What's the deal with ... Janeway becoming an admiral, despite losing Voyager for six years?

12. You don't get how this works. Just like the exec who causes havoc in Acct. and gets pushed up to being Head CEO in Charge of Paper Clip Returning, she has been shoved up the stairs to avoid more incompetence from her. Sure, go look at her assignments: Tour of the Ring of Cocktail Planets, in charge of the committee to re-design the Starfleet logo. Yeah, loads of responsibility.*wink* Admiral, yeah right, *snort*. The biggest thing she'll have to lose is the napkin she uses to wipe the cold, lumpy non-descript gravy that covers the cold chicken from her mouth at the dinner party for the Ambassar'd of Clomeennt. (alark2000@yahoo.com)

11. It's the only way she could get a cameo; after all, with the Admiralty comes the cameo. (steve@ottawastart.com)

10. Two words: Budget cuts. (daikun@email.com)

9. Actually it was a clerical error. You see, the difference between the vulcan word for court martial and promotion is only one little line. Probably someone's data pad was a little dirty. (karras22002@yahoo.com)

8. Plain and simple affirmative action. This is another case of an underqualified woman getting bumped ahead in the job roster ahead of other, better-qualified men, for the sake of Star Fleet Command's ridiculous affirmative action quota system! If Janeway had also been a lesbian, disabled, and a Klingon, she'd have been made Vice Admiral In Charge Of Starfleet! (thezodiac@canada.com)

7. She makes a perfect admiral. We can stick her behind a desk and she can lose paperwork. It's how all the great bureaucracies work! Without the great losers like Janeway, the world would work at warp speed. Think of the chaos! (deanna@magma.ca)

6. Has anyone else ever noticed how admirals on Star Trek are all either A)soon to be dead in a tragic and mysterious incident that the Enterprise then has to investigate or B)really really evil? Janeway is already far more sinister than any member of Starfleet before her, and her superiours recognized this. In hopes that she would fulfill Admiral Function (A) as well as (B), they promoted her. In hopes that he will live forever and remain honorable and undeniably sexy--er, noble, they will never ever promote Picard. (wren4742@hotmail.com)

5. During those six long years, all that fanfic got posted to Star Fleet servers where her reputation grew up to and beyond legendary. When Voyager reappeared, the Brass were falling over themselves to be first in line to promote her, hoping to win the affections of such a flexible and lascivious "head officer". (mrbroe@yahoo.com)

4. For bringing Seven of Nine back to the Alpha Quadrant (thereby increasing both the level of technobabble and bra-cup sizes throughout Starfleet).

Oh, and also for proving that dialogue for additional command crew members is basically redundant when plotting a seven-year series once you introduce yet another know-it-all human/machine hybrid into the mix(something that even Picard failed to cotton-on to despite all of Data's help throughout ST-TNG). (griffin@ucc.asn.au)

3. After the Dominion war and the Borg attack in First Contact Starfleet was just plain desperate. Wesley Crusher is probably a captain now too! (citizen_sci-fi@hotmail.com)

2. Her promotion was part of a bargain struck by Starfleet. Basically, Janeway wouldn't be kicked out on her ass as long as she never mentioned Neelix in public. Ever. (see317@attbi.com)

The Theorizer computes two theories have mathematically similar likelihoods of success. The Theorizer could list the exact calculation out to a few dozen decimal places to show you how close they were, but that would just be showing off.

1. After she strode up to them, planted her feet shoulder-width apart, thrust her pelvis forward, put her fists on her hips, and said "I'm home" in that gravelly voice, the Admiralty promoted her without thinking, and then went to change their pants. (superdave@jcom.home.ne.jp)

1. Well, she DID bring it back. (Death_Prophet@hotmail.com)