299 Days: The Preparation (28 page)

Besides, Ted explained, America’s high-tech military was extremely dependent on supplies and logistics. If semi-trucks quit rolling, the Army would face shortages of fuel, ammo, and spare parts just like everyone else. They had stockpiles but they, too, had fallen for just-in-time inventory. Cost-cutting wizards at the Pentagon had decided to go with just-in-time inventory to save money. Oh, how shortsighted that would be. Just like almost everything else in America. Shortsighted and disastrous.

“Another big problem a unit will face in a domestic crisis is that most guys will want to get back home to their families,” Ted explained. “Especially the lower level units. But, with the more elite units, we are each other’s family so we’ll fight as group. And most of those units will be Oath Keeper units.”

“What about cops?” Chip asked. “Those guys come in here all day to buy guns and hang out. They seem pretty solid to me.” Ted and Chip talked about law enforcement and how they thought a good chunk of them would choose the Oath Keeper side, either at the outset of a collapse or a little bit into it.

Grant didn’t know what it was like to be a Green Beret, but he knew a little about cops. “Hey, I don’t claim to be an expert here,” he said, “but aren’t cops a little more prone to corruption than, say, Army units? I mean, I see a little cop corruption in the cases I work on.”

Ted and Chip agreed that cops would be more likely to be corrupt just because cops were in constant contact with criminals, whereas soldiers weren’t. The consensus among Ted, Chip, and Grant was that some cops would go bad and maybe steal from people, but that the majority would not.

“Cops are local,” Ted said. “They don’t move around to a new base every few years like we do. That means they’ll think twice about shooting people in their own towns who are their neighbors and relatives, in some cases.”

Most cops would probably just quit their jobs. The current round of budget cuts would mean even fewer cops would be around. Those that were might decide that a collapse was a good time to quit, especially when it meant getting killed, or having to kill their neighbors.

Grant was soaking all of this in. He still couldn’t believe what he was hearing. It was reassuring. No, actually, it was a huge relief to hear, straight from the horse’s mouth, that the military and lots of law enforcement would not turn into an anti-civilian thug force. It sounded like there would be plenty of good military and law enforcement people to keep the bad ones under control. But there would still be plenty of bad military and law enforcement units.

As much Grant had improved his tactical skills, he always knew that his little Team was no match for any competent military or law enforcement opponent. Not even close. He remembered the day at the range with the Team when some Rangers from Ft. Lewis showed up to shoot. The Team was glad to let them use the range to learn from them. Those Rangers were amazing; ten times better than the civilians on the Team. Right then and there Grant and the rest of the Team knew their limitations. They were only able to defend themselves against civilian criminals, maybe up to the sophisticated gang level of civilian criminals. But that was it. Now he realized that his side would have some military and law enforcement backup with the Oath Keepers.

Grant had to head home, which was a short drive from the gun store. He would have stayed and listened to Ted for hours if he could. On the way home, he tried to “normalize” himself by getting back into the suburban world he was returning to. He struggled with making the mental switch from hearing a former Green Beret talk about which of the guys in his unit would fight against the U.S. Government in a coup, to hearing about how ballet practice went and what homework the kids had that night.

When Grant got into the driveway, he hit the garage door button. Hitting that button had become a symbol to him that he needed to go from thinking about the end of the world to thinking about being a suburban dad and husband. It was a hard transition on evenings like this one. Very hard.

Chapter 31

Budget Crisis

The State of Washington was technically bankrupt. Of course, a state can’t really declare bankruptcy, although California was considering it.

The official Washington State deficit for the year was $5.7 billion. It was widely rumored to be even bigger. Washington State’s budget for the previous year was about $30 billion, but half of that was the state portion of federal programs like Medicaid that the state couldn’t cut. That meant the state had about $15 billion it could control, and it was short by $5.7 billion. The local schools got almost all of their money from the state, which was close to $5 billion. The state was required by the state constitution to pay for education, so that meant that $5 billion could not be touched. That left Washington State with $10 billion to pave roads, operate prisons, provide social services, have a state police force, and more.

