EYES ONLY EYES ONLY EYES ONLY
Alpha Team: Soaring Eagle
Target: Political System
Goal: Elections, all the time, everywhere
Code Name: Kingfish
The U.S. is recognized across the globe as the "leader of the free world." We are a constitutional democracy, a nation of laws, with a free press, protection of individual rights, and freedom of speech and assembly. The individual is the source of sovereign rights that are temporarily transferred to legally elected representatives, but these rights may be withdrawn when sovereign individuals act collectively to do so. These things make us the envy of the world, even among those who are sometimes our enemies. For example, it is no accident that Ho Chi Minh, the Communist Vietnamese leader, loved to hear himself called the "George Washington of Vietnam."
What is less apparent to other nations is the link between democracy and capitalism. This link is not simply a historical accident. We are the world's richest nation not simply because of the growth engines of capitalism, but because the democratic system nurtures, supports, and protects capitalism. The wisdom of the Founding Fathers, and the U.S. Supreme Court decision in 1886, that decided that a corporation is a "natural person" under the U.S. Constitution, and therefore entitled to the protections provided by the Bill of Rights. Thus, corporations may use their vast financial and communications resources to compete with individual citizens in the political process through contributions to political candidates and political parties, and through the purchase of media time and space for corporate messages.
The goal of the Kingfish project is to put forward the case for electoral democracy on both moral and economic grounds. Alpha Team should begin to identify possible demonstration sites and specific strategies for implementing the project.
END END END END END
On the face of it, Alpha Team looks like the wrong bunch of operatives for this assignment. They have extensive experience, but mostly at destabilizing regimes and defeating anti-US candidates in elections. They are now being asked to build a system of stable elections and encouraging people to buy into democracy as the path to development. Let's look at the cast of characters.
William Yeager, aka Biff Yeager, or to his close friends "Banana Bif." The Banana part identifies Bif's main area of operations---Central America or the Banana Republics. It also identifies Bif as a second generation spook. Bif's father, Malcolm Yeager, worked for the United Fruit Company in the 1950s and was in charge of their operations in Guatemala. United Fruit was the country's largest landowner, and Malcolm got pissed big time when Jacabo Arbenz, President of Guatemala, ordered the confiscation of United Fruit's land that was not being used. Arbenz was trying to introduce land reforms and social welfare programs, and quickly got tagged as someone working with the Communists. Malcolm helped to set up safe havens on United Fruit land for the 200 exiles who were armed and trained by the CIA. He also directed United Fruit's public relations office to develop a national campaign publicizing the communist threat in Guatemala.
Bif was very proud of his father's work with the CIA, and the overthrow of Arbenz was often used as a textbook how-to-do-it case for toppling a regime with little expenditure of money and lives. And as much as Bif enjoyed having people brag on his father's work with the agency, he never talked about it much himself. Everyone liked Bif. He had a wide smile and didn't have a mean streak towards others. But everyone knew that Bif would not hesitate to, quote-unquote, "terminate someone with extreme prejudice." He did what he had to do to get the job done. It was nothing personal, just business.
Next is Ed Finley, called "Easy Ed" by those who wanted to annoy him, was anything but "easy." Ed was tightly wound and deadly serious about everything. He had a talent for getting under peoples' skins and pissing them off with innocuous comments that he thought were funny. When he passed you in the hall you could count on him saying something like, "So you decided to come to work today" or, "Are you only working half a day now?" Ed didn't really care how much or how hard people worked, and he thought he was making small talk. Unfortunately, he chose the wrong subject, because people were always putting out maximum effort, especially when they had a new assignment. The youngest member of the team, Ed was a "Yaley" who majored in psychology and turned it into an agency career working on propaganda. When the agency made the rounds of Ivy League schools looking for new recruits they seem to be attracted to types like Ed, probably because they were trainable. Ed's big contribution since joining the Agency was his work during the Gulf War, in demonizing Saddam Hussein and making him the new Hitler. Everyone agreed that Ed's work was truly inspired, brilliant at both a strategic and tactical level. The "weapons of mass destruction" allegation could keep Saddam bottled up forever. No one knows what they are, but everyone has them. And Saddam pays a price for what everyone does. And planting the false story about Iraqui soldiers in a Kuwaiti hospital taking babies out of incubators. Ed knew it was just the kind of story the press would eat up, and they wouldn't care whether it was true or not. He had an instinct for knowing what kind of stories "had legs," and would go with little or no factual basis.
The third person on the team is Marshall Shaw. He was the closest thing to G. Gordon Liddy since G. Gordon Liddy. He may have imprinted on Liddy during the Watergate years. He is a true believer, who feels the Agency is the only thing standing between the United States and a host of internal and external enemies. You can find his counterpart on TV cop shows---the officer who sees the police as the thin blue line between civilization and chaos, yet they take all the heat when upright citizens feel that the police may have gone too far in enforcing the law. Marshall is a Vietnam vet, which probably where he developed his mistrust of politicians, liberals, and the general public. He once had an assignment in the White House dealing with family security. One night late when he was making the rounds he heard sounds coming from the family movie room and he was getting a lot of static on his two-way. He went inside where there was a porn film on the screen, and slouched down on the couch was the First Lady with someone else and something in her hand that was making a buzzing sound. He couldn't make out the other party, who quickly left the darkened room. Marshall was so flustered he asked the First Lady if she needed his help, and she was so angry at his impertinence that she called him a "bloody fool." Marshall had been called all sorts of things but never a fool. He was hurt by the sharp Brit tone of condescension in her voice. He was only doing his job. Marshall still likes to work with White House staff types when they come asking for the Agency's help in digging up some dirt on key opponents in Congress, or on journalists who are working overtime making the administration look bad. The staffer like to act tough when they get near Agency operatives, trying to show that they can play "hardball" when necessary. Marshall would bait the White House types with discussions of how they might use wiretaps, or Internal Revenue searches to come up with dirt on some "enemies," and they would go along because they didn't want to look "wussie." He would then escalate the discussion of dirty tricks until he would slip in a thinly-veiled to "taking somebody out" or "making the prick disappear." He loved to watch the "tough guys" nearly wet their pants when they realized what Marshall was saying. The not-so-funny thing about Marshall is that if his chief told him that the President had some serious enemies who needed to be stopped, Marshall would stop them, no questions asked. And if he got caught, he would take a bullet before he would rat out anyone in the Agency.
