“The 2012 presidential election campaign is well under way when Barack Obama succumbs to a sudden heart attack. Vice-President Biden is sworn in as President and the Democratic Party recalls its convention. Jesse Jackson makes a powerful speech proposing that the party adopt Michelle Obama as their candidate. What happens next?”

Get Chimurenga person, Manu Herbstein‘s President Michelle or Ten Days that Shook the World – A subversive political fantasy on Kindle at Amazon (download Kindle for PC free at Amazon’s Kindle web page).

On your fantasy, I can’t imagine that any major magazine editor would publish — at least I hope not. The idea of B. Obama’s being assassinated is too painful, too raw, too possible. There’s just no chance the political agenda you attribute to Michelle could be realized and no evidence that it would be her agenda. Kucinich is not popular. You can’t get any legislation through the Senate in 10 days unless it’s enormously popular, if then. Your political agenda just is not the US’s, no matter what its merits may be. And some aspects of it might well be ruled unconstitutional. So yes, it is a subversive fantasy! And it is shared by some here, but not many. – DP
A long time ago I took an oath never to write anything inoffensive. . . the single characteristic that most makes a difference in the success of an article . . . is the author’s courage in revealing normally unspoken things about . . . his society. It takes guts to be a writer . . . What makes writing at its best interesting is the writer’s willingness to broach the unspeakable . . . the best writers, those whose originality shines, tend to be those who are most outspoken. – Sol Stein, Stein on Writing, Guts: The Decisive Ingredient

Sent: Monday, July 19, 2010 9:45 PM
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Some quotes:
“What I am tentatively staking out here today,” she said, “is a case for leadership, for American leadership. But leadership of a different kind, leadership based not on economic and military power. No. Not that. Not that. I ask, with all humility, that my leadership be judged and that this country’s leadership be judged, from this day on, on moral grounds.”
The Act to Restore Democracy to the United States of America . . . would make it an offence for any candidate for public office to accept gifts or loans in support of his or her election campaign; or, indeed, to use personal wealth for such a purpose. Congress would allocate funds to an Independent Electoral Authority and this Authority would in turn fund the electoral campaigns of all candidates qualified to stand for office. . . At a stroke, this law would level the electoral playing field. For the first time in generations the wealthy would have little or no advantage over the poor in the competition for office. She expected new talents to emerge which would enrich and invigorate American political life. New parties might enter the political arena, breaking the monopoly presently shared by Republicans and Democrats and breathing new life into American democracy. . .
“In the first year of my Presidency I shall close down, that is, disarm and evacuate, all our military bases abroad; and hand them over either to the host country, or, if the hosts agree, to the United Nations. All our warships will return to their home ports, tasked with patrolling our own shores, not those of other nations . . .”
She characterized the Middle East, Israel and occupied Palestine, as a “festering wound that has infected the body politic of much of our world.” The so-called “two state solution,” she said, was clearly no solution to anything and would no longer receive American support. “In its stead,” she said, “I propose to use all the means at my disposal to persuade the parties to negotiate, in a broadly representative national convention, the constitution of a single secular state within the pre-1948 boundaries of Palestine, a constitution that will guarantee full protection for both individual human rights and for the rights of all religious communities.”