Charles Wheelan - The Rationing

“We can say something about the German drug,” the Communications Director offered. “That’s the kind of thing we’ll do in the absence of Dormigen.”

“And if she dies while I’m giving my briefing—”

“ I don’t know what the fuck we should say! ” the Communications Director exploded. He composed himself and continued. “I think maybe we just don’t say anything.”

The administration had vowed not to use the word “ration.” The Speaker of the House was intent on using that word as frequently as possible. She had taken a beating for her position on the South China Sea Agreement and as the putative leader of a Hispanic separatist movement before that. Those news cycles were now past. One does not get to be Speaker of the House, let alone a credible presidential candidate, without taking a few punches to the gut. The Speaker had arranged a press briefing in the Capitol forty-five minutes before the Acting HHS Secretary was scheduled to brief Congress. “How is she going to react to the briefing before the briefing?” the Chief of Staff asked sarcastically upon learning of the Speaker’s plans.

“Call her,” the President directed. “Tell her we all need to be on the same page.” The Chief of Staff phoned the Speaker, who was unavailable, according to the young staffer who answered the Speaker’s cell phone. “Tell her that if she doesn’t become available, I’m going to take away her plane,” the President growled in the background, loud enough for the staffer to hear. [27] At the beginning of the administration, some observers had suggested—presciently, it would appear—that the President had passed out the military planes to legislative leaders so that he could threaten to take them away, not unlike giving a teenager a car and then using it as leverage. Miraculously, the Speaker became available.

“The President would like to know what you plan to say at your press briefing,” the Chief of Staff said. There were no pleasantries exchanged.

“May I speak with the President, please?” the Speaker asked. The President, who could overhear the conversation, shook his head no.

“He’s working on his remarks,” the Chief of Staff said. “We all need to be on the same page here.”

“Of course,” the Speaker agreed.

“Then why are you doing a media availability before we brief Congress?” the Chief of Staff asked.

“I have a pretty good idea what you’re going to say,” the Speaker replied. It was true that the President had done an informal briefing for the Senate Majority Leader and for many of the Conventioneers. There was no doubt that the content of these conversations had been leaked to the Speaker, if not more broadly. “Congress is a coequal branch here,” the Speaker said. “I want the public to understand that we are a partner in dealing with this crisis.”

“So you’re calling the press to the Capitol to give them a civics lesson?” the Chief of Staff asked facetiously. “I don’t believe that.” In the background, the President was shaking his head in anger and frustration. Before the Speaker could answer, the Chief of Staff continued, “Could you just support us here for five minutes?”

“If you are going to cut me out of the loop, I have no choice but to reassert congressional prerogative,” the Speaker said insolently.

“We involved you from the very beginning,” the Chief of Staff said. “You decided to freelance on the South China Sea Agreement and you got burned. That’s on you.”

The Speaker was in no mood to back down. “I’d like to know what the President plans to say,” she declared.

“That’s why we’re doing the congressional briefing before the speech,” the Chief of Staff said.

The Speaker gave a short, mirthless laugh. “The President has been calling people all over Washington. Everybody knows the situation.”

“Then you don’t need the briefing, apparently.”

“As a courtesy, I would appreciate hearing directly from the President,” the Speaker said. In the background, the President motioned for the phone; the Chief of Staff handed it to him.

“Madam Speaker,” the President said, “I am telling you not to address the press before we do our congressional briefing.”

“Cecelia Dodds has lost consciousness,” the Speaker said. “You know that, don’t you?”

“I didn’t realize the two of you were close,” the President replied. They were not, of course. Cecelia Dodds had criticized the Speaker on several occasions for her divisive tactics. The Speaker had declined to attend the ceremony at which Dodds was presented the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

“She’s a national treasure,” the Speaker said. “This will be your legacy.”

“One has to admire her selflessness,” the President said honestly.

“Let’s cut to the chase, Mr. President, you can’t tell me when to meet with the press.”

“Okay, then I’m asking. I’m asking you to be a team player here.”

“It’s always about your team. It’s your team or no team,” the Speaker said.

“What?” the President asked in genuine amazement. “I think we’re done here. You do what you have to do.”

Eager to have the last word, the Speaker said, “And by the way, Mr. President, you can have the plane. American taxpayers shouldn’t have to bear that expense.”

The President hung up without reply. “She’s running for president,” he told the Chief of Staff. “Her donors are going to give her a nice big campaign plane. That’s what that means.”

Two other things of note were happening at roughly the same time. In Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, a small group of armed Sunni extremists burst into an international school, overwhelmed a night security guard, and took a hundred and twelve students and faculty hostage. There were twenty-seven American students and two teachers among the hostages. The terrorists’ grievances were nothing new. They demanded a withdrawal of U.S. forces from Saudi Arabia and the other Gulf nations; the end of U.S. support for the Saudi monarchy; and assorted other such things. What was new, however, was the method to their madness. The hostage takers identified the American students with parents who worked for either the American military or the U.S. Embassy; the others were released unharmed. The kidnappers then demanded that the parents—the military and embassy officials—exchange themselves for their children. They had twelve hours to present themselves. When a parent walked into the school gymnasium, their child would be released; if that did not happen in twelve hours, the child would be shot. The terrorists had found and exploited the underbelly of the heavily fortified American presence in Saudi Arabia. Our military facilities and the embassy were impregnable; the international school, less so. The rest of this story is familiar to anyone who lived through it. I mention it merely to draw attention to the timing. The President received word of the terrorist assault just before his address to the nation.

Meanwhile, the Secretary of State and the Strategist were on their way to Bahrain. They had not boarded Air Force One for the flight back to the U.S., as staffers had realized. The President had instructed them to reexamine the possibility of India as a Dormigen donor, but the delicate nature of that situation was such that they could not fly to India unless and until the Indian Prime Minister invited them to do so. The Secretary of State chose Bahrain as a logical intermediate destination: a place where they might plausibly have diplomatic business that was close enough to India to allow them to get there quickly should the Prime Minister summon them. Just as the two of them were touching down at Naval Support Activity Bahrain, several prominent Indian newspapers were reporting on a “new poll” from the Indian Institute for Future Security showing that 68 percent of Indian voters believed that India had an obligation to help the U.S. during the Outbreak; 73 percent agreed that “India would benefit from closer ties to the United States.” The details surrounding the poll—and the origins and funding of the Indian Institute for Future Security—remain shrouded in mystery. In a later moment of indiscretion, the Strategist did tell an audience at the Council of Foreign Relations in New York: “The Soviets taught us that no one ever wins an election with ninety-nine percent. To be credible, your fake results need to be in the sixty to seventy percent range. Even eighty percent strains credulity.”