The Liberty Intrigue

by Tom Grace

  A column set over the Atlantic listed the six GOP candidates and their current delegate count. Fourteen states glowed brightly in contrast to the remaining thirty-six—states in which votes were being cast today to select the Republican nominee for president in this election cycle’s Super Tuesday. Seven of the states were shown in dark blue as their primary contests were over, with the remaining primary battlegrounds rendered in light gray. For presidential hopefuls, Super Tuesday separates the wheat from the chaff.

  Four of the seven previous primary contests were closed, meaning that only registered party members could participate in selecting the party nominee. The remaining states held open primaries that permitted any registered voter to vote on either the Republican or Democrat side of the ballot.

  The gauntlet of today’s primary contests would demonstrate a candidate’s ability to wage a viable national campaign. By emerging from the pack on Super Tuesday, a candidate stands to win not just a trove of delegates needed to claim the nomination, but the gravitas needed to attract the money vital for fueling a campaign through to November. For losers, the morning after Super Tuesday combines the bitter taste of failed ambition with the sobering reality of an empty campaign war chest.

  Page tracked the four closed primary states voting today, but the eight open states and their 375 delegates held his deeper interest. In the last campaign, he had used the momentum of a strong Super Tuesday performance to eliminate nearly half the field of Democratic presidential candidates and propel his man into the White House. This time around, his aim was to prevent any of the Republican candidates from developing that kind of momentum.

  The day opened with Florida Governor Lila Oates emerging as the clear front-runner after she took all ninety-four of her home state’s delegates in a winner-take-all victory at the end of January. Solid polling in the four closed primary states provided Page with a reasonable idea of how those delegates would be divided, especially delegate-rich California and New York. Offsetting the favorites in these states was the goal of the stealth primary campaign he was waging.

  “Just wait for me out here,” the President told his security detail as he entered the room.

  The leader of the stern-looking quartet nodded and quietly ordered his team into position at the two entries to the room. The Secret Service had the entire building in full lockdown mode for the President’s brief visit to his campaign headquarters.

  “Mr. President,” Page said warmly. “Welcome to the war room.”

  “I was in the neighborhood and thought I’d drop by. I’ve only got a moment, so lay it out for me.”

  “If the previous primaries are any indication, we expect strong voter turnout across the board. That plays into our crossover strategy. Absentee voting is at an all-time high in Georgia, New Jersey, Alabama, and Tennessee,” Page said with a smirk, “particularly in urban areas that went for you in the last election.”

  “And our community organizers?”

  “The grassroots support for various Republican campaigns is surprisingly robust. I’ve seen reports of van pools and shuttle buses taking voters to the polls. These folks are proving very helpful in ensuring the voters have no problems with these sometimes complicated ballots.”

  “Exit polls?” the President asked.

  “By the numbers, Oates started the day as the front-runner, but only because she won Florida. Anything less than a win in her home state and she would have packed it in last week.”

  “Just don’t let her build up too much momentum. I don’t want her in a position to win the nomination.”

  Page nodded. He also knew the President didn’t want to face an opponent with Oates’s intelligence, quick wit, and compelling history. The lady’s accomplishments refuted the liberal social script, causing most on the left to view her as the GOP’s most dangerous threat to their political power. Page would do all he could to prevent the President from facing off against Oates in the fall, when she would very likely fillet his boss during the debates.

  “The reverends are slamming her as a sellout to her race and an ingrate to those who paved her way,” Page reported. “She won’t be in the driver’s seat come June.”

  “Good,” the President replied.

  “And if things play out the way I think,” Page continued, “all six of your potential opponents will still think they have a real shot at the nomination come morning.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  ON AIR

  FEBRUARY 8

  “My friends, let’s get right to it,” Denby began, skipping his usual show-opening patter. “The dust from the Super Tuesday primaries has settled and we are no closer to knowing who will face the President in the general election than we were twenty-four hours ago. I say no closer not because yesterday’s vote should have decided the matter, rendering moot the votes in the remaining states along with D.C. and various territories. I say no closer because we still have exactly the same number of candidates as we had yesterday, and not one is so far back as to count them out.

  “At this stage in the game, with this wide a field of candidates, you would expect to see a couple floundering with delegate counts in single or double digits. These would have issued statements about reviewing their options, meaning they were checking how much cash they had on hand and deciding whether or not to cut bait.

  “For the purposes of full disclosure, I have met all of the candidates seeking the GOP nomination at one time or another over the years, and my relations with them ranges from friendly to simply polite. I am not a member of the Republican Party, so I was unable to cast a vote for any of them in my home state of Florida last week because this state holds closed primaries. For the record, I think it’s a good idea that party members alone select the party nominee.

