The Road to Legendhood

by Mike Palecek

HE STOOD FIRM, FINE, LEAN, justice warrior, smart, ebullient, handsome, simulated, phony baloney.

In The Hall Of Me, a cavernous though sparkling, ravishingly lit room of mirrors.
From the middle He saw the smoke machine finally beginning to work, the rolls billowing, spreading out, like the ghosts of Damascus past.

This was his favorite room, one of several hundred, maybe soon several thousand with the planned additions, of His Library Of Me, taking up sizeable, significant acreage in this Chicago neighborhood that could have no more purposeful purpose, He had to admit.

Out in front sat the bronze statue showing Him dealing three-card monte on Pennsylvania Avenue wearing His Magician’s hat, His wand in a pocket, a white rabbit on His lap and “Habeas Corpus” under his feet.

From the rooftop helicopter pad He could be in Martha’s Vineyard in a quick jiffy, if need be, or D.C., or Honolulu, Tel Aviv or Nairobi, as the case may be.

He sported a gabardine suit, open shirt, sandals, sunglasses atop His head, and gold, embossed “Forty Years of Service” decoder ring, genuine BARRY rodeo belt buckle. He was The Man Of The People, even now, more so, perhaps, the touch of grey lending a certain proletarian pizzazz.

PULLING HIMSELF AWAY, with a stylish nod to Himself in the dozen and more, mirrors, The Hope & Change Champion Of The Free World glided along the moving walkway into His Office, surrounded by one thousand [Bill Nye, Neil Degrasse Tyson and Bill Clinton had counted] books He had written including, Hope & Change For The Rest Of Us; Hope & Change In The NFL; The Audacity Of Me; If I Did It, an insider’s look at how the C.I.A. fools the American people; But Mostly Me! … Boston, bin Laden, Benghazi, The Places You’ll Go; Hope & Change In The Bedroom; Work From Home, A Guide For Today’s Mass Murderer; Hope & Change For Dummies.

The Man Of The Moment The Hour The Minute The Second, The Honorary Kiwanis-Rotary-Sertoma Grand Poobah, paused over His desk where he was working on a new piece, a Manifesto, with back-story, pathos, energy, for something-someone who had not really happened yet. He swiped at a tear with His middle finger as He perused his work, pretended to take a sip from the water glass on the desk. Everything was being filmed, from nine angles, for posterity, for history, to be released to the American people someday, not today, maybe soon, likely not soon at all, certainly not ever.

Setting a folksy foot up on the expensive chair, He leaned on a knee to take a look at His computer screen, where here, among the dozens of important vital projects for the people, He was writing laws, not really laws, suggestions, demands, that would become laws, clarifying freedom of speech as it really is, a tired notion that had lived out its usefulness, not fitting with the hip, with-it, Labradoodle in every window, folksy new age America of today. There was simply too much going on. Only those up to speed would be able to sluice through to find the gold.

BEHIND HIM, BESIDE HIM, ABOVE HIM were photos of Him, telling the world Osama bin Laden had drowned in a jet ski accident at sea, watching the jet ski accident in horror with His friends on a secret TV, in the basement, in the dark, eating Doritos, clutching the cushy pillow.

In a file cabinet behind the working desk, the working President Peace Prize looked to check the “Confirmed Kills,” “Kill List,” “MILFK List (mothers I would like to fucking kill),” and the “George Floyd (in progress),” files.

The Best Friend Of All The Young Dudes, taking the Chief Executive In Motion moving sidewalk over to the far wall, where on a bulletin board the size of Yemen were positioned newspaper clippings, colored pins with strings connecting the colored pins, and photos of people and books and purple penguins trying to take down Him, and with Him, the United States of America. The “come on baby, do the locomotion” motion music took Him right to the ladder, which He nimbly, athletically, smoothly climbed to make an adjustment He’d been thinking of all night.

While up there he thought of someone who had done incredible work in the work of Democrat Democracy to knuckle-under when the time was right, a B.O. Prize for him. He did not have to write it down. He would remember, just like a waiter who did not have to use a note pad, He was a genius. He smiled, up there on that ladder thinking about what His grandmother had told him, “You will be President someday.”

