The other inauguration speech

By JOE BENNETT

Know this, America. We have nothing to fear but getting carried away with sonorous oratory.

For yea, verily, I say unto you who are watching this inauguration on televisions in the little village where my father was born, or on rather larger and more expensive televisions in the ornate clubhouse of a golf course in Dubai where the waiters are drawn from the poor countries of the world and the patrons from the rich ones, the waiters being dark of skin and slim of frame while the patrons are white of skin and generally speaking fat, I am come.

And what I bring unto you in my coming is my youth, my coffee-coloured skin, my transparent decency, my calm, my confidence, or at least the expression of my confidence, and my heritage of high-flown biblical diction.

And so it comes to pass that I have inherited an empire in decline, an empire with a shrinking gdp and a maxed-out credit card and bankers lobbing themselves from the windowsills of Manhattan, and you look to me to lead you through the valley of the shadow of death and across the desert of thorns and up the rugged Mountains of Difficulty until we shall behold from the summit the promised land of stable house prices and a thriving automotive industry, a promised land that looks remarkably similar to the one we inhabited only a year or two ago. People, I hear you.

I feel your yearning to be released from unwise and unwinnable wars against an indefinable enemy. I share your desire to return to pre-eminence among the peoples of the world and to have once again more money than anyone else and to be able to go on foreign holidays and photograph poor people being decorative without having to fear being bombed.

I am but one frail man. Cut me and I bleed. But I accept the mantle that you have thrust upon my shoulders, and I accept the crown that you have placed upon my head, and I do hereby vow to roll up my sleeves, mindful though I am that mantles generally do not come with sleeves, and go to work. And I ask of you only, my fellow Americans, that you too roll up your sleeves and go to work with me, though how you actually set about doing this if you've just lost your job I shall let pass for the moment, for this is an inaugural speech and is therefore long on sonorous metaphor but short on specifics.

E pluribus unum, my friends, out of many shall come one. Out of many candidates for the presidency has come one president. And out of that one president have come many allusions, allusions to John F Kennedy, to Martin L King and to The H Bible. And out of the many words that have been spoken about this president, and the many votes that have been cast for him, and the many many dollars that have been flung at him, has come one clear and present danger.

That danger is an emotional condition that has begun to sweep the globe, from the plains of Africa where my father was born, to the golf clubs of Dubai where he wasn't, but where, incidentally, I am amused to learn, there was a raucous cheer as my no-good predecessor climbed aboard a chopper and disappeared from public view for good and ever.

I am aware that right now in this speech I am exploiting that emotional condition just a teensy weensy bit because it is a potent force, but I am also aware of its absurdity and its danger. It is an emotional condition that the human beast has always been vulnerable to and it has probably done more harm and killed more people and enslaved more people than any other.

I am afraid, my friends, that you have begun to see me as the messiah.

For though the parallel is inexplicit and I shall make damn sure I keep it that way, it is most certainly implicit and active. I come from outsider stock. I rose from nothing to the throne.

I bring a message of hope and revival. I have vowed to scourge the greedy and succour the poor in spirit. I shall uplift the little errand boy and I shall spank the bankers. I bring hope of a new way and a new dawn. I am come unto you in your hour of need when the ice caps are melting and the Chinese have got our money and the bailiffs are at the door and the realtors weep and the recreational vehicles stand forlorn on the sales yard and the ghouls cackle at our backs, and I bring tidings of great joy.

Beware, my friends and fellow Americans. Beware belief. Belief can move mountains. But it tends to put them back down in the wrong place.

- © Fairfax NZ News