The Unfolding, page 12
“The Republican Party has a constitution of its own, did you know that?” Eisner says.
“Lovely,” Tony says, taking a handful of nuts and passing the bowl. “Perhaps we can read aloud from it tonight at dinner.”
“If I can pull us back into one conversation, the question is how to reclaim our America, a traditional America that honors the dreams of our forefathers. When you look at our peer group, which I define as conservatives of a certain age with an extra decimal point or two in the bank, there are already some things happening, early efforts to recapture the flag. We’re not looking to replicate what’s already out there.”
“You’re talking about what the brothers are doing? The gatherings?” Bo asks.
“They’re calling them ‘seminars,’ ” Tony says.
“There are the seminars and the conversations we have at our beloved club up north and at Bilderberg,” Bo says.
“I always feel nervous at the Grove,” Kissick says.
“Like someone’s going to mistake you for a stick in the mud and take a leak on your leg.”
“Something like that.”
“Old men like to see one another. We get lonely,” Bo says.
“Back to the plan—between the club and the brothers, there is philosophical overlap and alliances to be made, but what most of us have done in the past, throwing money at it, isn’t working,” the Big Guy says.
“Correct, and that money is buying more rubber-chicken dinners. I fucking hate chicken. And I am not interested in policy. Or think tanks,” Bo says. “Been there, done that.”
“All these years, I didn’t risk anything except money,” the Big Guy says. “I played it safe and now I’m unhappy.”
“Well, that’s why we’re all here,” Tony says. “To jolly you up.”
The Big Guy smiles. “Thank you, Tony.”
“Would anyone like a glass of orange juice?” Tony asks. “There is nothing better than fresh-squeezed orange juice.”
“Sure,” Bo says. “Hit me.”
Bo crosses his legs, revealing the bare ankle of an old man, hairless and very white. On the ankle is a red-hot wound, a thick brown scab at its center. The red zone spreads out to a pale pink, like an exploding chrysanthemum or fireworks.
“You want some antibiotic cream for that?” Tony asks.
“It’s fine,” Bo says. “Better than it was.”
“He can’t help it,” the Big Guy says, talking about Tony. “He takes care of people.”
“A giver,” Eisner says.
The Big Guy clears his throat and looks down at his index cards. “The only reason we didn’t lose in 2000 was because we had control in Florida and in Washington, and Gore is a doughboy. We were able to hang on because he and the Democrats didn’t have the balls to fight—they didn’t know what hit ’em and we did well with the court. But that wasn’t what you’d want to call a win. That was one of our wake-up calls and we missed it.”
“Hit the snooze button,” Bo says.
“You’re right; we’re has-beens. A new world is emerging and we have done ourselves a disservice by clinging to the past,” Kissick says.
“The world around us has changed but our little bubble has remained the same,” the Big Guy says. “Obama won because people wanted something new, something different—hope.
“So,” the Big Guy says, referring to his last index card. “The election makes it clear that we have been through a period of upheaval even if we were blind to it. Upheaval is an indicator, a bright red warning light, which if not heeded spells the end of democracy as we know it.” He stops for a moment, pauses as if for applause.
“Do you mean the end of democracy or the end of the Republican Party?” Tony asks.
“The Republican Party is officially a stale cookie—just crumbs,” Bo says.
“Here’s my question: What is the man in the middle of America thinking tonight? I bet he’s scared shitless. He’s losing his footing, the factory is closing, his job is gone, his pension isn’t what he thought it would be, people coming into the country illegally are taking what he thinks should be his. And his wife is haranguing him: Why aren’t you doing more? It’s a wonder he’s not killing himself or everyone else. I often find myself thinking that if I wasn’t successful in the ways I am, I might be a murderer. What we’re looking for here is pretty clear,” the Big Guy says.
“Is it?” Kissick asks. “You would be a murderer?”
“I would be very unhappy. Is that better?”
“Are you really concerned about the average Joe or is that just a line you wrote down?” Bo asks. “I suspect that there are many Joes who don’t know the difference between Democrat and democracy. And personally, among friends, perhaps we can be a little more honest, what we care about most is ourselves.”
“Whether or not I care about Joe is irrelevant,” the Big Guy says. “We need to harness the power of Joe; there are millions of Joes in this country; we need to bring Joe into the fold. And if Joe doesn’t know the difference between number one and number two, that’s fine—we just have to tell him what to think. We remind him that in America democracy is capitalism, guns, and lower taxes. Because Joe is the one who is going to get the work done. This isn’t about money; it’s about power.”
“Don’t say power, say freedom,” Eisner says. “Substitute freedom for power.”
“This isn’t about money,” the Big Guy says. “It’s about freedom.”
The doorbell rings. The local sandwich place in town has made lunch for them. The delivery guy comes in and sets it up on the dining-room table.
“Looks good,” Bo says.
“We can eat turkey sandwiches and talk about our Pilgrim past,” Kissick says.
“Actually, the Pilgrims were on the evangelical side; John Winthrop’s sermon from 1630, the ‘city upon a hill,’ our ‘beacon of hope,’ comes from the New Testament,” Eisner says.
