God, it's like Comp 101 at Princeton all over again, thought Sam dismally.

"Too much flowery, superfluous bullshit," said Toby. "Fix it."

"Y'know, we get enough flack from Doug, can we please be Batman and Robin and you back me up?"

"I'm Batman. You're Robin. I'm saving your little neon spandex ass again. Make the changes."

Sam made some changes, but couldn't bring himself to change them all. It just wouldn't be true to his vision of the speech let alone himself. Printing out a new copy, he gave it to Toby again. A few hours later, Toby was back and the paper was--again--covered in red.

"Sam, take it out."

"Y'know what this reminds me of?"

"Utter crap?" suggested Toby.

"Harry Chapin."

After a moment of contemplation, Toby chuckled--the first time in a very long time. "Harry Chapin?"

"You know who Harry Chapin is?"

"Sam, my sisters were avid protesters. What do *you* think? The better question would be: Do *you* know Harry Chapin? How old were you when he died? What, two?"

"Twelve."

"I was close. But g'head. Teach me about the Last of the Protest Singers."

"Flowers are red," began Sam.

"Depends on the flower."

"Green leaves are green."

"Duh."

"There's no need to see flowers any other way than the way they always have been seen."

"`The hell?"

"But the little boy said: There are so many colors in the rainbow, so many colors in the morning sun. There are so many colors in the flowers and I see every one."

"You're losing me, Sam."

"It's a Harry Chapin song! Mostly, it's about the state of affairs in our public education system, when we turn our children into *drones* by *killing* their creativity and then, by the time they find someone who *will* foster it, it's too late. They've been told the way they do things is *wrong*. It's not *wrong*, Toby. It's different. You're going to make the President sound too dull by taking out my words, my `superfluous bullshit.' We've got big words so the voters can look them up and yet, he'll go out there and sound like the dull old professor everyone hated!"

"Sam--"

"There are so many colors in the rainbow, Toby. Why can't we see them? Why can't we share them with the public?"