"No, we can't."

“Good afternoon, I speak to you as the President of the United States of America. We are done. I’m sorry to say this, but as a nation, “No, we can’t”. We have shown time and time again that we are unable to think of our fellow man. We are unable to function as a nation with liberty and justice for all.

Today that ends, we will no longer be led by someone who is only thinking of what they can do to be re-elected, making promises that appeal to the masses even if they are to the detriment of our future. No more, we cannot sustain this.

We consume, but we do not contribute. We value those famous for poor reasons, and we ignore our farmers who provide our bread, our teachers who educate the next generation, our engineers who build our cities. I could continue for hours about the people we undervalue, but I think if you look inside, you will be able to make your own list.

Big business that does not contribute, I’m afraid your time is up, as we will no longer accept you getting fat whilst we carry you. You will now give back what you have pillaged from this nation, the money will be used to improve our sustainability, we will bring our manufacturing back onshore, we will maximize the potential of our farms, we will hire the best educators for our next generation, as we are nothing without our future. We will rebuild our nation to be great for our children, not a crumbling husk that will collapse around them.

We have appointed ourselves world police, but we cannot police our own backyard. What is wrong with us? Our answer to gun violence is more guns, and we cannot see the fundamental problem with this? We as a nation are stupid, our allies have taken guns out of the hands of the people, and gun crime has been nearly eradicated. We have continued to arm ourselves, and at every turn, we have shot our innocents; children have died, teenagers have died, adults have died. Did any of them deserve to be murdered? I personally don’t think so, but I have been fought at every turn to disarm these people.

Today I stand before you broken, it is time to clean up our own backyard before we turn our attention to a global scale. It is time to end this violence and hand in the guns. I do not buy the fact you need that gun for self-defence. Self-defence does not involve the murder of your fellow citizen. I have sympathized with the relatives of the dead, I have uttered meaningless platitudes as your President designed to alleviate the grief of your fellow citizen, but to put it bluntly, what they needed was for their loved one not to have been shot dead. So I repeat, enough, no more guns. Starting tomorrow, you will be handing them in. This has been written into our law, and our constitution amended. It cannot be changed, and it will not be changed.

I am not the man who will lead this once fine nation to realize its potential. I have tried, but I have fallen short at every turn. I announce to you, I am not the change you hoped for. I am not your beacon of light in this time of great darkness. I have implemented one small change that will lead to a better future for many of our citizens. But because of these actions, I am no longer able to rule this country. So today, I stand before you and offer you my resignation as The President of the United States of America. “

Clare stood in front of the sign in the natural history museum, watching the projection onto the wall of former President Ernest Jamison giving the “No, we can’t speech.” on January the 2nd 2032, which her generation acknowledged was the dawn of change. They were the first generation in many years to look up from their phones, to look around them at the world and really think about what was important. They didn’t go to school in fear, looking at their classmates, wondering if they’d done something to offend them and if today was the day they wouldn’t get to go home.

Sometimes all it took was one person to start the change, one person to make a bold stand that would improve the world.