Chapter 14: "Speed of Lightning, Roar of Thunder"
"Please get rid of these idiots, Hatter! Send them all back to where they came from!"
"As you wish, my dear." Hatter detached the two piglets from their dispensaries and herded the entire crowd back to Caterpillar to deport them back their own times.
The deed done, Hatter came back and offered to introduce me to guests of that same time that might be more to my taste.
"Anyone would be preferable to that clown parade you just had in here!"
Hatter speeded off to Caterpillar for a few more kidnappings. I wondered why Hatter couldn't just round up his own guests in Wonderland. Then it hit me that either the two Queens or I had killed just about everybody but the Gnomes and the Card Guards. Rounding up a tea party in Wonderland was mission impossible, unless you wanted a room full of Gnomes who had no taste for tea.
Hatter came back with a fat, sloppy dude in a baseball cap, a cartoonist, and a woman in a dog suit with a cape. The fat dude and the cartoonist were trying to get the woman to run for President of the U.S. in 2016.
"Still more presidential candidates, Hatter?" I asked.
"Just one, this time. The woman in the dog suit."
I leaned across the table and eyed the woman in the dog suit. A blond aged professor type who looked quite well-preserved. Rather attractive, really, if a man was not insistent on young, nubile jiggly types.
"What's with the dog suit?"
"People keep pestering me to run for President. They think I'm some kind of savior. The U.S. political system is so dysfunctional that I wouldn't be able to accomplish anything if I did get elected. Look what the Republicans did to Obama during his term."
"This is Victorian England in 1871. I have no knowledge of the U.S. political system during your time."
"It hasn't changed a bit since your time. It was dysfunctional in your time and it's still dysfunctional in my time. I don't think there's any hope of changing it."
"Then why are you in politics?"
"I was pushed in."
The fat dude and the cartoonist began pleading with the woman in the dog suit to run for President. I looked at Hatter.
"Introductions, please?"
Hatter obliged me. The woman in the dog suit was Elizabeth Warren, a U.S. Senator and populist crusader who said aloud what no one else dared to. She had no fear of offending the "money people" who controlled so much of what went on in the U.S. government. The fat dude was Michael Moore who was a leading documentarian of the period who had the gift of being funny merely by opening his mouth. When he wasn't shoving food into it. The cartoonist was Garry Trudeau who was known for the quasi-editorial comic strip Doonesbury. Mr. Moore got down on his knees in front of Mrs. Warren and began to beg.
"Please Mrs. Warren! You have to run! If you don't, we'll get Hillary and that will be another four years of Obama! Maybe even worse."
Mr. Moore and Mr. Trudeau wrapped arms around each other's necks and began to sing:
Awooo, awooo, awooo, awooo, awooo, awooo
When criminals in this world appear
and break the laws that they should fear
and frighten all who see or hear
the cry goes up both far and near
for Underdog! Underdog! Underdog! Underdog!
Speed of lightning, roar of thunder
fighting all who rob or plunder
Underdog. Underdog!
when in this world the headlines read
of those whose hearts are filled with greed
who rob and steal from those who need
to right this wrong with blinding speed
goes Underdog! Underdog! Underdog! Underdog!
speed of lightning, roar of thunder
fighting all who rob or plunder
Underdog. Underdog!
Mrs. Warren winced. "Hey, Caterpillar! I know you're watching! Could I please have back my regular clothes?" Right before my eyes a hazy distortion turned Mrs. Warren's dog suit and cape into a classic lady professor's pants suit. I blinked. I wondered if I had really seen that. Was Hatter's iced tea spiked? "Thank you!" shouted Mrs. Warren to the out-of-sight Caterpillar. She seemed not the least disturbed at what had just happened. Mrs. Warren turned to Mr. Moore and the cartoonist.
"As long as the U.S. House of Representatives remains gerrymandered in favor of the Republicans and unrepresentative of the actual wishes of the voters, running for President is a fool's errand. As long as a minority of 40 Republican Senators can completely gum up a Democratic administration that controls all three branches of government, running for President is a fool's errand. As long as the Citizens United decision in the Supreme Court allows unlimited corporate speech, running for President is a fool's errand. My function in the Senate is primarily educational. I bring up the issues that everyone else is afraid to address for fear of losing campaign funding. Filibuster reform has to be the top priority in the Senate. As long as the Senate remains an undemocratic body that requires a 60% majority to get anything done, positive change in the U.S. in anything other than the most tiny increments will remain impossible."
Mrs. Warren gave a long sigh. Mr. Moore and Mr. Trudeau looked at each other and nodded. It was obvious that they understood that Mrs. Warren was right. I, of course, had little idea what their discussion was really about, but I could read their faces. The disappointment and fatalism was obvious.
"Send me home, Caterpillar!" shouted Mrs. Warren. A portal appeared beside the chairs of each of the three Americans from the future. Mr. Moore nodded to Hatter.
"Thank you for your hospitality and a most interesting experience!" Moore laughed. "Nobody at home is going to believe this!" Moore stepped into his portal first. Then Mrs. Warren and Mr. Trudeau followed.
I looked at Hatter. "Don't you have some new weapons to show me?"
End of Chapter 14
This story is based on the characters created by American McGee. EA (Electronic Arts) owns the copyrights. The Underdog theme was written by W. Watts Biggers, Chet Stover, Joe Harris, and Treadwell Covington.