  “Governor Oates, whom I do know well as she is the governor of Florida, was running sixth until her victory in our winner-take-all primary made her the first candidate to win over one hundred delegates. She and Colorado Governor Walterhouse are the current front-runners, both surging over two hundred yesterday, but the rest of the pack is clustered in the low hundreds with only sixteen delegates separating number three from number six. A decent showing by any of these four in the Kansas, Louisiana, and Washington primaries on Saturday could do for them what Florida did for Oates.

  “I personally like all six of the candidates running. They all have some decent ideas on how to get the country back on track. Most have worked in the private sector and understand there is a world outside the Washington Beltway. Two have positive records as elected state executives—valuable leadership experience our current president never added to his thin resume of achievements. I won’t endorse anyone until the party has chosen its standard bearer. What I will advise is that you follow the Denby Doctrine: Wherever possible, vote for the most conservative candidate.

  “Polling is not so much a science as an art form. I always find it interesting when a pollster asks me a question, usually political in nature, and I disagree with the premise. That said, polling for Super Tuesday really took it on the chin, especially in states with open primaries. In the states with closed primaries, the pollsters got it pretty much on the money. But the states with open primaries saw their turnout numbers way up. Drilling into the data, my crack team of political analysts found that voter turnout in predominantly Democrat districts was unexpectedly high. In these same districts, we found trends favoring candidates who were polling poorly elsewhere.

  “Now, there are two ways to read this trend of traditionally Democrat districts voting heavily in a Republican primary. One is that even the hard-core, genetically bred, union rank-and-file, leftist true believers are dissatisfied with the President and his anti-America agenda. The other is that a concerted effort by hard-core, genetically bred, union rank-and-file, leftist true believers is underway to damage the effort to select the most viable opponent to square off against our dear leader. I wonder which it could be.”

  “I’ll end this segment with a news it
em from my impressive heap. There is a story out of Charleston, South Carolina, about a woman who has uncovered a case of identity theft possibly involving the assisted care facility where her father resides. It is not unusual for facilities of this kind to assist their residents in acquiring absentee ballots for upcoming elections—patriotism being a distinguishing characteristic of many of our seasoned citizens. The only election her father missed was when he was busy shooting at Nazis in World War II. Her dad was my kind of guy—a decorated, cigar-smoking veteran and a conservative to boot. The daughter appreciated the nursing home’s effort to assist their patriotic residents until last week, when her father voted in the South Carolina Republican primary. The story notes that the father suffered a severe stroke last November that left him in a coma.”

  “There is no way of knowing for whom this veteran’s vote was cast in the primary, and he might have even agreed with the pick. We will keep tabs on this story as the investigation develops, but I find it interesting. What political party do we know that has managed to locate missing ballots in a tight Senate election to affect the outcome, so many ballots that certain precincts had over one hundred percent voter turnout? For a party that has enjoyed the broad political support of dead voters, a little help from those in a coma shouldn’t be hard to conjure.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  AUSTIN, TEXAS

  MARCH 5

  Egan nodded to the audience that was applauding his half of the presentation. After a few months on tour, he had finally grown comfortable onstage and developed a natural rapport with the audiences. The standing-room-only crowd that packed the Lady Bird Johnson Auditorium was on its feet, which still caused him some embarrassment, but he would accept applause over stony silence every time.

  As Egan returned to his seat on the stage, the university president stood and motioned for the enthusiastic audience to return to their seats.

  “Gentlemen,” the university president began as the last ripples of applause died out. “On behalf of the University of Texas, I thank you for sharing your incredible experiences with us. What you both accomplished in Dutannuru shows what common sense and hard work can do for a community and a nation.”

  The audience concurred with another round of applause.

  “We now move into the question-and-answer part of the evening, after which our two guests will be signing copies of The Dutannuru Miracle. Now I direct your attention to the two staff members with microphones standing in the aisles. If you have a question for our distinguished guests, just raise your hand and they will come to you. Otherwise, I have plenty of questions, but this being Texas I know y’all won’t be shy.”

  Several hands shot up and the young man roaming the right-side aisle approached a coed near the front of the auditorium. Standing at her seat, she received the microphone.

  “My name is Olivia Iglesias,” the young woman announced in a sultry drawl. “And I read your book this past weekend and could not put it down. And y’all here who haven’t read it, I highly recommend you do. I’m pre-law/poli-sci, and most of the required reading is theory. In Dutannuru, y’all put your theory to the test and proved it works. It’s the best case study I’ve ever read, and the most riveting.”

  “Thank you, Olivia,” Mensah said. “You are very kind.”

  “I hate to correct you after such a nice compliment,” Egan offered, “but the course President Mensah took in rebuilding Dutannuru was not based on an untested hypothesis. The principles behind Dutannuru’s political and economic climate were proven conclusively by the Founders of the United States, and again by President Ronald Reagan in the 1980s.”

  “What Ross and I did in Dutannuru was not new,” Mensah added, “but it works every time it is tried. Dutannuru was in dire straits and we needed what you Americans call a ‘sure thing.’ Ah, we digress. What is your question, my dear?”

