The Golden State

“Hi everyone,” the Cunt says, looking around the room like a beauty queen, flicking her braid from her front to her back. Her skin is flawless ivory. “I know a lot of you in the room already, and I’m so honored for this opportunity to address the Board of Supervisors. I’ve been working with the North State counties now for, let’s see, my whole life.” She laughs. “Five generations of my family have ranched and lived off and enjoyed and stewarded the land,” she says. She looks like she would be cool to the touch, with languid veins peeking through thin skin. “I don’t need to tell you all that the state of California has lost touch, and that the Federal Government is imposing policies on us that are actively harmful to our way of life. This is the same government that wants to tell you how to educate and take care of your children, who are your property.” I have never thought about Honey being my property, it’s such an odd way to put it. Do I feel like Honey is my property? I ask myself, and the answer comes back yes and no. The Cunt continues. “You want to talk specifics and facts and figures I’ll tell you that the Federal Government is currently in the process of taking away four good dams that are providing water for our agricultural lands in the North State by the border. These are good, clean, renewable energy dams, folks, and they’re replacing them to ‘steward Coho salmon’”—this with her long fingers forming air quotes—“that you can, this very day, buy in Whole Foods for eight ninety-five a pound. An allegedly endangered fish that the government needs to save by taking away the sources of water for families and farms. I know I’ve only got a little time here, but I want to encourage you all to watch one of my presentations on the UN Agenda 21, which is so tied up with the future of our state and our country. Not if, but when, these reforms take place, we are going to wish we took action, if we don’t take action now, while we can. And that means supporting that State of Jefferson.” She looks around again. Something is crackling in the room. “In conclusion I want to leave you with one of my favorite passages from the Bible” which, what the fuck happened to Church and State I wonder. “‘If my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and I will forgive their sin and will heal their land.’” I roll my eyes all the way back into my head. “This is our land, that we love, folks,” she says. “We’ve got to do what it takes to protect it. Thank you.” Mad applause and she waves at everyone and swishes her braid again and sits down with Cindy’s group, who put hands on her shoulders and she puts her hands on top of their hands and whispers things I can’t hear.

A last guy gets up, probably in his fifties, camouflage baseball hat, tucked-in polo shirt in a nice currant color. “I’m Larry Elkins,” he says, “and that’s a tough act to follow.” Everyone laughs. I wonder if there is anyone in this room who felt the crazy emanating off the Cunt besides me and apparently Cindy. This is California, I think, feeling a little hysterical. “I’ve got a quote that I wanted to read too, from our greatest president. And that’s President Lincoln. ‘You cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the strong. You cannot help the wage earner by pulling down the wage payer. You cannot further the brotherhood of man by encouraging class hatred… You cannot establish sound security on borrowed money…’” What a fucking pedant I think but the room collapses into whoops. Honey wakes with a cry and furiously struggles against the restraints keeping her in the stroller. The noise in the rotunda is tremendous. I bend to free her and put her on her feet, where she is immediately charmed by the novel sound of her small shoes slapping unctuously on the marble floor and starts running in ragged little circles.