'We are the party for all the people', said Kamala Harris, Democratic candidate for the presidency of the United States, smiling and looking down at Robert (Little Bob) Evans and then out at the large crowd gathered for her campaign speech. 'We take all comers, all those of alternate sex, lifestyle, disability and...' Here Kamala reached down to pat Little Bob on his back but managed only to tousle his hair...'stature'.
Bob Evans was a canny one, a smart one, a savvy one who knew how to feather his nest in an age of inclusivity, and sensed that this was his time - not his community's time, for little people would have to fend for themselves, but his time and his alone. He had waited years for this opportunity, but doors were shut at every turn.
There was the film producer in Hollywood who told him two was enough, meaning the two dwarves who had made it big on the silver screen. 'The days of R2D2 are over, bud'. the producer said. 'It's all AI now, and my Apple can generate a hundred of you before lunch'.
Or the Account Executive and Bailey & Peabody, Advertising, a firm known for its diversity and inclusivity. Bob had heard that they were working on a spoof of the infamous Bud Light transgender misadventure and were looking for the 'alternately gifted'. Again he was met at the door with a 'we already got one of those', and true enough on the sound stage behind the door was a dwarf Bob had met at Burning Man.
His installation was a paean to little people, although because of its retro-expressionism, the figures were lost in some metaphorical garble; but most who watched this little person managing grappling hooks and block-and-tackles to hoist a cast iron Quasimodo into position thought it was part of his performance and applauded as the figurine swung back and forth in the hot desert sun until affixed at the top of a mess of cylinders and rod baskets.
Little Bob waved to him, hoping to get a chance to chat, but the Account Executive slammed the door before he could get a response.
Still, there was hope. If Dirk Devin could get a job as an actor, albeit in some minor pitch for peanut butter or chewing gum, maybe there was room for him; but no dice The dance cards of even the most woke and inclusive enterprises were filled.
The fact was that small people were not top of the inclusivity agenda. Especially among liberal ranks every possible permutation of black people, gay men, and large women came before the 'height challenged', and whether public sector or private, inclusivity seemed to stop well above four feet.
When a friend suggested that the new Democratic nominee for President of the United States was looking to fill her campaign staff with little person, he said he would call the Vice President's diversity recruiter, a former dancer at 'Men And Boys' a gay club in New Orleans that featured farm scenes, drew crowds for the choreography and libretto, and was particularly well known for its off-color acrobatic dances
The contact was made, and thanks to the diversity recruiter who was anxious to fulfill the Vice President's promise of maximum inclusivity and because there had been no suitable candidates despite a tiring search, an interview was arranged
The diversity recruiter had gone down many blind alleys. Circus dwarves and midgets were being phased out thanks to a Barnum & Bailey initiative to review their appropriateness given changing community mores, and the only ones left were sixtyish men who had spent their whole lives riding the backs of trained bears and getting tossed through hoops by musclebound strongmen. They all snorted coke and were wired to the gills. 'An occupational hazard', one remarked.
'Think about it' The life of a circus dwarf was not exactly an easy one, so the snorting and freebasing was overlooked by management especially because a coked up dwarf performed particularly well.
The diversity recruiter thought he might have found a reasonable candidate in Hiram Blunt who was coming off the hard stuff and made more sense than most of his colleagues, but still could not string more than a couple of sentences together.
'A perfect match', said one conservative snoop who had gotten wind of the affair. The Presidential candidate never made much sense herself, parsing, exegeting, twisting and turning the English language into a gobbledygook mishmash; so while it might make good vaudeville, it would make for seriously bad politicking.
When Blunt was rejected, he sued the Harris campaign for discrimination, and despite many attempts at settlement and under-the-table payoffs, the dwarf stuck around until the price was right, pocketed his benefits and went back to the circus tent, coke, and his affair with Belinda Mayo, a small prostitute that doubled as a frilly ballerina in one of the producer's unlikely fantasies.
So the recruiter, once burned, was twice shy and was particularly careful in his search for the right candidate. When Little Bob turned up at campaign headquarters looking like Little Lord Fauntleroy in his cute blue serge suit, polished cordovans, and snappy tie, the recruiter was delighted.
The interview went extremely well. Bob was particularly well-spoken, temperate in his responses, cordial and respectful. 'This is the dwarf I have been looking for' and, pending an interview with the head honcho, he would recommend hiring.
After the interview with the Presidential candidate, Kamala remarked to the recruiter, 'I just love the little guy', and soon thereafter he was at the lectern. Asked to say a few words he mounted the lectern up a step ladder brought by an attendant, adjusted the microphone, gestured to the electrician to lower the lights, and began to read his prepared speech.
He had learned his political lesson, and prompted by the lady's aides to say little with as much emotion, passion, and conviction as possible, he began with the usual Ladies and Gentlemen, but then wandered in the weeds of dwarf culture with all the memes, homonyms, viral asides, midget lingo, and obscure references common in circuses and old time vaudeville. It was as good as it gets.
Kamala had familiarized herself with deep ghetto pimp talk and could pass as a ho' for a few minutes; and could do a few bitchy gay comebacks she had learned in the Castro, but this....this incredibly poetic, eloquent dwarf talk did the trick. She was now fully, absolutely inclusive.
'I am proud to stand here before you', Kamala went on, 'here in this great land plenty, and celebrate all its people'. Here according to the teleprompter, she was to point to her little friend; but he had moved, and given his diminutive size, no one had noticed that he was now on the other side of the lectern, so she pointed to air, smiled, and went on. 'Where is that bloody fool?' she whispered to an aide but there he was on the other, right side in a trick he had learned early on.
Anyway, she had squared the circle, completed her mission, filled her coterie with just the right balance of black and white, fat and thin, gay and straight, and tall and short. What she didn't understand was human nature and our hardwired competitive streak, and she never anticipated the bitching and moaning among the specialty groups she had assembled. 'Boys will be boys' was her smiling response, but it wasn't until the blacks had ousted the gays and fat girls took center stage after clawing and biting their way that peace reigned.
'Diversity is some hard time', Kamala said.
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