The Governor’s Day

“Well, Beyonce did it.”

It was 7 a.m. and the Governor defensively held the local newspaper in his hand. The headline screamed., “Governor Phil Bryant lip-syncs State of the State Address.”  The tall and thin governor propped his cowboy boots up on the desk. Carved on the the upper-right desk drawer were the words,  “Fordice was here.”  The Governor sure missed the former governor and political mentor.

“Dammit, what else was I supposed to do?!?  Giving a State of the State address is hard.”

The hissing opossums were really hissing now. Saturday Night Live’s Seth Myers had made the joke about Mississippi last week during the fake news. He said that the Legislature was nothing more than a barn-full of 39 hissing opossums.  The Governor knew Tate Reeves, Lt. Governor (and Opossum #1) was behind the leak about the lip-syncing. He had to have given it to the pesky reporter Geoff Pender (who had splashed it on the front page. )

“Does Opossum have an O?” The Governor’s aide asked as he was typing up the press release.

“Only in the Soviet Union,” the Governor said.

His aide stopped and then prayed he was joking.

“And besides, I thought I did a darn-tootin’ good job. I listed every new job that had been created last year and even mentioned JFK. I thought that would make all six of the liberals left in the state happy. But NOOOOO.” The Governor rolled his eyes defensively. “How’s the Charter School bill coming along.”

His aide checked his phone.  The Hissing Opossums in the House were hammering out the details.  “They are adding amendments as we speak.  Looks like we’ll get something this year. And if we don’t…”

The Governor interrupted, “Then we create a Charter Legislature and bypass the regular one.  A Charter Legislature can be run by private companies, take all the Legislature’s funding and cherry pick legislators I like.”

The affable governor laughed.  “But I don’t think I’ll be enrolling Rep. Steve Holland.”

The aide laughed and said seriously, “The Democrats have already come up with their own Charter Legislature anyway. Rep. Cecil Brown figured out a loophole in the rules. They just passed full-funding for education.”

The Governor looked out his window at the State Capitol and sighed.  “How’s the border fence coming along? Can we build one around the Democrats?”

His aide flipped through his files. “Louisiana is completely sealed off. Not even a nutria can get through it. And if it does, we’re planting land mines.  The nutria will pop like after Hurricane Isaac.”

The Governor smiled. “Good deal.  Can we get one built around Washington?  We have to keep that Obamacare stuff out of the state.”

The aide said, “The Insurance Commissioner smuggled in some Obamacare already with that Insurance Exchange.”

The Governor, showing visible signs of rage, poked pins in his Mike Chaney voodoo doll.

He then began pacing around his office.  “Are the opossums funding Mississippi Development Agency like they are supposed to?” It was the one time the Governor wished he had real power.

“No, sir.  MDA head Brent Christensen is having to sell cookies at the Pearl Walmart this weekend.”

“Daggummit!” the Governor cursed. He was so mad that a perfect coiffed gray hair nearly fell out of place. “I need to get on my radio station and do a telethon for MDA!”

“An MDA telethon is already being done. But if you do, you could lip-sync it,” his aide said helpfully.

The Governor glared menacingly at his assistant but then he smiled and said, “At least I don’t have an imaginary girlfriend.  What a moron. Deborah would kill me.”

“Yes sir,” the aide nodded.

The Governor knew he be farther up poop creek than Lance Armstrong if he made the First Lady mad.

The Governor looked down at the Department of Education and said, “The world has too many liberals. Maybe we need a border fence down there, too.”

His aide nodded and jotted on his to-do list “Fence around Dept. of Ed.”  The Governor smiled and stretched. It was time to start another day running the Great State of Mississippi.