‘Now Sherman! Now Kersey! Now Lorie and Chris!’

“Let’s be naughty and save Santa the trip.”

—Gary Allan

’Twas three months before Todd Toss, and through City Hall,

An odd rumor was stirring, a real-life curveball.

The whispers were hung with Republican flair,

“Let us dethrone Prez Gloria. Just one Dem we must snare!”

Contestants were measured for right-leaning threads,

Veiled snapshots of MRIs mapped lefty heads.

“That Marti’s just trouble, and Cole is a sap,

And David’s a shoulder we never would tap!”

A green light flashed on and there came such a clatter,

Republican heads spun as if set on a platter.

The War Room soon filled up with choking coal ash

(The President Picker came cheap and for cash!)

The smoke soon did crest and a blinking glow

Spelled out the best choice to strike the Todd blow.

“If it’s a coup that you opt to engineer,

Then the obvious choice is Sherri Lightner!”

Republican eyes darted lively and quick,

But how to gift-wrap the plan, all nice and slick?

It mustn’t appear from Republicans came,

Such partisan gamesmanship, that would be lame.

“Now Sherman! Now Kersey! Now Lorie and Chris!

For 2015 this is a chance we can’t miss!”

The mayor of Couptown scrawled words on the wall,

“I didn’t say it, but that Gloria must fall!”

Into the wind the loyal elves did fly,

Like hawks seeking prey from a circling sky.

So up to the 10th floor the buzzards they flew,

In hopes that dear Sherri somehow would come through.

And then, in a twinkling, they heard of the split,

Pro Tem Lightner proclaimed, “I’m going for it!”

But media snoops soon began sniffing around,

“Hey Sherri, how does top council cat sound?”

The rumors continued for weeks underfoot,

With Sherri declining to say, “Oh, kaput!”

But as vote day drew near, there was no turning back,

“Boy, the liberals are angry. What’s up with the smack?”

Her eyes, they once twinkled, now seemed only wary,

“I’ll take that Scotch now, just ditch the cherry!”

Droll Republican mouths also kept a down low,

“A poor secret like this, no one should know!”

The lump of a swipe they held tight in their teeth,

“We’ll wait till vote day, and then we’ll unsheath!”

And when that day came, from out of the belly,

Came such a burp roar, all stale and smelly.

“This ain’t no big deal,” assured Sherman the elf.

“She’s a Dem, for crissakes. Look, I’m voting myself!”

With a wink of a tally into which Lightner fed,

Mayor Couptown declared, “Prez Gloria’s dead!”

He quickly announced that with Sherri he’d work,

Somehow still sounding like a slippery jerk.

And laying a finger aside of his nose,

When queries of Brown Act snubs did media pose.

He sprang to his sleigh, to his team gave a whistle,

“A re-vote, my chums. That should cure this darn thistle!”

But what can one claim from such a scurrilous sight?

“Bring on 2015, you’re in for a fight!”

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