Only six people in the entire Galaxy understood the principle on which the Galaxy was governed, and they knew that once Zaphod Beeblebrox had announced his intention to run as President it was more or less a fait accompli: he was ideal presidency fodder.*
*President: full title President of the Imperial Galactic Government.
The term Imperial is kept though it is now an anachronism. The hereditary Emperor is nearly dead and has been for many centuries. In the last moments of his dying coma he was locked in a stasis field which keeps him in a state of perpetual unchangingness. All his heirs are now long dead, and this means that without any drastic political upheaval, power has simply and effectively moved a rung or two down the ladder, and is now seen to be vested in a body that used to act simply as advisers to the Emperor--an elected governmental assembly headed by a President elected by that assembly. In fact it vests in no such place.
The President in particular is very much a figurehead--he wields no real power whatsoever. He is apparently chosen by the government, but the qualities he is required to display are not those of leadership but those of finely judged outrage. For this reason the President is always a controversial choice, always an infuriating but fascinating character. His job is not to wield power but to draw attention away from it. On those criteria Zaphod Beeblebrox is one of the most successful Presidents the Galaxy has ever had--he has already spent two of his ten presidential years in prison for fraud. Very very few people realize that the President and the Government have virtually no power at all, and of these few people only six know whence ultimate political power is wielded. Most of the others secretly believe that the ultimate decision-making process is handled by a computer. They couldn't be more wrong.
You see my dilemma with this post. The above passage is a perfect set-up for me to launch into a discussion of the current resident of the Oval Office. I'm not going to do that. He is going to be all over TV this evening. Therefore, I will not draw more attention to President Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named.
When I got home from work this afternoon, I began cutting branches from the trees on the side of my property. They were coated with ice, and one of the limbs was resting on the roof of my house. Therefore, with the help of my daughter's boyfriend, a saw, and my dad's old tree trimmers, I deforested a little. I can now park on the side of my house again without fear of severe damage.
I also drove down to my mother's house. The damage to her trees was much worse. One tree was lying on the snow, snapped off at the base of the trunk. Branches littered her entire front yard, and there were limbs on the roof. At the base of her driveway was a wedge of ice boulders. So, I spent some time there shoveling, chipping, and collecting some of the fallen lumber.
And now, I am sitting at my kitchen table, visiting with one of my favorite people in the world--my niece, Aubri. She just graduated from college last December, and she came over to cut and dye my wife's hair. My niece and I have similar senses of humor. We recognize the ridiculous and hypocritical, and we revel in making fun of it. (That's the nicest way I can describe it. To put it another way: we can be mean girls when we get together.)
However, Saint Marty can't think of a better way to spend this State of the Union evening. Cutting branches. Eating ranch pretzels. Laughing with his niece.
Please vote for Saint Marty (Marty Achatz) for 2019/2020 Poet Laureate of the Upper Peninsula:
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