Of course, a big chunk of paying for those things was paying the salaries, and especially the pensions of the state employees. But, with $10 billion of spending and a $5.7 billion deficit, the state had only half of the money it needed to do those things. Half.

It never should have gotten to this crisis point, Grant thought. The policy wonks at WAB told Grant that if the state would have just spent at historically normal levels for the past six years, there wouldn’t be a deficit. But, during the boom years, the state was raking in the tax money — and spending even more than the record-setting amounts it was taking in. Spending kept growing faster than revenue, and when revenue stopped coming in, the spending actually went up. A lot. Besides the increases in “safety net” spending, the other reason that spending kept going up was that, unlike the private sector, government spending was not a one-time thing. Once a program was created, it had to continue being funded, and each year the budget for it went up. It was called “baseline budgeting” which meant that one year’s spending was the “baseline,” and an increase for the next year was required. To reduce the increase was a “cut.” And voters hated “cuts” even if the cut was just slower growth in spending, not an actual cut. This stupidity was only possible with masses of brainwashed people.

The biggest reason spending went up so fast was that the state kept saying “yes” to every state employee union it could. More pension money? Sure. State employees had the most generous pensions of anyone in the state. Want to get out of paying for any real portion of your health insurance? Sure.

In return, state employee unions would take millions of dollars from their members and donate the funds to the politicians who ran the state, and “negotiate” things like pensions and health insurance. It was theft.

But no one cared. Grant could not comprehend why people didn’t care that they were being taxed so much, under the threat of going to jail, just so politicians could buy votes and keep their little politician jobs? How was this not obvious? He thought of it this way: If someone came to a person’s house and said they needed to pay thousands of dollars a month — and if they didn’t they’d be hauled off— so their neighbor can have plenty while they struggled, and they could simply end the monthly knock on the door by voting at the next election, why wouldn’t everyone do that?

Because they were brainwashed. They seemed to chant like zombies, “Must fully fund education. Is for the children. State employees are underpaid. Must increase funding….”  It was like mass hypnosis. It started in the public schools. Manda would come home and tell Grant what they “learned” in school and Grant would come unglued.

“So, Manda, what did you do at school today?” he asked her one time.

“In History we learned about the Depression,” she said. “What did they say about it?” he asked.

“That some FDR guy saved the country with new government programs,” she said. “You need to spend money to get out of a depression. All those people getting the money spend it and that’s good for the economy.”

Grant gave her a quick overview of why that wasn’t true. He found himself quoting Ludwig von Mises to her. It was going over her head.

“Sorry to go off, dear,” Grant said, “it’s just so frustrating that they’re teaching this crap.”

“That’s OK,” Manda said. “I just listen to what I need to know for the test. They’ve been wrong about just about everything in History and especially Social Studies. Remember when they said gun owners were dangerous? You own guns,” she said pointing to Grant, “and you’re not dangerous. I’m just trying to get a good grade. Don’t worry Daddy. I’m not a little socialist.” She smiled when she said that.

Manda got it. Grant remembered how appalled she was when he told her that her share of national debt was $150,000. She said, “That’s payments I have to make on a house, except I don’t get to live in it.” Smart girl. She knew more about politics and fiscal matters than 95% of adults in government-loving Washington State.

Grant thought about the federal “stimulus” money that the feds had just stopped handing out to the state. For the bailout of Washington State alone, the feds created several billion dollars of debt just so the Governor and legislators wouldn’t have to be uncomfortable around their union friends. What a great trade. An awkward moment at a cocktail party is such a horrible thing. Better to put another couple hundred bucks on Manda’s $150,000 tab that she’d be paying for the rest of her life, with interest. That actually made sense to these people. And, once again, the majority of voters in the state applauded the politicians doing this for their “leadership.” It was surreal. How could this be happening?

Grant wondered if this was really happening with the state, or if he was just getting bad information. He called Jeanie. She was still nice to him. She felt bad that she wasn’t being principled but was, instead, keeping her government job. She had been dying to tell someone what was happening and was happy to fill him in.

