It was 10:15 am on Inauguration Day, and John Paul Farmer was beginning to lose hope. The former Obama White House staffer had spent the last night at his sister’s apartment in Washington DC, working the phones and emailing any sentient being he’d met during his years in Washington. Farmer was trying to find someone, anyone, who could get the Tested Ability to Leverage Exceptional Talent Act—the Talent Act, for short—to President Barack Obama.

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