Charles Wheelan - The Rationing

“Maybe not,” the Strategist said, almost musing to himself. The two women looked at him, waiting for him to complete the thought. “What’s the first thing you think of when you hear ‘U.S.-China Friendship Agreement’?” he asked.

“It’s the usual Orwellian doublespeak, like reading Pravda back in the day,” the National Security Adviser said.

“These guys are not nearly as good at propaganda as they think they are,” the Strategist said. “When you can shut down newspapers and arrest critics, you tend to lose the subtle art of persuasion.”

“And?” the Secretary of State asked impatiently.

“They’re ham-handed,” the Strategist explained. “They’re amateurs when it comes to the American public. They think they’re better than they are. If we let them make the first move, there is a good chance they’ll overbid.” [20] The Strategist was, at the time, considered to be one of the top twenty competitive bridge players in the world. In bridge, players see their cards and then make a “bid” as to how well they will do in the hand. A player can mess up a hand with great cards by bidding too aggressively, or “overbidding.”

“It’s risky,” the National Security Adviser said.

“Not really,” the Strategist countered. “We’ve got no other good options. Putting out a statement when we don’t know what they’re going to say is like punching shadows.”

Back in the studio, the balance of my interviews dealt mostly with the upcoming Chinese press conference. I got better at dodging and weaving. Also, the terrorism questions went away; there are only so many things that can be discussed in a three-minute radio interview. Between Austin and Denver, the producer spoke into my headphones. “You’ve got a little break here, almost seven minutes, if you want to use the bathroom or get some water or something.” I stood up, just to stretch, and then I remembered Tie Guy’s most recent text. I called him and he answered almost immediately. We had not spoken since the Outbreak became public. I expected him to say something about all that, but he surprised me.

“Nature fights back!” Tie Guy exclaimed.

“Yeah, that’s what you texted. What?”

“Your buddy Huke is on to something. Nobody likes dust mites, right?”

“Not that I’m aware of.”

“This particular subspecies of dust mite bites humans. And the bites itch .”

“Okay, so?”

“Check this out: Capellaviridae is most likely to become virulent in places that have been most aggressive in trying to exterminate the North American dust mite.” There was a brief silence as I absorbed what he was saying. “The clusters,” he added. “Remember? There are just a handful of places where the virus is common and people got sick?”

“Vaguely,” I said. “How do you know about the extermination?”

“I got lucky. We don’t have any data on who is trying to kill dust mites, but exterminators are licensed in a lot of states. There are pretty good records of the chemicals they use.”

“I’m at a studio,” I said. “I’ve only got about five minutes before I go back on the air.”

Tie Guy continued quickly: “There is a particular kind of pyrethrin that is highly effective against dust mites and not used for much else. The few places where that insecticide has been used aggressively are also the places where Capellaviridae has turned virulent. The correlation is striking.”

“Do you have any idea why?”

“Nobody likes to be exterminated,” he said, gleeful at having finally been able to share his finding. “I need resources. You’ve got to help me. The data are speaking to us. We need to listen.”

The producer was waving three fingers from the window. His assistant had pasted DENVER on the window. I gave Tie Guy the Chief of Staff’s private number. “Tell her who you are and what you need.”

BOTH HOUSES OF CONGRESS WERE SCHEDULED TO COME BACK into session at four p.m. Senators and representatives were racing to the Capitol from across the country. The Speaker of the House had wasted no time in releasing a statement calling for a congressional investigation of all government actions related to the Outbreak. But what she had expected to be her shining moment in the spotlight—the launch of her presidential campaign, if the Strategist is to be believed—turned into a train wreck almost immediately. Back in Houston, Tony Perez, fake news author extraordinaire, was seeing a record number of views on his posts. Eyeballs are money, and he was doing his best to ride the story. Even as the President and staff were squashing the terrorism rumors at every turn, Perez was finding that the Latino separatist angle had legs. Ethnic tensions had been simmering in the country long enough that any story positing an Anglo-Hispanic rift, with a political conspiracy throw in, was bound to get clicks. In his fourth post of the day, Perez “fed” the story, a term he described as adding just enough new detail to get the original readers to come back, while attracting new ones. He did so with a “bombshell revelation”: The likely first president of the Estado Latino Nuevo would be America’s most prominent and powerful Latina politician—the Speaker of the House (“according to sources close to the Speaker”).

The Speaker summoned reporters to the Capitol expecting them to bask in the glow of her leadership. She had prepared short remarks blasting the President for “turning over America’s health to greedy corporations” and for his administration’s “complete lack of transparency.” She had rehearsed fulsome pledges to “explore every option for managing this crisis.” But she would never get that far. Not long after the Speaker said, “Good afternoon,” reporters began yelling questions about Latino separatism. CNN’s top political reporter shouted over the din, “Have you accepted the offer to become the President of Estado Latino Nuevo?” The question was ridiculous—but devilishly so, as the layers of falsehood embedded within it were guaranteed to throw the Speaker on the defensive. No one in the mainstream media gave any credence whatsoever to the separatist story, let alone the notion that the Speaker would lead the breakaway Latino republic. But the Capitol Hill reporters were clever enough to recognize the Speaker’s political ambitions. The press conference was a solid signal that she was trying to build a reputation beyond the Beltway. (The Strategist was not the only one who saw this as the beginning of her presidential campaign.) The assembled members of the press did not really want to know if the Speaker of the House was cavorting with Hispanic separatists. What they wanted to find out was how she would react when the accusation was leveled against her.

“That report is absolutely false,” the Speaker said emphatically.

“Did you turn the offer down?” the CNN reporter followed up.

“There was no offer,” the Speaker said.

A grizzled male reporter yelled from the back, “Would you consider such an offer?”

CNN and most other stations were covering the Speaker’s press availability live, anticipating the drama. The President, the Strategist, and several other senior staff watched in the conference room on Air Force One. The Strategist chuckled maliciously. “She is so fucked. Maybe this is when she’ll finally tell America that she’s not even Hispanic.”

A female reporter for Telemundo asked, “Would you support a separate state for America’s Latino population, if the region were to vote to secede?”

The Speaker ignored the question. She said, “The reports of any terrorist attack—domestic or otherwise—are entirely false. The whole notion of some breakaway Latino nation is completely ludicrous.”