  “The government of the United States has, for much of the past century, drifted away from its founding principles. The results of that progressive slide to the left are apparent. Under the current administration, that slow but steady drift has turned into a swift current. Across most of the country it feels like we’re rushing downriver toward a steep waterfall in a leaky barrel. I look forward to casting my first vote in the presidential election this November, and I really want to vote for someone who understands what made this country great and who will strive to restore what we’ve all lost to this progressive erosion.”

  “I share that desire, Olivia,” Egan said.

  “My question is directed at you, Mr. Egan. Will you please run for President of the United States?”

  Egan looked dumbstruck by the question as the audience applauded in thunderous agreement. Mensah rose from his chair and walked to the edge of the stage beaming proudly.

  “What a marvelous suggestion!” Mensah gleefully bellowed over the applause. Pumping his fist in the air, the former president led a chant that shook the auditorium walls: Egan! Egan! Egan!

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  PLANO, TEXAS

  MARCH 6

  Barbara Jones tapped the number-two button on her car radio, switching to the local news/talk station from an old country station that had slipped into one of its lengthy commercial breaks with a pharmaceutical ad for improved male performance.

  “And in Austin last night,” the newscaster read, “a book tour stop by a pair of Nobel Peace Prize winners turned into an impromptu campaign rally, clips of which have gone viral on the Internet. During the Q-and-A session that followed the lecture, engineer Ross Egan was implored by an audience member to seek the nation’s highest office. A reporter on the scene spoke with the young woman who posed the question.”

  “What Mensah and Egan did with literally nothing in Dutannuru truly was miraculous,” Olivia Iglesias explained. “Texas has weathered this recession better than most states, and our pain is small compared to where Dutannuru was when Mensah came to power. If you look at what he and Egan did in those first years and compare that to what our President has done in the same amount of time, you’ll see real quick who knows how to get the job done and who doesn’t.”

  Jones pulled into a parking space in front of the elementary school and followed the signs to her precinct voting place. The line was longer than she recalled from previous elections at this time of day, but it moved quickly and she was soon in the booth with her ballot. She scanned the names of the six Republicans on the ballot and moved her pen to the oval beside Lila Oates’s name. The tip hovered over the ballot for a moment as Jones considered her vote. Earlier that week, she had finished listening to the audiobook version of The Dutannuru Miracle and was deeply moved by the story of the war-torn nation’s resurrection.

  As much as Jones admired Oates, she still longed for a candidate whose accomplishments and optimism inspired her. She had cast her first vote for JFK, but the rest had gone to the candidate she found least objectionable. At her age, she wanted and expected more out of those seeking high political office, and too often was left disappointed.

  Not this time, she thought.

  Barbara Jones guided the tip of her pen down to the bottom of the list of candidates and filled in the oval beside a blank line. Then she wrote in neat block letters the name of the candidate she deemed most qualified to serve as president: Ross Egan.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  THE WHITE HOUSE

  MARCH 7

  The President sat in his private study scanning the cable news channels. Pundits dissected the returns from the previous day’s primaries for trends like haruspices divining the future by poking at the entrails of sacrificed animals. A briefing book lay across the president’s lap, its pages covered with Post-it notes and his scrawled comments littering its margins. The President’s personal secretary rapped at the frame of the open door and peered into the room.

  “Mr. Page is here for your two o’clock.”

  “Show him in,” the President replied as he stood and handed her the briefing book.

&nb
sp; A moment later, while the President was pulling a bottle of water from a mini fridge, his secretary returned with Page in tow.

  “Mr. President,” Page said warmly as he entered the room.

  “Can I get you something to drink?” the President asked.

  “Depends. Got anything stronger?” Page wore a sly smile.

  The President motioned for Page to close the door as he traded the water bottle for a couple of cold beers. Like college boys, they twisted off the bottle tops and flipped them into the corner wastebasket.

  “Good for two,” Page said.

  “Downtown.”

  They tapped the bottles in a toast and the President motioned for Page to take a seat on the sofa.

  “In a word,” Page began, “the Republicans are screwed. There’s just under six hundred delegates left to be divvied up and even with a clean sweep of the table, not one of them can crack a thousand, much less reach what they need to clinch the nomination.”

  “Oates and Neuske looking to broker a deal?”

  “Hell yes, but the rest are looking to play kingmaker. To pull off the nomination, someone has to promise the moon to at least three of his or her rivals. I think this will run into June before a deal is cut. And if one of the front-runners stumbles, the rest of the pack is right on their heels.”

  “How’s the media treating it?” the President asked.

  “Our analysts are making the rounds, opining that the confusion is symptomatic of Republican dysfunction. Most are taking our spin on it. Best part, this chaos on the Republican side has made you look more presidential as you go about your duties above the fray. And since we’re not running any ads, there’s no voter fatigue.”