Christopher Buckley - Boomsday

“Gimme a break,” the correspondent for The Washington Post muttered to himself as he typed. “You drove into a minefield to get your rocks off.”

“-in wars very different from the great ones fought by our forebears. Still, war is war.

“Thanks to advances made by my generation, people around the world can now find decent coffee on practically every street corner. Can send e-mails. Participate in chat rooms. Type on laptop computers. No, Mr. President, we have not been idle. But these accomplishments pale in comparison with the ones of those who went before us. And so, Mr. President, it is-truly, surely, indeed, absolutely-time for us to make the ultimate sacrifice on behalf of our children and give back. Give back our own lives, so that those who come after us may not become enmired indeed, enmeshed in an endless swamp of debt and misery. This, Mr. President, is truly the least we can do for our country.”

Cass and Terry watched Randy’s speech on TV at the Tucker offices.

“Not bad,” Terry said. “A little Kennedyesque, but not bad.”

“Give the man credit,” Cass said. “He definitely put it on the table.”

“You know he’s gonna get crucified.”

“Yes,” Cass said, “but Randy has a tendency to rise again on the third day.”

Gideon Payne had also been listening. His minions had alerted him that a speech of keen interest to the pro-life lobby was being broadcast to the world. He watched impassively, stroking his neatly groomed beard. A smile spread across his face like an oil slick. Gideon thought, Truly the Lord is bountiful. Here is manna from heaven, and all covered in butterscotch sauce.

Had he merely dreamed a beautiful dream, or had a United States senator just gone on national television to advocate mass suicide as a means of dealing with the deficit?

He gave his chinny-chin-chin a little pinch to see if it was a dream. No, his beard felt real enough under his soft fingertips. This was no dream. It was the lowest-hanging fruit in the Garden of Eden. Gideon could scarcely believe his good fortune. He himself could not have devised a more succulent fund-raising opportunity. He folded his hands across his capacious belly. His gaze wandered to his phone. He counted silently. One, two, three…

He’d only reached fourteen when it began to ring-line one, then line two, then all ten lines, lovely little green lights full of sound and fury, signifying…money.

Bucky Trumble did not bother to knock on the door of the Oval Office.

He said a bit breathlessly, “Jepperson just introduced a bill on the floor of the Senate that would legalize suicide in return for tax breaks. It’s Devine’s Transitioning scheme repackaged as legislation. And he got Fundermunk to co-sponsor it.”

President Peacham barely looked up from his desk. “The ones committing suicide are Jepperson and Fundermunk. Hardly know how we’ll survive without ’em. Screwy fucking idea.”

“I’m not so sure, Mr. President.”

“Why aren’t you?”

“Because, sir, the White House is getting so many e-mails in support of their ‘screwy fucking idea’ that our servers are crashing. The switchboard’s flooded, too.”

President Peacham looked up. “What are you saying?”

“They’re from kids, mostly. The under-thirties. A lot of it may be generating from her blog. But they’re going for it, and they’re going for it big-time. We’ll know more. I’m monitoring.” Bucky walked in a circle as he talked excitedly. “We’ll know more. I’ve got Sid Fiddich working the Hill, see what he can-”

“Will you stand still, for chrissake. You’re making me dizzy. If you want to exercise, go to the goddamn gym.”

“This thing’s a can of worms. A big can. Our numbers are bad enough as is. We’re going to need the eighteen-to-thirties next November. Meanwhile, you can’t-there is no way we are going to support a legal suicide bill. I don’t care how bad the crisis is. Meanwhile, this is going to raise her profile big-time. Everyone knows this was her idea.”

“In other words…”

“In other words, Mr. President, it is now officially too late to re-arrest this chick.”

For that much, Bucky Trumble was in fact grateful. He had not been looking forward to bribing the nation’s top law enforcement official to commit breach of justice by dangling the promise of a Supreme Court appointment in a second term that at this point was looking elusive at best.

The president let out a lungful of disappointed air. “Well, we’ll just have to tough it out, won’t we? Blame it on Fred. If they come after us, you can just throw up your hands and say, ‘I had no idea she was Frank Cohane’s daughter. President sure as hell didn’t.’” He drummed the desk with his fingers. “What in the hell is Jepperson up to, anyway, sponsoring this piece-of-shit legislation?”

“He’s coming after us, is what he’s doing. It’s a way of making us look bad for not doing anything on Social Security reform.”

“Jesus Christ on a pogo stick. No one can do anything about Social Security reform! It can’t be done. Period.”

“Tell that to the under-thirties. Tell it to Jepperson. He’s playing it for all it’s worth. I think he’s going to challenge us for the nomination.”

“ Randolph Jepperson? I’ll kick his overbred ass back across the Charles River so fast his bow tie will spin.”

“I wouldn’t underrate him. He can sound like a rich boy, but he’s a mean son of a bitch. Look what he did to poor old BS Smithers. And he’s rich. Real rich.”

“I’m not afraid of that candy-ass. I’ll tear off his prosthetic leg and beat him to death with it. On national television.”

“That’ll get us the disabled vote. Look, Mr. President, we need to manage this. Let’s see how it plays out. You know who’d be good to have on our side? Gideon Payne.”

“Sweet Jesus. Don’t even-”

“Hear me out-”

“Damnit, Bucky. Last time that goateed butterball was in here, he lectured me- me -for a full fifteen minutes on why I needed to intervene in that vegetable case down in Georgia. Christ in a refrigerator, the woman’d been in a coma for fifteen years. She had a flatter brain scan than a three-thousand-year-old Egyptian mummy. And he wanted me to issue an executive order to plug her back in. Who appointed Gideon fucking Payne the conscience of the nation anyhow? Hell, he killed his own goddamn mother, didn’t he?”

“I don’t much personally care for him, either, Mr. President, but slice him or dice him, he is Mr. Pro-Life. I’m saying let’s make him an ally. Let’s at least not have him as an enemy. Remember the Godfather’s rule: Keep your friends close, your enemies-”

“Damnit, Bucky, every time you quote that at me, you’re about to drag some asshole in here and make me kiss his ass. I’m president of the U.S.! My ass is the one that oughta be kissed! What the hell’s the point of being president, anyway? Been so long since anyone kissed my butt, I wouldn’t know where to find it at this point.”

“Feeling better, sir?”

“Yes,” President Peacham barked. “I goddamn well do .”

“Shall we say three o’clock, then? Today?”

“Get the hell outta here.”

Bucky Trumble stood his ground.

“All right. All right. Bring the little turdball in. I’ll kiss his ass. Then I’ll go out on Pennsylvania Avenue and kiss all the tourists’ asses. Jesus Christ. Goddamn job isn’t worth a-”

“Thank you, sir,” Bucky Trumble said, leaving quickly.

Frank Cohane’s office at Applied Predictive Actuarial Technologies looked out over a coastal California vista redolent of eucalyptus and kelp.