The Speaker's Word: The Past Isn't Dead. It isn't Even Past.

Day 4,122, 18:57 • Published in USA USA • by Paul Proteus
"There is no civility, only politics." -Senator Palpatine

Always relevant Mood Music

Welcome to THE SPEAKER'S WORD: The Official Journal of the eUSA Congress.
Dateline: Monday, March 4th, 2019 (Day 4122)
Location: 135th eUS Congress
Editor: Paul Proteus, Speaker of the House and Avid Gardener

Relevant thread.

Welcome to the latest edition of the Speaker's Word. Today, the Speaker's Word is being guest published in Goodbye Blue Monday, due to esteemed editor Paul Proteus having lost the keys to the Congressional press room. Also its in the basement, and there are spiders, reports say.


Finally, some color. Objectivity is dead anyway

First,

Meet your Congressional Leadership Team for the Month of March:

Speaker of the House: Paul Proteus

Paul Proteus is a former citizen of note who, in recent years, has been dead. However, through a particularly egregious clerical error, his corpse ended up on the Federalist congressional ticket this month. His qualifications for the post include only having been censured once, having done basically everything else at varying levels of competence, and writing that one article about how Congress should blacklist everyone in 2015.

Deputy Speaker of the Horse: Derphoof

Derphoof is a literal pony. He is also vengeful. Surprisingly so. Insiders indicate Derphoof was chosen for his role due to his abilities as an enforcer. His role is to make sure Congress critters fall into line and silence dissent while allowing the Speaker to maintain a facade of impartiality. Derphoof is also charged with investigating the recent spike in budgeting for carrots and hay that have perturbed Congressional oversight in recent months starting during his own speakership.

Deputy Speaker of the House: Evry

Evry will provide actual knowledge of the code and will write in depth weekly reports for Paul Proteus to ignore on the state of the Congress. He will also be charged with handling all public relations as revenge for that one time Evry made Paul write a Speaker's Word in 2013.

Deputy Speaker of the House: You?

This list is obviously fluid and will be updated regularly. If you’re interested in learning how the meat is made and herding a few cats in the process, shoot me a PM!

Unwitting Congressional Librarian: Cromstar

Cromstar is a librarian of souls, serving only the dead and dead-at-heart. Don't stare if he crumbles in front of you. It is natural. After thousands of years under the harsh Earth sun, Cromstar is in the process of rapidly returning to dust. He's very self conscious about it.

Campaign Promises

In running for speaker I made many promises. Now that I have been delivered overwhelming support, I have to admit, while I promised the world, there is only so much I can do. I am after all, one digital representation of a person. Still, I stand before you and promise to do all that I can do to deliver. We will go line by line through what I promised to do as Speaker.

1) Post a picture, potentially of cereal:


This image constitutes 90% of Paul Proteus' qualifications for this position

2) Carefully read the Code:

Surely you weren't serious? You were? Well, I control F'd speaker, and then I got bored. So, as per my current interpretation, I can and will do whatever I want. As is the motto of the clearly relevant to people besides Derp and myself Broforce MU, #noplansnorules. If you have any problems with this, send all complaints and impeachment attempts to my corporate office in Poughkeepsie, NY

3) Exist

I'm working on it, okay?

I think that's all I actually promised. Moving on before I remember anything else,

Congress Thus Far

This is what you are all here for. A glimpse behind the curtain into the nefarious and high stakes world of political theater. It is my duty as your incoming Speaker to keep you all in the loop to all secretive backroom dealings, no matter the costs nor danger to my safety. So without further ado:

- Some people were censured for rogue proposals. Maybe other things. I think one of the censures was automatic. Idk, kongress gonna kongress.

- Known miscreant Paul Proteus was nominated Speaker by acclamation, except the two people who nominated someone else. Derphoof will be meeting with them to discuss their futures with the organization shortly.

- A member of Congress made known to the body his impatience in being given access to the Congressional dining hall

- ...

Leading us to our next section

Democracy: What is it?

Let's be serious for a moment. Or as serious as we can be in this format. This game is in its death throes. It has been for years, but something is different this time. Let's put it this way, I spent over 3 years of my life ensuring that my party had some hand in who the speaker was. That was a legitimate hobby of mine. Time I could've spent, I don't know, painting? But it was our collective efforts sinking countless hours of our time into this void, even as our ranks thinned, that made it fun. Worthwhile...almost. We used to be sincerely invested even if we pretended not to be. And now?

It's not that we're going down on a sinking ship. The ship sank ages ago. That's fine. We're at the bottom of the ocean now, but it seems we're going through the same motions we did when we had a ship. And honestly, I'm happy to oblige. I'm enjoying being back even if briefly. Dusting off this paper once a year, and engaging with all of you on discord and on the forums is as rewarding as always. But it's a reward that comes with the knowledge that we're further along than we ever expected this experiment to last. And we should play armed with that knowledge. if there's anything you want Congress to do, seriously, now is the time to do it.

So, let's get to the point. If you think the Speaker can be utilized at all to do anything fun, let me know. I am, all ears. Comment, shout, PM me. Say anything. I cannot pretend I have returned to do anything beyond, well, be here and share a few more moments with you. I can't make this game meaningful when it is not. But maybe we can create a few more memories before we all wake up from our collective delusion and sign off for the last time. Until then, while we still are mired in the nostalgia, I can only say, there's no point to institutions if we're not using them for our own purpose. I guess what I'm saying, is if one day the fun thing to do is burning everything to the ground, I will never stand in the way. And if the fun thing is to shoot the shit while we censure people and approve SCI expenditures from now until the lights shut off, or one of the never-ending PTOs finally ends things for us, well, I'm happy to be a part of that too. The important thing is we're playing together.

And on that cheery note, I leave you. I await further developments to report.


Yours,
in Congress,
in Life,
in Death,

Speaker of the House, Paul Proteus

As an aside, I forgot how long it takes me to find the appropriately angsty images for articles. Also it's been so long since I've written anything that isn't in LaTeX. It's weird. That's all I'm saying.