Full Black - Brad Thor [31]
“So Green Ramp is about choreographing a black swan event?”
“That’s what we think,” Salomon replied.
Ralston shook his head. “Standing manipulates America right up onto the ledge and then shoves. He ought to be tried for treason.”
“Now you know why I wanted to make this film. He needs to be exposed.”
“What he needs is to be swinging from the end of a rope. That’s the price you pay for treason.”
“Not anymore,” Salomon said. “Not in today’s America. We don’t try people for treason, much less put them to death for it. It’s looked upon as an archaic reaction to what should be handled, if at all, as a criminal matter. If we began hanging traitors, we’d lose a good many of our politicians, business and union leaders, even teachers.”
Considering some of the crimes that had been committed in the past twenty years in America, Ralston didn’t exactly think that would be a bad thing. “Do you have any idea what kind of black swan event they were looking at creating?”
“Unfortunately, no. It’s not the kind of thing they put on their website. And it might not be just one black swan, it could be a whole wedge of them.”
“But it’ll probably have something to do with the economy, right? Some sort of new financial crisis?”
The film producer shrugged. “Considering his expertise, that makes sense, but there are other possibilities. He’s stirred revolutions in other countries by creating crises of confidence in government. He’ll rig an election and then leak that the election was rigged. But even that might be too pedestrian when it comes to what he has planned for the United States. With his money and demented worldview, anything is possible.
“Remember, no matter what, James Standing feels that the ends justify the means.”
“Do you have any idea exactly what his ends are? What is it he has in mind? Some sort of global governance?” asked Ralston.
“Standing is a globalist, all right,” replied Salomon. “And he definitely believes he can help usher in some sort of utopia, but there’s one final step that would have to be undertaken, and that’s the most frightening thing of all about him.”
“What is it?”
“Remember what I said about him being worse than Hitler, Stalin, Mao, or Pol Pot if left unchecked?”
Ralston nodded.
“We found an interview he gave on the sidelines of the economic forum in Davos, Switzerland. It was some small European paper and maybe he didn’t think it would get any pickup, but he allowed his proverbial mask to slip. In the twentieth century, he said, the world saw the loss of about 225 million people due to war, genocide, and disaster. According to him, the only way mankind can survive the twenty-first century is if the world population is cut by at least five billion. And that will only happen if every industrialized nation is forced into collapse, starting with the United States.”
CHAPTER 16
NEW YORK CITY
Julia Winston crossed her legs in just such a way that James Standing couldn’t help but wonder if she was doing it purposely for him. It wouldn’t have been the first time a female reporter had done that. It didn’t make any difference that he was old enough to be her grandfather. Henry Kissinger had been wrong. Power wasn’t the ultimate aphrodisiac, money and power were and Standing had more than most could even imagine.
Winston was wearing an A-line skirt, the kind that clung tightly to her upper thighs and showed off her tiny waist. She wore an inexpensive yet chic collared shirt, probably from Brooks Brothers or, God forbid, Banana Republic. Her jewelry consisted of what appeared to be a small pair of diamond stud earrings, but that might have been fake. The only place she seemed to have spent any real money was on her shoes.
Smart girl, thought Standing. While most men wouldn’t have made it past her tits, any of the women in the field she was competing with would have checked out her shoes. The difference between bitch and classy bitch with women always came down to