Dawn of the Unthinkable (7 page)

They walked down the hallway together in
silence. Rudi did not know why he stayed with this man; he could be
pompous, petty, arrogant, and vain.
Now we have to add cowardly
to the list
, he thought ruefully. He might have to take some of
the other job offers he had been receiving a little more
seriously.

Kincaid asked him, “Any other camera-toting
vultures in there?”

Rudi squinted his eyes, trying to remember
the human contents of the room. “If there was, they have already
packed up and left, so I think we got away with something.” He
could not resist speaking his next thought, “Really, Senator, that
wasn’t too manly,” he said in as respectful a voice as he could
muster.

“I know, I know,” Kincaid half-whined. “It’s
just that I’ve seen that damn
Zapruder
film about a million
times and I’ve just got this morbid fear of getting my head blown
off.” Rudi had heard this before, and while he could see why
someone may have wanted to take Kennedy out, this guy probably
could not stir the same passions.

“Senator, I can’t remember too many senators
other than Bobby Kennedy getting shot, so I think you’re safe.
Besides, I don’t think anyone would do something like that in a
committee hearing room. Too many witnesses.”

Kincaid lapsed into a depressed silence. He
had not thought of that; of course, Rudi was right.
Oh, man
,
he sighed to himself,
the press would have a fine time with this
one
. He could hear the messages pouring in now from “The
Mothers against Inappropriate Touching in the Face of Sap
Squirting,” or some such focus group that seemed to form with the
sole purpose of devilling him. Sometimes he wondered if it was all
worth it, whether the indignities he had to put up with could
outweigh the perks. Then he thought of the one perk he was on his
way to, and he picked up his pace.
She
would take his mind
off this sorry mess.

He got back to his office
and went into his private bathroom (
One of the perks
, he
reflected,
mine even has a shower, unlike those for the lowly
congressmen.
). He looked in the mirror and cursed that he would
need a shower. He had hoped that a little water would take the
stuff out, but nothing short of a whole scrub would do. He started
to strip down, ignoring the phone ringing in the office. Ginny, his
secretary had already left, and the rest of the staff was at one of
the endless retirement/bridal/engagement parties that any large
organization could generate. He had long ago quit attending these
events unless forced. His own family life had somewhat
disintegrated in the face of too many late nights on the Senate
floor, and in other, less-esteemed establishments; therefore, it
was hard to celebrate others’ good fortunes. Besides, as a classic
narcissist, he could not much see the point of any gathering in
which he was not the center of attention. He flipped open his cell
phone and dialed her number. He had not put it in the phone’s
memory, and the phone itself was registered in an aide's name. If
something ever came up, he wanted “plausible deniability,” a term
that still made him laugh. Washington had many euphemisms for
lying.

The phone rang twice before it was picked
up. There was silence on the other end, and he quickly looked at
the window on the phone to make sure he had dialed the right
number. The number was right, so he said hesitantly “Hello…?”

The answer came back as a snarl, “Where the
hell have you been? You’re late!” The ferocity of the tone took him
by surprise. He was used to her being in control but still had a
hard time adapting to the lack of fawning respect he got from most
other people. Of course, this was part of her appeal, and he could
feel a flush of excitement coursing through him.

He stammered, “I, uh, kind of got tied up
here. Some legislative stuff, you know,” giving a little half-fake
laugh.

Her reply chilled him. “I know! I saw it all
on TV! Were you
hurt
?” She laughed wickedly. He closed his
eyes and felt a headache beginning in his temples.

“What did you see?” he asked, fearing the
worst and trying to find the remote control to the TV.

“Check out
CNN
, baby. They been
replaying it over and over again,” she cackled. “They even have the
point of impact, just like your beloved
Zapruder
film.” Once
again, he regretted telling her about that; she was always using it
to club his lack of manhood. However, nothing could have
emasculated him more than the film he was now viewing on the
tube.

It clearly showed the young lady approaching
him, and him using his best fatherly, senator mannerisms. You could
not hear what they were saying, but you could see him look away at
one point; people would be able to see that he was looking for an
aide to pull him out of the conversation. It was at that point that
the silly yellow bottle came out of her purse, and he reached for
the page. You could see her startled expression, which quickly
turned to shock and outrage as her skirt went to half-mast and a
pretty pair of pink panties was there for the world to see.
Damn, in the old days, ladies wore slips
, he thought,
and
this might not have been so bad. But no, this child (she looked all
of about sixteen) had to go practically au naturel, probably to
allow some cheesy boyfriend quicker access
, he thought
disgustedly. He could see his eyes wide with terror, and he looked
like a perfect fool.

He clicked the TV off and hung his head. A
scriptwriter could not have made this any worse. He knew he was
going to be a laughing-stock and was not looking forward to meeting
with the spin-doctors to try to fix this. Smug bastards, they would
be shaking their heads in sympathy while internally calculating
their fees like a bunch of crows fighting over road kill. He
remembered he still had her on the phone. “Oh, boy,” he sighed into
the phone, “that was bad.”

“
Bad?
” she laughed, “That was a
joke
! I’d hate to see what you’d do if someone pulled a real
gun instead of a kitchen utensil. You’d probably try to crawl up
some aide’s asshole!” she said with total scorn. He winced at the
imagery. Why did he put up with this? Then he remembered.

“Should I still come over?” he asked
hopefully.

“I prefer real men, but I guess you’ll have
to do. Get here in fifteen minutes, or I’ll be gone,” she said and
hung up.