When he called, he made sure she was in a place where she could talk without her co-workers overhearing. Jeanie described how the Governor called a big meeting of all the agency heads. That included Menlow, even though he was the separately elected State Auditor and a Republican (at least on paper). The state budget flowed through the Governor’s Office, so they had control over the money. Jeanie went to the meeting with Menlow.

“It was crazy, Grant,” she told him. “These people are absolutely terrified of what’s coming. One of them, Montoya at Corrections, started crying. She said prisoners would have to be released. Lots of them. Some pretty bad ones, too.” Jeanie was scared. She knew what it would mean for these animals to be in neighborhoods like hers.

Grant felt terrible. Not because of all the cuts; they were inevitable and spending never should have gotten so large that devastating cuts like this were necessary. No, Grant felt terrible that he was enjoying this so much.

What kind of asshole takes pleasure in this? Him. That’s who. He couldn’t control the warm joyous feeling he was having that this beast of government was wounded. It was wounded and couldn’t hurt people as much, anymore. No more ruining Ed Oleos, Big Sams, or Joe Tantoris. The collapse was beginning. It was about damned time.

Then he felt guilty. How could he enjoy this? Seriously, prisoners released to terrorize communities. How was this good news? It wasn’t. This was why Grant and a few others had been yelling at the top of their lungs for years that the state can’t keep spending more and more money. When the federal stimulus money came in, everyone else cheered. Not Grant. He knew that postponing the necessary cuts would only make the day of reckoning harder. Much harder. Which it was.

The warm joyous feeling wouldn’t go away. Grant needed to try to be sympathetic.

“What about state employees?” Grant asked. “What kind of cuts will there be?” He was trying to keep the topic on things that affected her.

“No raises this year,” she said. “No increases for the pensions. Furloughs for five days a year.”

“How much will that save?” Grant asked.

“The Governor’s Office thinks $98 million over two years,” Jeanie said.

“That’s a drop in the bucket when you’re looking at $5.7 billion,” Grant said.

“That’s all they think the unions will tolerate,” Jeanie said.

Taxes would go up — way, way up — but there was a limit to what people could pay.

Jeanie added, “The state can’t borrow any more money.” Grant, who had become an expert on the state constitution from all the cases he worked on, knew why. The constitution limited state borrowing to 9% of tax revenue. Revenue was down, way down, and 9% of it wouldn’t come close to the $5.7 billion.

Grant said, “The State of Washington has maxed out its credit card.” That was quite an astounding statement.

It got worse. The $5.7 billion deficit and maxing out of the state’s credit card was just the present problem. The problem for the next few years was the pensions as a huge wave of state employees would start retiring and collecting their pensions. The amount of the actual shortage in the state pension system was a closely guarded secret, but the rumor was that the deficit was about $20 billion, which was about two years of the state’s entire discretionary spending. In just a few years, the pension checks would start bouncing, unless taxes were raised to levels so high that no one in their right minds would get up and go to work. There was no way to avoid this. Unless, of course, pension benefits were drastically reduced. Everyone knew that wouldn’t happen. Retired union state employees were a huge voting block. The politicians would never do it willingly.

But, future events would force their hand. It was inevitable. Those greedy politician bastards created this system, knowing it would fail. They knew it, but they’d be out of office by the time it all fell apart.

After a long contemplative pause, Jeanie said, “Just about everyone I know is a state employee. Jim is. I am. Just about everyone in my neighborhood is.”

“Same in my neighborhood,” Grant said. He started mentally going up and down the houses on his street. He didn’t know most of his neighbors’ names, but, strangely, knew what agencies they worked for. The people on his cul-de-sac were the director of the Office of Women and Minority Business, the assistant state treasurer, a recently retired assistant director of the state education department, a biologist with the state game department, the soon-to-retire budget head of the Department of Ecology, and an administrative appeals judge. The only two private-sector families on the cul-de-sac were his family and the Spencers. That was it. Obviously, Olympia was different than other places because it was the state capitol. But still.