Impeachment

by Mark Spivak

  © 2020 Mark Spivak

  This is a work of fiction. References to real people, events, establishments, organizations or locales are intended only to provide a sense of authenticity and are used fictitiously. All other characters, and all incidents and dialogue, are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical means, without the prior permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in reviews and other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, contact the publisher.

  Published by Blacklight Press

  A City of Light Imprint

  City of Light Publishing

  266 Elmwood Ave, #407

  Buffalo, New York 14222

  info@CityofLightPublishing.com

  www.CityofLightPublishing.com

  Book design by Ana Cristina Ochoa

  ISBN 978-1-942483-97-7

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  About the Author

  Discuss this Book

  Prologue

  Ten Months Earlier

  President Khaleem Atalas leaned back in his chair, closed his eyes and rubbed his forehead. He allowed himself this gesture of fatigue because he was alone in the Oval Office with Joel Gottbaum, his closest political advisor. The chair had been a birthday gift from his wife many years before, and it had travelled with him from his home outside Philadelphia to his Senate office and down Pennsylvania Avenue to the White House—a journey almost as remarkable as that of Atalas himself. At the time he received it, he had been an unknown community organizer and the chair seemed like an extravagance. Now, the leather was worn and fraying in spots, and the contraption resembled something from a garage sale. His insistence on using it had less to do with humoring Korinne than reclining in one of the few places he felt truly comfortable.

  “You’ll have to make a statement about the troop levels,” Gottbaum said when the President opened his eyes. “And I’m afraid you’ll have to do it soon. Both Fox and CNN are pressing me on it.”

  “They can wait a couple of weeks.”

  “That gives them a couple of weeks to continue comparing you to Cane. We can’t afford it—the election is eight months away.”

  “I’m waiting for the CIA to cough up some information on Al-Akbar. They thought they had a lead on his whereabouts. If we can catch the son of a bitch, people will forget about the troop levels.”

  “They don’t much care about them now, to be honest. We’re talking about containing the network noise. Remember, you’ve reduced the force in Sumeristan by 30 percent since you took office.”

  “Yes, and we’ve put 100,000 troops into Kabulistan. With nothing to show for it.”

  “Here’s the narrative,” said Gottbaum. “You inherited this mess from George Cane—people understand that. It doesn’t hurt to keep reminding them of it, regardless of what Saturday Night Live says. Sooner or later someone will give up Salman Al-Akbar, and voters will forget how many troops we have in Kabulistan.”

  “Maybe so, but that’s not going to stop the insurgency in Sumeristan.”

  “So you do a George Cane, and propose another troop surge. It worked for him.”

  “Look Joel, as a political operative, you’re the best in the business. I wouldn’t be sitting here if it weren’t for you. But this goes beyond politics. People are sick and tired of being at war, and I don’t blame them. It’s sucking our economy down the tubes. We’re making no progress. It’s one thing to tell them that we’re engaged in an ongoing battle against the forces of terror, but this has been going on for nearly a decade.”

  “And it’s been a decade with no domestic terror attacks inside the U.S. You need to keep reminding them of that as well.”

  “Is that what I tell working mothers in the ghettos? That we can’t expand social programs for their kids because we’re funding 100,000 troops in Kabulistan?”

  “You could tell them that because of your efforts, no suicide bombers have committed mass murder in their neighborhood.”

  “Every single one of those attacks that we’ve foiled was scripted to take place in rich, white areas—gated communities, luxury condos. These guys know they won’t get any mileage out of bombing the ‘hood.” He drummed his fingers on the desk. “Cane and Hornsby had it easy. All they had to worry about was the Dua Khamail and Husam al Din. I’d like to see them take on the New Caliphate for a week.”

  It was difficult for anyone to believe that less than two years had passed since Husam al Din had spawned their latest mutation, the New Caliphate. Dismissed at first by the CIA as a radical but harmless fringe group, the organization had swelled to nearly 50,000 members dedicated to establishing an Islamic state in Sumeristan. The first beheading had occurred six months earlier when the group executed a captive from Doctors Without Borders; since then, the brutal videos of the decapitations had become a staple of the nightly news. The New Caliphate troops were organized into military brigades and wielded weapons supplied to them by Russia and China filtered through allies in Persepostan. Even worse, they fought with a fearlessness totally absent in the Sumeri army units who opposed them, and they were starting to accumulate territorial gains in the provinces.

  “If we play our cards right,” said Gottbaum, “maybe we can get them to start beheading the Republican primary field. One every few weeks ought to do it.”

