Joe Quimby straightened is tie again. He could hear the crowd from backstage, already excited from hearing his VP candidate speak, but that was just a warm up for the main event. This was Quimby’s chance to truly make something of himself. He’d dreamed of becoming president, ever since he was a little boy. He’d served his time, going to college, then law school, making the right contacts, greasing the right palms. Becoming mayor of Seattle had been a major step, as had becoming governor of the state a few years later.
Now he was running on an iron strong platform of anti-fluffy legislation, but that wasn’t the way to stir up the crowd. Quimby knew that most people voted with their gut, and the way to get their vote was to appeal to their base instincts. Fluffies fulfilled that role admirably. Ever since he’d won re-election with the Fluffies Save Baby headlines seven years ago, he’d known they were the key to victory. There was something about fluffies that pulled on people’s heart-strings, making them either love or hate the creatures. There was no in-between.
Since he’d become state governor, he’d flipped his position to an anti-fluffy stance. His liberal hugbox electorate hated him for it, but he wasn’t seeking the governorship again, and his anti-fluff proposals were massively popular, especially in rural areas plagued by ferals eating crops. In Ohio, his approval ratings were close to ninety percent. The hugbox candidates running against him simply didn’t stand a chance.
“Thirty seconds Mr Governor,” one of his aides told him. Quimby straightened his tie again, and slowly started walking on to the stage.
The bright lights were hot and dazzling, and the audience roared in appreciation as he strolled on to the stage, raising his hand to wave and flashing the smile he had spent years practicing in the mirror as a teenager. He stopped to take in the view and wave some more, thanking the audience for coming to hear him speak. These people were his core supporters, and peppered throughout the crowd he saw banners and signs saying “Quimby for President 2032” and “Down with Fluffies!”
“Thank you, thank you,” he said, waiting for the audience to calm down and listen, “thank you.”
The audience carried on cheering.
“Thank you… thanks. Thanks folks,” he repeated. Would these idiots ever shut up and listen?
“Thanks folks. Wow…” he waited for the last morons to shut up and settle down, “New Hampshire really knows how to hold a convention.”
“YES!” roared the crowd.
“That’s what I love about this state. You’re good people here. Good people. And I’d love to come back here and celebrate with you when I become president.”
The crowd erupted again.
“Ever since… ever since I won the primary here, I knew I’d be the candidate. Like I say, I’d love to celebrate, but we’ve got serious business to discuss.”
The crowd settled a little, eager to hear what he would say.
“Since the invention of fluffies, some 8 years ago, we have seen chaos, destruction. A whole city destroyed. Fire and flooding, like something from the book of Revelation. After Cleveland fell, we saw mega herds fleeing, heading into Pittsburg, Detroit, Columbus… wherever they could find some food. We saw herds heading out west, like a biblical plague, eating crops… entire cornfields out in Iowa and Missouri. Good folks, seeing their livelihoods wiped out, overnight. And what did the president do?”
“NOTHING!” the crowd roared, just as they had in his last ten speeches.
“Hasbio… Hasbio said,” Quimby started, pausing for effect, “That Fluffies were the next big thing. That they’d bring billions into our economy, creating jobs. But it was a lie. It made a few corporate fat-cats rich, like Richard Moloch, or David Mordecai, but are they helping you? Are fluffies making you rich?”
“NO!” the crowd answered.
“And after Cleveland fell, do you know what the Canadians were doing? In Toronto and Montreal? They were opening shelters, feeding the fluffies. Feeding them, and turning away American refugees from Cleveland. Can you believe that? Well, its true, believe me.”
“ASSHOLES!” shouted a man in the front row.
“Haha,” agreed Quimby, “You tell them partner. I like to tell it like it is. Political correctness is ruining this country. Ruining it. You know, in Canada, four years ago, they even gave fluffies human rights. Can you believe it? It was the law, for a little while. Even today they still have animal rights. For toys. Animal rights for biotoys. And you know what President Supreme wants to do if he gets re-elected? He wants to give them animal rights too. Humane euthanization and all that crap.”
“ITS BULLSHIT!” said the same excited supporter, drawing a laugh from the crowd.
“It is, it is…” Quimby replied, but then there was an interruption.
“Fluffies need human rights!” some liberal hugbox retard was yelling, waving a banner and carrying a fluffy. She had a bunch of mixed race, trans-gendered freaks with her too, all carrying fluffies and yelling. The stupid hugboxers would never learn.