Ray Bracker is the fourth and most unusual member of Alpha Team, and probably in the agency in the DC-Langley area. The first thing that set him apart is having attended school at an obscure regional university, and having a degree in social science. He is bookish, not in appearance, but in his interest in big ideas about nations, economies, or ecological systems. Reading the work of cross-over academics is his favorite outside activity, but he never reveals this to others. He would never mention the names of John Kenneth Galbraith, Robert Reich, Paul Kennedy, or Amitai Etzioni, whose books he read, but he never really uses their specific ideas in shaping his own writing and speaking. Ray tends to absorb their way of looking at the world, often their unstated framework in a wide-ranging work of history or economics. Ray tends to deconstruct their work and reassemble a framework of his own, with propositions about human behavior and the operation of social systems. Thus, he is interested in whether human beings are acquisitive and self-interested by nature, or whether they are capable of cooperation and altruism. He also ponders the role of different forms of conflict as a stabilizing element of social life. After reading Paul Kennedy's The Rise and Fall of Great Powers, Ray spent months thinking about the economic, political, and social principles that had to exist in order to produce the recurrent patterns reported by Kennedy. Ray has come to the conclusion that human societies are complex, but rule-governed systems, operating on laws much like those governing the operation of physical systems. He believes that humans are no different from other animals, with the exception of their brain and its capacity for abstract, symbolic thought and communication. This human capacity to think reflexively leads to the self-delusion that they are not like other animals, and have special qualities like free will and self-determination. It also leads to all sorts of arrogance about being special people and having been the product of some cosmic intelligence or God. In short, Ray is a system thinker, and he explains what he does not in terms of right or wrong, but in terms of organizing principles that govern the maintenance and survival of human societies.
Alpha Team Briefing: Operation Kingfish
Bif opens the meeting. "Welcome back. I assume that you all read the Kingfish memo. It was short enough. Reactions?"
Ray jumps in first, it is his kind of stuff. "I like the broad framework. The link between democracy and capitalism is inspired, and historically correct."
"No easy sell", adds Ed. "Lots of people around the world have fixed ideas about who should and shouldn't be leaders. There are powerful religious and ethnic hatreds that stand in the way of normal electoral politics. But it can be done."
"Working the political front will be harder than the economic side," says Marshall. "Too many people to try to bring along when you're talking democracy. On the economic side we simply have to put the screws to the big money boys in each country."
Bif sees an idea worth developing. "You're partly right Marshall, but don't take the democracy stuff too seriously. It is designed to keep the masses occupied, not as a way to 'bring them along" as you put it. Our main goal is to make elections a way of life. We want elections from the president of a country down to dog catcher. we want elections at the national level, the regional level, the state level, the district level, the precinct level, and if we can get it, at the block level also. As a matter of fact, we want elections in every classroom, in every grade, in every school in the country. Goddammit, even the mental hospitals and prisons should have elections for their wards or cell blocks. Not a day should go by without someone, somewhere running for some office. And if they are not running for office, they are talking about it, or raising money to do it, or gathering volunteers to do it."
Ray is overwhelmed by the detail. "Jesus, Bif, how will we ever do something like that?"
"Don't you see Ray, all I'm talking about is what we have in America. Don't you think we should share that with the rest of the world," says Bif with some emotion.
Ed is clearly excited by this idea. "Okay Bif, let's start with what we know. First of all people will only join in elections if they think they can get something out of it. But they want so many different things that it's hard to unify around wants. Some want lower taxes, some want social security, and some want as much health as they can get. On the other hand, you can get more agreement on the things that they don't want or the people they don't want to get anything. they want to be sure that welfare queens aren't on the dole, or that abortions are not supported, or that illegal immigrants don't get health care. Second, the main thing that keeps people from elections, especially in less developed countries, is they believe that most politicians and government bureaucrats are corrupt, and by and large, they are right."
"Good start, Ed," says Bif. "How would you go about getting people to believe in elections and to develop more trust in politicians? After all, let's be honest about it, American politicians are just as corrupt as you'll find anywhere."
"Yes,"says Ed, "but the corruption is so institutionalized that it's treated as normal."
"That's your assignment Ed," says Bif, with a sense of satisfaction at having moved toward strategic thinking. "Do a working paper on how to transform corrupt practices in less developed countries into normal corruption."
That's a heady question for Ray, who responds. "Now you're talking about basic human motivation, and how to harness self-interest and make it appear like civic virtue. If I may paraphrase Adam Smith--That man may advance the general welfare when seeking the gratification of individual selfishness."
Marshall broke into his most mischievous grin, exclaiming, as General Westy once said,
'Grab 'em by the balls and their hearts and minds will follow!"
"Great Marshall, You do the white paper on squeezing the balls. Well done folks. Let's take a break for lunch. When we come back at two, Ray will do a walk-through on how to build an infrastructure for elections."
2:00 p.m.
The group is a little lethargic, as their bodies are using energy to process the food they gulped down. Ray is feeling professorial but trying his best not to act like a pointy-headed professor. "Let's start by thinking about the strengths of the U.S. system. First, it is a two-party system, but in name only. The parties are much more alike than different. Second, the parties pretend to speak to the needs of all the people in the country, when in fact they only work on behalf of the privileged 20 percent. Third, the two parties have a mix of income groups, educational groups, racial and ethnic groups. In other words, there is no party made up solely of workers, or Blacks, or Hispanics, or of women. that is the danger to be avoided. Political parties must appear to represent all, avoid any discussion of class differences among Americans, and work hard to encourage as many divisions of identity politics as you can devise. This is the only way that the privileged 20 percent can keep bullshitting the other 80 percent."
"You're really smart Ray," Ed says with genuine admiration.
Ray accepts Ed's admiration, and continues. "The challenge is to have voting in elections become a public virtue and a private vice. The virtue part is to elevate voting into a quasi-religious act--you know, the stuff on patriotism and flag as civil religion. That makes the voters feel that they are somehow special people."
Marshall chimes in. "What is great about this virtue stuff, is that voters can look down their noses at non-voters as less deserving of anyone's consideration. We can start treating non-voters like welfare recipients or child abusers."
What is less apparent to other nations is the link between democracy and capitalism. This link is not simply a historical accident. We are the world's richest nation not simply because of the growth engines of capitalism, but because the democratic system nurtures, supports, and protects capitalism. The wisdom of the Founding Fathers, and the U.S. Supreme Court decision in 1886, that decided that a corporation is a "natural person" under the U.S. Constitution, and therefore entitled to the protections provided by the Bill of Rights. Thus, corporations may use their vast financial and communications resources to compete with individual citizens in the political process through contributions to political candidates and political parties, and through the purchase of media time and space for corporate messages.