  “Sure.” The President grinned. “At least you can still cheer me up.”

  “Just trying to earn my princely salary.”

  “You want to earn it, you can worry about what happens if these people start capturing provincial capitals before the election. If they’re marching on Baghdad by the middle of the campaign, the Republican nominee can stroll in here with his head in his hands and a higher approval rating than I have right now.”

  “With all due respect, you’re starting to get tunnel vision. You’re at 48 percent, within the margin of error, and trending upward. We’ve locked dow
n all the key Democratic constituencies, even the ones that were wobbly last time—particularly gays and Hispanics. The economy has moved out of recession, and real estate prices have rebounded. You need to tell people of all this.”

  “I do.”

  “I mean, on a regular basis. Like weekly.”

  “You’re right.” Atalas rubbed his forehead again. “Who’s worried about a few dozen beheadings when the stock market is doing better?”

  “People vote their pocketbooks. Never forget that. The video of yesterday’s beheading is ultimately not as scary as the increase in food prices, or the decline in the value of retirement accounts.”

  “Shit.” Atalas grinned again. “You’re pretty slick for a white guy.”

  “That’s because I play basketball. I can also dance, by the way.”

  Atalas rose, walked to the window, and stared at the manicured grounds.

  “The one thing I don’t want to do, Joel, is kick the can down the road. If we don’t figure out a way to contain and defeat the New Caliphate, we’re no better than the Cane crew. I don’t want somebody else sitting here ten years from now, bitching about my mistakes.”

  “First, let’s focus on having you sit here next year. Then you can do the rest. But we need every possible edge we can get. The word on the street is that the Haft brothers are prepared to spend hundreds of millions to defeat you.”

  “All right. What do you suggest?”

  “Stay on message. Repeat the catechism: We’re in this mess because of George Cane’s invasion of Sumeristan. You’re doing everything you can. You’ve reduced the troop levels by 30 percent, and you’ve strengthened our forces in Kabulistan. Your dual motivations for this were ousting the Dua Khamail and restoring the legitimate government, which you’ve done, and catching Salman Al-Akbar, which you’re going to do at any moment. You’re on the verge of a breakthrough. In the meantime, those troops are holding the New Caliphate at bay.”

  “Sounds encouraging.”

  “It’s all true.”

  “And how long before we start bringing those troops home?”

  “With any luck, you’ll catch a break and find Al-Akbar before the election. In the meantime, we’ll issue a projected timetable for withdrawal.” Gottbaum smiled. “The public loves timetables.”

  Chapter 1

  Late November, After the Election

  Paul Gilliam, the Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, unlocked the back door of his Northwest Washington home. He reached into the plastic bag and placed the bottle of Doxepin on the kitchen table. Gilliam then pulled up a chair and stared at the bottle.

  The pills had been prescribed for him several years earlier, when he was having trouble sleeping after the death of his wife. He insisted on picking up the refill himself, despite repeated offers from his personal assistant. Gilliam always retrieved the prescription at night. His routine was inflexible. He returned home, put the bottle on the table, and contemplated the possibility of taking all sixty pills at once.

  He imagined it would take several minutes to swallow them, preferably with a glass of milk. He would then walk into his bedroom and lay down. He envisioned he would have to take a wastepaper basket with him, since significant vomiting might set in. The side effects would be unpleasant, but it would be over within ten minutes.

  He wouldn’t do it, of course—or probably wouldn’t. He didn’t think of himself as a coward. He didn’t regard himself as a person who wallowed in his own depression, either, but once every two months he allowed himself this luxury. At least he was clear about the source of that depression. In the course of his scrupulous self-examination while contemplating the Doxepin bottle, he realized that his problem went way beyond loneliness caused by the absence of his wife. Paul Gilliam considered himself a failure.

  Five years earlier, things had been very different. During his confirmation hearings before the Senate Judiciary Committee, Gilliam had droned on pompously about the majestic impartiality of the law. The law transcended individual opinion, he remembered saying. Onlookers could debate its spirit and intent, but judges were charged with enforcing it to the letter. His pronouncements made such an impression on the committee that he was approved unanimously, then confirmed by the full Senate by an overwhelming margin.

  His first inklings about the devious complexity of the law occurred when he voted with the majority to deny a stay of execution to a convicted murderer. The eyewitness testimony against the man was ironclad, even though DNA testing had been inconclusive. After the man was put to death, further DNA tests exonerated him. Gilliam was initially haunted by this, but his guilt was assuaged by informal conversations with his colleagues. Many on the Court had played a role in executing an innocent person before learning from their mistake.

