“Of course, Robert. I welcome any discussion that can reduce waste in any form.” His broad smile conveyed confidence and trust. It was a clever disguise for the consummate politician. Gregg swung his six foot one, two hundred and eighty pound frame around, bringing his arm heavily across Robert’s shoulders. “There’s a subject we should touch on, first.”
As Robert turned with Gregg, a stocky man suddenly appeared at Gregg’s elbow. Gregg glanced at the man’s name tag, then smoothly brought him into the conversation. “Robert, I’m sure you already know Alex.”
The stocky man took over, saying, “Senator, it’s always a pleasure to see you, but I don’t believe the Deputy Attorney General and I have met. I’m Alex Hunt; Texas Bar Association.”
“Robert has reminded me tonight that he’s not yet the Deputy AG, Alex.” Gregg interjected. “We’re both a little premature in our congratulations on what apparently is still in the ‘state secrets’ category,” he added with a knowing wink.
“That may be, Senator Gregg.” Hunt nodded with a smile. “But it’s such a well-known secret that I’m sure you’ll be wearing the title soon enough,” he told Robert. “It’s very nice to meet you.” His Texas accent was somewhat faded, like his hazel eyes. His silver hair was subdued next to Gregg’s shock of pure white hair. Still looking at Robert, Hunt asked, “I wonder if I could pull you aside for just a moment? I’ll be glad to return him to you in a few minutes, Senator,” he told Gregg.
Robert was used to this two-step, Texas or otherwise. “Certainly Mr. Hunt. I hope you don’t mind, Senator?”
“Mind? I’m delighted, since it gives me the opportunity to refresh my scotch.” Gregg patted Robert on the shoulder before he headed toward the bar steward. The corner now belonged to Robert and Hunt.
“I believe we share a common interest.” Hunt began.
“What would that be?” Robert put on his politician’s look of interest.
“We all want OPOV’s first vote to come off without a hitch. I’m sure y’all have covered all the bases, and that there will be no problems. We have every confidence in your ability to insure that, but if anything should come up, I’m available to help. Here’s my card. I want you to consider me a willing and able resource for whatever you may need—anything at all. Feel free to call me anytime.” He didn’t wait for a response before adding, “Perhaps you’d like to do a little fly fishing, or maybe some dove hunting one of these days? Any time you’d like to go, just give me a call. Hang on to that card.”
Before Robert could speak, an announcement came from the side door. “Ladies and Gentlemen, The President of The United States.” Robert turned toward the door as The President entered. The President was wearing his usual room-encompassing smile, seeming to catch each attendee’s eye as he worked the room.
Once the President had finished his handshaking, Robert turned to where Hunt had been standing. He was gone. In fact, now that Robert thought about it, Hunt hadn’t been there when the President had shaken his hand. Robert was dumbstruck. Not only was that the shortest conversation he could remember having at one of these events, it also seemed to be pointless. He checked the card Hunt had given him. It had nothing on it except a phone number.
Looking around the room, Robert also noticed that Senator Gregg was gone.
Chapter 9
Pulling out of The White House parking lot, Robert was tense. The careful conversations and undercurrents running through the seemingly idle chitchat had made his neck as stiff as a board. Like most events of that kind, each visitor had an agenda. Robert could have ignored all of them, like most politicians, but that was one skill he hadn’t mastered. Each question seemed to come with a request or a direct link to something on Robert’s to-do list; his very long to-do list. While he hadn’t picked up any action items from the lawyers in the rooms, he none-the-less felt increased pressured about his own overloaded job. He needed to work off some tension, and forget the job for an hour, but the drive home was only increasing his stress level. The few miles down Constitution Avenue and across the bridge to 66 took longer than the twenty miles into the suburbs.
Robert could feel his spine compressing, and his jaw clamping down. The bands on the sides of his neck felt like rods of steel, penetrating his skull. He reminded himself that all of Washington was stressed, but he felt no joy in the fellowship. Everyone he knew downed prescription happy-pills, chugged coffee, and swilled more alcohol every day. Most of his friends had diet problems, thinning hair, hormone imbalances, or prostates that were about to explode. The obsessive exercise and health food regimens of the nineties had faded—not that they’d ever been that popular in DC. Bars, not health clubs, were the habitual retreats of politicians and the thousands of government workers.
Robert knew he’d end up with a health or drinking problem if he kept having days like this one. He hadn’t been able to get Chris’ assertions off of his mind. They’d been nagging at the back of his brain between reminders of tasks left undone. That meeting with Hunt bothered him. Senator Gregg had glanced at Hunt’s name tag, as if he hadn’t quite remembered him, but to Robert it seemed that Gregg had arranged for the introduction to take place. Robert still couldn’t figure out what purpose Hunt had in seeking the introduction, or why Gregg had sounded just a bit condescending about the Deputy AG title. And certainly Hunt had the oddest business card Robert had ever seen. Hunt may have some connection to a special interest group or lobby, he decided. This was probably a clever maneuver to get Robert’s attention. Robert figured he’d be hearing more from the guy sooner than he’d like.
By the time Robert pulled into the back driveway of his two-story, mock colonial home, he’d developed a headache to go along with the stiff neck and compacted back. He felt like he could have ripped the leather off his briefcase with his teeth from the frustration he felt.
