And Now, an Important Issue

Much as I loathe to contradict the worthy and refined Fafnir, I feel that I cannot let this statement of his (found in comments below):

Our last ninja president was Grover Cleveland I believe.

be unchallenged.

While all know that Ninja are not precisely over-represented among our Presidents, it is certainly untrue that there has not been one for over a hundred years. As Reader Michael N. has noted*, rumors of FDR’s ninjahood are legion; what is less well known was that the period between 1920 and 1945 were the Two Decades of the Ninja, starting with Warren Harding’s and Herbert Hoover’s epic battle for the White House** and ending with FDR’s reluctant break*** with the traditions of the First Ninja**** to save Western Civilization itself.

But I speak too much, too soon. I will simply say: contemplate Mount Rushmore, the curiously unsatisfying public reason why Alexander Hamilton remains on the ten dollar bill, and why the Whigs are never discussed in any political science textbook printed in a state whose name ends in a vowel, and soon, perhaps, you will understand.

Perhaps.

Moe

*Who is also aware of my dealings with the Ninja, especially in the matter of the argyle socks. And let us not forget the Oompha-Loomphas…

**Hoover’s ability to take on the superficial appearance of others was greatly useful in this struggle, especially when he was able to secretly slay (in what he always claimed was a fair fight) Calvin Coolidge and take his place. From there, it was a simple matter to go to the endgame with Harding. Alas, the metaphysical stresses that Hoover went through to in order to successfully run against himself (the Inauguration alone was an almost insurmountable challenge) proved too much for his sanity, such as it was. Of course, it was then inevitable that J Edgar Hoover***** would swear revenge on the system that destroyed her secret brother… but was ultimately stymied, decades later, by the heroism of the super-group of American Jungian archetypes (known in their public identity as the Village People) – though not without cost. To this day a guarded and hidden cenopath in Bayonne, New Jersey, is the only public record of the heroism of the martyred Spiro Agnew.

***”No Ninja may serve more than two terms.” This was the Law, and Roosevelt knew it well – but the iron boot of fascism was trodding across Europe, and Churchill’s Drunken Master Kung Fu was not enough to stem the tide. It meant war with the originators of the Ninja traditions brought to America by William Penn (and reaffirmed by His Imperial Majesty Norton I, Emperor of the United States and Protector of Mexico) – some would say that the Nipponese cabal’s abandonment of the principles set down by the Gorilla-Whale Dragon Throne Hidden Master would have made such a decision easy, but those who would so say would be fools – and it meant that he would have to trod Harrison and Lincoln’s path of assumption of the sacred kingship, and subsequent death to rejuvenate the land.

But there were giants walking the earth in those days.

****George Washington, of course. It was the secrets of his Shuriken Teeth of Doom fighting style that drove Arnold to treason and Burr to sedition… but I digress.

*****What, you thought that the other Hoover was a male? Tsk, tsk, grasshopper.