5 – The Fixer
Late in the evening, after the election results were announced, there were celebrations up and down the streets of D.C. There were speeches, parties, more parties, and even late-night gatherings to congratulate everyone. Needless to say, it was a long night that lasted into the early hours of the morning. The final good nights were at about 2:00 AM when Hawthorne finally lay his head down to catch some sleep. He had an early morning rise with a 7:00 AM meeting to meet some of his cabinet member choices.
At the campaign headquarters, Hawthorne and Leon were still ecstatic about the outcome. However, Leon showed concern on his face, so Hawthorne started, “What’s wrong? I can always tell when you have something on your mind. Do we have a problem?”
“There are some troubling items I need to take care of. We can fix it, but I need to know about something in your past.”
Hawthorne felt anxious. “Go on!”
“Someone has posted something about an incident back in your high school days. I need you to tell me about some guy named Taylor Quinn and something about you putting a kid in the hospital,” Leon queried.
“That son of a bitch! Quinn is just some asshole I went to school with. He and his family had me cornered due to a situation that happened. Good thing my dad cleared it up.”
“Continue, as I think there is more to it than just that. What did you do to this other kid?” Leon asked.
“Well, that other kid, he went by Leslie, I think, or some queer name like that. He came out as gay, and he thought that no one would have an issue with that. He thought we’d all just go along with it.
“After class, I kicked his ass all over the parking lot. I banged him up against his little yellow gay VW bug. I smashed his face in and broke his nose. Come to think of it, I think he had a few broken ribs and a punctured lung. I would have finished him off, but then Taylor interrupted.
“I was just introducing him to Central Kansas’ response to what those types of vermin deserve. To be wiped off -”
Leon stopped him, “I know those were different times, and now you would handle this more politically correct. I hope? So, we can fix this.
“I have found out that this Quinn of yours works at a small university in western Kansas. I have already sent a message to the Dean of Technology and the President of the university. In the celebration of our win, we are donating to small colleges all over the country, and theirs is on our list. However, we needed to deal with any disturbances to your character, so I mentioned that they needed to investigate some false claims. In addition, if dealt with discreetly, we would want to offer to donate funds to erect a building on their campus to house their political science department.
“The good news is that they had just started a political science department this semester. The timing could not have been better for us. So, this will be swept under the rug rather quickly.
“The President of the university has responded and assured me that things will be dealt with and not to worry. They look forward to having a building with your name on it on their campus. The President of the university has even offered a tour, and I think we should go tour the campus and deal with this dissident directly ourselves,” Leon finished.
“I think we need to bury this guy, Quinn! Bury him so deep that he won’t be able to climb out. How do you propose we do that?” asked Hawthorne.
Leon responded with an inquisitive tone. “Let me stew on that. I think we can manage some financial mishaps and such. But we will wait until we meet him and see if that is necessary. If he proves to be a problem, we will act then. Things will go our way! Hawthorne wins again!”
They both laughed at the fun they were going to have, destroying an enemy in their path.
At the 7:00 AM cabinet meeting, the agenda was to gather all the prospective cabinet choices and inform them of some changes. After everyone was accounted for and seated, the meeting started.
It was discussed that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and its subsidiary Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) would be rebranded as a private company named VigilNest, headed by Leon’s best friend Virgil Müller. In public, he would be known as Vincent Miller. Medicare/Medicaid would be combined and rebranded as a private company named CareNest, headed by Kelvin Handschuh, to be known publicly as Kevin Handy. Social Security would be rebranded as a private company named SilverNest, headed by Günter Schmidt, who would be referred to publicly as Gary Smith.
Leon ran the meeting and ended it with, “The plan is to cut these government programs, thus cutting them out of the national budget and national debt. At first, we will have resistance from the general public, as these ‘entitlement entities’, as they like to call them, are essential to the poor and needy.
“Once we cut these programs, we will announce their new counterparts. We will work on that later.
“Also, we need to rename our leaders to avoid the general prejudice that comes from a large sect of your voters. Which is why, as mentioned, our leaders will take on a whiter American name to avoid any of those predicted issues.”
Leon continued, “Lastly, this does not leave this room. Any leaks from one of you means all of you are out. If the leaker is found out, we will make it publicly known who it was, so the rest of you who got kicked out will know who the leaker was.”
With that, the meeting ended, and everyone left except Hawthorne, Tommy, and Leon. So, they continued their discussions.
“How long before we announce CareNest and SilverNest will file for bankruptcy and close down?” asked Hawthorne. “I want it to seem like we tried, yet circumstances led to their failures, and not that it was planned.”
Leon, pondering the thought, “Six months seems too soon. A year will seem coincidental. We should plan in about twenty-five months, after midterms, to show some signs of decay, not at the same time, but stagger them. I would say twenty-eight months for CareNest and thirty-eight months for SilverNest. This will give the impression of randomness and be far enough apart that the masses might have forgotten about the two and only focus on the present failure.”
Hawthorne added, “If we can pull this off and get the funds out before the bankruptcy, we could fund a lot of our agenda with those dead programs.”
“Yes, and we will have control of the poor, the weak, and the disabled. Those who cannot afford to pull themselves up out of despair, we use as some type of labor force. Those who are in debt, aka over their heads and cannot pay back what they owe, they too will also be added to that labor force. No more allowing the general public the option of filing bankruptcy,” Tommy surmised.
“We could set up people’s current debts into accounts. We will call this SoulNest,” said Hawthorne.
“If your account goes past due or you find yourself unable to pay your SoulNest, you could be added to that workforce,” added Tommy. “Just like we discussed in college. Remember? I think we called it IronNest.”
Leon ended with, “It is getting near lunch time, so we’d better wrap this up before your blood sugar gets out of control, Hawthorne.
“To wrap up, we combine existing government programs, and we make them private. Sometime in the future, due to a stock market crash that we control, these private companies will go under and dissolve. The destitute will make our workforce, which we can then give or lend to the corporations for cheap labor.
“Let’s go get some lunch!”
They were off, and the private meeting was over.
For the rest of the book:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0FP9QLW39