As Þröstur started talking into the microphone, before he could finish his first sentence, screams of outrage came from the audience. He paused for a moment and then bellowed "Are you civilized ? Do you have any manners at all ?"
Kristiana then rose from her seat and stood in silence. The President of Antarctica stood up beside her, then the Prime Minister (after a quick political calculation). Slowly, more and more people looked at the silent group. Meanwhile Þröstur struggled with a dozen people yelling at him, getting nowhere except higher blood pressure for all involved. Finally he saw Kristiana and he stopped, stood straight and quietly looked up at her. This finally calmed the crowd.
She spoke. "We are all citizens of the Union. Our Union is unique in the world in many ways and proudly so. One of our proudest achievements is that for over 300 years we have been ruled by reason, developed from reasoned debate. Let us continue this tradition of ours. The loudest voices are rarely the wisest."
And with that she sat down.
After a moment, Þröstur stated "I will be pleased to answer any questions that you may have. Please line up at either the microphone on the left or the right. I will take a question from the right mike first." And with that over 100 questions were asked and the answers took almost 3 hours.
more later
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