[October, 2036]
“Good morning, children,” Miss Frizzle addressed the class of moiling third graders, her fingers lightly resting on her riot control baton. “Has everyone handed in their permission slip for next weeks class trip to the historical recreation of the Cambridgeside Galleria? Splendid. Now, please put down your Learn-o-matic orbs for a moment and welcome our visitor, DannyO. DannyO is here to tell us his memories of the turbulent times at the beginning of the century, long before you were cloned.”
“Thank you, Miss Frizzle. Good morning, good morning. Students, Miss Frizzle has asked me to talk about a particularly interesting and unusual series of events that happened when I was just a little older than your parents. It was a long time ago, and thing were quite a bit different then, before the dawn of the enlightened age and the start of the reign of Empress Chelsea.”
DannyO paused and thought to himself how classrooms had once traditionally had a painting of George Washington over the blackboard, where they now had a floating hologram of Her Benevolence, Lord Emperor Chelsea. And, not for the first time, he marveled at their similarity. “Must be the wig on George,” he thought.
“It’s hard to imagine now, but we haven’t always been at war with Eastasia. In fact, there was a time when we weren’t at war with anyone at all. But Miss Frizzle asked me to talk about something else today. She asked me to talk about the election of 2008.”
“The nation was divided. On the one side, the forces of ‘Anything would be better than the direction we’re going‘ were rallied around a progressive young man named Obama while the mighty coalition of traditionalist ‘We probably shouldn’t step out of the handbasket until it comes to a complete stop‘ aligned behind the teachings of a elder statesman from an earlier time, named McCain.”
“Now, McCain’s running mate was a young woman named Palin. Yes, I see you’ve heard the name! Her great granddaughter is now chancellor of the Alaskan prefecture and guards our northern flanks against an invasion of the cyber-Mongols. But don’t be worried — they haven’t attacked for a dozen years, and probably never will again. Ever since we completed the strip mining of Alaska in 2029, there hasn’t really been anything there worth fighting for.”
“But I’m rambling off-topic again, and I only have another minute or two. And I want to leave time for answering your questions.”
“The most astonishing thing happened in mid October of that year. With the economy in ruins, and the nation tearing itself apart in endless arguments over which candidate looked better behind a lectern and which candidate had more reprehensible associates in the distant past, McCain and Obama met secretly and discussed a plan for uniting the nation. Nobody knew where the plan came from, although there has been endless speculation. I certainly don’t know. I was spending all my time on TBD, and things were going badly for the Red Sox, so my attention was elsewhere.”
“Ignoring the announced agenda, they used the time scheduled for the final debate to reveal their plan. Instead of running against each other, the announced that they would unify their forces and attack the real problems facing the country. The young, charismatic communicator named Obama would lead as nominal president, while the older, craftier, but less polished McCain would serve as his vice president, as the position was then called. Sort of like their predecessors, Bush and Cheney.”
Miss Frizzle pushed the silent alarm button under her desk. She knew help would be there in a moment. If she could distract the children for a moment, the reeducators would arrive before the children formed any lasting memories of Bush/Cheney. But right now there was nobody else–it was up to her to protect them.
“Mr. DannyO, could you tell us what happened after the announcement? And please do not mention their antecedents again, if you don’t mind,” she added in a cheerful voice that carried, to DannyO’s perceptive ears, a hint of carefully balanced menace.
[October, 2008]
So, what are you going to tell your great grandchildren, or second-generation clones, about the 2008 presidential campaigns?
