Continuing the expeditions of Jeff MacNelly, James Kilpatrick, and Eugene McCarthy, with apologies.

The Ward Heeler

Long thought to be near extinction, this creature is more Cheshire Cat than dinosaur. Appearing in opportune times, the WH greases the skids for a myriad of political adventurers who are willing to place the traditional small tribute in one of the WH’s many pockets. The big handed WH boasts a vestigial memory of centuries of experiences  with political fixers, dirty tricksters, and obeisant sanitation workers. It uses its experience to get things done, mostly little things, but nonetheless important things, for the WH is the master of a very small universe. It is the WH that obtained the trash cans, the letters of recommendation, the no-show jobs that cemented the structure of fealty in the thousands of little feifdoms that make up a political organization. However, there are some signs that the  Ward Heeler’s realm may be getting bigger. International money launderers and internet bot factories have been seen of late to be merging their skills to affect WH-like results, on a global scale. The Ward Heeler may have disappeared again, but its Cheshire smile is visible all over the internet.

 

-Danny Grosso

Continuing the expeditions of Jeff MacNelly, James Kilpatrick, and Eugene McCarthy, with apologies.

The Parliamentarian

Part school marm scold, party wise old owl, the Parliamentarian has been gumming up the works in legislative bodies and smaller public meetings since such bodies and meetings began convening. Indeed, as soon as sets of rules were drawn up, their organic texts spawned the species of Parliamentarians to further and protect their legacies. Bounding out from the rule books, the Parliamentarians have an innate knowledge of parliamentary norms. Their sure sense of superiority makes them oblivious to criticism, which allows them to gladly suffer the barbs of hearing participants wishing to speed off to post-session cocktail parties. Soldiering on through eye rolls and grimaces, objections and outright threats, the Parliamentarian keeps its fidelity to the relevant rules of order and procedure.  Though despised by short cutters and unscrupulous committee chairs, the creature is a delight to late night caterers, who are often contracted to feed hearing staff working overtime due to protracted procedural protestations.

 

-Danny Grosso