A Global Warming Nightmare

The year was 2025. The United States was finally out of Afghanistan and Iraq and almost completely out of the State of Florida. In the summer months that is. Floridians headed north every summer now to escape the 120 and 130 degree temperatures resulting from global warming. The people in the north, who no longer could remember what a snowbird was, dubbed them flamingos.

The entire population was shifting northward and Canada was beginning to see itself as a world power. America was in decline. Some Canadians were talking about the United States becoming a Canadian province. CNN had become the Canadian News Network and people in Canada never knew anymore who was president of the United States or what was going on there.

Some things had not changed, however. Rush Limbaugh was still railing against environmentalist wackos and global warming--from his new Excellence in Broadcasting studio atop the Montreal tower. He was still clamoring for a border fence, but now he wanted it between the United States and Canada. He could often be heard calling New Yorkers who attempted to get into Canada by swimming the St. Lawrence River wetbacks and border collies, and he often got upset when Americans called in to his show and spoke in broken French. Many Canadians agreed with Limbaugh. Cries of Yankee go home were heard everywhere. Canadians did not want America's poor and huddled masses. It was estimated that there were twenty-five million illegal aliens in Canada. The Canadian Civil Liberties Union bristled whenever anyone used the term illegal aliens. They said it was a racist, code word for poverty stricken Americans who had fled to Canada to escape global warming and to do work that Canadians wouldn't do.

Chelsea Clinton, who had just a few months earlier taken the oath of office as the first female president of the United States (she did it for her mother), tried to set an example for the rest of America by keeping her environmental footprint small. Whenever she traveled, she rode in Mare Force One, a sleek, aerodynamic, six horse power buggy, complete with an Amish driver. Solar panels on the buggy roof powered her lap top, blackberry, radio, television, ipod and cell phone.

She could often be seen trotting down to the Supreme Court building, where her mother sat as Chief Justice. She rarely saw her father anymore as he had become a....

My wife was shaking me. I woke up, wondering if we were in Toronto or Ottawa.

"Neither," she said, "You were having a nightmare."

I was covered with sweat. I walked over to the air conditioner and cranked it up. Then I turned on every light in the room. I did not want to fall back asleep. I did not want to know how that nightmare ended.