Kim Jong-May received with rapture and adulation in Bridgend

The Tory drill sergeant was putting his troops through their final paces in the Brackla community centre just outside Bridgend in Wales. “Present arms,” he shouted. Several dozen activists held up their Strong and Stable Leadership placards. After about five minutes, almost everyone had had enough. One bloke near the back was complaining that his arm was aching. The drill sergeant wasn’t happy. He had told everyone to keep their placards up until after the Supreme Leader had left and that heads would roll if her reception wasn’t anything other than ecstatic. Starting with his.

Eight minutes earlier than planned, a commotion at the main entrance put everyone on full alert. Once again the placards, all of them identical, were thrust into the air and this time they stayed there as Kim Jong-May was greeted with rapture. She smiled awkwardly. The Supreme Leader isn’t entirely comfortable meeting ordinary people, even when they have been hand-picked for their devotion.

After a brief introduction from the Welsh secretary, Alun Cairns, whose Vale of Glamorgan constituency is next door to Bridgend, Kim Jong-May stepped on to the platform to address her loyal subjects. “This is the most important election in my lifetime,” she began. Primarily because it was the only one in which she had ever stood as Supreme Leader. And what she wanted was a mandate so large she would still be in power long after she and everyone else in the room had died. Even eternity wasn’t long enough. Her eyes scoured the room for the merest hint of dissent. None came. No one dared even blink. Or breathe.

Kim Jong-May told herself to relax and try harder to engage with her people, but she wasn’t entirely sure how to do so. It was so hard to do empathy when everyone in the room was weak and unstable. She willed her eyes to convey warmth, but they remained ice-cold. “What this country needs is strong and stable leadership,” she continued. “And only I can provide that strong and stable leadership.” Anything less was unthinkable.

Traditionally, Conservative leaders rarely bother to show their faces in the Welsh Labour heartlands, but with Labour trailing so badly in the polls Kim Jong-May was not going to waste any opportunity to make her power absolute. Labour must be crushed. The Lib Dems – a few hisses greeted the mention of their name – must be crushed. Plaid Cymru must be crushed. No matter that all of these parties stood no chance and had already said they wouldn’t do deals with one another, the Supreme Leader knew they – along with the Wizard of Oz and The Straw Man – were a coalition of chaos. Winning wasn’t enough. Only the annihilation of all opposition would do.

A few minutes in, Kim Jong-May began to switch off. She had said all she had come to say and really wanted to go home, but she understood there were niceties to be observed so she went through the motions. “This country needs strong and stable leadership,” she said again, her voice now stuck in a metronomic loop. “And I am what strong and stable leadership looks like. People say the country is divided, but everywhere I go I see a unity of purpose.” It helps if you only go to places where you are assured of a warm reception.

Strong and stable leadership. Every sentence began and ended with strong and stable leadership. That’s all the country needed. Other than a plan. “We need to have a plan,” she confided. “And that’s why we have a plan.” Though she wasn’t prepared to reveal what that plan was. Only that the plan was to have strong and stable leadership. With strong and stable leadership, Brexit, the economy and cuts to services would look after themselves. Because when you had strong and stable leadership it invariably turned out that your plan was the right one even when it was the wrong one. Just under 10 minutes after she had started, the Supreme Leader drew to a close.

“I will take a few questions from the media,” Kim Jong-May said hesitantly, mindful that – for the time being – she wasn’t living in a one party state. Could she give a few more details about what sort of policies her government might be adopting? The Supreme Leader didn’t blink. Don’t be silly. Everything would be revealed in due course, either before or after the election. All that mattered was strong and stable leadership. Then she was gone. A few people still had some unanswered questions, the main one being what the purpose of the event had been. Kim Jong-May had neither done nor said anything. It had been a defining act of political existential futility.