“I thought it was Ron Reagan who said that,” the Big Guy says.
“I would have pinned it on Kennedy,” Bo says.
“Let’s eat,” the Big Guy says.
At lunch they talk about their health. They are obsessed with living as long as they can, preserving whatever they can. They are of the belief that if you can’t take it with you, then whatever you have damn well needs to last a long time.
They talk about bread and carbs and what foods to eat. They talk about how people don’t think men care about that stuff but they really do. And they talk about businesses they’ve bought and sold, what they won or lost—each has their own version of a greatest hits album.
“I’ve had some repairs done: a heart valve, a knee, and a little work on one shoulder. I feel like a million bucks and it only cost about half that.” Bo laughs. “I’m divorced more than once with a kid who doesn’t talk to me because she thinks it’s my responsibility that we lost her big brother as a teen. It would be better if she was angry at the drug dealer or her brother’s friends, but it’s easier to hate your father.” Bo looks at Eisner. “How do you feel about your father?”
“Haunted,” Eisner says.
“Still waiting for that stamp of approval?” Tony asks.
“Something like that.”
“Because I do like the sound of my own voice,” Bo says, “I’m going to tell you that a lot of the problem is related to what you’d call progress, connectivity, and outsourcing. Lehman was the tip of the iceberg. When this global economy contracts and everyone sees how intertwined it’s become—there’s gonna be even more pain. No one wants to admit that it’s all been knit together now like an ugly Christmas sweater.”
Kissick claps. “Just the word derivative gives me pains. Lehman had more than a million derivative contracts, notational value of almost forty trillion dollars. No one seemed to understand the global implications.”
“Can we get back to business?” Tony says.
“Yes, please,” the Big Guy says. “And I want to say, it doesn’t bother me if we differ on some things; I was thinking about it during lunch and I really do care about Joe America. We are all Joe America.”
“On some level,” Tony says.
“I’m sure you care, old man,” Bo says, slapping him on the back. “It’s one of your better qualities. It’s not that I don’t care, but sometimes what’s good for me and what’s good for the average Joe aren’t exactly the same. Hard to have your cake and eat it too.”
“Speaking of which,” Tony says, carrying a carafe of coffee and a large plate of cookies back into the living room. “Shall we continue over dessert?”
The Big Guy takes a sip of his coffee, strong and black and hot, the way he likes it. Charlotte calls it burned because he often pours the coffee from the coffee maker into a saucepan and fires it up to boiling. He sips the coffee and takes a look at his second set of cards, wrapped with a rubber band, marked Morning Part 2. “I thought it would be useful if we each shared our concerns. Tony, you want to start us off?”
Tony spins 360 in his chair for effect. Big and bold. “I’m going to use a word I haven’t heard from anyone in a long time. Vision. That’s what’s missing. Vision. Our leaders, whether elected, appointed, or hired through the civil service, lack vision. There is no one stepping up and laying out a game plan, a strategy. It’s all election-cycle thinking, how can I get from here to there, short distances. There’s no one training for a marathon. They say what they have to say to get the votes and then nothing—poof.”
“Good point,” Kissick says. “Short-term thinking is very expensive.”
Tony continues. “My other, bigger issue is that we’re a divided country, now more than ever since the Civil War. We are economically, racially, and gender divided, and that divide is part of the chasm that we’re too busy navel-gazing to notice. But when that sucker splits, we’re all going down.”
“How’s it going to split?” Bo asks.
“Random tipping points,” Tony says. “Things you never thought of, like the weather. Hurricane Katrina. Civil unrest. Crazy shit like O. J. Simpson in a Ford Bronco live on TV. Floods, fires, pestilence, killer bees. It’s coming soon and it will be live on TV and all over your phone. The age of small and regional is over; everything goes big. Any of those could spin entirely out of control.” Tony spins full circle in his chair.
Bo nods. “He has a point.”
“Does that make you nauseated?” the Big Guy asks. “The spinning?”
“I like it,” Tony says. “It feels like flying, like the merry-go-round I used to play on, and it reminds me of Plato, the spinning top and the principle of opposites.”
“You’re giving me a headache,” Bo says.
“Because I’m spinning?”
“Because you’re talking about desire versus reason and the parts of the soul. The thirsty man who refuses to drink. It’s not like I haven’t heard it before.”
“We’re all that man,” Tony says. “An object won’t change its motion unless force is applied. Newton’s first law. When force is applied, it gets interesting. The acceleration of an object depends on the mass of the object and the force applied.”
“Yes, and?” Bo says.
“When one object exerts force on another object, the second object offers equal and opposite force. But what happens when there is an out-of-balance situation? That’s a nonreciprocal interaction.”
“Why are we having a physics lesson?” Kissick asks.
“Because this is what’s happening. There is a greater amount of force being applied resulting in acceleration. It will continue to grow,” Tony says. “And it cannot be contained.”
“That’s a big one,” the Big Guy says. “Capitalism and fundamentalism in a race toward the rapture?”
“Something like that,” Tony says.
“I have a fear of my own to share,” Kissick says.
