Disclaimer. The political and religious views of the author hinted at in this story are his and his alone, and do not necessarily reflect the views of the host of this website. This is a fictional story, written for entertainment purposes and is not to be considered as a serious piece of political analysis. Any similarity with any living or deceased person is entirely deliberate “What are you going to do when you graduate Laura?’
“I´m going to be the most powerful lady on the planet,’ she replied stretching.
“You mean you are going to be the first female American President?’
“No’ she smiled. “But I am going to be married to him. The actual president doesn´t have a life of his own. Every single breath he takes is recorded. There is always someone watching him. He can´t even fart without some newspaper or other writing about it! I couldn´t stand that. No, I am going to be the power behind the throne. I´m going to be quietly pulling the strings in the background. I´m going to be married to the President and he is going to be completely under my thumb.’

As if to emphasize the point she made a fist, stuck her thumb out and then rubbed the tip of her thumb on the tablecloth. None of the Welch family around the dinner table laughed. They knew Laura. They knew her potential. She was young, intelligent and attractive. They knew she might well just do it.

Years passed. She had graduated. It was 1977. She was at a political social event. One gentleman was obviously a little worse for wear, or, to use the euphemism traditionally linked to British politicians, he was “tired and emotional’.
“Who is he?’ asked Laura.
“You don´t want to know him. He is an alcoholic. He is always getting into trouble because of it. He was even arrested last year for drink-driving. He is George Bush.’
“But George Bush is a lot older surely?’
“You will be thinking of his father – also called George Bush. But younger George isn´t a patch on his father. He really is the black sheep of the family.’
A smile played around Laura´s lips. She knew that the Bush clan were wealthy influential Republicans. The drunken oaf´s grandfather, Prescott Bush, had been a senator. This was just the chance she had been waiting for.
“Introduce me to him please?’
“Are you sure Laura? This guy is really bad news.’
“Yes I know what I am doing thank you, just introduce us please.’
Her friend led her to him. Through his drunken eyes he thought that the two lovely young ladies approaching him were waitresses.
“Have you another drink for me?’
Laura took charge at once.
“I think you have had quite enough. Let´s go outside and sober up a little.’
With that she took him gently, but firmly by the arm and steered him gently outside onto a veranda. She sat him in a chair. She sat next to him, gently stroking his hair.
“Drink does different things to different people. Usually when people have had as much as you to drink they start to feel sleepy. As the alcohol flows throughout their bodies it has a relaxing effect. As the drink enters the mouth, so the mouth relaxes. As it passes down the throat, the throat relaxes. Then it flows into the stomach making the stomach relax. Gradually the whole body relaxes, you can feel that can´t you.’
The figure beside her just grunted in agreement. She realised that she could progress onto the next stages.
“Take a nice deep breath in…go on… Do it….you’re going to breathe in anyway….that´s right… Make it a nice deeeeep breath in…..and breathe out and……….mmmmm…..let go…..

I want you to go inside yourself for a moment….okay….you’re already inside huh …okay….. take another deep breath in…. and imagine that your going for a walk….your walking through a forest….and this forest exists deep within your mind…..keep breathing…. keep listening to these words….as you find yourself wandering… deeper and deeper into the forest…. deeper into the forest and deeper into your own mind…. now  allow yourself  to feel a nice peaceful state of relaxation begin to enfold you and wash over your body…..noticing how the sunlight begins to lessen….as you can see the sparkle of sunlight flickering upon the highest treetops……the sun´s rays flickering and mesmerizing you as you go peacefully upon your journey….going down… deeper and deeper.. deeper and deeper into the forest now… deeper… into your own mind….. and all you want to do is… just let go now….Now… notice how good it feels as you imagine the peace and tranquillity beginning to take over your body… soothing your mind.. allowing you to just let go now of all your everyday concerns and just be in the now……allowing the feelings of peace and tranquillity to flood your body now …… PEACE……… and….. TRANQUILITY…. notice how good it feels when you allow yourself to let go of all those mundane everyday thoughts and allow the peaceful tranquillity of the forest that exists so deep inside your mind to wrap you up in its peace and quietness.. feel the PEACE and TRANQUILITY now…..

Now take a moment to ponder…. and now breathe in the stillness of the forest as you let me guide you. Allow my words to guide you into that lovely peaceful state. You love being guided by my words. You want to listen to me again and again. You want me to lead you, to guide you. Don´t you George?’

Again he grunted in agreement. She knew she had him. Soon they were meeting on a daily basis, and he was completely under her spell. Within three months of meeting, she had got him to control his drinking. He would later give it up altogether. They were married. The next year she got him to take his first, faltering steps into politics, an unsuccessful stab at the House of Representatives. Although he was beaten by Kent Hance, she did manage to strike up a friendship with Kent. After the election she invited him round.
“It is so nice to be able to relax after all that electioneering. It is so nice to relax with friends, don´t you think……’
After a few hours he was under her spell as well, eventually turning him into one of the biggest supporters of her husband. Like several Southern Democrats, she got him to defect to the Republicans.

With her support he had a successful career in the oil industry, while he supported his father´s political career. Laura trained him, and he became Governor of Texas in 1990. In that election he was up against Ann Richards. Laura had found that her charms were useless against females, so that had to resort to good old fashioned political mud-slinging and skullduggery, in contrast to the earlier campaign. She also later found it impossible to hypnotize people who had not got a good command of English. (Her husband was an exception to this rule of course).

10 years later he became President of the United States. His term of office was of course dogged by the 9/11 attack, which led to America leading a United Nations invasion of Afghanistan.

Next Laura Bush turned her attention to Iraq.
“If only I could meet Saddam Hussein, I´m sure if I could meet with him I could get him to see sense.’
But the information from the advisors was that this was just not possible to arrange. She had had a similar problem with Moslem leaders elsewhere. It seemed they generally liked to keep their women – and other women – in the background. In this case they were really in the background, unlike Laura who was extremely careful never to take the limelight and always to appear to be supporting her husband, where in fact she was controlling him.
“In that case, we will just have to invade Iraq.’ She concluded.

The advice came back that no country would support an American invasion of Iraq. Hastily she arranged meetings with several Western leaders. The first was with Tony Blair and his wife Cherie.
“Well I am delighted to meet you, you must be tired after your long trip. You are probably suffering jet lag as well. I am sure you want to relax for a while…..’

She was amazed how good a subject he was, and after a few sessions he was agreeing with absolutely everything her husband George was saying, and what George was saying, of course, was nothing more and nothing less than what Laura told him to say. Within a few months a number of world leaders, mainly from English speaking countries, had fallen under her spell and an international coalition entered Iraq.

But of course, unfortunately there are limits to how far one person can control events on the other side of the globe. What to do exactly after removing the governments of Afghanistan and Iraq was never completely planned through. Removing competing governments on either side of Iran has inadvertently strengthened the fundamentalist Islamic regime in Iran. As Germany found to its costs in both world wars, waging wars on two fronts simultaneously is hard. American and British forces are bogged down by guerilla activity by terrorists in Afghanistan and Iraq. Almost daily American or British troops get killed in the Middle East. Do you ever wonder how we got into this mess? Well now you know!
THE END.