He hung up and hustled into the shower. It
would be impossible to get there in that time, but she would wait
just for the pleasure of ripping into him for being late. As the
water coursed around him, he wondered about how the film had gotten
to
CNN
so quickly. It had to be a set-up, because the
cameraman, who must have had one of those small camcorders, had
only focused on the girl and him. Those tree-huggers would not have
thought up anything as nasty as this on their own. Usually they
were content with rhyming slogans on recycled poster-board. No,
somebody had to have put them up to it, but who? Could it be the
one he was going to see? She was not usually the type to stage
events that involved other people, but maybe she was branching out.
On the other hand, maybe his wife. She certainly would not mind
seeing him humiliated, as he had done it to her enough. He quit
thinking about it as his headache worsened; he would have to take
something for it now. He finished his shower, dressed, and left for
his appointment.

Fall 1989

Ryan came back from the range re-energized.
He was only an average golfer, but driving the ball was his
strength and he loved to bang them out. Douglass was a lot better
but was pretty forgiving of his mistakes, so he was the ideal
partner.

The physical hiatus allowed Ryan to plunge
back into writing his article. He was glad he did not have to do
this for a living, as sometimes the words came to him easily. At
other times, he could barely squeeze out a “the.” He figured that
if he could just stick to it, he might be able to finish in a week,
which was about his attention span for extra-curricular projects
such as these.

He had, in the course of his work life, a
lot of low paying part-time jobs. So even if he did not have the
academic credentials to write a political commentary with a lack of
a PoliSci degree, he did have a broad range of life experiences to
draw on. So while his upbringing had been lower middle-class
suburban, he had experienced some of the grittier jobs that a man
could have. Though certain people might question his ability to
comment on the state of society, he felt that he had worked up from
the bottom, becoming the first in his family to earn a Master’s
degree. In order to fix society you had to have seen how most parts
of it lived, and through working tough jobs and witnessing how the
upper class lived, he had a good idea of how things worked. He had
heard many different opinions from the various people he had worked
with over the years and tried to incorporate many of those thoughts
into his writing.

Even though his varied resume wasn’t normal,
he felt that he had become more well-rounded with his professional
experiences. It was a benefit few people had, but he thought it was
valuable. Therefore, his system would encourage “job-shifters,” who
would come and go at whatever jobs they were qualified for. They
would have to stay long enough to be trained so that their work
would be minimally acceptable at the least, and safe. Careers
requiring a great deal of training to be safe, such as pilot,
police, and firemen, would not be able to have as much
job-shifting, but even there, a greater amount of attrition would
be encouraged. It had to be assumed that if complete chaos could be
avoided, the jobs would be enhanced by the constant influx of fresh
ideas.
This would be especially important in the government,
where people tend to stay, and stay… and stay some more
, he
thought with a smile. He tried to rationalize his long tenure as
compared to his plan’s philosophy, and he thought,
Well, a
certain amount of stability would be required to keep some
“corporate knowledge” in every organization
. The only problem
was when certain institutions, such as the government, presented so
much job security that hardly anyone ever left. While there may be
expertise (and this was often debated), there was rarely
enthusiasm, and the organization began to become stagnant. His plan
would always provide a minimal level of subsistence even to people
who were “between jobs” for years and therefore encourage
turnover.

The job-shifters would bring their new ideas
and their inevitable mistakes to many new trainer and inspector
types of jobs. With this much activity, joblessness could become
virtually extinct, and reasons for crime would start to dry up.
Boredom and lack of self-esteem, often from not holding a job,
could then lead to crime; this system would give a purpose to
everyone. For those who seemed at risk, they would be appointed a
counselor at an early age, and intensive follow-up would be
performed until a person was performing at his best capability. All
people would have to serve some time in this corps of counselors,
so that they would have some empathy with “under-achievers,” and
would know first-hand of the pitfalls to avoid. He sat down to
write out the thoughts.

2. All People Should be
Employed.

All people should be
employed, but those who are incapable of employment will be urged
to work for the betterment of society.
Unemployment of any kind will be eliminated, with job
trainers and counselors established to help the chronically
unemployed. The committees, evaluators, and administrators will be
considered jobs that are of benefit to society, and therefore will
go toward maintaining and upgrading a person’s lifestyle if they
are unable to work at anything else. The new order will be based
upon using the already existing work ethic within citizens and
providing jobs at all skill levels. In this manner, all people can
become contributing members of society, and gain the self-esteem
that accrues from participating fully in a community. In order to
accomplish this, society must:


Provide a complete
education to everyone, starting as soon after birth as desired. All
people will have complete access to as high and varied a level of
education as they are capable of achieving. There will be branch
campuses of the best schools in all fifty states. The attaining of
advanced degrees or professional status in a trade will be
evaluated and will lead to substantial upgrades in lifestyle. There
will be many more trade schools created to train people to build
the increased amount of housing stock that will be required, as
well as processing increased amounts of necessities.


A person can work at the
job that they are currently in, or switch as many times in a career
as they choose without loss of their current lifestyle. Those
choosing to stay will provide stability, while those that choose to
change often will provide new ideas and energy. In order to
maintain safety and “corporate knowledge,” experienced employees
will receive higher sustenance, but job “shifters” will not have to
worry about unemployment. The constant turnover will create the
need for new inspectors, trainers, and administrators, creating
more jobs. In this way, there will be a job available for everyone
as soon as they are able to work. This will alleviate the problems
caused when an individual stays in a job that they do not enjoy
solely to maintain their standard of living and the despair of
unemployment.


There will be sufficient
labor to produce all that society needs, so that those who
currently do not directly produce products (i.e. lawyers,
administrators) can continue to provide the services that they
currently perform. With full employment, the current workweek can
be reduced so that working parents can spend more time with their
families. Computer inventory programs will continually determine
what goods are needed, so that operations can produce what is
necessary, not what they think will sell, or what they are trying
to sell. People should be encouraged to consider farming, because
in a world without money, food and products will be valuable
resources.