The goal of the Kingfish project is to put forward the case for electoral democracy on both moral and economic grounds. Alpha Team should begin to identify possible demonstration sites and specific strategies for implementing the project.
END END END END END
On the face of it, Alpha Team looks like the wrong bunch of operatives for this assignment. They have extensive experience, but mostly at destabilizing regimes and defeating anti-US candidates in elections. They are now being asked to build a system of stable elections and encouraging people to buy into democracy as the path to development. Let's look at the cast of characters.
William Yeager, aka Biff Yeager, or to his close friends "Banana Bif." The Banana part identifies Bif's main area of operations---Central America or the Banana Republics. It also identifies Bif as a second generation spook. Bif's father, Malcolm Yeager, worked for the United Fruit Company in the 1950s and was in charge of their operations in Guatemala. United Fruit was the country's largest landowner, and Malcolm got pissed big time when Jacabo Arbenz, President of Guatemala, ordered the confiscation of United Fruit's land that was not being used. Arbenz was trying to introduce land reforms and social welfare programs, and quickly got tagged as someone working with the Communists. Malcolm helped to set up safe havens on United Fruit land for the 200 exiles who were armed and trained by the CIA. He also directed United Fruit's public relations office to develop a national campaign publicizing the communist threat in Guatemala.
Bif was very proud of his father's work with the CIA, and the overthrow of Arbenz was often used as a textbook how-to-do-it case for toppling a regime with little expenditure of money and lives. And as much as Bif enjoyed having people brag on his father's work with the agency, he never talked about it much himself. Everyone liked Bif. He had a wide smile and didn't have a mean streak towards others. But everyone knew that Bif would not hesitate to, quote-unquote, "terminate someone with extreme prejudice." He did what he had to do to get the job done. It was nothing personal, just business.
Next is Ed Finley, called "Easy Ed" by those who wanted to annoy him, was anything but "easy." Ed was tightly wound and deadly serious about everything. He had a talent for getting under peoples' skins and pissing them off with innocuous comments that he thought were funny. When he passed you in the hall you could count on him saying something like, "So you decided to come to work today" or, "Are you only working half a day now?" Ed didn't really care how much or how hard people worked, and he thought he was making small talk. Unfortunately, he chose the wrong subject, because people were always putting out maximum effort, especially when they had a new assignment. The youngest member of the team, Ed was a "Yaley" who majored in psychology and turned it into an agency career working on propaganda. When the agency made the rounds of Ivy League schools looking for new recruits they seem to be attracted to types like Ed, probably because they were trainable. Ed's big contribution since joining the Agency was his work during the Gulf War, in demonizing Saddam Hussein and making him the new Hitler. Everyone agreed that Ed's work was truly inspired, brilliant at both a strategic and tactical level. The "weapons of mass destruction" allegation could keep Saddam bottled up forever. No one knows what they are, but everyone has them. And Saddam pays a price for what everyone does. And planting the false story about Iraqui soldiers in a Kuwaiti hospital taking babies out of incubators. Ed knew it was just the kind of story the press would eat up, and they wouldn't care whether it was true or not. He had an instinct for knowing what kind of stories "had legs," and would go with little or no factual basis.
The third person on the team is Marshall Shaw. He was the closest thing to G. Gordon Liddy since G. Gordon Liddy. He may have imprinted on Liddy during the Watergate years. He is a true believer, who feels the Agency is the only thing standing between the United States and a host of internal and external enemies. You can find his counterpart on TV cop shows---the officer who sees the police as the thin blue line between civilization and chaos, yet they take all the heat when upright citizens feel that the police may have gone too far in enforcing the law. Marshall is a Vietnam vet, which probably where he developed his mistrust of politicians, liberals, and the general public. He once had an assignment in the White House dealing with family security. One night late when he was making the rounds he heard sounds coming from the family movie room and he was getting a lot of static on his two-way. He went inside where there was a porn film on the screen, and slouched down on the couch was the First Lady with someone else and something in her hand that was making a buzzing sound. He couldn't make out the other party, who quickly left the darkened room. Marshall was so flustered he asked the First Lady if she needed his help, and she was so angry at his impertinence that she called him a "bloody fool." Marshall had been called all sorts of things but never a fool. He was hurt by the sharp Brit tone of condescension in her voice. He was only doing his job. Marshall still likes to work with White House staff types when they come asking for the Agency's help in digging up some dirt on key opponents in Congress, or on journalists who are working overtime making the administration look bad. The staffer like to act tough when they get near Agency operatives, trying to show that they can play "hardball" when necessary. Marshall would bait the White House types with discussions of how they might use wiretaps, or Internal Revenue searches to come up with dirt on some "enemies," and they would go along because they didn't want to look "wussie." He would then escalate the discussion of dirty tricks until he would slip in a thinly-veiled to "taking somebody out" or "making the prick disappear." He loved to watch the "tough guys" nearly wet their pants when they realized what Marshall was saying. The not-so-funny thing about Marshall is that if his chief told him that the President had some serious enemies who needed to be stopped, Marshall would stop them, no questions asked. And if he got caught, he would take a bullet before he would rat out anyone in the Agency.
Ray Bracker is the fourth and most unusual member of Alpha Team, and probably in the agency in the DC-Langley area. The first thing that set him apart is having attended school at an obscure regional university, and having a degree in social science. He is bookish, not in appearance, but in his interest in big ideas about nations, economies, or ecological systems. Reading the work of cross-over academics is his favorite outside activity, but he never reveals this to others. He would never mention the names of John Kenneth Galbraith, Robert Reich, Paul Kennedy, or Amitai Etzioni, whose books he read, but he never really uses their specific ideas in shaping his own writing and speaking. Ray tends to absorb their way of looking at the world, often their unstated framework in a wide-ranging work of history or economics. Ray tends to deconstruct their work and reassemble a framework of his own, with propositions about human behavior and the operation of social systems. Thus, he is interested in whether human beings are acquisitive and self-interested by nature, or whether they are capable of cooperation and altruism. He also ponders the role of different forms of conflict as a stabilizing element of social life. After reading Paul Kennedy's The Rise and Fall of Great Powers, Ray spent months thinking about the economic, political, and social principles that had to exist in order to produce the recurrent patterns reported by Kennedy. Ray has come to the conclusion that human societies are complex, but rule-governed systems, operating on laws much like those governing the operation of physical systems. He believes that humans are no different from other animals, with the exception of their brain and its capacity for abstract, symbolic thought and communication. This human capacity to think reflexively leads to the self-delusion that they are not like other animals, and have special qualities like free will and self-determination. It also leads to all sorts of arrogance about being special people and having been the product of some cosmic intelligence or God. In short, Ray is a system thinker, and he explains what he does not in terms of right or wrong, but in terms of organizing principles that govern the maintenance and survival of human societies.
