Distraction - Bruce Sterling [192]
This bizarre allegation simply hung there, misfiring, for another forty-eight hours. There was no formal reaction from the Administration. They simply declined comment on the issue, as if the demagogic raving of the Governor of Louisiana was too clownish for words. Public attention focused instead on the U.S. Navy, whose Atlantic armada was being launched against the Dutch in an archaic ritual of wind-snapping Old Glories. The gallant old warcraft wallowed out to sea from their half-drowned military dry docks. All eyes were on the War now—or at least, they were supposed to be.
Outside America, it was obvious to anyone, even the perennially suspicious Chinese, that a naval attack on the Dutch was an absurd and ridiculous gesture. It was the subject of amused lampoons in Europe. Only the Dutch seemed sincerely upset.
But the effect within America was profound. The nation was at War. Roused from its fatal lethargy by the cheering prospect of doing some serious harm, the Congress had actually declared a War. The result was instant, intense civil discord. Outflanked by the state of War, most of the Emergency committees promised to go quietly. A few defied the Congress and the President, risking arrest. In the meanwhile, antiwar networks congealed and raged in the streets. They were sincerely disgusted to see the Constitution perverted, and the nation dishonored, for domestic political advantage.
Twenty-four more feverish hours of War ticked by. Then, the Administration accused the Governor of Louisiana of conducting unethical medical experiments on illegal aliens. This news arrived in the very midst of the martial fife-playing and drumbeating. It was a shocking distraction. But it was serious—bad, very bad, unbelievably bad. The surgeon general and the cabinet head of Health Services were wheeled out in public, burdened with grim looks, medical evidence, and terrifying cranial flip charts.
The PR attack on Huey was badly handled, amateurish, graceless even. But it was lethal. Huey had laughed off many other scandals, sidestepped them, passed the buck, silenced his critics, suborned them. But this scandal was beyond the pale. It was all about invisible, helpless, rootless people, deliberately driven out of their minds as an industrial process. That was just a little too close to home for most Americans. They couldn’t live with that.
When his phone rang, Oscar was, for once, entirely ready.
“You little SCUMBAG!” Huey screamed. “You evil Yankee narc! Those people were perfectly happy! It was heaven on earth! And the feds came in the dark and kidnapped them! They burned them alive!”
“Good evening, Governor! I take it you’ve seen tonight’s Administration briefing.”
“You’re FINISHED, you jumped-up little creep! I’m gonna make you sorry you were ever cloned! I made promises to those people, they were under my care. You outed them! I know it was you. Admit it!”
“Governor, of course I admit it. Let’s be adults here. That news was bound to come out, whether I leaked it or not. You can’t run two years of secret neural experiments on hundreds of human subjects and not have leaks. Scientists talk to each other. Even your pet scientists. Even nonpedigreed chicken-fried scientists who live down in salt mines doing gruesome things to foreigners. Scientists communicate their findings, that’s just the way scientists are. So of course your pet goons in the salt mines leaked word to other neuroscientists. And of course I got wind of it. And of course I told the President. I work for the President.” He cleared his throat. “Mind you, I didn’t design that presentation tonight. If I had, it would have