“The Trump administration is sending more federal agents to Portland, Ore., as officials consider pushing back harder and farther against the growing crowds and nightly clashes with protesters, vandals, and rioters.”
Washington Post, 7/27/20

- - -

As you all know, the planet Alderaan has descended into complete chaos after an unarmed Alderaanian was killed by a police droid, sparking weeks of protests. In response, I, Chancellor Palpatine, deployed stormtroopers in order to quell the protests and restore order. In the days since, it’s become clear that deploying the stormtroopers has only made the situation worse, which is why I’m doing the only sensible thing: deploying even more stormtroopers.

Considering that the protests have mainly been relegated to a few city blocks of the Alderaanian capital, it might seem like deploying an entire battalion of unidentifiable, unaccountable murder-commandos would be an excessive show of force inconsistent with the values of the Galactic Republic. But my goal as Chancellor has always been to bring balance to the Force. And sometimes that means letting the Dark Side of the Force beat the ever-living crap out of the Light Side of the Force every now and again.

Of course, the galactic media has been quick to criticize this necessary crackdown, distributing countless holograms showing stormtroopers dousing that so-called “Wall of Ewoks” with Tibanna gas, sending their furry little figures into violent, fully-body coughing fits. But to those that say, “How can you spray those adorable dudes and dudettes with toxic gas?” I simply say, “Easy, aim lower.” Let’s face it, just because they’re cute and three feet tall doesn’t make them any less of a threat.

And as for the claims that throwing suspected agitators into unmarked AT-AT Walkers and freezing them in carbonite is both a violation of their galactic rights and an affront to the rule of law? Well, rules of law are meant to be broken. Unless that rule is the 9 pm curfew across all of Alderaan, in which case, if you break it, you can and should be severely punished.

The truth is, the only way to fully restore law and order is to dissolve the law entirely and establish your own, entirely new world order. That’s the reason why I’ve deployed my galactic goons to Alderaan, and if I have to deploy them to Endor and Tatooine and Coruscant next, then I’m more than happy to do so.

It’s also why I’ve been toying with the idea of dissolving the Galactic Senate, depending on how the next election goes. If I win, it’s proof that the Galactic Senate wasn’t all that necessary to begin with, given how great of a job I’m doing. And if I lose, it’s proof that the Trade Federation’s ballot shipping protocols were compromised and I need to dissolve the Galactic Senate, weed out the traitors, and then fix all the problems myself. I guess what I’m trying to say is, I’m definitely going to dissolve the Galactic Senate pretty soon and ditch my Chancellor role in favor of a more Emperor-for-Life-type situation.

And as for the notion that I could lose the election because I’m simply unpopular? Look, did I let the Candorian Plague situation get out of hand, thus leading to billions of entirely preventable deaths, because I kept calling it a “Hothian Hoax” and refused to wear a gas mask? Sure, I’ll own that. And have I made the recent civil unrest far worse by consistently siding with known evil-doers like Count Dooku, the Confederacy of Independent Systems, Sith-sympathisers, and sex-smugglers? Yeah, I’ll give you that. But make no mistake — I still have broad support from the silent majority. And just because I’ve brainwashed all of them into silent compliance using the Force does not make them any less of a majority.

That said, think of these stormtroopers as a soft launch for my new Empire — an Empire where free speech is heavily censored and dissent of any kind is not tolerated. And while that might sound an awful lot like the kind of “cancel culture” mentality I constantly accuse those woke Jedi-justice-warrior types of espousing, I can assure you mine is completely different, because when you step out of line in my Empire, I don’t just want you to lose your job — I want you to lose everything. So the protestors on Alderaan better keep that in mind before they go out and march for a better planet again.

Plus, if all else fails, I’m not above just obliterating Alderaan entirely. After all, I do have the launch codes to the new Death Star.