Alpha Team Briefing: Operation Kingfish
Bif opens the meeting. "Welcome back. I assume that you all read the Kingfish memo. It was short enough. Reactions?"
Ray jumps in first, it is his kind of stuff. "I like the broad framework. The link between democracy and capitalism is inspired, and historically correct."
"No easy sell", adds Ed. "Lots of people around the world have fixed ideas about who should and shouldn't be leaders. There are powerful religious and ethnic hatreds that stand in the way of normal electoral politics. But it can be done."
"Working the political front will be harder than the economic side," says Marshall. "Too many people to try to bring along when you're talking democracy. On the economic side we simply have to put the screws to the big money boys in each country."
Bif sees an idea worth developing. "You're partly right Marshall, but don't take the democracy stuff too seriously. It is designed to keep the masses occupied, not as a way to 'bring them along" as you put it. Our main goal is to make elections a way of life. We want elections from the president of a country down to dog catcher. we want elections at the national level, the regional level, the state level, the district level, the precinct level, and if we can get it, at the block level also. As a matter of fact, we want elections in every classroom, in every grade, in every school in the country. Goddammit, even the mental hospitals and prisons should have elections for their wards or cell blocks. Not a day should go by without someone, somewhere running for some office. And if they are not running for office, they are talking about it, or raising money to do it, or gathering volunteers to do it."
Ray is overwhelmed by the detail. "Jesus, Bif, how will we ever do something like that?"
"Don't you see Ray, all I'm talking about is what we have in America. Don't you think we should share that with the rest of the world," says Bif with some emotion.
Ed is clearly excited by this idea. "Okay Bif, let's start with what we know. First of all people will only join in elections if they think they can get something out of it. But they want so many different things that it's hard to unify around wants. Some want lower taxes, some want social security, and some want as much health as they can get. On the other hand, you can get more agreement on the things that they don't want or the people they don't want to get anything. they want to be sure that welfare queens aren't on the dole, or that abortions are not supported, or that illegal immigrants don't get health care. Second, the main thing that keeps people from elections, especially in less developed countries, is they believe that most politicians and government bureaucrats are corrupt, and by and large, they are right."
"Good start, Ed," says Bif. "How would you go about getting people to believe in elections and to develop more trust in politicians? After all, let's be honest about it, American politicians are just as corrupt as you'll find anywhere."
"Yes,"says Ed, "but the corruption is so institutionalized that it's treated as normal."
"That's your assignment Ed," says Bif, with a sense of satisfaction at having moved toward strategic thinking. "Do a working paper on how to transform corrupt practices in less developed countries into normal corruption."
That's a heady question for Ray, who responds. "Now you're talking about basic human motivation, and how to harness self-interest and make it appear like civic virtue. If I may paraphrase Adam Smith--That man may advance the general welfare when seeking the gratification of individual selfishness."
Marshall broke into his most mischievous grin, exclaiming, as General Westy once said,
'Grab 'em by the balls and their hearts and minds will follow!"
"Great Marshall, You do the white paper on squeezing the balls. Well done folks. Let's take a break for lunch. When we come back at two, Ray will do a walk-through on how to build an infrastructure for elections."
2:00 p.m.
The group is a little lethargic, as their bodies are using energy to process the food they gulped down. Ray is feeling professorial but trying his best not to act like a pointy-headed professor. "Let's start by thinking about the strengths of the U.S. system. First, it is a two-party system, but in name only. The parties are much more alike than different. Second, the parties pretend to speak to the needs of all the people in the country, when in fact they only work on behalf of the privileged 20 percent. Third, the two parties have a mix of income groups, educational groups, racial and ethnic groups. In other words, there is no party made up solely of workers, or Blacks, or Hispanics, or of women. that is the danger to be avoided. Political parties must appear to represent all, avoid any discussion of class differences among Americans, and work hard to encourage as many divisions of identity politics as you can devise. This is the only way that the privileged 20 percent can keep bullshitting the other 80 percent."
"You're really smart Ray," Ed says with genuine admiration.
Ray accepts Ed's admiration, and continues. "The challenge is to have voting in elections become a public virtue and a private vice. The virtue part is to elevate voting into a quasi-religious act--you know, the stuff on patriotism and flag as civil religion. That makes the voters feel that they are somehow special people."
Marshall chimes in. "What is great about this virtue stuff, is that voters can look down their noses at non-voters as less deserving of anyone's consideration. We can start treating non-voters like welfare recipients or child abusers."
Ray is excited by the positive reactions of his colleagues. "The trick," he says, "is to make voting a virtue, but also to make it complicated and boring. In order to find real differences between parties and candidates, you have to really work at it. And the only place you will find a difference is at the margin---on a single issue that is of importance to only a minority of people."
"Where do the political parties fit in?" says Marshall. "If they are really just tweedle-dee and tweedle-dum, how do they appeal to potential voters in a way that really depresses an interest in voting."
Ray is a little irritated by his colleagues failure to pay attention. "As I said earlier, and don't make me say it again, the job of the parties is to appear to work hard to eliminate divisions among people, when in fact they are reinforcing those divisions. The pointy-heads call it reification."
"Whatification?" mimicks Marshall. "This ain't Harvard, Ray. Tell it to us in English."
"The political parties always talk about reducing divisions between men and women, Blacks and Whites, Christians and Jews." Ray feels himself getting into it. "Yet every time they embark on a new plan to eliminate divisions, they are actually heightening the divisions by making them real at a new level that didn't exist before they embarked on their anti-division plan. That's reification. The whole program of political correctness is the best example of what I have in mind. You get people worrying about the Confederate battle flag in South Carolina, or the name of Squaw Valley, or the Atlanta Braves and all you do is to make the divisions more pronounced."
"Correct" says Ed, "and the beauty of it is that it doesn't cost a cent. Nobody gets a job when you change the name of Squaw Valley to Pleasant Valley, but the pols get all puffed up as if they have done something. Keep people thinking about the names of their bridges and you can blow smoke up their asses all day long."
Ray beams, "Now you are with the program, Ed. Let's give this strategy of perpetual elections a "Step Name."
Step 1: Elections mean freedom. Freedom means choices. Choices mean risk.
