299 Days: The Preparation (30 page)

The drug gang leaders were well read. They knew from Mao’s writings on guerilla warfare that they had to effectively administer the areas they took over. The Mexican government was a corrupt joke. It couldn’t keep the electricity and water running. The drug gangs did. They would behead anyone who got in their way. If they ordered that the people would have electricity and water, and heads would literally roll if that didn’t happen.

Taking care of basic government services like utilities didn’t mean the drug gangs were nice. They were vicious animals, pure evil. But, they were effective at governing and they had a lot of support from the population. Whether it was fear or genuine loyalty, it was still support. The gangs would provide the government services that a corrupt government could not.

The horrific violence sent a flood of refugees into the U.S. Many went right into California, which was essentially shut down with all the protests and crime waves. Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas were also hit hard by the human tidal wave coming into their states. Grant thought of “human tidal wave” as a cliché until he saw a satellite image on the news showing a literal wave of human beings flooding the U.S. border. They were hungry and needed shelter. They were human beings and had to be helped.

The U.S. Government and a few private organizations set up refugee centers in California, Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas. With so many Hispanics in the U.S., many Americans had a personal connection to the refugees and everyone was trying to help. There were still plenty of decent people in this country.

The images on TV were unbelievable. It reminded Grant of the Albanian refugees in the Balkan War of the 1990s — except it was here in America. Hundreds of thousands of Mexican women, children, and elderly were dying of thirst, starvation, exhaustion, and cholera. It made Katrina look like a mild rainstorm.

Of course, the government screwed it up. It could not act quickly enough. In Texas, FEMA spent time trying to get environmental approvals for shelters while children were dying. A particularly powerful photograph that became famous showed a middle-aged white man in a FEMA truck on a cell phone with a dead child lying on the ground near him. He was apparently on the phone with the EPA trying to get a waiver to locate the food, water, and medical supplies for that child and about two million more people.

People were outraged. How could the government, that supposedly was the solution to every problem, not have a plan for this? The Mexican drug wars had been going on strong for years; the fall of the Mexican government could not have been a surprise. Why didn’t the government have a plan for the inevitable wave of refugees? The U.S. was the richest nation in the world, but it didn’t have bottled water and tents for people? People paid almost half their money to the government in taxes, but FEMA didn’t have money for bottled water? Everyone saw, very graphically, that the government was absolutely incapable of taking care of them in a disaster. It was just like in Katrina, but on a much bigger scale. And, just like Katrina, the government’s response to this crisis woke up some people about their incompetence. The Mexican refugee crisis woke up even more people than Katrina did, however.

Hispanics were even more outraged. What they saw was a bunch of white people who weren’t helping a bunch of brown people. Hispanic groups charged the government with racism, which was preposterous. It wasn’t racism; it was incompetence. Now several million Hispanics in America were convinced that the U.S. Government and all Americans hated them and wanted them dead. Membership in anti-white Hispanic race groups like La Raza, which was Spanish for “the Race,” surged. This was exactly how racists of all colors used race and hatred for their political agendas.

Not all the refugees were children, women, and old people. Some were hardened criminals. Some of the Mexican gang members not fit for combat, like young boys and older men went up north with the waves of refugees. There was no better opportunity to transport gang members into the U.S. than by riding the human wave across the border. The criminals preyed on the refugees, raping women and children and stealing supplies. This was captured on TV, too. With the government incapable of doing anything about it.

Not only was the U.S. Government incapable of helping refugees, it was also incapable of protecting its own citizens from some very nasty people. Many of the gang members coming across the border linked up with their brethren who had just been released from the jails. They created “super gangs,” which were very large, well- armed, and highly sophisticated criminal enterprises. They were closer to a military unit than a traditional street gang.

In the span of a few days, most people in America realized that they were helpless if something like that happened in their area. But, after decades of thinking nothing bad could ever happen in America, most Americans still could not bring themselves to believe that it would happen to them. The refugee crisis and violence was still far away in California and Texas; not their neighborhoods.