“Fluffies have human DNA! Human rights for fluffies!” they carried on yelling, as the crowd booed and shouted at them. Suddenly, the crowd turned on them, viciously attacking the protesters and their fluffies, burying them under a torrent of fists and feet. The phrase “sorry hoofies” wandered into Quimby’s mind.
“That’s right!” Quimby praised them, “You show those hugboxers what we think of their lies. Rough them up. I will pay your legal bills, I promise.”
Eventually security dragged the protestors away, bleeding profusely. At least one fluffy was dead, and another was missing its front two limbs, crying pathetically about its “weggies”.
“Don’t believe the lies in the media folks. The UN might say that fluffies have got human DNA, but we all know its a hoax. Just like global warming. You remember that one? We’ve been having the harshest winters in fifty years…” Quimby knew he was going off track. Voters in Florida and gulf states wouldn’t like this line of reasoning, what with the Hurricanes becoming worse every year. It was best to get back to the fluffies and appeal to the northern voters.
“So they say fluffies have human DNA, but I say they are LIARS. Those scientists will say anything just to keep their jobs. We all know fluffies aren’t human. They don’t deserve human rights, or even animal rights. They only deserve destruction.”
The crowd went nuts again, cheering and chanting his name.
Quimby then moved into the next phase of his convention speech. The formula was simple. Primacy and recency effects meant that people tended to remember the first and last things you said, and glossed over the crap in the middle. It was the basis of the “shit sandwich” of compliment-criticism-compliment, and it worked great in electoral campaigning. Quimby would talk about Fluffies-Economy-Fluffies, and the rest of it would fall into place.
He talked a bit about jobs, China, the UN, the EU, and free trade deals. He talked about bringing jobs and factories back to America. He talked about the ongoing war in Iran, and bringing troops home. He talked about the Chinese military bases and nuke sites, and standing strong with his allies. He even mentioned Israel, to keep the lobbyists in line. Then he went back to fluffies.
“So anyway, up here in New Hampshire, you get harsh winters right? But what happens before then, in the fall?”
“FLUFFIES!” the crowd yelled back.
“That’s right. The feral herds have learned to migrate south for the winter, to avoid the Canadian snows. Every fall they descend on us like a plague of locusts, eating crops, raiding people’s homes, shitting everywhere. And the shit, I don’t have to tell you about the shit… its horrendous.”
The crowd muttered in agreement.
“And let me tell you, these Canadians, they aren’t sending their best fluffies… they’re ferals, and rapists… and some of them, I assume, are good fluffies.”
“And now, we’ve got this Snake Daddy character. An American no less, leading feral herds out of Vancouver, and down into our great country, so the Canadians don’t have to deal with them any more. An all because those hugbox freaks won’t kill them themselves. Do you know what he’s saying? He’s saying that any fluffy that dies in America will be reborn in Spaghetti land. Spaghetti land? Really? We all know where that leads. All of us. We’ve got laws about that phrase for a reason. And now he’s leading them here, like the pied piper, promising them the land of milk and honey. Well I WONT STAND FOR IT.”
Quimby looked up. This was the most important part of his speech. Taking a deep breath, he began.
“I would build a great wall, and nobody builds walls better than me, believe me, and I’ll build them very inexpensively, I will build a great, great wall on our northern border, to keep the fluffies out. And I will have Canada pay for that wall.”
“YES!” came a cry from the audience
“Mark my words,” Quimby added, looking serious, to emphasise the point. The audience responded with rapturous applause.
“Nobody is tougher on fluffies than Joe Quimby. Nobody.”
“I would immediately terminate President Supreme’s executive order on Fluffy termination. Immediately. The humane euthanisation law will be ended. Sure, you can still shoot fluffies, but in my book, if there are vermin in your yard, you can kill them any way you like. Stomp 'em, crush 'em, boil 'em, even plain old fashioned burning. Any way at all. These hugboxers are the one’s who’ve been running this country into the ground.”
The audience goes crazy for a little while, applauding, cheering, screaming and even starting a brief chant of USA! USA! USA! Quimby eventually held up his hands to quieten them down, before concluding his speech.
“If a fluffy knocks on your door in America, saying ‘Dis am smawty wand’? - STOMP. Be nyu daddah? - STOMP. Need nummies fow babbehs? - STOMP. Together, we will stamp out the feral fluffy menace, once and for all, and Make America Great Again!”
The crowd went insane. Chanting his name. Chanting USA repeatedly. Quimby knew he had the election in the bag.