Ray expands. "Step 1 has the power of being a totalizing and individualizing principle. People are drawn in to embrace the universally attractive ideas of freedom and choices. But wait! Making choices is fraught with danger. I might choose the wrong party or the wrong candidate. How do I know who will represent my interests? Decisions, decisions, decisions.
Ray has brought everyone down with the complications of Step 1. He is pleased, because that is exactly the effect it is supposed to have. First, it energizes, then it complicates, and then it paralyzes. "OK guys, let's call it a day. I'm going to take a couple of days off to bring the academic community on board for this project. Let's meet again next Tuesday at 8 a.m. Pencil it in."
*****Monday, April 14, 1999. Office of the President, Harvard University ********
Ray can't take his eyes off the huge crest on he wall. A shield with crimson background and three open books in the shield. Each book has bold letters across the open pages--VE--RI--TAS. Ray muttered to himself, "Veritas, Truth." Below the shield in bold black letters: HARVARD. Ray had the same feeling of awe when he was in the Vatican years ago, waiting to see the Pope. And the irony didn't escape him as he snickered quietly. In both cases, he was making an offer that they couldn't refuse.
Ray spoke into his lapel to start his voice activated recording device: "4,14,99 meeting with Drew Kenneth Siegel, President of Harvard University." Ray snickered as he recalled the report that many of the faculty referred to Siegel as DK, meaning "Don't Know," while others preferred DKS, "Don't Know Shit." The President's assistant returned to the room. Ray thought she looked like an English nanny, or a well-educated tutor for children in the Royal family. Hair pulled back into a tight bun, very little in the way of makeup or jewelry. Actually quite attractive, if you liked that sort of thing. Ray wondered if she and Siegel had anything going. He smiled to himself. Not at Harvard! siegel would be going after the undergrads.
"The President will see you now." Ray follows tight bun into the office. She leads Ray to his chair and leaves. She never looks at the President, so Ray assures himself that there is something going on between them. That kind of studied indifference is not normal, unless you are trying to convey the opposite of the real situation. Ray thought the President looked like tight buns type. Nice looking, mid-50s, casual dress, very Brooks Brothers, but with a flair. A crimson print mouchoir in his jacket pocket. Slightly effeminate, but maybe a gesture to diversity at Harvard.
"Mr.Bracker, how nice to meet you."
"Than you for seeing me President Siegel, especially on such short notice."
"How may I help you Mr. Bracker."
"This is actually a courtesy call. The Agency has asked me to speak with a number of your faculty about a project that is of great interest to us, and may be of interest to your faculty as well. I thought that I would inform you of our efforts in this regard so there would be no surprises down the line."
"I appreciate your consideration, Mr. Bracker, and it is fortunate that you stopped by here first, before approaching the faculty.
"Why so?"
"As we move into the 21st century, there is great awareness of the importance of knowledge to governments and corporations, the two greatest consumers of knowledge. Harvard University, as it happens, is the greatest single repository of leading experst in all fields of endeavor. Some people believe that money is the greatest source of power, but here at Harvard, we know that it is knowledge."
Ray decided to stick it to this pompous twerp. "Yes, I believe that one of your distinguished faculty, John Kenneth Galbraith, wrote on the at subject in the late 1960s. I believe it was in The New Industrial State that he said that power is located in that resource which is in shortest supply, first it was land, then capital, and now it is knowledge."
"I am duly impressed Mr. Bracker. We may find a visiting appointment for you on our faculty." Actually, Siegel cringed at the mention of Galbraith's name. He was so tired of hearing about that patrician John Kenneth G and his ties to the Kennedys. Siegel knew that he was smarter than Galbraith, and with the right political sponsors he could be Secretary of State rather than stuck in this no-where job of ass-kisser to rich alums. "However, my point Mr. Bracker is that here at Harvard we no longer encourage faculty to be so available to agencies of government or to corporations as they once were in the past. As you may know, we have been stung pretty badly by all the revisionist history pointing to our cooperative efforts with government to bring Nazi scientists to the U.S. after World War Two."
"To say nothing of what we now know to be all the help provided by Harvard faculty in toppling Allende in Chile, in managing that disaster we called the Vietnam War, in devising strategies to defeat revolutionary movements like the FSLN, the Sandinista Front for National Liberation in Nicaragua, and the FMLN, the Farabundo Front for National liberation in El Salvador. Some even say that Harvard may have as many war criminals as Nobel laureates on its faculty." Ray was now enjoying himself telling this asshole that people besides Harvard faculty know what is going on in the world. "Shall I go on?"
Siegel turned stone cold. "My point Mr. Bracker is that we do things differently today."
With all due respect, Mr. Siegel, there is more buying of faculty today by government and corporations than there ever was in the past. Why some of your people may well as be listed as independent entrepreneurs who just happen to have office space at Harvard."
"Wrong, Mr. Bracker! You can still buy all the faculty you want at schools with a direction in their name, but not at Harvard!"
Now Ray was really pissed. The son-of-a-bitch looked up my resume, and knew that he got his degree at Southwestern State University. Maybe he should just cut his losses and move on. "Well I guess there is nothing left for us to talk about."
"I didn't say that Mr.Bracker. Harvard faculty are still eager to trade their expertise for a little extra something, but it must be done tastefully, discreetly, and, above all, academically. So, we are talking grants, conferences, travel money, exhibitions, publication of books, support for graduate students. And, most importantly, the money must be laundered--the Rockefeller and Ford Foundations are well situated for this kind of assistance. Everyone is happy. You get what you want, the faculty get what they want, the Foundations continue their role as influence peddlers and opinion shapers, and Harvard and its faculty have clean hands. So, what were we talking about Mr.Bracker? How may Harvard assist you?"
"Well, Mr. Siegel, I was thinking about $30 million to create a Harvard Center for Global Democracy."
"Why don't you call me Drew."
________________________________________________________________________________
Alpha Team Briefing: Leader Ed Finlay
Target: Political System
Goal: Normal Corruption
"Okay guys, the problem that we face with corruption in less developed countries is the way that corruption is carried out. There is no subtlety to what is done, and no effort to disguise the actions of the corrupt party. Everyone is motivated to get what they can NOW, with no interest in laying a groundwork for corruption so that it may proceed normally, as it does in the U.S."
"Sort of like Hillary's $100,000 overnight gain in cattle futures," says Marshall, and getting great laughter from the rest of the team. (NOTE: This was written in the year 2000, long before the Clinton's would be receiving hundreds of thousands of dollars from Wall Street firms for giving a speech. It must have been some speech to be worth $500,000).