Despite everything going on, many people still did not recognize how dependent and vulnerable they were. Instead, many of them became paralyzed by fear and did nothing. Very few Americans started preparing like they knew they should. They sat around their TVs stunned and helpless.

Texas responded to the crisis differently than California. Texas took its status as a formerly independent republic very seriously. About two days into the mess, the Governor of Texas held a press conference and said what would become famous words, “If the Federal Government can’t restore law and order to Texas, then Texas will. We entered this union of states voluntarily and we can voluntarily leave it.

And from what I’ve seen, the Federal Government can’t do much of anything right, so we don’t think they can stop us. Texas will take care of Texans. Period.”

This secessionist passion had been slowly building for years in Texas, but now, with the Feds screwing up so clearly, it was finally coming to the surface for many people.

One of them was Bill Owens, Grant’s friend from law school who lived in San Antonio. He had settled there at a nice law firm and served in the Texas National Guard as a Judge Advocate General (JAG) officer, which is a military lawyer.

Before the Mexican crisis, Bill called Grant periodically and told him how people down there were sick of the federal mandates and the federal taxes; basically, the federal everything. Entrepreneurs and freedom-loving people from all over America were moving to Texas. The taxes were far lower and the business climate was markedly better than anywhere else in the U.S., especially on the East Coast and California where small business was almost impossible. Texas welcomed businesses.

Crime was astonishingly lower in Texas, too. That was because Texas gun laws allowed, even encouraged, citizens to carry concealed handguns. Very often, an armed robber would enter a store in Texas only to be stopped by armed customers and store clerks. The same was true of burglars breaking into homes. Killing one burglar led to dozens of fewer crimes that burglar would have committed. It also led to fewer people who wanted to be burglars.

How did the progressives in the North react? By calling the Texans “cowboys” and Texas the “shoot-em-up wild West.” They referred to the armed robbers as “victims of gun violence.” It was like there two versions of America: Texas and the North.

Southern and western mountain states were moving in varying degrees toward the Texas model because it worked. Northeastern and upper Midwest states and the West Coast (including Washington State) were moving toward the Northern model. There was a split, which was widening. Confederate flags started popping up everywhere.

Grant never liked the Confederate flag. He respected Southerners’ right to fly it and be proud of the many Southerners who served bravely in the Civil War. He knew that the Union Army and the Federal Government during Reconstruction were not exactly the angels that they had been portrayed as in the history books. He knew that Southerners were not all racists. In fact, Grant knew that most Southern whites were generally fine with minorities because they lived among them. Many Southerners (of all colors) were Christians who believed that people of every race were the children of God and should be respected as such. Sure, there was still some racism in the South, but it was nothing like the stereotypes of racist Southerners portrayed by the North.

Grant had never known or even heard of a Southerner who thought slavery was a good idea. But the Confederate flag said something nasty to Grant. That symbol had become a symbol of racism. Try as he might, he couldn’t get past the negative image he had of that flag.

The yellow Revolutionary War “Don’t Tread on Me” flag was far better. Sometimes called the “Gadsden flag,” the “Don’t Tread on Me” flag communicated the liberty of the Revolutionary War without any of the racial baggage. The Tea Party had successfully adopted “Don’t Tread on Me” as its symbol. Of course, the progressive media tried to make “Don’t Tread on Me” into the new Confederate flag and imply that only racists flew the Gadsden.

Bill Owens called Grant from Texas during the refugee crisis.

“Things are getting dicey down here, man,” Bill said. “Mexican gangs are doing some pretty bold stuff. People are on edge. I’ve got all my mags loaded. I sleep with my 12 gauge nearby. People are starting to openly carry handguns and even long guns. All people can talk about is how much the Feds suck. If I need to get out of here, can I come up to you?” Bill was an officer in the Texas Guard so he should probably stay in Texas, but it never hurt to have a backup plan.

