A poster goes up on the bulletin board, along with a few rather benign enchantments to protect it from tampering. It is typed, not hand-written, and features the grinning visage of the green-skinned businessman, giving the whole thing the look of a newspaper column. It is entitled "Whose Legislature?" and reads as follows:
Hello once again, ladies and gentlemen of RhyDin! I never expected I would be writing you so soon, but an irresistible audience factored in with idiots holding rubber stamps leaves me no choice.
The last time I wrote to all of you, I hoped to advise you about the very real dangers of centralized government here in RhyDin. I hoped that Governor Simon would allow us to keep on reaping the benefits of laissez-faire that brings so many jobs to our fair city, and by and large, he has done excellent work keeping his fingers out of our pies. Merchant vessels come and go by sea and space, without any real trouble from whatever you choose to call "the powers that be," and RhyDin continues to be a hub for foreign goods and capital that make our wealth and opportunities possible, whether you are a craftsman, businessman, bartender or dockworker. Alas...
A specter is haunting our city - the specter of regulation.
I know many of you have already read all about the so-called Proposition 37, from the so-called House and Senate, that will use its so-called authority to make certain that those of us who might be seen by their committees as "magical" sign our names and how we would like to exercise our natural abilities to a piece of paper; then, they claim they will decide which abilities we get to use, how and when, and what punishments are best for those who fail to sign their names to that piece of paper or use any of their natural abilities outside of the proscribed guidelines.
What punishments will they be? Ten lashes for a gnome enchanting an alarm clock so it never needs winding? Thirty for a shapeshifter who changes her face to escape a pack of Makos? A hanging for the boy who turns invisible to nick an apple? I know for some of you these people may be frightening, but what scares me is being ruled by people I cannot remember ever voting for!
Do you remember the Great Senate Races of 2008, when Senator Blackhammer united the dwarfish and gnomish voters to beat a six-term incumbent, and Vice President Aurovea Luneshadow had to step down because of the embezzling scandal in the Federal Bureau of Non-Moneyed Collections? And do you remember when the House blocked the Senate bill that would have made Yule a federal holiday, with the addendum that only ships between fifty and five hundred tons, with no more than two hundred and no less than eighty passengers, could dock on weekends?
I don't either! The governor is a very recent addition to RhyDin's history. This is only the second administration we have lived under, and our first governor stepped down after only one term. Who did we vote for between the gubernatorial elections that I'm missing? Were the presidential and senatorial candidates on the back of the ballot? Were they printed with invisible ink? I knew I should have held mine up to the light before I signed it, and that roguish upstart Blackhammer might not be in office right now!
The point is that, whether or not you agree with Proposition 37, the men and women who wrote it do not have the consent of the governed. They are not the rulers of RhyDin; no one is. Without their enforcers, they are an overly structured body of political essayists who hope people will think they have to obey whatever they put on paper. With their enforcers, they are warlords and thugs who plan to drag those of us who do not conform to their standards out of our homes and punish us however they see fit. If Proposition 37 succeeds and their authority succeeds, do not believe for one moment that will be the last law they write.
Suppose they decide that unregulated elves, or humans, or nasty creatures with green skin are an awful menace to society! Then you will have to sign a piece of paper reassuring them that you will not be uppity with your pointy (or round, alternately) ears, or green skin, or you'll have to submit to thirty lashings from the United Federated Progressive Subcommittee of Progressive-Aligned Neoconservative Legislators. Frankly, if someone is lashing me, I'd prefer to curse or praise their name in one breath instead of seven.
So whose legislature is this? No one, except the legislators'. They all seem to take their authority very seriously, so I suppose if they have any bills, edicts, propositions or bylaws, the Senate and House will have to obey them, but none of the rest of you have to. If they come to your door telling you that you owe them taxes and must give them all of your gold or two of your pigs, send them away. If they come into your yard and say that you cannot have a tomato garden on the southern side of a street, spray them with a garden hose (if you don't have one, turn your watering can over their heads). If any of these silly men come back with enforcers, call for the Watch or whatever local volunteer force might protect you, and remember that you have every right to defend your household and the people in it.
And if you find one of those legislative foxes in your hen house late at night, tagging all the chickens and adding their serial numbers to a ledger? Rub egg in their faces. Please.