"Not the same thing," Ed replies. That's small potatoes stuff and besides Hillary wasn't in the White House when she became an overnight genius in trading cattle futures. The real problem is that is that there is insufficient trust by leaders in less developed countries in their ability to build a stable system of corruption so that people will be able to delay their immediate need for gratification in anticipation of greater rewards in the future. I propose the following first step principle for inclusion in the overall plan." Ed clicks on an overhead that projects on the screen in big, bold letters:
Step 2: In service to country, gratification delayed is gratification gained.
"This Step 2 has the virtue of getting the "haves" to think twice about immediately stuffing their pockets with public money, and the "have nots" to lower their expectations about what will follow from democratic elections. I am continually amazed when I see in these less developed countries local police on the street getting kick-backs from local vendors and accepting money from drivers to avoid parking tickets. The police have to learn that they will get their money from people above them not below them. It will come in the form of raises, bonuses, and pensions, all of which are hidden from public view."
Ray Bracker smiles sardonically, exclaiming "Instead of calling you Easy Ed I'm voting for Sneaky Ed."
"Flattery will get you nowhere, Ray. Let me illustrate the nature of the problem that we face. Take the case of Russia. The President-Elect Vladimir V. Putin has vowed to fight corruption and lawlessness in Russia. His credibility is tarnished by the fact that he is the majority owner of a major television company, and while running for president he used his company's TV programming to attack his opponents in the election. He is also believed to have substantial financial interest in sveral formerly state-owned industries that have been privatized."
Ray jumped in. He loved to talk about this kind of stuff. "The other problem Putin has is trying to reign in his regional governors. If you want to see corruption go check out guys like Murchenko who runs the Kalingrad region like a Baron reminiscent of feudal times. Putin has a hell of a time making the Governors accountable to Moscow, and they are afraid of losing the support of the regions."
Bif smiled. "Let's get Marshall to work on the hearts and minds of the Governors. But watch out for those Russian balls, Marshall, they might bite back. Anyway, you're right Ray, about the magnitude of the problem. The important thing is to examine why something like this would never happen in the U.S. When the President or members of Congress have millions invested in corporations take public office, they put their investments in a "blind trust." Someone else takes over the decisions about their investments in oil companies or the banking sector, and they can contribute or accumulate wealth without their direct involvement. It's a really great arrangement, one that American people seem to approve of. You can serve in the White House or Congress making decisions that can affect the value of oil companies or banks, and yet behave as if it does not affect your personal financial interests. A real stroke of genius by the Congressional ethics crowd, and it is the essence of normal corruption.
Ray seems very irritated. "That's not the real payoff for Congress. It comes after they leave, quote-unquote, public service. Poor bastards like us do all the work, take all the heat, and those blow-hards get all the gravy."
Ed jumps back in quickly. "Right on Ray. I know where your devious little mind is going. The real payoff is the revolving door! After they leave quote-unquote, public service they go to work for the corporations that they regulated, or the countries that they bashed when they were in office. Former Senator Mike Mansfield is on the payroll of the Japanese, helping them get more products in the U.S. When he was Senator, he bitched about all those Japanese imports. Henry the K is on the payroll of more companies and foreign governments that you can count."
"Bombs today, bonds tomorrow," Ray snickers. "Those guys would give Ghadafi a blow job if the fee was right. And speaking of blow jobs, I see where Clinton's ass-kissing defender during Monicagate has left the White House to consult for some half-assed country."
Ed is back again. "Let's focus on what is important here. The U.S. has devised a system that keeps the pols and the bureaucrats from stealing directly from the public treasury. Instead, we funnel megabucks to corporations through tax loopholes, subsidies, research support, and the like. We also develop a system of regulation of powerful corporations. We regulate banks, hospitals, oil companies, automobile makers, utilities, the stock market---you name it and we regulate it. So when members of Congress or White House lackeys, or loyal workers on the Democrat or Republican National Committees decide to move on, they have loads of opportunities to work as influence peddlers for the private sector firms. The beauty of this system is that you win whether you are a Republican or Democrat, and whether you win or lose an election."
"You're starting to piss me off Ed," shouts a slightly red-faced Marshall. "Why should we help those bastards continue to feed off this system?"
"Try to remember that you're a professional, Marshall," replies Ed with some anger. "The maggots that feed off this system will get theirs someday, but right now we have a job to do. We have to get the elected leaders and government officials in less developed countries to let the private sector companies be the first beneficiaries of the public treasury, and to believe that their turn will come after they leave office. That way, the pols and the bureaucrats can actually spend their time in office trying to build the country rather than finding ways to rob the treasury. The key is--let's say it loud and clear: Deferred Gratification. That was the old Calvinist virtue that created wealth, but for enjoyment in the hereafter. Well, we are not that stupid. The hereafter for our Third World pols is after they get out of office."
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The mirror behind the bar has a small sign in red, white, and blue letters.
You can always spot a spook. He never springs
for a drink or tips the bartender
Marshall didn't especially like this watering hole. The bartender was a smart ass who enjoyed being "in" with the Langley crowd. Most of the Agency people who came here after work were low-level scut-workers with plastic IDs that made them think they were part of the intelligence community. Marshall came here when there was a chance he might get too juiced to drive. If things got too bad he could go back to his office and sleep it off.
The place always had a solid contingent of clericals that livened up the place. They didn't hold much interest for Marshall. He like companionship, but the conversation costs were high. While Marshall is reflecting on his day, in walks Easy Ed Finlay. When Ed spots Marshall, he has that deer in the headlights look, as if he has been caught at a Pat Buchanan rally. Marshall is amused. "What's up Ed. Here to look over the chippies?"
"On my way home and thought I'd get a beer before hitting the traffic."
Marshall persists. "You have your eye on one of those hot numbers in the ID section?"
"We're not at work Marshall, so you can stop ragging on me."
"You college boys don't know how to kick back and relax. You always need blasting music and pot to make you think you are having fun. Is that what it was like at Yale?"
Ed ignores Marshall's baiting, but he does want to talk about the group's assignment. "What do you think of our new assignment?"
Marshall is not surprised that Ed wants to talk shop. The little weasel is always trying to get his mind around something. "It's a big improvement over the diddly stuff we have been working on. I'm not sure that I can handle another assignment that involves planting stories with foreign journalists that paint U.S. policies as benign or humanitarian. Who do they think reads that shit anyway? Sometimes half the population can't read, or if they could, they wouldn't have the money to buy a newspaper."
"I don't know Marshall. Those stories can make a difference. Besides, we are trying to reach the middle and upper classes, and they will carry forward our message."
