As in so much of society today, Gooberville suffered a breakdown in civil discourse. The Gooberville City Council meetings grew longer in length as citizen and politicians took to calling each other doodyheads and such things, getting into personal, vindictive arguments, rather than attempting to debate issues in a civil manner.

The Mayor asked the City Attorney to draft an ordinance to force people to behave in a civil manner. The City Attorney said, “Let me think about this. I will let you know soon.”

As they entered Gooberville City Hall the night of the next Council meeting, the Mayor told the Attorney that he had not heard from the Attorney as promised. “Ah, I think you will find tonight that the matter will be resolved without need for a new ordinance.”

Once again, it was time for the Mayor of Gooberville to give his annual State of the Goobers address. Seeing it had not been a particularly good year, what with Gooberville leading the nation in foreclosures thanks to a building rampage the city was on the previous decade, the remaining Goobers who had not returned to the big city were curious what the Mayor might say.

The crowd was shocked when the Mayor entered on a wheel chair, his legs in heavy braces, a small dog in his lap, a set of pince-nez glasses on his nose and cigarette holder complete with cigarette in his mouth. He waved as his assistant wheeled him to the podium in front of the dais, instead of to his regular seat. He struggled to his feet to address the crowd, still murmuring, wondering what might be wrong with the Mayor.

“Why aren’t you at Little League practice?” Dad asked Junior, when Dad walked in the door from work.

“It was called off, because we don’t have anywhere to practice at.” Junior turned back to his video game.

“What do you mean you don’t have anywhere to practice?” he demanded. Junior was concentrating on stealing a car and killing people on the TV screen and didn’t hear his father. “Hey! I said ‘what d o you mean you don’t have anywhere to practice?’”

Junior rolled his eyes and paused the game. “I mean the coach called and said there are no parks open. In fact he said I should thank you for that.”

The citizenry of Gooberville were up in arms again with their school board. This was often the case. Goobers were rarely happy with their school board members.

For years, Gooberville grew at a phenomenal rate. Due to a state law, the schools were not allowed to be considered as part of the equation when approving more development. The Gooberville School District filled with kids it had no place for. The schools became overcrowded. The citizens became angry that their children attended schools that were so crowded, students were using desks on a timeshare basis, half the class standing, while the other half sat. A bell would ring, and they all switched places.

Mr. White sat uneasily in the chair as the interview began. It had been a while since his last foray into the job market. He was uneasy about this whole process.

“At a time when we are letting people go, I was told to talk to you about a possibility of bringing you on board. I’m not exactly sure why,” said Mr. Broadend, as he leaned his large executive chair back and studied Mr. White.

“Let’s face it, sir. Your company is in trouble. Mammoth Automobiles has been in deep doo-doo for a while. All of Detroit is in trouble. You’re going hat-in-hand to the government to get bailed out, aren’t you?” Mr. White began. “I can help you. I have ideas.”

The Mayor liked big projects. The People saw that the Mayor was doing something when they saw big projects. It meant he cared about the People, all these big projects. However, big projects meant big money. The Mayor didn’t always have big money for his big projects.

Developer Dan liked big projects, also. But Developer Dan’s big projects were not of the same nature as The Mayor’s. Developer Dan liked to build houses. Lots of houses. Lots of inexpensive houses. He had already built a lot of houses, which made Dan a happy man. Oh, and dare I say? It made Dan a fairly wealthy man.

Dan ran into a problem one day. Building lots of houses requires land. Lots of land. Lots as in parcels and lots as in a large number. Dan had lots of lots, but Dan’s lots of lots were not next to the city. There were some inconvenient farms in between Dan’s lots of lots and the city. They were inconvenient, because Farmers Joe and Bill did not make money from building houses. They made their money by farming. Dan hated farming. He had tried it, but found building lots of houses more rewarding.

I admit that, at first, I didn’t get it. One of the presidential candidates had supporters holding up signs that read “Country First.” What the heck did that have to do with anything? So, I’m on the phone with my Dad and I mention it.

“Don’t keep up on the news, do ya?” Dad asked. I thought I did, I told him. “Not good enough, ‘parently. You’d know that ‘Country First’ is the result of all them Hollywood rock ‘n roll types that ain’t lettin’ ‘em use their songs. They wanted to use that 'Barracuda' song, but them gals that done it didn’t want them usin’ it.”

Bob called all the Boneheads together for a family meeting. “Good news!” he declared. “We are getting a pool!”

All eight children cheered. It was all about the children, after all. Bonnie, Bob’s wife, had been after him to find a way to keep the children home, especially the teens. It would keep them out of trouble and out of gangs.

This was especially brought home after Bob had to go shopping for a shotgun. Their oldest daughter, Bella, a senior in high school, became pregnant. She had apparently failed the only lesson in her abstinence-only sex education class and the Boneheads would be grandparents soon. Bubba, the star football player at the high school, had also failed that single lesson and would be joining the Bonehead family soon, if Bob and his newly acquired shotgun had anything to say about the matter. Bob and Bonnie firmly believed that marriage should be defined as the traditional union of an unwilling boy and unwilling girl.

Bob Bonehead went to sleep listening to talk radio and after eating a bit too much pepperoni pizza. The issue on talk radio, as he drifted off, was on the horrors of the elite in charge of America. Problems needed to be solved by people more in tune with the common folk. We need leaders that we can sit and have a beer with, not elitists with fancy degrees.

Bob felt a pain in the side. He went to the doctor. His regular doctor, Dr. Smith, wasn’t in. A new doctor was covering. “Dude, what’s the prob?” asked the new doctor, who wore a Hawaiian shirt with what looked like pizza stains on it..

Having fallen through the looking glass, I found myself in the council chambers for a small community. “You cannot recuse yourself from this vote!” cried one councilman from the dais.

“Why not?” shouted another.

“You are here to vote, so you must vote!”

“But I am told to vote would be a conflict of interest. I am told by my lawyer to recuse to avoid a conflict.”

“Pishaw. What do lawyers know of the law? It is your duty to vote. You were elected to vote. You cannot leave while the rest of us vote and show ourselves to be the leading candidates for village idiot. No one will know where you stand on the list of village idiot candidates.”