A state of disobedience

Presidential Limousine, Atlantic Avenue,

Virginia Beach, Virginia

Her feelings were all spilled out, from her speech to the convention, leaving the President to feel little but emptiness inside. Even the thought of going to her own, formal, political seppuku did not move her. For Wilhelmina Rottemeyer's impending press conference was for no other purpose than to announce her resignation from the office of President of the United States.

Though her body felt empty, her mind was full, full of thoughts and questions and wonderings. What went wrong? How did it all go so wrong, so quickly? I was at the top, the pinnacle. Not only at the top, but with more real power than anyone, even Roosevelt and Lincoln, had ever had.

Did I move too fast, as Carroll said once? Or did I move too slowly, as Vega insisted? One thing I know I did wrong; I underestimated that damned wetback from Texas. But who would have guessed that that little no-account, who wasn't even independent enough to keep her own name when she married, would have had the will to move her state almost to independence? Breaking me in the bargain.

Should I have left that old priest alone? Left the anti-abortion nuts alone? How could I? I had a constituency, not the least important part of it, my own federal law enforcement chiefs. How much hold over them would I have lost if I had caved in on the priest? Too much, I think.

And I had plans, I had dreams, for this country and for the world. Sure I was ambitious for myself, but who ever got anything worthwhile done that wasn't ambitious? I saw a world at peace, because why should anyone fight when everyone has enough? I saw a world where the environment was protected and cherished. I saw a world where everyone was equal . . . well, maybe women a little more equal than men. What was so wrong with that?

I wish sometimes that there really were a God so that I could ask him what I should have done.

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