Home Invasion - J. A. Johnstone [12]
Of course, he had known all along that it would come to this. Even as a boy, he had known that it was his destiny to be president. He’d always been the smartest one in school, and not just book smarts, either. He was handsome and charming and had a knack for getting people to believe him and to do what he wanted them to do.
All for their own good, of course.
Now he was in a position to remake this country the way it ought to be, to show people who didn’t agree with him the error of their ways, to patiently explain to them why he was right and they were wrong and if they would just go along with what he wanted their lives would be so much better.
And if they didn’t want to go along for their own good … well, the President of the United States wasn’t known as the most powerful man in the free world for no reason, now was he?
He would make them go along. Stupid, racist rednecks.
But he had learned from the mistakes of his predecessors. Over the past dozen years, it had become impossible for anyone to be elected to the highest office in the land without the fawning approval of the media, and each victor in turn had tried to push the country farther to the left, convinced that it was his or her mandate to do so.
Unfortunately, there were large segments of the populace who didn’t agree with that, mostly from those damned flyover states that nobody who mattered really cared about anyway, and they had made it difficult to get any truly progressive policies implemented. The last two people who had held this office before him hadn’t been bold enough. They had clung to some foolish notion that people should be happy with change, even massive change.
This President knew better than that. That was what he had based his entire life on.
He knew best.
And even though he had been biding his time, he knew that when the moment arrived, he would make them all see that he was right.
Maybe today.
He thought that every day when he sat down behind the big desk in the Oval Office.
And today just might be the day, because his Chief of Staff looked very excited when he hurried into the room.
“Have you heard the news, boss?”
“You mean about what the Vice-President said at that dinner last night?” The woman had a positive genius for putting her foot in her mouth.
“No, this,” the Chief of Staff said as he picked up a remote from the President’s desk and pushed some buttons.
A wall panel slid aside to reveal a giant-screen TV, which lit up as the Chief of Staff turned it on.
“Damn it, who left it on that channel?” the President exploded as he saw which of the cable news networks the set was tuned to.
“Sorry, sir,” the Chief of Staff said as he hastily switched the channel. “Maybe some of the cleaning crew had it on while they were in here last night, even though they know it’s against the rules. I’ll find out and deal with it, you can be sure of that.”
“Fire whoever was responsible.”
“Of course, sir. “ The Chief of Staff raised the volume. “Just listen to this, if you don’t mind.”
A man with slicked-back hair and sunglasses was saying, “I am ashamed to be a Texan.”
“Well, of course, he is, whoever he is,” the President said. “Any sane person would be ashamed to be a Texan. They haven’t voted correctly in … how many elections in a row is it now?”
“I don’t know, sir.”
“The whole state’s just a bunch of religious fanatic, death-penalty-loving, gun nuts. Praise God, pass the ammunition, and fire up the electric chair."’
“They were using lethal injection down there, sir, until we put a stop to it. But if you’d just listen …”
“Who was that?”
“A lawyer.”
The President smiled. He loved lawyers. He might have been one himself, if things had worked out differently. And they were always good for massive campaign donations.
An anchorman was talking now about some shooting that had left two people dead and another injured. “Gun nuts,” the President muttered. “I suppose somebody with a grudge against the government went on a rampage?