It's been fun, RhyDin! Until next time,
XOXO,
Dib Jaster Aurene
Deputy Executive Officer
DeMuer Exports
Hello once again, ladies and gentlemen of RhyDin! I never expected I would be writing you so soon, but an irresistible audience factored in with idiots holding rubber stamps leaves me no choice.
The last time I wrote to all of you, I hoped to advise you about the very real dangers of centralized government here in RhyDin. I hoped that Governor Simon would allow us to keep on reaping the benefits of laissez-faire that brings so many jobs to our fair city, and by and large, he has done excellent work keeping his fingers out of our pies. Merchant vessels come and go by sea and space, without any real trouble from whatever you choose to call "the powers that be," and RhyDin continues to be a hub for foreign goods and capital that make our wealth and opportunities possible, whether you are a craftsman, businessman, bartender or dockworker. Alas...
A specter is haunting our city - the specter of regulation.
I know many of you have already read all about the so-called Proposition 37, from the so-called House and Senate, that will use its so-called authority to make certain that those of us who might be seen by their committees as "magical" sign our names and how we would like to exercise our natural abilities to a piece of paper; then, they claim they will decide which abilities we get to use, how and when, and what punishments are best for those who fail to sign their names to that piece of paper or use any of their natural abilities outside of the proscribed guidelines.
What punishments will they be? Ten lashes for a gnome enchanting an alarm clock so it never needs winding? Thirty for a shapeshifter who changes her face to escape a pack of Makos? A hanging for the boy who turns invisible to nick an apple? I know for some of you these people may be frightening, but what scares me is being ruled by people I cannot remember ever voting for!
Do you remember the Great Senate Races of 2008, when Senator Blackhammer united the dwarfish and gnomish voters to beat a six-term incumbent, and Vice President Aurovea Luneshadow had to step down because of the embezzling scandal in the Federal Bureau of Non-Moneyed Collections? And do you remember when the House blocked the Senate bill that would have made Yule a federal holiday, with the addendum that only ships between fifty and five hundred tons, with no more than two hundred and no less than eighty passengers, could dock on weekends?
I don't either! The governor is a very recent addition to RhyDin's history. This is only the second administration we have lived under, and our first governor stepped down after only one term. Who did we vote for between the gubernatorial elections that I'm missing? Were the presidential and senatorial candidates on the back of the ballot? Were they printed with invisible ink? I knew I should have held mine up to the light before I signed it, and that roguish upstart Blackhammer might not be in office right now!
The point is that, whether or not you agree with Proposition 37, the men and women who wrote it do not have the consent of the governed. They are not the rulers of RhyDin; no one is. Without their enforcers, they are an overly structured body of political essayists who hope people will think they have to obey whatever they put on paper. With their enforcers, they are warlords and thugs who plan to drag those of us who do not conform to their standards out of our homes and punish us however they see fit. If Proposition 37 succeeds and their authority succeeds, do not believe for one moment that will be the last law they write.
Suppose they decide that unregulated elves, or humans, or nasty creatures with green skin are an awful menace to society! Then you will have to sign a piece of paper reassuring them that you will not be uppity with your pointy (or round, alternately) ears, or green skin, or you'll have to submit to thirty lashings from the United Federated Progressive Subcommittee of Progressive-Aligned Neoconservative Legislators. Frankly, if someone is lashing me, I'd prefer to curse or praise their name in one breath instead of seven.
So whose legislature is this? No one, except the legislators'. They all seem to take their authority very seriously, so I suppose if they have any bills, edicts, propositions or bylaws, the Senate and House will have to obey them, but none of the rest of you have to. If they come to your door telling you that you owe them taxes and must give them all of your gold or two of your pigs, send them away. If they come into your yard and say that you cannot have a tomato garden on the southern side of a street, spray them with a garden hose (if you don't have one, turn your watering can over their heads). If any of these silly men come back with enforcers, call for the Watch or whatever local volunteer force might protect you, and remember that you have every right to defend your household and the people in it.
And if you find one of those legislative foxes in your hen house late at night, tagging all the chickens and adding their serial numbers to a ledger? Rub egg in their faces. Please.
It's been fun, RhyDin! Until next time,
XOXO,
Dib Jaster Aurene
Deputy Executive Officer
DeMuer Exports