Brotherhood Beyond the Yard (The Simon Trilogy)

by Sally Fernandez

  Paolo scoffed. “I know this will seem like an odd statement, but let’s keep politics out of this.”

  Chase, feeling he was back in the game, chimed in with, “The conflux of high inflation and high unemployment, the stagflation Hank alluded to, cannot be blamed on the Carter administration. The stagflation actually started in 1965 and had snowballed for the following fifteen years, and neither the Carter nor Reagan administrations can be faulted,” he offered smugly.

  Paolo shrugged and looked in Simon’s direction.

  Simon took his cue and said, “Boys, let Paolo continue.”

  Paolo, unrelenting, resumed. “As I was saying, the man elected to fill that role was Republican candidate Ronald Reagan, who served two terms, followed by Republican President George Herbert Walker Bush, serving one term that ended a twelve-year reign. Then a new era ushered in a new face. The obscure Democratic governor from Arkansas, William Jefferson Clinton, became the forty-second president of the United States. Once again, the Republicans passed the baton.”

  Paolo continued passionately. “When certain events are foreseeable, I will have the ability to design, with a modicum of predictability, effective speeches that are responsive to the national psyche. The net result would be that I could author campaign speeches to sway the voters before they commit to a party, and steer them toward a candidate.”

  At that point in the discussion, Simon stepped in and summarized Paolo’s pitch, stating, “If you really could measure the current status and extrapolate future trends in areas such as economics and national security, then presumably you could write the campaign speeches, including an acceptance speech, today.”

  “Exactly!” Paolo proclaimed.

  Simon agreed with his prior statement about backing the winner. “That’s where the power lies.” He then approached Paolo’s theory taking a different tack. He asked Paolo, “If it is all about the words, then why do you need to predict? Can’t you just write the speech around major issues and push the cause?”

  Paolo, after a slight pause, agreed. “It is possible, absent an unforeseen major event, a force majeure that could change the metrics.” He also admitted that he could instantly tweak the words at any time to adapt to a shift in sentiment, without changing the tenor of the message. “Either party can own the national security or economic debate based on the strength of the message,” he declared.

  As a follow-up, Simon asked, “For example, could you write the campaign speeches for an unknown candidate who would run years from now, let’s say, 2008?”

  Paolo’s inner challenge kicked in, and with great enthusiasm he asserted, “With Hank’s ‘Internet Activism’ and Seymour’s ‘Media Blitz,’ along with my words in the campaign speeches, I seriously believe we would have the power to steer the course of history. With that scenario, we wouldn’t be backing the winner—we’d be creating the winner.”

  It was a boffo ending for Paolo, especially considering he’d had a rather dubious beginning.

  At that moment, La Fratellanza was in high spirits and their juices were flowing.

  —

  Chase’s emotions were working in overdrive. He was all set to rock, so the others sat back comfortably and let him roll. Certainly after all the “liberal speak,” the reserved Chase was ready to lay out the details of his theory. He used the back door approach, as Seymour had, before he described his thesis topic.

  “Originally, my interest was to study the long-term effects of U.S. banking deregulation on the world economy. Conversely, after a spirited conversation with Hank during the first week of class and continuing conversations on the same subject, my focus changed slightly.”

  Following the episode of rescuing Hank’s book, Housing Finance: Expanding Capital for Affordable Multifamily Housing, from spiraling off the bookshelf, and after listening to his argument as to why all people were entitled to own a home, his thesis morphed into “U.S. Banking Deregulation: The Catalyst for a Housing Crisis.”

  Chase gave details on the enactment of the Glass-Steagall Act of 1933, named after Carter Glass and Henry B. Steagall, which established the FDIC, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, and introduced banking reforms in the form of controls. “Legislators have been trying to deregulate those imposed regulations ever since, and beginning in the early eighties, the debates became ferocious.” He winced.

  “Banking institutions found their way around the federal laws and aggressively expanded into new lines of business. Banks began to relax their lending practices, lending to less credit-worthy clients, and at the same time increasing their interest rates on those loans,” he presumed.

  Chase further established that during the same period, organizations such as the Association of Community Organization for Reform Now, known as ACORN, founded in 1970 and today the nation’s largest grassroots community organization, targeted the banks and challenged their alleged predatory lending practices.

  Chase, referring to Hank’s earlier explanation of his thesis, looked directly at him and apologized, “Forgive me, for I am about to step on your toes.”

  Hank took the opportunity to retort. “Don’t worry, you’ve already stepped on my toes, twice,” he said, following with a wink.

  Returning the wink, Chase continued to explain that one of ACORN’s tactics to battle social injustice was to acquire low-cost housing loans for the low-to-moderate-income people they support. In 1977, he explained, there was a housing crisis and, as a “Band-Aid,” the Carter administration passed the Community Investment Act, forcing banks to provide subprime mortgages, fulfilling Hank’s belief that all people were entitled to own a home.

  “I disagreed with the concept that housing was an entitlement, which had been the mainstay of my debates with Hank,” he clarified. Getting back on point, and in an excitedly higher pitch, he said, “I believe a ‘perfect storm’ is in the making. One that will not only create another housing crisis, but one where banks and the financial market as a whole will fail—sending shock waves around the world!”

