my world, they instead took up arms and declared themselves a new Republic. I have to be the one to not diplomatically recognize the Republic of California. I have to fight the UN hearing from their diplomats. Your world contained no California diplomats; mine does.”

The President’s own narcissistic attitudes forced him to fight with himself when there was no one around that he could belittle. No one around to abuse but himself. “If you were so smart you would’ve seen this coming. I have to clean it up. You get to sit there and watch me pick up the pieces. I will defeat the California uprising. I will defeat the Progressive movement. This will be a Peaceful Nation led by a People’s Party for Perpetual Peace. I will do it. I will do it because I am a smart man. I am a smart man and you are not.”