By the time we were finished, Lester came out as the leading ConPopper candidate in the eastern USA— and in early 2068, he went to Ottawa as a delegate and a politician to watch, mainly because no one could figure out why he’d worked so hard and spent more than a few millions of his own funds to get elected to what amounted to being a delegate to an advisory assembly.
The NAU wasn’t totally advisory, although most people thought so. It could set mandatory continental shelf fishing quotas as well as patrol the Arctic Ocean against foreign mineral-nappers, supported by the Offshore Patrol— what was left of the U.S. Coast Guard that had been transferred to the NAU, along with the less-than-adequate funding to support it. The NAU also had just completed the integrated intraborder security system between the U.S. and Canada, effectively erasing all border patrols there. The Congress had acquiesced in that in order to shift U.S. Homeland Security forces to the Mexican border, where they could expand their free-fire zones. Besides, since more and more U.S. citizens had migrated northward, and very few Canadians wanted to move south, there wasn’t much point in the U.S. border checkpoints anyway, and the Canadians still wanted U.S. new dollars.
For the first year, Lester made speeches and attended debates, and offered high-sounding propositions— but only the ones I told him wouldn’t come back to bite him. Anderson LeBrun didn’t like Ottawa. That was what he told Lester, anyway, nothing about his not wanting his dalliances to come out, given his prenuptial agreement with his fourth wife— something about a different resource division if that occurred. I did counsel Anderson that leaving was probably in his best interests. I even smiled. He didn’t.
Before long, Lester proposed letting the NAU Offshore Patrol take over anti-smuggling duties along the North American coastline. With the adoption of the low-cost MS integrated sonar/radar imaging systems and the RPV-towed balloon limpet mines, the Offshore Patrol effectively reduced sea-borne smuggling by 90 percent, and Lester was hailed as innovative and cost-effective.
That wasn’t enough for him, but I’d known that from the beginning. Fame and adulation are far more addictive than money or sex, or even money and sex combined.
He sauntered into the staff office in Ottawa on that June fourteenth and looked at me. “I’ve done all I can do here. It’s time to get ready to make the Senate run.”
I gave him a polite smile, the one that he knew meant I had reservations.
“You don’t agree. Why not?”
“You’d be better served running for vice chairman of the NAU.” The popular view was that no one of any import wanted the position of vice chairman of the NAU, that is, except Charles Morgan … and Luis Gonsalvo, who had no chance, not when half his potential supporters had nowhere to vote. Even Lester wasn’t that interested.
“It’s a meaningless position in a largely ceremonial organization,” he pointed out. “Why would I want to do that? I ran for the NAU Assembly to build name recognition without having to wait for years to work up through the party to run for the U.S. Senate.”
I didn’t tell him that running for the Senate would have been a stupid decision. “It may seem like a meaningless position, but it has national and international visibility, and you get the NAU to pay for a larger staff. Plus, since they’re paid in Canadian loonies, you can get better staff while you wait for the next Senate election. You run next year, and you’re against John Jacob Astor. He won with eighty percent of the vote.”
“That’s because he was a porn star. Besides, I’ve got more than enough money.”
So I told him, “You might not take Astor, but you can take Morgan, and the position of vice chairman won’t be ceremonial in another two years.”
By then, Lester knew enough not to dispute me on things like that. “What do you see happening? What exactly do you have in mind?”
“What’s the current U.S. deficit— this past year?”
“Twenty trillion.”
“And what are the projections for next year?”
“You’re the political scientist.”
“That’s true.” At times, I knew he thought I was a political mad scientist, but I’d been right on so far as he was concerned, all the way.
“So you tell me what this has to do with me … and the Senate run.”
“Next year’s deficit will run to fifty trillion … if they’re lucky, and the president and the Congress will have to come to the NAU to serve as an intermediary for a bailout from Canada or the Indian multinationals. They won’t call it that. It’ll be a restructuring of governmental assets or something like that. The Canadians will have to pony up, because they don’t want the Indians getting a foothold, not after what it cost to buy off the Chinese in the second restructuring. You don’t want to be the Senate to clean up that mess, but you do want to be in a visible position when that happens. Even if it doesn’t happen, the visibility won’t hurt your political future. In fact, visibility in a position where you can’t be held accountable for the mess will be an asset.”
He did nod at that, before he spoke again. “What about Morgan? Charlie’s never made a mistake in his life. He’s still married to his childhood sweetheart. He’s not brilliant, but he’s definitely not stupid. He’s always hired the best and the brightest staff, and he’s listened to them.”
“What church does he attend?”
Lester looked puzzled. “That’s not an issue. The man hasn’t so much as a littering or a water-overuse citation. He’s greener than the northern swamps and straighter than a hydropower spillway.”
“Don’t worry about it. We’ll take care of it.” And we did.
First, we came up with a series of Webchures— each one targeted at a different voter niche. My favorite was the one for the high-minded hypocrites. We didn’t call them that, of course. They were voter group 1A-Beta: Undecided, highly educated, religiously affiliated, self-identified, self-made professionals.
The Webchure was slick. It showed Morgan in a series of images— all with members of his staff, all recognizable, and all digitally “enhanced” to highlight their attractiveness, especially that of the men, and their positions altered to bring them very close together. We also made some very subtle alterations to Morgan’s expressions, so that he appeared far more interested in his companion than in the papers or the scene. And the captions were, pardon the pun, apparently straightforward.
“NAU delegate Morgan working closely with trusted aide Mark Roberts …”
“Morgan discussing medical issues with …”
“Longtime personal assistant with Delegate Morgan …”
The text took Morgan’s own words, often from debates before the NAU in Ottawa, ostensibly setting forth his own words.
… and I would like to thank the gentlewoman from London, Ontario, and she is a gentle, sensitive, and feeling woman in every sense of the word, for raising the issue of non-asset-based financial and economic interdependence, particularly as it pertains to currency stability across the NAU …
… we all know what we know, but what we know is not necessarily what we think we know, especially in terms of cybertechnological-asset management interfaces …
The Webchures for other groups were more pointed, since most of the other niche voter groups weren’t inclined to value subtlety. I particularly liked the one that went to Weapons Unlimited, which featured Lester standing beside an M-98 tank, smiling.
“Tired of tiresome U.S. regulations on the right of self-protection? Ready for a new approach? Then support Bill Lester …”
Then again, the one to Trees Unlimited wasn’t bad, either. There, Lester was standing before a stand of Mugo pines in northern Saskatchewan and declaiming, “Reforestation is the key to a better environment and more effective government … I’ve known that for years, and that’s why I was one of the first to put my own money into growing these very trees …”