  Chase wasn’t prone to histrionics, but he animatedly professed that the government had learned nothing from the savings and loan crisis of the 1970s and 1980s. The thrifts, as they were called, acquired savings deposits and then provided mortgages, car loans, and personal loans, all of which became unsustainable, so loans naturally defaulted.

  “Ultimately, the government bailed them out using taxpayers’ dollars, to the estimated tune of one-hundred-sixty-point-one billion dollars,” he complained.

  Chase had been studying the congressional records and found that as early as 1988, in the midst of the S&L crisis, the financial sector placed severe pressure on legislators to deregulate the banking industry further. He explained that there are those who judge the Glass-Steagall Act of 1933, which introduced the FDIC in an effort to reform the banks, as being a contributor to the S&L failures.

  “I believe it created an environment where the S-and-Ls became more willing to take on additional risk,” Chase declared. “While I suppose the FDIC had a causal effect, I feel the Tax Reform Act of 1986 produced a more devastating result.” President Reagan signed the act into law as an attempt to simplify the tax code, and at the same time put a cap on the notorious tax shelters of the 1980s. However, many of the tax shelters were real estate investments.

  “It was the countless number of investors, no longer able to take the tax advantages, who defaulted on their loans that caused the S-and-Ls holding those loans also to default,” he alleged. “Within the next few years, possibly as early as 1999, another sweeping bill will pass. I predict it will be a bill that will allow the mortgage industry to offer mortgages to those who do not meet the customary credit criteria and whose income levels are below standard. Like the savings and loan crisis,” he contended heatedly, “these practices will also become unsustainable.”

  Chase closed his argument by stressing that he was searching for compelling data to support his own beliefs, data necessary to jostle Congress and alert its m
embers to the impending “perfect storm.”

  Concluding his presentation, he waited for a spirited critique as he looked in Hank’s direction, but none came, except for, “Well done,” followed by a big smile.

  Paolo and Seymour, feeling the area of finance was out of their league and having no questions, congratulated Chase with a celebratory high-five.

  During the jubilation, Simon signaled from across the table that they hadn’t quite finished. Once he regained their attention, he asked Chase, “Can you predict, assuming no one heeded your warnings, as to when the storm might hit? And, can you specifically predict what the impact would be on the U.S. economy? Finally, would you be able to identify what solutions the government could provide to prevent a total financial collapse?” This was what he believed Chase was inferring.

  To those questions, Chase responded, “Possibly, probably, and maybe.”

  Simon would be the last to explain his thesis topic, but the hour was late and he believed “The mind can only comprehend what the seat can endure,” as someone once quoted. “The only preview of coming attractions,” he said, “is that I have a lot to explain and it will be rather technical.”

  He thought it best that they call it a night and resume on Monday at their usual time.

  They all agreed.

  As it was nearing 11:30 p.m., the group was famished as usual. The time had slipped away from them, and they had forgotten to eat, so La Fratellanza headed for Jake’s.

  While seated in their private booth in the corner, each of them tried prodding Simon to give a hint as to his topic, but he was too cagey for that. He directed the conversation back to his favorite subject, the legitimacy of Desert Storm.

  7

  THE SHADOW THESIS

  After engaging in their weekend amusements, they reconvened at Simon’s apartment and picked up where they had left off on Friday night.

  As it was Simon’s turn, he restated that his topic was about Internet security and submitted his title, “The Pandora’s Box of the New Millennium.”

  “I believe it will be virtually impossible to protect data on the Internet in general,” he stressed, “and most important, personal data.” Underscoring his belief, he asserted, “All of us are at great risk. Not only are our identities in jeopardy, but more vitally, our national security.”

  Simon, the Internet guru, continued to provide some history regarding the first real use of the Internet in the 1960s, when the United States funded research projects for its military agencies. “By the early nineties,” he noted, “the Internet turned out to be so popular that programmers began to design applications that became useful to virtually every aspect of one’s life.”

  “When Seymour discussed the World Wide Web, he was referring to only one aspect of the Internet,” Simon stressed. He clarified, stating, “There are multitudes of services interconnected to resources other than the Web.” He pointed out that when he referred to the Internet he included the totality of hardware and software that allow computers to communicate with each other. “I feel it is necessary to make that distinction because the risk I cited earlier is the access to those computers and their data. It is the computer hackers who circumvent the system through illegal access.”

  Simon continued to explain that in the beginning, it was more of a challenge and there was no intent to commit harm, but then it deteriorated until it finally fell into the hands of criminals. He cited several cases. Starting in 1981, groups of hackers were forming with names such as the Warlords. In 1982, a group calling themselves the 414s broke into sixty computer systems at institutions such as Manhattan’s Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center and the Los Alamos Laboratories in New Mexico.

  “This continued every year with more and more hackers. Then in 1986, Congress passed the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, making it a crime to break into computer systems. That didn’t stop the hackers, for each year the illegal access increased exponentially and became more insidious. For example, in 1994, a Russian hacker siphoned ten million dollars from Citibank and transferred the money to bank accounts around the world. The authorities recovered all but four hundred thousand.”

