Challenge #00792-B061: One Smoke-Filled Evening in a Dimly-Lit Room

Vetenari being a tidy soul, would have made certain that the mess he’d tidied up Stayed tidy.

Republican Secret Congress, the not-too-distant future…

“Okay, so the Thin Man is gone, and so is President Gunther. The question now is, how do we reverse the damage to America?”

“We can’t use the old arguments,” said one of the shadowy figures. “The Thin Man gave them dang Liberals all the ammo they’ll ever need!”

“And worse,” said another, “he came up with the easiest solutions to all the things we said were ruining America… and he made America the greatest country on this earth!”

“Not that it wasn’t before,” growled the apparent leader.

There was a generic murmur of “Oh yes"es and "greatest country bar none"s, but an anonymous listener could tell that their hearts weren’t in it.

"Thanks to the Thin Man, our power system is completely demolished,” said the leader. “We can no longer prey on the fears of our people because our great nation has faced those fears and come out smiling.”

“It ain’t fair,” grumbled another shadowy figure. “This one man turns up and just… fixes everything for everyone but us. How the hell are we going to get votes now?”

A young man tentatively raised a shaking hand. “We… could… do something… different?”

He was kicked out of the ever-dwindling Republican Party in short order. But the writing was on the wall. America loved the sensible solutions. The age of unreason was dead.

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