Christopher Buckley - Boomsday

“…what else they’re planning,” Cass said.

Randy picked up the phone and said, “Send Mike Speck in, would you?”

A few minutes later, Mike Speck entered. Speck was a former Secret Service agent who handled what Randy called his “special legislative assignments.” Randy had brought him aboard his Death Star staff at the beginning of his second, scorched-earth Senate campaign. As Randy described what he called “the problem” to the stony-faced, laconic Speck, Cass almost felt a twinge of concern for her father, knowing that this scary-looking man was headed his way. This was surely the senatorial equivalent of sending Luca Brasi to make someone an offer they couldn’t refuse.

After Speck left, not having uttered more than three words, Cass said, “He’s not going to break my father’s legs or anything, is he?”

“Maybe a pinky or two.” Randy had already moved on to the next thing. Cass found him very focused these days. “Okay. Now- how’s the Wrinklies campaign coming?”

“Terry wasn’t hot for it. He hated it, actually.”

Randy rolled his eyes. “Well, Terry isn’t paying for it, is he? How soon can you get it up and running? We got momentum going here, kiddo. Have you seen the latest numbers? Who was it said it’s the customary fate of new truths to begin as heresies and end as superstitions?”

“Huxley. Thomas, not the one who wrote Brave New World .”

She had seen the numbers, and they were trending-“creeping” might be the better term-their way.

There had been more violence. The latest incidents had been triggered when the Florida State Legislature passed a law exempting mausoleums from state sales tax. As Boomers faced the inevitability of death, despite their healthy diets and exercise and yoga and not smoking and drinking pomegranate juice every morning, they had started to build themselves mausoleums. As with the mansions they had erected in life, so in death they planned to-sprawl.

American passions have a certain viral quality. Competitiveness had entered in. Vast mausoleums were going up all over the state, with features that not even old King Mausolus could have envisioned: “grieving rooms” for the visiting relatives, with music playing twenty-four hours a day (in the event the bereaved felt like stopping by at three a.m. for a quiet sob after hitting the International House of Pancakes); theaters with padded seats where the bereaved could watch home movies of the dearly departed. An entire new industry had sprung up around just that: companies that made epic documentaries about you, complete with interviews, testimonials, animations, sound tracks. One aging Boomer-owner of a string of foreign car dealerships-had commissioned an IMAX film of his (not all that interesting) life, to be shown in perpetuity on the walls of his 360-degree mausoleum. Other Boomers were channeling their intimations of mortality into art: commissioning paintings that celebrated their lives, to hang for all eternity in climate-controlled air beside their remains. Carl Hiaasen of the Miami Herald expressed the opinion that it might just be simpler to wall them up in their mansions, “preferably alive.” Vast sums of money were being spent on this literal decadence. In due course, the Florida Mortuary Builders Association petitioned the legislature for “special variance”-in other words, tax exemption. The measure passed in midnight session, when no one was looking.

To offset the revenue loss, lawmakers quietly voted during the same session to increase the sales tax on soda, beer, skateboards, video games, and the hypercaffeinated beverages so favored by the youth of the Gator State. (The legislature was banking that they were too brain-dead to notice that their taxes were being raised.) When this news was revealed in the harsh light of day-and the Florida sun can be pretty harsh-it was not greeted with enthusiasm by younger Floridians, who vented their rage by assaulting and defacing the more extravagant mausoleums. Governor George P. Bush once again had to call out the National Guard. The pictures on television of bayonet-wielding soldiers guarding enormous Boomer tombs at the public expense made Transitioning an increasingly attractive proposition. So, yes, Cass had seen the numbers, and Randy was right: There was momentum out there.

“Randy,” she said.

“Um?” He was scribbling notes for his speech that night to ABBA-the Association of Baby Boomer Advocates.

“We’re not actually expecting Transitioning to…”

“Hmm…”

“Pass?”

Randy took off his reading glasses and rubbed his eyes. “If you’d asked me that a month ago, I’d have said it was likelier that icicles would form in hell. But you know, we’re getting more and more votes. Just as long as we keep giving away the store, mind you.” He chuckled mirthlessly. “But at the end of the day?” He sniffed philosophically. “Nah. Not a chance. On the other hand, this is America. Our national motto ought to be: ‘Since 1620, anything possible, indeed likely.’” He began to hum the words to the Billie Holiday song: “The difficult we’ll do right now, the impossible will take a little whi-ile…” He said, “That was the Seabees motto in World War Two. Well, point is, we’re making a fine nuisance of ourselves. A very fine nuisance,” he murmured, looking over his text. “I’m told the White House is passing peach pits over this. They’re going to have to deal with Randolph K. Jepperson sooner or later.” He handed her the legal pad. “Want to run this through your washer-dryer? It’s my speech to ABBA. ABBA. Can you imagine naming yourself that? Mamma mia. ”

“I’ve created a monster,” Cass said.

“No, darling.” Randy smiled. “Mother created the monster. You merely added a few finishing touches.”

ABBA had formed a few years earlier when a faction of members of the American Association of Retired Persons decided that aging Boomers needed their own lobby. The split with AARP had been contentious and litigious. Given its demographics-77 million, average household income of $58,000-it had quickly become a formidable lobby. Its guiding philosophy was: “From cradle to grave, special in every way.”

ABBA’s headquarters on Massachusetts Avenue near Dupont Circle had been designed by the architect Renzo Nolento at a cost the organization preferred not to discuss in public. The building’s lobby consisted of an elliptical atrium with brushed steel walls. In an interview with Architectural Digest, Nolento revealed that he had been inspired by the platinum stainless steel finish of the Sub-Zero refrigerators popular among ABBA’s membership. “I wanted to express a certain coldness,” he said, “but also a forcefulness that conveys the idea ‘Don’t fool around with us because we are very powerful, okay?’” The metallic walls were inscribed, “Ask not, what can your country do for you. Ask, what has your country done for you lately?”

Randy whispered to Cass as they were escorted to the greenroom behind the stage, “Here we are again - behind enemy lines.”

He and Cass had debated whether he should accept the invitation to speak to ABBA. The Boomer membership was not particularly happy that Senator Jepperson’s chief adviser, Cass, had been inciting youth mobs to attack their retirement communities. But recognizing the value of getting ABBA “on board” in the Transitioning debate, Randy had been in quiet talks with the leadership. People might not smoke anymore, but the “smoke-filled rooms” lived on one way or the other. And in the spirit of those locales, he had, in the manner of his ilk, been making certain promises.

Among others, Randy had pledged his support for the cosmetic surgery benefit ABBA had been lobbying for, along with a Segway “cost defrayal” so that creaky-kneed (or just plain lazy) Boomers could deduct the full cost of these devices that were now ferrying so many of them around the nation’s sidewalks and malls. He’d also agreed to support other ABBA legislative goals: a federal acid reflux initiative; a grandchild day care initiative; visa requirement waivers for elder care; and a sure-to-be-controversial subsidy for giant flat-screen plasma TVs (for Boomers with deteriorating eyesight).