  As the security systems protecting these computers and programs became more sophisticated, so did the hackers. Simon stated emphatically, “There is virtually no system that can’t be penetrated.”

  The other members of La Fratellanza looked at each other inquiringly, remembering Simon’s own hacking episodes, and were curious to know where he was leading.

  Then it all unfolded.

  The time had come for Simon to present them with his “shadow” thesis.

  While still holding the floor and with their full attention, Simon announced, “I have a way to make our projects even more exciting, a project we can work on together, shake it up a bit,” as he put it.

  Before delving into the details, he first used his persuasive skills, and complimented them for their intriguing proposals. Pointing to each of them, he acknowledged the fact that they had completed most of the research necessary to prove their hypotheses. In his view, his brothers had succeeded in their mission.

  They acknowledged that each would undoubtedly ace his thesis, and agreed that in some cases they actually had to dumb down the information slightly for their respective academic advisors.

  With great anticipation, La Fratellanza waited for Simon to continue.

  This time Simon spoke deliberately, pacing his words as he explained, “Collectively, we can devise a theoretical plot, a sort of a Manchurian Candidate II, ultimately giving us control of the office of the president of the United States.” He glanced at their faces and then quickly added, “Not really, but in theory.” Noticing Chase’s expression, Simon said, “Or, if that offends your sensibilities, you can think of it as Rudyard Kipling’s The Man Who Would Be King. Or could be king, with our help,” he cajoled.

  Continuing to ignore their shocked stares, Simon went on to explain how each of them could incorporate one aspect of the plot, as it pertained to their topic, and cleverly tuck it deep inside the pages of their convincing arguments. “In essence, each individual thesis in combination would create the proposed ‘shadow’ thesis.”

  Simon, feeling he now had more than just their attention, continued to lay out the details of his conspiratorial game. “We should start by assuming we already have a candidate, a man not born in this country, with no traceable history, and, to make it even more challenging, a minority. We should also assume that the candidate possesses the level of intellect required to fill the role.”

  He explained that, as a team, they would need to create a new identity, construct a training curriculum, and groom the “Chosen One” to win the Oval Office. “It is obvious,” he said, “we would also need to plan carefully every step necessary to enter the world of politics.”

  Simon reminded his brothers that they would be able to utilize some aspects of their own theories, which they had already confirmed in their theses. At the same time, he prodded them to recognize that it would require the concentrated efforts of everyone. Then, with his wry smile, he said, “That would be the easy part. Then we have to get him elected.” He paused for a moment to get their reaction as they sat around their round table.

  The silence in the room was overwhelming.

  The members of La Fratellanza looked at one another with disbelief. However, as the clock ticked, a smattering of interest crept back into the room. The group refocused on Simon. They were curious where this would lead, but primarily, they were dubious about the level of seriousness.

  Simon continued to let the silence permeate the room for a short time; then, he regained his role as self-anointed leader. “It is only a game, like war exercises, and would make the writing of our theses more interesting,” he emphasized.

  He allowed that the plot itself must remain a secret, for obvious reasons, pointing out that should anyone discover it, the “shadow” thesis, as he liked to call it, would be misunderstood. Simon reminded them tha
t their only personal exposure would be if one person were to read each of the five theses. “Of course, the reader would have to know specifically what he or she was looking for to connect all the dots.” He shrugged.

  He then reiterated his earlier comment. “It is only a game, an academic exercise to stimulate our intellects. Since each of us has completed his thesis, we have the luxury of free time that we can use to our full advantage. This a rare intellectual challenge on which we must capitalize. It will give us a real sense of the potential of our efforts.”

  Simon stopped pontificating—the others began contemplating.

  All agreed, except for Simon, that they needed time to dwell on it. That night they did not go to Jake’s, but returned directly to their dorms.

  —

  The next day they gathered for their scheduled study session, but this session was different from all others. After digesting Simon’s riveting plea for a little excitement, they all agreed to what they considered a harmless intellectual diversion, something to satisfy their love of a challenge.

  Paolo was the only one to raise an issue. “What about the legitimacy of a non-U.S. citizen running for the office of the president?” He referred to the U.S. Constitution stating, “In order to hold that office the person must be a natural-born U.S. citizen.’”

  Simon let him rattle on for a moment, and then reminded him, and the rest of them, “We will be creating a new identity, one of a natural-born U.S. citizen.” He volunteered to assume the responsibility of taking all the necessary steps to validate the Chosen One, including a birth certificate, college records, and all other documents to authenticate his persona, as part of the project.

  After a lengthy discussion, Paolo and the others relented and accepted Simon’s logic.

  Simon was more than pleased. He had been confident from the start that his proposal would intrigue them. He had planned it carefully—and thus far—perfectly.

  Simon again stressed the importance of secrecy, reminding the group that if anyone were to discover the “shadow” thesis, it would surely be misconstrued. He then turned and pointed to their computer lab. A second black box stood out prominently, something they had overlooked while enthralled by Simon’s presentation.