  Then came Democracy Unchained.

  The real name of the case was Cole vs. Federal Election Commission when it came before the Court. Herbert Cole was the sponsor of a right-wing interest group that produced a documentary on Bethany Hampton titled Bethany: The True Story. Hampton was the wife of former President William Hampton and was serving as junior Senator from New York. She was also running for President against Khaleem Atalas. The film was negative and inflammatory, and the goal of Cole’s company was to air it on HBO before the end of the year, in order to inflict the maximum damage on Hampton during the Democratic primaries. The U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia had ruled that it could not be shown. Cole appealed, and the case reached the Supremes in May.

  The initial consensus was 5-4 in favor of showing the documentary, with the majority falling back solidly on the First Amendment. But then the Court’s senior conservative began to argue that the majority’s interpretation was too narrow. He urged his colleagues to view free speech in the broadest possible sense. Why was it possible for a film company to express its opinion on political matters, when other corporations or labor unions were prohibited from doing so?

  Right-wing think tanks and interest groups began to pile on in favor of unlimited free speech—which meant, of course, unlimited campaign contributions. Organizations funded by the Haft brothers were calling the case Democracy Unchained, and the name went viral in the media. Gilliam watched helplessly as the process spiraled out of control. The final majority opinion stipulated that political contributions were a form of speech. Although the opinion placed no restrictions on the amount of contributions, it did specify that the source of donations had to be disclosed (rules that were later skirted or ignored). Paul Gilliam was torn, but he recognized that according to the letter of the law the opinion was correct. He joined the 5-4 majority.

  Khaleem Atalas eventually defeated Bethany Hampton to win the Democratic nomination, and the impact of the Cole documentary was insignificant. Of far greater importance were the effects that Democracy Unchained had on the electoral process. By the next election cycle, the cost of a Presidential campaign had escalated to a billion dollars, and half of that money on either side came from a handful of donors.

  Paul Gilliam was horrified. He watched as election contests morphed into shouting matches between billionaires. The content of campaigns was no longer about the issues. They had turned into a series of vicious and continual attack ads, which when taken together gave the impression that both sides were desperate. Even worse, the polarization turned Congressional terms into long stretches of gridlock between campaigns. Everybody seemed to hate everybody, and nothing was getting done. His worst moment came during a State of the Union address, when he and his fellow Justices had to sit through a blistering attack on Democracy Unchained by Khaleem Atalas in the House chamber.

  He had spent his life trying to be fair, to interpret the law impartially according to the text on the page. He also placed high value on the importance of admitting his mistakes. When Gilliam looked honestly at Democracy Unchained, he couldn’t deny one simple fact: He had single-handedly fucked up the American p
olitical system, and he had done so out of his own rigidity and inflexibility.

  He mused on this as he spread the Doxepin tabs out on the table before him. This was also part of his ritual. He separated the pills into piles of five, then methodically scooped up each group and put them back in the bottle. There were sixty, but he would not take them tonight. He would attempt to live long enough to make things right.

  Gilliam rose from the table, poured himself a glass of milk, and swallowed one Doxepin tablet. Goddamn Democracy Unchained, he thought as he staggered off to bed.

  Chapter 2

  One morning in early December, as the executives of Haft Industries were contemplating what they might buy their families for Christmas if the brothers ever gave them a day off to go shopping, Richard Haft sat in his office watching the year’s first snowfall. As usual, the atmosphere at corporate headquarters outside St. Louis was quiet and peaceful; the turbulence of politics never influenced the company’s drive to make money. He picked up the phone and hit the button on his console that connected him directly to his brother.

  “Morning, Dickey.”

  “Do you have some time for me this morning?”

  “Let me check the calendar.” There was a ten-second pause. “Come by at 11:30. We’ll make it work.”

  Roughly three weeks after President Khaleem Atalas was reelected, Rolling Stone published a lengthy profile of the Haft brothers titled Trouble in River City. The massive contributions made by the two brothers during the campaign had opened them up to scrutiny, and Democracy Unchained had suddenly revealed their existence to large numbers of Americans. What was remarkable about the piece was the line of thought pursued by the magazine.

  Unlike the previous year’s story in Mother Jones, Rolling Stone did not take the Hafts to task for being two of the largest polluters on the planet. They refused to focus, as The New Yorker had, on the ongoing war between the brothers and the President, a conflict that had been raging since before Atalas took office. Nor did they follow the path of Forbes and recount the bitter family conflicts that began when the Hafts were children, forming the basis for decades of litigation.