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President of the United States AU
Jun. 27th, 2014 03:47 pmFollowing two disappointing Democratic terms in the Oval Office, Julian Arenas rose as a Latino candidate, moderate, fiscally Republican, socially liberal. More or less, he was a Republican trying to get the Democratic vote.
It could have fallen flat on its face. In fact, that was what he expected it to do. Instead, the simple-spoken charisma caught on. He reached across racial boundaries, and broke the liberal coalition that had been wearing away at the mostly-white, mostly-male Republican party. He especially seized the fastest-growing demographic in the country, Latinos. A very controlled, efficient campaign left him without major gaffes to cope with, and also left him quick to take advantage of gaffes from the other side. Somehow managing to straddle the line between parties, taking the moderate vote, he was immune to the shots at other Republican House and Senate candidates in the same election, while benefiting from the mistakes made by Democrats.
It helped, of course, that he had a beautiful wife, a First Lady who was herself a veteran with a stunning service record.
It was what was behind the scenes that was really interesting.
They loved each other. (You could see it in their eyes, whenever he danced with her, whenever he kissed her cheek.) But they hated each other, too. She was one of the few people in the world who'd found some version of superpowers, and what she wanted to do, more than anything, was what was right. And Julian, satisfied that there was going to be someone pulling hard the other way, gently steered the world towards wrong. He wouldn't mind if America collapsed like a house of cards. In fact, it would be really, really... interesting.
It could have fallen flat on its face. In fact, that was what he expected it to do. Instead, the simple-spoken charisma caught on. He reached across racial boundaries, and broke the liberal coalition that had been wearing away at the mostly-white, mostly-male Republican party. He especially seized the fastest-growing demographic in the country, Latinos. A very controlled, efficient campaign left him without major gaffes to cope with, and also left him quick to take advantage of gaffes from the other side. Somehow managing to straddle the line between parties, taking the moderate vote, he was immune to the shots at other Republican House and Senate candidates in the same election, while benefiting from the mistakes made by Democrats.
It helped, of course, that he had a beautiful wife, a First Lady who was herself a veteran with a stunning service record.
It was what was behind the scenes that was really interesting.
They loved each other. (You could see it in their eyes, whenever he danced with her, whenever he kissed her cheek.) But they hated each other, too. She was one of the few people in the world who'd found some version of superpowers, and what she wanted to do, more than anything, was what was right. And Julian, satisfied that there was going to be someone pulling hard the other way, gently steered the world towards wrong. He wouldn't mind if America collapsed like a house of cards. In fact, it would be really, really... interesting.