Dead or Alive - Tom Clancy [186]
Jack, this guy’s a loser,” George Winston announced, to general agreement around the dining room table. “The country needs somebody different. You, for example.”
“Question is, will you come back in?” Ryan asked.
“I’ve served my time,” the former Secretary of the Treasury replied.
“I tried saying that, too, but Arnie isn’t buying.”
“Goddamn it, we got the tax system all fixed until that dickhead went and fucked it all up again—and he chopped revenue doing it!” Winston emphasized in some disgust. Raising tax rates invariably decreased revenues as soon as accountants got to work on the new code. The new and “fair” tax code was a godsend to the tax-avoidance community.
“What about Iraq?” Tony Bretano asked, changing directions. The former CEO of TRW had been Ryan’s chosen Secretary of Defense.
“Well, like it or not, we’re stuck with it,” Ryan admitted. “Question is, can we smart our way out of it? Smarter than Kealty’s being, at least.”
“When Mary Diggs gave his speech two years back, he damned near got himself shot.” General Marion Diggs had clobbered the military of the United Islamic Republic during his tour as Army chief of staff, but his observations about more recent conflicts had been totally ignored by the new administration. Diggs’s successors in the Pentagon had bowed to White House orders and done what they’d been told to do. It was a common-enough failing of senior military officers and wasn’t the least bit new. The price for many of the fourth star was to have your balls removed. Most of them were not old enough to have served in Vietnam. They hadn’t seen friends and class-mates die for political misjudgment, and the lessons inflicted on the previous class of officers had been lost in the process of something called “progress.” That Ed Kealty had dissolved two complete light-infantry divisions, then walked into a conflict that cried aloud for light-infantry formations, was something the news media had almost totally ignored. Besides, tanks were pretty things to photograph.
“I’ll say this for you, Tony. You always listened to advice,” Ryan told him.
“Helps to know what you don’t know. I’m a good engineer, but I don’t know it all yet. This guy who took my old office is occasionally wrong, but he’s never in doubt.” Former Secretary Bretano had just described the most dangerous person on the planet. “Jack, I have to tell you now, I won’t be coming back. My wife’s sick. Breast cancer. We’re hoping they caught it early enough, but the jury’s still out on that.”
“Who’s your doc?” Ryan asked.
“Charlie Dean. UCLA. He’s pretty good, they tell me,” Bretano answered.
“Wish you luck, pal. If Cathy can help, let us know, okay?” Ryan had used his wife for numerous medical referrals over the years, and unlike most political figures, he didn’t figure that everybody with an M.D. after his name was the same, at least in treating other people.
“I will, thanks.” The news had a sobering effect on the meeting, in any case. Valerie Bretano, a vivacious mother of three, was well liked by just about everyone.
“What about the announcement?” van Damm asked.
“Yeah, gotta do that, don’t I?”
“Unless you want a stealth campaign. Kinda hard to win that way,” Arnie observed. “Want me to get Callie Weston to gin up a speech for you?”
“She’s good with words,” Ryan acknowledged. “When will I have to do it?”
“Sooner the better. Start framing the issues.”
“I agree,” Winston said. “He doesn’t know how to hit above the belt. Any bad baggage, Jack?”
“Nothing I know of—and that doesn’t mean nothing I remember. If I’ve ever broken the law, they’ll have to prove it to me, and a jury.”
“Good to hear that,” Winston observed. “I believe you, Jack, but remember the devil’s advocate. Lots of them in Washington.”
“What about Kealty? What dirty laundry does he have around?”
“A lot,” Arnie answered. “But you can only use that weapon with care. Remember, he has the ear of the press. Unless you have a videotape, they’ll apply a hellacious reality test to it,