The Obama Think Tank

 Traditionally live plants are prohibited on cruise ships.  It is a simple policy, and most cruise protocols are simple.  If one crew member has a skateboard in his cabin, gets drunk, rides his skateboard down the corridor, and breaks his leg in an unnecessary fall, then skateboards become a prohibited item for the entire ship, guests and crew.  If you have a history of cruise industry work, you will know democracy isn't the heart of cruise politics.  Scandinavian merchant marines is a better model.  While cruise industry work completely isn't communist, it is close.  The percentage of American workers on most ships is less than five percent.  Be careful demanding your American constitutionally-afforded rights.  You will not succeed.  Instead you will secede from your union.  Many of your American rights are  not recognized.  If you want to succeed, you will learn to acclimate to the communist precedent.  It is not a huge endeavor, but it requires understanding, compromise, and succession.  You will learn the protocol, and you will sacrifice many of your uniquely American privileges.  I was an avid skateboarder, skateboard collector, and skateboard historian.  It was a hobby I gleaned from my childhood, my seclusion living on a ship, and from my artistry.  I didn't just skateboard in the modern sense.  The new school of skating has become "Skate and Destroy."  It is aggressive, separatist, and rebellious.  My skate aesthetic is old school.  While it is not beige and powder blue, it is mellow and relaxed.  It is spiritual, holistic, and tactile.  Its characteristic are similar to jazz, and improvisation, freedom, and individuality are core components.  Initially while I was successful bringing this aesthetic to cruise work, eventually it was eradicated.  The communist doctrine determined that for the well being of the party (or company) the risks (and rewards) of skating were too risky.  There was not time to allow such indulgences.  Skateboards became prohibited items for everyone, and that was that.  Traditionally live plants were prohibited on cruise ships for good reason.  Plants can carry disease, and this potential for transmittable disease was too much a risk for the health and well being of workers and guests.  No live plants!  "Central Park at Sea" or a Lido Deck full of live plants emerged from nowhere.  It became the focus for this class of cruise vessels.  Not long thereafter guests who had cruised were dropping like flies.  Skateboards did not cause this problem.