“I can’t wait to hear it,” Bo says.
“Cyberattacks,” Kissick says.
“That’s a good one,” Bo says.
“We’re not prepared,” Kissick says. “WW3 is going to happen and it won’t be a conventional war. Not a drone attack. It’ll be about the national grid.” He pauses. “Do you know that National Grid, the firm that powers the Northeast, is actually based in England? In 2006 they bought KeySpan, a gas producer, then they picked up a subsidiary of Southern Union Company and now they’re laying cable between the UK and the Netherlands. If our most basic needs are being provided offshore, we have less control. What is the investment of Americans in America? Foreigners own a heck of a lot of US debt; just wait till they come calling.”
“You’re all over the place,” Bo says, “banking, the national grid, gas supply; can you boil it down so I know what to hold on to here?”
“Yes,” Kissick says. “One word. China.”
“Gold star,” Bo says.
“Are you being facetious?” Kissick asks.
“Not at all. I am in agreement with your assessment and I would add one more word—Russia. China holds substantial US debt; they have an investment in the US that’s doing well, but Russia, apart from using us to launder dirty money . . .”
“You’re on to something,” Tony says. “No one talks about Russia, but there’s a lot happening there; the economy is unbalanced, meaning only a few are making money but they’re making it in spades. Their technology is evolving and they have people with good skills. I wouldn’t put it past them to launch a cyberattack in the next few years, like a thorn in the side. There are things coming in from the outside and we here on the inside are not doing enough to protect ourselves. If the situation is allowed to progress, our government will erode, like rust under a car, and we won’t discover it until they are ‘in the house’ or our feet sink through the boards.”
“There are numerous threats on the horizon,” the Big Guy says.
The men all nod.
“Getting back to what Tony was saying, I’ve got a few things stuck in my craw,” Bo says. “One is the religious right. I don’t care what people believe in, but they sure do, to an extreme. I think we’re underestimating their impact. They’re relentless zealots and their beliefs are encroaching on government in a way that is antithetical to our footprint. For the last thirty years, they’ve been creeping further and further into the party. You know who I’m talking about . . .”
“Weyrich,” Kissick says.
“And his kind,” Bo adds.
“Ralph Reed, Norquist, Pat Robertson,” Tony adds.
“Do you remember when Reed attacked John McCain in the South Carolina primary?”
“Like I could ever forget. We do ourselves a disservice to be in bed with them. The other issue that’s gotten even more out of control is the size of the government itself. There is no way people working in the government can even know what other people working in the government are doing. If we cut the workforce by half, we wouldn’t even notice. The bureaucratic bullshit world would remain bureaucratic bullshit and all the rest would be the same. I can point to the moment when it happened. That’s the thing about getting old, you hold the history . . .”
“In 1970 there were six million government employees,” Bo says.
“That’s impossible,” Kissick says.
Bo doesn’t even bother to reply.
“Where do you get these numbers?” Kissick wants to know. “I’m the numbers guy and I can tell you with confidence that you’re wrong. The government workforce has not kept pace with private sector growth and, in fact, is smaller than it was.”
“Fuck me with the numbers,” Bo says. “My point is that during the 1970s government turned into a bloated bureaucratic potbellied pig. It used to be that when one administration came in the other one went out, but in the late sixties and into the seventies, Washington became a place people wanted to stay, raise families, and all that crap. They may not all be government employees in the old-fashioned sense—but these contractors, lobbyists, bureaucratic hangers-on, whatever you call them—they’re excess baggage.”
“Political groupies,” Eisner says. “That’s what my parents were.”
“That’s not what your parents were,” Bo says. “But you are correct to say political hangers-on linger in Maryland, Virginia, even some neighborhoods in DC. Real estate in Washington was dirt cheap after the riots.”
“What riots?” Kissick asks.
“Really?” Bo asks. “What did you study in college?”
“Math.”
“The rest of us took some history courses and 1968 should ring a bell because—”
Kissick realizes his error. “I’m a total ass. Fuck me. Bobby Kennedy was assassinated. And you were there. I remember you telling the story about how you were there.”
“I was there, but that’s not what changed the housing prices in Washington.”
“Martin Luther King,” Tony says, throwing the bone in the middle. “I hate the tension.”
“There were four days of riots in Washington, more than a thousand fires. That’s why real estate was cheap,” Bo says. “It was crazy in 1968 when you look back on it; everything that could arise did arise.”
“You seem to be familiar with Eisner’s father, but may I ask what your father actually did?” Kissick asks. “I’ve always wondered.”
The room gets noticeably still; it’s the question everyone wants to ask but no one ever does.
“What didn’t he do is really the question,” Bo says, avoiding answering.
They nod.
“This is all such good stuff,” Eisner says, eating it up.
“Is that so?” Bo asks. “You know, of course, that the modern meritocratic civil service can be traced to Imperial China?”
“I did not know that,” Eisner says.
“Humor me for another five minutes,” the Big Guy says, as he hands out paper place mats with a map of America printed on them and small packs of crayons. “I picked these up this morning at the local pancake joint.”
