Neat Little Rows

[Markus Wilding]

Time colors perspectives. This is true of most any society, institution, or individual person. Most go through life assuming that their view on a subject or event is objective, without bias, but the truth is that each person has a thousand biases that inform them of how to solve a problem, study a solution, or implement a strategy. These biases only grow stronger with time away from the problem, until the "obvious solution" is clear as day and anything else is disregarded as irrelevant, unworkable, or simply impossible.

For nearly two decades, the Socialist Republic Army had held to an agreement that was negotiated in early 1946. This agreement had been the result of rampant sectionalism that feared growing military influence would lead to a Soviet-style cult of personality and dictatorship, a fear that so far appeared to be unfounded. Though civilian leadership within the White House and Senate had so far kept the economy on the up, growing resentment within the Army and Navy began to come to a head. Men were becoming tired of serving their country and dying in wars for their own homeland only to return home maimed, wounded or just discharged from service only to find themselves forgotten about and abandoned. Something had to change, they resolved at veteran's clubs. The government had declared it would take care of the nation's WWII population that had come home, the men who fought to unify the states, but the pensions, resources, and assistance rendered was lacking.

Someone had to do something, and the solution they saw was now obvious. The civilians only saw the world through the lens of the mid-40s, when the German Flu ravaged the world and threatened to shatter them at every turn. Slowly, at first, retired officers and former enlisted men began to go into politics at a low level, joining council boards, winning mayoral elections, and generally involving themselves more deeply within the political structure of their homes. Most every male had been a soldier thanks to the SRA's two-year conscription laws, but few of them had gone to war themselves, and this perceived status as warrior elite earned votes. Before August even came, many men were now openly declaring intent to run for Senator and Congress, with their civilian counterparts left scrambling and wondering where they had gone wrong.

For Micheal Lee, former Socialist Republic Army master sergeant, there was only one election worth winning - that of President.