"Bullshit! You reach the uppers with cash, not with puff stories about the U.S. Didn't you take any hard-nose courses at Yale. You think its all about persuasion and media, don't you."
"You old cold warriors never give up, do you? This is the 21st century, Marshall."
"That's the root of your problem, Ed. You have no basis for comparison. You have no idea what it was like during the golden age of the Cold War. We were big thinkers then, not the diddly shit of planting stories with foreign journalists. We talked about toppling governments and taking out world leaders who were giving us grief."
"Okay I'll order another beer and you can tell me some war stories from the good old days."
"I won't bore you too long Ed, but you can never know what it was like to go eyeball-to-eyeball with the Ruskies over the Cuban missiles. Being in a room with serious people who make a difference and talking about when and where to use the big stick. Back then everyone knew what we were capable of doing. They knew that we could do it slow, like wearing down a country with sanctions, and hundreds of internal incidents of subversion. And they knew that we could do it fast, like Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The Ruskies knew what we were capable of, and they blinked."
"Are you a slow man or a fast man, Marshall?"
"I'm AC-DC, ED. I go both ways. And that's why I like our new project," he exclaims with such enthusiasm that he surprises Ed, who sees Marshall as too cynical for such reactions. "There are big ideas driving this project, and a chance to stretch our legs again and see what we are capable of doing."
Ed looks at Marshall straight on. "What are you going to do with your grab-them-by-balls assignment? How are you going to get the big money people to buy into my suggestion of deferred gratification when it comes to corruption?"
"I though you might give me some help on that one Ed. You have the more devious mind. I'm too direct."
"You have to sneak up on the short hairs, Marshall. You can't grab them with a direct frontal attack. the key is indirection. Make it loom like you are going after a group other than the big money boys, while laying the groundwork for getting their attention."
"Can you give me a clue Ed?"
Ed could give more than a clue but he thought that Marshall should work this one out for himself. Besides, if you give out ideas too freely, people will take you for granted. "I would start by thinking about how the U.S. moved into the number one spot for all nations when it comes to putting people in prison. How did we get almost two million people in jail, and almost half of them Black."
" You are a sneaky bastard, Ed."
______________________________________________________________________________
Alpha Team Briefing: Leader, Marshall Shaw
Subject: Short Hairs
" Okay, I know that Bif asked me to do a white paper, but I didn't feel comfortable putting some of this stuff on paper. Even though I'm just tossing around ideas, some of this stuff can blow up in your face."
"Yeah, like Fidel's cigars," laughs Bif.
"Hey I wasn't in on that off-the-wall idea. Fidel just chews them, he doesn't light them. It's part of the image. Anyway, my point is that I'm a little paranoid about a paper trail, and we all know that paranoia is what keeps most of us alive, or at least holding our jobs. Besides, I wanted your input."
"You mean you want to implicate us in the Short Hairs project," Ed says with a snicker.
"When they come for me, I ain't going alone," says Marshall, to the cheers and catcalls of Bif,Ray, and Ed, who is giving Marshall the thumbs-up and finger at the same time. Actually, they all loved this kind of stuff. It makes them feel closer to the 007 image of their sometimes boring work.
"Okay, let's earn our pay. The assignment is to come up with a plan for less developed countries that will bring the big-money business people to support the elections project. We will do this by changing their long-standing practice of buying elected officials. We need to sell the idea that we must stop the practice of gross corruption and replace it with a system of normal corruption. People will never buy into elections and democracy as long as here is gross and visible corruption. As Ed Finlay argued in his presentation last week, the key is delayed greed. The business types have to learn to use the orderly workings of government to get their hands on the public treasury. That assumes trust among the greedy bastards that everyone will play by the same rules, and if everyone is patient, the pols and the big money boys will eventually get everything they want."
Ed chimes in, "That also means that the big money people and the pols have to accept an occasional disciplining of one of their own when he doesn't play by the new rules. It's necessary to throw one to the masses once in a while in order to save the entire system."
"Give us Barrabas! Give us Barrabas!" shouts Ray, with great gusto.
"up yours, Ray!" exclaims Marshall, thoroughly enjoying the levity. "To get this project in place we need to have a symbol that is universally feared and hated in all countries. A symbol so powerful that it justifies major efforts to limit or eradicate the condition."
"A no-brainer Marshall, it's drugs, I all its varied and wondrous forms," says Ed, with some embarrassment for answering such an easy question.
"Right! Drugs. The destroyer of youth, corrupter of adults, despoiler of virtue. We start with a national campaign about the magnitude of the problem and how drugs is responsible for corruption among officials, and how it drains money from the public treasury. We subtly link drugs to poor economic conditions that exist in a country, and show how the elimination of drug use will contribute to economic growth."
"Remember that great anti-drug showing a fried egg with the caption "This is your brain on drugs," say Ed. "How can we adapt that in Russia or in Nigeria? We can start with the hard drugs like meth and coke and when necessary move into the prescription drugs that non-druggies use to deal with normal health problems."
"Slow down Ed, you're too far out in front," cautions Marshall. "Let's stay with getting the drug problem on a country's agenda. First, we connect drugs with economic development, giving people the feeling that their lives would be better if the drug problem didn't exist, The we connect the availability of drugs to a country that is also disliked for other reasons. Drugs in Iran come from Iraq and vice versa. Finally, we associate drug use with segments of the population that have already been marginalized, using the music industry and Hollywood as the wedge. If this is done effectively, you have the basis for an anti-drug and the need for crusaders."
"But the drug menace has to be linked to highly organized menacing forces," says Ed, with a hiss that says this is my meat. "We can't us e the Mafia anymore. Too many Corleone movies. Marlon Brando as the Don has ruined this trope forever. But their are still the Columbian drugs lords, international cartels with billions in cash, quasi-military entities with advanced weapons, aircraft, boats, advanced technology. Hell, it's like fighting another country with an army, navy and air force."
"Right on the money, Ed," says Marshall. "The power of the drug lords requires a counter-force with comparable resources and the political legitimacy to act in order to protect the nation. When faced with a national emergency, like in wartime, it is necessary to overlook some of the things associated with legal rights. We will use the cultural resources of the country in question to create some thing comparable to the FBI. In Russia, the tradition of the KGB can serve as a starting point."
"And let's not forget the local police in this work-up," says Bif, who is trying to stay on the edge of the briefing. "The drug war has transformed local police departments into formidable military forces, with enormous firepower and sophisticated technology. In the U.S. they are the ones who have used the war on drugs as the excuse to fill up the jails with young Black men. They transform local racist fear into battles from the anti-drug crusade."