“Of course, man,” Grant said, trying to take in all this news. It’s really happening, he thought. “But I think things will be difficult up here, too. Soon,” Grant said to Bill. Then they talked about the logistics of keeping in contact and deciding if Bill’s family should come up or if the Matsons should come down. Grant kept thinking about what a hard sell he would have with Lisa. “Hey,” Grant would have to say to Lisa, “Let’s evacuate to the Free Republic of Texas.”

“Have you lost your mind?” she would scream. Oh, what fun times they were in.

Grant had one of those moments when he didn’t know if he was in the present or the future. Things were happening exactly as he thought they would. Was it happening now or was he seeing the future? He couldn’t tell. Perhaps it was both.

“Who were you talking to?” Lisa asked him.

“Oh, Bill in San Antonio,” Grant said as if nothing were wrong. “Sandy says ‘hi.’” Bill’s wife and Lisa were friends back when Grant and Bill were in law school.

“Are things OK for them down there?” she asked, in her first mention of the Mexican crisis. She must have seen something on TV about it.

“They’re taking some precautions,” Grant said casually. “I told them they could come up here if need be,” he said, wondering what her reaction would be.

“Sure. If they want to,” Lisa said. To her, the issue was a visit with old friends instead of people fleeing chaos and violence.

Bill and Sandy fleeing Texas wasn’t a visit with old friends to Grant. It was proof that a collapse was happening. Grant wondered if he was overreacting.

Chapter 34

People Get What They Deserve

Grant was driving to work and listening to the radio. At the top of the hour, the news came on. As interested as he was in the California and Mexican crises, he was actually getting a little tired of all the 24/7 coverage of it. He was having crisis fatigue.

He was hardly paying attention to the radio news announcer when she said nonchalantly, “The nation’s credit rating has been lowered again. Moodys and Standard and Poors, which rate stocks and bonds, have lowered the U.S. bond rating …” blah, blah, blah. The U.S. Government’s bond rating had been lowered earlier from AAA to AA. This was yet another downgrade, now from AA to A.

The radio news went on, “Experts predict that Uncle Sam’s cost of borrowing money will go up yet again. In other news …” This meant that Moody and Standard and Poors were telling investors that buying bonds from the U.S., loaning money to the U.S. for it to spend on unsustainable social programs, was no longer a safe investment. Grant knew what this meant. Collapse.

The bond rating was a really big deal. It meant that investors, like the Chinese, would be even more reluctant to keep propping up the U.S. Government by buying U.S. bonds, which is, in effect, loaning money to the U.S. Government. It had always been only a matter of time until the Chinese came to this conclusion, but it looked like that day had arrived.

“Today,” Grant said to himself. This was it. The lowering of the bond rating would mean a sell-off of U.S. bonds. The question was whether it would be instantaneous or dragged out for some time. The Federal Reserve would create more fake money with a few keyboard clicks to buy the bonds. This meant trillions of fresh dollars would flood into the system. Inflation would go up. Way up; the only question was how high. Would it be 1970s inflation of 10% or 1990s Russian inflation of 300%? Somewhere in between? Even 10% would be devastating.

The lower bond rating had another devastating effect on the economy. The U.S. would need to raise the interest it paid on its bonds much, much higher to entice investors. Interest on the bonds had always been a percent or two. Now it might be 5%, 10%, or higher.

This meant the U.S. had to pay more (in inflated, made-up dollars) to borrow money. This added fuel to the inflation fire. It also meant the amount of interest people in the U.S. paid would go way up. Many private loans for houses and other things were based on the U.S. bond interest rate; when it went up, so did interest on mortgages, credit cards, and everything else. This alone would grind the economy to a halt.

The stock market crashed about five minutes after the announcement of the second bond downgrade. The downgrade, coupled with the fact that the U.S. Government had basically lost control of its Southern border, led to a massive sell off. The stock market went down 900 points before trading was suspended. Gold went up 50% in about ten minutes. People were in a full panic.