Mars or Bust: An Admonitory Fable
Kira Bacal
Smashwords Edition
Copyright 2012 Kira Bacal
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“Mr. President, you can’t do that,” the young man said with a gulp.
The leader of the Free World frowned, looking rather like the propaganda caricatures popular in newspapers behind the Iron Curtain and on numerous college campuses in the USA. “Son,” he said deliberately, “I’m the President. I can do pretty much anything I want: nuke the Reds, declare war – well, at least a “police action”, suspend the Constitution –“ Hasty whispering in his ear furrowed his brow even more. “Well, all right then, strike that last. But I can still do nearly any damn thing I want.”
“But – but, sir…” His agony was interrupted by a shout of laughter from the President.
“Ha! I had you going there, didn’t I? My LBJ impression always fools them. ‘Son’, I say, and they always start to sweat!” He trailed off in more chuckles while his advisers exchanged glances above his head.
“Okay,” the President said, sobering with the abruptness that so worried the Presidential physician. “So what’s the issue?”
“Well, sir,” the luckless aide began again, “there just isn’t enough money to do it all.”
“Are you recommending that we raise taxes?”
“Oh, no sir!” The aide, and the rest of the Cabinet members present, looked horrified.
“Good!” the President leaned back with a glower. “For a moment there you sounded like a Democrat! Better watch that, young man, before we have to start watching you.”
“Oh, no sir, no sir! I would never suggest that! I was just explaining, sir, that we can’t fund all the programs, and so we’ll have to – have to – well, cut one, sir.”
The President shrugged. “At least that sounds properly Republican. Okay, so it’s just a question of which one gets it in the neck, eh?”
The young man nodded, hoping desperately that the President wouldn’t suggest they pray for guidance. After all the Protestants – and even the Catholic – why was it a Quaker who insisted on group worship?
“Well, let’s see. There’s the whole War on Poverty thing, right?” Heads nodded around the room. “ ‘The poor will always be with us’, you know,” he mused, as around him everyone cringed and looked for soft patches of carpet. “And it’s not like they’re gonna vote for me anyway… But, no. If I drop that, those bleeding heart Democrats will have the corner on the whole compassion thing. Those fellers would give the whole damn country away if they could. Have you ever seen anything like that? Hey, have you heard the one about Senator –“
“Sir,” pleaded the young man, hoping against hope that he might refocus the President before his time ran out and the generals came in for their daily briefing. They always made him nervous, eyeing him as if trying to come up with a way to reclassify his draft status.
“Oh, all right. Anyway, we can’t kill the war on poverty. Gotta make them poor folks think we care about them.” He chuckled. “Silly wabbits.” He looked at his cabinet members. “Did you guys see that commercial? It’s for some breakfast cereal. Quite entertaining, actually! It seems there’s this rabbit, see? And he wants--”
“Sir –“
“Remind me to tell the cook to get some of that stuff.”
“Yes, sir. I will, Now, about the budget situation.”
“Don’t nag at me, boy. All right. What’s left? Viet Nam? Are you out of your mind, son? I can’t pull us out of ‘Nam any quicker than I already am!” He paused. “Hey, that was nearly a rhyme, wasn’t it?” ‘Nam, am…”
“The Communist threat, sir, would –“ One staffer began, only to be waved into silence.
“Commies, shmommies. I’ll tell you what the real threat to the American way of life is: those vodka-soaked Russkies figuring out the favor they’re doing us. What do you think would happen to us if the Soviet menace suddenly decided to given up their evil ways and move to Detroit? How can there be a balance of power if there’s no one to push against? I can’t be the leader of the free world, if there isn’t a – a—an unfree world, can I? Besides, I promised the Chinese that I’d stick around there long enough to make the Soviets nervous. Didn’t you see my press? They love me? All that ping pong stuff – now that’s what you call a legacy.”
“But, sir, that only leaves –“
“Who the hell
really wants a bunch of moon rocks anyway? I mean, look here, kid,
we’re all lawyers for a reason, right? We all hated science
in school. Cutting up frogs and wearing pocket protectors – there’s
a reason those types don’t get the girls, young man. What are they
going to do? Get their floods in a twist because we’re not setting
up a base on the Moon?”
“Well, sir, it is a very popular
program with the kids, and they built the center out in Florida so
that they could ready four Moon rockets simultaneously, and…”
The President rolled his eyes. “Do you know what we call kids here in the Oval Office?”
“Uh, no, sir…”
“NON-VOTERS!” The President bellowed. “Besides, they all just grow up to grow their hair long and smoke dope anyway. They’re too busy marching and sitting in and worrying about the Negroes and burning their bras to vote, even when they get old enough. And if they look like they’re about to, I’ll just draft the lot of ‘em and send ‘em off to ‘Nam. Ha! Besides, the pencil necked twerps are hardly the types to go voting for me anyway, now are they?”
“But the astronauts themselves, sir –“
“Bunch of fighter pilot jocks with God complexes,” the President grumbled. “There’s only one God, boys, and don’t you forget it.”
Amidst hasty murmurs of “No, sir!”, the President looked pensive. “Besides, we’ll just send them all over to ‘Nam too. That’ll keep ‘em happy, that whole boom and zoom club. Hmm. We do have a buncha those Nasser centers all over the country though, don’t we? Surprised we haven’t had the Jews complaining about the name – ha ha!” The staffers all did their best to chuckle alongside their party leader.
“Still, I can’t exactly shut ‘em all down. We’d have Congress screaming bloody murder.” He glared at the sweating young man. “I don’t much like any of these choices you’re giving me, son!”
“Well, sir,” the young man gulped, “you could always just… forget about them.”
“Huh?”
“Well, I mean, the point of NASA was to go to the Moon, right?”
“Are you quoting that man?”
“No, sir! No! I just was trying to point out that, well, NASA was created to do one thing, right?”
“Yeah – show them Commies that they’re not so smart, beat ‘em to the Moon. So?”
“Well, sir – they did. Didn’t they? So, now, they don’t really have, well, anything to do… See?”
The President was quiet for a moment, then let out a hoot of hilarity. “Why, sonny, so they don’t! Aren’t you the clever little fellow! What a good point! You’re right. They just did too good a job, didn’t they? Thank heavens that man got himself snuffed by the Mob before he could tell ‘em what to do next. Never hack off the Italians, gentlemen.
“Anyway, that’s brilliant. All we have to do is avoid giving them any new work, and not much new by way of budgets, and that will be that!”
“You mean you’ll cut their budget, sir?” One staffer, newer and less clever than the rest, was still struggling.
“Oh, hell no! Congress would never stand for that. But we just don’t tell ‘em what to do, and we slowly whittle away their funding, since there’s nothing that they’re ‘sposed to be doing. And eventually, one of two things will happen.”
“Sir?”
“Either they’ll all get bored and find something else to do – go cut up frogs someplace else, I guess – or they’ll be taken over by those annoying civil servants who have no skills, do nothing but hold meetings all day, and are about as useful as warm spit on a summer’s day, but – because they’re government workers, you can’t get rid of them. Either way, it’s not my problem, or my fault. Young man, I see a sunny future before you. And in fact, I think I may soon be looking for a new NASA administrator. Would you be interested?”
…Now there’s no actual evidence that this is what happened, but there is a suspicious blank spot of just the right length on one of the Nixon tapes. You’ve lived through the last 30 years; you’ve seen what’s happened; you draw your own conclusion!
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About the author:
Kira Bacal is a physician and scientist who has worked at NASA and the US Senate, among other odd and wonderful places. She currently lives among towering trees in New Zealand with her two children and a vandalism-prone Leonberger.