Marshall takes charge again. "So, first we create the drug problem, and then we create the local and federal forces who are charged with combating the drug menace. We put them to work sweeping the streets of the undesirables and thereby making the good folks feel safe again."
Bif can't resist. "But eventually the good folks are going to have some doubts about thet tactics used by the government or local police. Look at what happens in New York. The rich who live there love the hard nose tactics of the police, but they are also the first to scream about the excessive us eof force."
"Not to worry," Ed says with a smirk. "The rich want the streets clean of beggars, drunks, and muggers. But they don't want to see how it is done. But that's the beauty of a repressive operation that appears to be targeted on some marginalized group, whether it's Blacks in the U.S. or gypsies in Russia. The public practice of repression in the name of some lofty goal is a totalizing experiemce."
"Here comes Ray's totalizing shit again. What the hell are you talking about, Ed," erupts Marshall with some irritation.
"what I'm talking about is that you want people to simultaneously want the repression and to be upset by it. It is cathartic for the privileged classes to see the jails being filled with those considered as human waste. And when they're upset, it's not about how the waste is being treated, it's about their awareness that such things could be done to them under the right circumstances. That's what it means to call this kind of repression "totalizing." It gets the attention of the poor and the rich, but for different reasons."
"And that's why the short hairs project will bring along the pols and the fat cats." Marshall beams, with a sense of satisfaction. "Today we put wiretaps on the phones of suspected drug traffickers, and tomorrow it might be a search of your bank records, or how you get your recreational grass or coke. Who knows what that might turn up."
Bif's beaming. "You guys have done good. Let's call it a day."
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White House Press Conference
"Mr. President, there have been reports recently that the Pentagon and the State Department have undertaken a joint project to recruit, arm, and train paramilitary units in the largest Russian cities, and that similar plans are underway to do the same thing in Nigeria. What can you tell us about this, sir?"
"I can always count on you for the tough ones, Sam. As you know, our government, in cooperation with the governments of Russia and Nigeria, have undertaken joint programs to build the institutional infrastructure for democratic elections. the people of Russia and Nigeria deserve the opportunity for self-government. But we are not doing this just because it is the right thing to do. We have a self-interest in seeing a democratic Russia and Nigeria. With political stability comes an interest in investment, and both countries have enormous natural resources to attract investors."
"Yes sir, a follow-up please. What about paramilitary units?"
"Well Sam, the only thing that I can say is that a number of our big city Mayors and Police Chiefs are asked routinely by their counterparts in other countries for advice about law enforcement matters. That's the least that we can do when people ask for our help."
"Thank you, Mr. President.
"Yes, Sally, what's your question?"
Mr. President, is it true that you are getting another dog, and, if so, how have you prepared Skipper for his new friend?"
"Why Sally, you must be taking lessons from Sam. You just can't keep a secret from the professional journalists. That's also something other countries need to learn from us.
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Press Conference, Los Angeles Mayor's Office
"I want to start by giving you a report on the LAPD's anti-gang, anti-drug unit, known as CRASH--Community Resources Against Street Hoodlums. During the last month, through the counter-intelligence program of our CRASH officers, we have made over 3,000 arrests and convictions. The new techniques of gang profiling and drug profiling make it possible for us to identify and neutralize criminals before they commit crimes."
"Mr. Mayor, what do you say to those people who allege that the CRASH units go after innocent kids on the basis of their race and where they happen to live?"
"Innocent kids have nothing to fear from the LAPD. We start with known gang members and look for their associates who wear gang clothing and gang tattoos."
"What tattoos and what clothing, Mr. Mayor?"
"If I tell you that, than gangs will know what we're looking for."
"And what about the allegations that a CRASH officer was caught stealing and selling cocaine from the evidence room, and that some units have been beating and framing homeboys on street corners, planting evidence."
"Responsible journalists don't try to use a few bad apples to make the entire force look bad. The bottom line here is that most of the LAPD are professionals doing their job to protect the people of this diverse city. This city belongs to everyone, not just the homeboys and drug dealers. The people of LA have the right to walk to Starbucks without fear."
"But Mr. Mayor, can all these allegations be false or mistakes of a couple of bad apples?" Some people are starting to wonder about who polices the police?"
"Well let me ask you, Mr. Smart Guy. If the CRASH program is so bad, why are so many police departments in Russia and Nigeria using our program as a model for their own anti-drug task forces?"
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NEW YORK TIMES, June 15, 2000
Worldwide Poll Data Results: People Want to Vote
"Finally, I can die in peace. And I hope that it is my dharma to return as a voting registrar," said the street beggar in the teeming streets of Calcutta, after he cast his first vote ever for a movie star running for the city council. It doesn't matter if you are Cuban, French, or Pole--people want to vote. It doesn't matter it's a soft drink, a movie, or a president--people want to vote. What was once a right of people in a handful of democracies has now become the latest craze of people around the globe.
Preliminary returns from the most ambitious world-wide opinion poll ever conducted were released today by the Phew-Grogby GLOPOLL. This person-on-the-street poll queried 64,000 people in the largest cities in over 100 countries, asking how they feel about voting as a means of expressing their views on everything from soft drinks to female politicians. Although the final results will not be available until early fall, the big picture is already clear: people from all walks of life feel empowered by voting. Some also believe that it is having an effect on their self-esteem, so says Kareem Shafir, a street sweeper from Bangladesh: "I hold my head a little higher these days knowing that my preference in soft drinks are respected by others. Of course, I cannot afford such luxuries, but someday I will."
The pol was commissioned by the World Federalist Association to see if their year-long global project "Down With Suffering, Up With Suffrage" is taking hold. WFA chief executive John Anderson, himself a former presidential candidate in the 1980 elections, describes the polling results as an "overwhelming endorsement of the power of the people in a plebiscite." Speaking at the Rose Garden press conference, after a meeting with the President and First Lady, Anderson pointed out that "most people aren't aware that the word plebian is not a put-down. People should be proud to be called plebes, for they shall inherit the earth. The First Lady made it her personal mission to bring polling booths to every city, village, and town around the globe in order to make voting way of life. The World Federalist Association will work with the First Lady to turn the sleeping giant into an army of workers and consumers. And I want to make a personal pledge to Kareem Shafir: I will not rest until you can freely choose to buy a soft drink whenever you wish."
The U.S. Marine Corp band played selections from over 200 national anthems, and homeless people from downtown Washington who are working on the Suffering-Suffrage project were invited to the Rose Garden reception to meet some of the foreign dignitaries.
The End
