A Politician Tells the Truth Before Armageddon

This Wednesday, I decided to do another "random word" story.  Like last time, I used a random word generator to select 14 words around which to build my tale. That includes 3 nouns, 3 adjectives, 3 verbs, 3 adverbs, 1 interjection, and 1 preposition.  The words that came from the random words generator appear in green.

The story itself reflects a frustration with politics.  Even after the brutal election season ended, all I hear about is politics.  It's especially bad in Iowa, because it seems like here, election season never ends.  People are talking about the 2016 election already, and all I ever hear are politicians slinging mud at one another, twisting facts to support their case.  This is true in every political party, so trust me, I'm not singling anyone out.

So, I began to think about it.  When would a dirty, crooked, the worst of the worst politician actually tell the truth?  Well, that's simple.  At the end of the world when they don't have to worry about reelection.

Now, not all politicians are like this, but there are enough of them to make you bitter.  Rather than stew in bitterness, I thought it would be more fun to write this.

A Politician Tells the Truth Before Armageddon

My Fellow Citizens of Earth,

I address you now, not as the holder of the most powerful political office in the world, but as a member of the human race.  As a fellow human being, I feel I need to be honest with all of you.

First of all, for as long as I have been in politics, I haven’t had an honest atom in my body.  Lies drive the political process far too often, and I repeatedly allowed my greed to take precedence over the truth.

The biggest lie I ever told will reflect poorly on me until the end of civilization.  Unfortunately for everyone, due to the nature of my blunder that will only be three more days.

First contact was a serious matter, but I treated it as a strategic advantage in my bid for reelection.  In all honesty, the situation here at home was rapidly deteriorating, and I didn’t know how to prevent World War III.  Tensions were too high, and I pretended to understand the nature of these conflicts better than I actually did.

When the Vintari initially met with our envoy, they were interested in opening peaceful trade negotiations.  There were no indications that they intended to go to war with us.  Yet their very arrival triggered the raving lunatics to declare the end of the world.  Many prepared for a possible conflict.

My mistake came from putting too much faith in the scenarios put forth in alien invasion movies.  I saw the way humans banded together when faced with an extraterrestrial threat.  I thought if I could create that conflict of the people of Earth versus an alien adversary, I might be remembered as the leader who united the world and brought it back from the brink of destruction.

That’s right.  I committed terrible crimes against my people, and my sole purpose for doing so was to ensure my own legacy.  World peace, while a noble goal in itself, was only a tool to bring me immortality.  Oddly enough, I knew what I was doing was wrong, but I didn’t care.

The threats reported by this administration were fabricated at my command, no more real than an illusionist’s optical trickery.  The so-called Vintari attack on our lunar colony was staged.  I gave the order to have those civilians killed, and as our people died at my hand, I reminded myself that there are acceptable losses in any war.  I knew that these actions would give us all a common enemy.  I guess I succeeded in the end, only that common enemy is me.

Damnation!  That is what I have brought upon us all.  My malady was arrogance, and it sealed our fate.  I moved forward with my dastardly plan because, I truly felt that if we threw all we had at the Vintari, we couldn’t lose.  As your leader, I was entrusted by you to employ good judgment on your behalf.  In that charge, I clearly failed.  There aren’t enough apologies in all of creation to earn your forgiveness, so I won’t waste your time by trying.

I’m not sure if there really are a heaven and hell.  Many times I’ve claimed such certainty, but that too was a sham to buy votes.  All I can say now is that, if they are real, I know where I’m going, so I hope for my own sake that they’re as much a lie as my campaign speeches.  Though I know what I’ve done to you is wrong, I care more about my own position after death than I do about all of you.  How terrible is that?  None of you should have ever voted for me, but how were you to know when I did nothing but lie and make my opponent seem worse.

So at this very moment, the Vintari planet killer is on its way.  I can see that massive ship barrel toward this little light blue marble of a world in my mind, and I know we are defenseless.  We ran every probability study we could, but most of our fleet has already been destroyed.  Those of us on the surface of this world are the only ones left.

My advisors warned me that, due to the hopelessness of the situation, there is a 98% probability that I’ll be lynched by an angry mob as I walk out of this building.  That’s okay with me.  What’s another 3 days of life anyway?  I imagine whatever you have in store for me can’t be any worse than what the Vintari have in mind for me.

Good luck to everyone.  Though you’ll all be united in death soon enough, you’re all on your own until then.

Good night.