He wore ten plastic and rubber bracelets on His wrists, every color, showing that He was a friend of everybody on earth and thinking of every cause and condition.

COMING DOWN THE LADDER, passing The Coolest Cat plaque on the wall, He walked to the podium in the middle of the all-wood room, the exact same podium He had stood at to announce to the American people late at night and being up and not sleeping, but working hard for The American People that Osama bin Laden had been buried at sea as we believe would have been his wish, as it would be anyone’s wish and we are working hard every day, for The American People, that one day, no matter the color of your skin or the content of your character, you too, and if not you, then your children and grandchildren, will be buried at sea.

Oh, how The Liar In Chief wished He could have been around to announce the moon landing, He would have been good at it, He had thought as He finished his buried at sea announcement to The American People and turned away from the podium to walk down that long hallway, thinking, as He was lately all the time, it seemed, of The American People, Osama bin Laden and the brave American military, not really.

Laid into the floor, by an artist whose grandmother was an underground conductor on the Underground Railroad, who now lived in the south of France, a retired law professor and ski instructor three months every winter, even at her age, were blocks, artistically subtly regal, with orange traffic cones showing where they were, emblems, depicting the things named after Him, streets, bridges, schools, one desert, a cafe, a used gun shop in Juarez, nine prisons, an inclusive torture chamber at Guantanamo.

Also shown, artist’s renderings, were things yet to be named for him, a sphinx, two pyramids, a motel in North Dakota, The Black House, Mars Mansion, also a total re-do, hipster modernization of Mount Rushmore, and a suburb of Flint, Michigan, Husseinville.

His security system was a bookshelf running the length of the west wall holding copies of all the American History textbooks currently in use in the American school system, along with, in a locked glass cabinet, the book He had banned, No One Dead on Beach J.

HE MOVED SLOWLY NOW, reverently to the east room, off The Office, where it was engraved, set back, in stone, so subtly and unobtrusively that you could walk right past them if you didn’t know they were there: “We tortured some folks,” and “The bums will always lose.”

And where One could sit in a replica of the Lincoln Monument, actually sit in Lincoln’s lap, taking Lincoln’s place, obscuring Lincoln with You and listen to recordings of speeches and quips by You, over and over for the rest of time, if You wish, but You would not do that. You know there is work still to be done for The Best Friend Of The Health Insurance Industry.

Now entering The Messiah Mambo Room there it was and He went to it, the stuffed horse, Black Jack, the black stallion that had marched riderless on national television, across every living room in America, during the John F. Kennedy funeral procession. The saddle was gold, draped in bling, with jeweled swords hanging on both sides.

A tiny chair sat there so that, when He desired, He could climb up, pull His sunglasses down from the top of His head, sit there and recall the battles, the victories, the glory.

Alas, the battles were not over. He could not rest. Not yet, shortstop.

HE BRUSHED A HAND across the horse’s rump and entered the Peace Prize Room through a door marked with skull & bones and lit tiki lamps.

He proceeded slowly, coming to the Ergonomic Emperor standing table and computer workspace, where a lit cigarette waited for Him. He undid the top button of His shirt, rolled His sleeves to the elbows.

The lights dimmed. He reached below the computer, pulled out the white hood, put it on. The lights became a disco ball, spinning.
The music thumped in the walls and under His feet and in the ceiling.
He punched in his password: Dominion Strong.

His screen lit like a pinball machine reacting to a quarter. He was in.

Recalling His own recent pronouncement and decree that Nuremburg was just a dusty room in a dusty town and the words of a retarded friend of His that the constitution was just a piece of paper, He squeezed and fondled the gel joy sticks and went to work, flying, in real time, on His screen and in the world.

“This is so funk-a-delic.”
Over mountains, small towns, villages, ocean, desert, to a village.
To a building on the edge of the village, a gathering, a party, a wedding party, a home, a family, a target rich environment.

“Fire when ready, sir,” He heard in His headphones. Oh, He was ready all right.
He was born ready.

–– Mike Palecek is the author of “The Resistance.”  He has worked as a journo in Minnesota, Nebraska and South Dakota. He also co-hosted The New American Dream Radio.  Did time for protesting US military policy.  Got 65,000 votes when he ran for Congress as an Iowa Democrat. www.mikepalecek.newdream.us