With the American Army committed in Mexico and the internal chaos going on inside America, it was believed the US would not have sufficient forces available to prevent the IR from wiping out Israel, allowing the IR to finally secure the entire Middle East and bring an end to the Jewish State.
“Mr. President, it is official. All votes are in and the referendum won in the US with 62 % of the vote. It also won in Canada with 52 % — not as much as we would have liked — but it passed,” said Monty with a big grin on his face.
“This is great news. PM Peck is scheduled to call me at 1100 today, and we are going to hold a joint news conference tonight at 7pm here at the White House to make it official. We will both sign the referendum into law, and that will start the official process of merging our two countries together,” the President said happily.
“This is a great day, Mr. President. It is clearly one of the most significant moments in American history, sir. Ten new states will join the Union and our country will increase in size by over 40 %,” said Monty.
“Mr. President, congratulations on the referendum,” said Jeff, also smiling from ear to ear.
“Thank you, Jeff. It was a lot of hard work selling this these past three months; I’m just glad it paid off. I fear it would have been bad politically if it did not.”
“Well, Mr. President, it worked and we have ten new states. I’m going to organize a meeting as soon as possible with their former economics and finance ministers, and we will work to bring the Canadian economy into ours. We will need to work on currency conversions, consolidating their debt into ours and converting their people’s money into NADs. It’s going to take a bit of time to make all of these adjustments, Mr. President, but this is a task I am really looking forward to,” said Jeff said with a serious look of determination.
“I am too. This is a significant point in our country’s history, no doubt, and this is also a chance for all of our people to start something new. I firmly believe this will really improve the economy,” said the President with confidence in his voice.
“I believe it will certainly help. Their unemployment is still near 20 % while ours has finally fallen below 6 % for the first time in two decades. There are significant infrastructure projects that will need to be done in Canada, but the sheer volume of natural resources is going to be an amazing boon to our economy. They have been unable to exploit them properly for decades because of a lack of investment and their ridiculous environmental laws,” said Monty, who was clearly calculating the new wealth this would bring to the country.
“That is about to change gentleman. Monty, we also need to work very vigorously to get the Freedom Party firmly entrenched in the new Canadian States. We need to ensure that they know which party is bringing them this newfound prosperity and security.”
“Yes, Mr. President. That will be one of our first tasks; I will meet with Speaker Fultz about this and get the party heads working on getting things set up,” said Monty, tapping a quick note to himself on his tablet.
The Speaker of the House, Mike Fultz, was also the Deputy Chairman of the Freedom Party, while the President remained the Chairman. Speaker Fultz’ primary responsibility within the party was its expansion and recruitment of candidates. The actual Freedom Party headquarters was located in Tampa, FL, where Henry Stein initially founded the group. The Party actually had 7,000 full time employees spread throughout the country and boasted an incredible candidate research team. Their goal was to find and interview potential candidates for positions in their state that the FP thought they could win.
For the past eight years, the FP had been active in identifying and recruiting candidates to run for every state and federal position across the country. Of course, not every candidate won, but enough candidates were winning at the state level that several states were now FP governed and run states. As the economy continued to improve, more people left the Democrat and Republican parties to join the one party that truly was doing what they said they would do. Their goal was to truly bring prosperity back to America and make the nation great again.
The President, out of necessity, was already starting to turn his attention towards his own re-election. “Remember this is an election year, and the Democrats and Republicans are already going full bore after us. The polls still show us with a very commanding lead, but once the final candidates are determined, it will be a tougher fight.”
“I would not be too concerned with it, Mr. President. In the last three years, unemployment has gone down almost 6 %, and is going down 1 % to 2 % each quarter. We are showing steady economic progress and more and more people have money in their pockets,” said Jeff.
“Thank you for the assurance, Jeff. Let me and the President worry about the political stuff; you worry about integrating the Canadian industry and economy into ours and ensure that the economy continues to improve,” said Monty, clearly not wanting another senior advisor in the Administration advising the President on the election or political matters within the FP.
“Sure thing, Monty. I didn’t mean to intrude into your area; I was just saying I don’t see the elections being a problem for us. I travel the country a lot, and when I’m waiting around in the airports, I often strike up random conversations with people and ask them what they think of the Freedom Party. The vast majority of people love the President’s straight talk and the President’s take charge attitude. I very seldom find someone who has something negative to say,” said Jeff.
“That’s good to know, Jeff. I do appreciate your thoughts on the matter. What Monty means is that you have a huge job ahead of you, and a lot of our political success will hinge on our success or failure with the economy. Focus on your part of the machine and let us focus on the other parts,” the President said with a smile, clearly trying to ensure Jeff did not feel left out of the inner circle.
The spring and summer of 2040 brought dramatic changes to North America as Canada and the United States merged into one country. Ten new stars were added to the flag, bringing the total number of stars to 64 (Northern and Southern California, East and West Colorado, East and West Washington State had separated and become their own states during the early 2020s under the Warren Administration, and Puerto Rico had also been added as a State during the same timeframe).
The United States continued to see enormous economic growth, especially as employee wages began to quickly increase. The median household income had risen from $62,400 annually in 2037 to $83,700 by the summer of 2040. The Republicans had nominated one of their rising stars to challenge Henry Stein and the Freedom Party while the Democrats nominated a familiar name and face, Senator Lowden from Northern California.
England and the EU also continued to grow as the Transatlantic Fair Trade Agreement increased trade and eased movement between the two continents. England and the EU also began to experience a sharp increase in emigration as tens of thousands of Muslims were immigrating to the Islamic Republic. The IR was starting to truly turn into the Islamic paradise most Muslims longed for. It was a pure Islamic country, with little in the way of Western influence. The State controlled that, to be sure. Slowly, the IR was starting to solve their food shortage problems through the creation of thousands of bio domes and genetically modified seeds to grow more food per acre than traditional seeds.
The modernization of the IR military continued at a rapid rate. They had increased their military force to near three million soldiers, and another two million more were being trained. Russia and China both had increased the number of military advisors in the IR to over 50,000. China had established a new naval base in Oman, repositioning one of their supercarriers as they continued their expansion into East and South Africa. Russia had expanded their naval base in what used to be Syria; they had also leased an airfield and established a training squadron to assist the IR in training pilots for the new aircraft they were purchasing.