Inside the home there was no sanctuary. The house was a war zone. James and Andrew raced by shouting something unintelligible as they collected their karate paraphernalia and hand chopped all the furniture.
“No kicking!” Robert yelled, as the stair rail took a side kick from Andrew.
Tracie could be heard upstairs giving Alicia instructions about the boys’ schedule through bedtime. Tracie’s voice had a high-pitched, harried tone. Robert decided to lay low downstairs in the study. It had been his private office, but when Tracie got her appointment as European Hostess to the Kennedy Center it had to serve double duty for them both. Her father had arranged the elite position for her. It wasn’t a job. Nothing in Washington worth having was. The salary, or lack of one, was meaningless. Everyone made their money from side deals garnered from their new connections. Tracie’s appointment was strictly on the volunteer level, but she treated it as being as important as any job Robert had.
Robert heard Tracie making a final checklist for the kids with Alicia. He heard her come down the stairs, and through the hall. The study door opened.
“Robert?” her head peeked through the door. Seeing him sitting at the two-sided banker’s desk, she came into the room. “I thought I heard you come in. I have a dinner with the German delegation to set up the visit from the Chancellor.” She spoke in a continuous string of words. There was no point in Robert responding. He was just supposed to listen.
“Isn’t it wonderful? This is really a fabulous opportunity!” she continued. “There’ll be a reception, small classical concert, and then there’s a formal dinner at The White House.” Her speech flew by at high speed as she ticked off the events on her fingers. The last three words were emphasized with a flourish. “They’ll handle the dinner, of course, but the rest is mine. Isn’t it great? I’ve got to rush now. Alicia put something in the Sub-Zero for you. Don’t wait up for me.” She left the room and hurried down the hall, her heels tapping loudly on the hardwood floor.
Robert rose from the desk and reached the hall in time to see Alicia closing the door behind her and the boys. The door slammed shut and the alarm activated with a chirp. None
of them had waived, or even yelled goodbye.
“Fine, honey, how are you and the kids? Me? Oh, it was a normal day, the government is falling apart, my old school chum may have gone around the bend, and the debt will enslave all of us, but the coming civil war should fix everything.” He commented sarcastically toward the vacant hall. Robert went back to his study. The sudden quiet of the house was startling, but he felt a sense of relaxation. It was as if the house could now breathe a sigh of relief. The silence was broken only by the cold wind causing a leafless tree branch to lash at the window behind him. He was left isolated with his thoughts.
Rubbing his eyes, Robert replayed the day’s events in his mind.
What data was Chris going to give him? Why had Gregg slipped out of the reception so quickly? And what about Hunt? Was he actually a member of the Texas Bar? Robert snapped his laptop into the docking station. Jabbing on the power, he absentmindedly toyed with the mysterious “Mr. Hunt” card in his pocket.
A familiar tune signaled the computer boot cycle was complete. Robert punched in his ID and password, and pressed his thumb to the sensor device plugged into the USB port. It read his print, and began flashing the second phase of IDs and passwords as well as opening several programs in sequence across the screen.
Clicking on the Intranet global data warehouse icon, Robert continued clicking until he reached the Federal and State Bar Association listings. Selecting The Texas State Bar Association, he scanned several pages, coming to a short list of lawyers named Hunt. None had a first name of Alex, or any variation of that name. Robert paged through them. One after another went by, complete with photographs. Not one looked even vaguely similar to the man he had just met. Robert rocked back and forth in his chair. Perhaps Hunt had only recently passed the bar? Unlikely, he decided. Hunt’s age and invitation to a White House function precluded that notion. A quick search of the web for the name Alex Hunt turned up a number of people, but no lawyer was among them. The phone number also came up empty. White House security would have kept him from getting a pass into the White House reception if he wasn’t legitimate somehow, Robert mused. He’d check with them in the morning, but the information they’d release would be limited. White House security didn’t share readily. The real question was whether Hunt was connected to Gregg. Gregg didn’t spend time with people he didn’t have a use for, so Robert knew there had to be a link. He printed out the list of all licensed lawyers and bar associates with the last name of Hunt.
While that was printing, he headed toward the kitchen, thinking he’d pour a glass of wine, and see what concoction Alicia had left for him to microwave.
Pulling a nice, drinkable Cabernet from the wine rack, Robert selected an appropriate glass. He opened the bottle and poured, then set aside the glass and bottle to breathe. Opening the refrigerator he saw the note stuck to the side of a rectangular plastic container. “Roast – heat in microwave for two minutes, turn two minutes, add vegetable container, heat for two minutes” it read.
He closed the door without removing the containers. Picking up the wine glass, he headed back to the study. The printer had run out of paper, so he put in more and hit the flashing orange button.
As he stood there, Robert looked up at the wall. His diplomas, certificates, and picture shaking hands with the President were framed and hung in the corner above a tall, narrow frame of his successive business cards. The rest of the wall was covered with pictures of Tracie with every dignitary she had met since she had become a Kennedy Center Hostess. The wall used to be a showcase of every important event since she and Robert had met. Their French winery tour, bridal photos, wedding portrait, baby pictures, and each yearly family photograph had originally adorned the space. Robert wondered what she had done with all those pictures. He decided they’d been relegated to the attic with the other family shots. Tracie’s new sense of interior design did not allow family photos in the public areas, or in their showcase bedroom for that matter, since it was on the tour during parties and dinners. Only politically impressive images and the occasional sign of family wealth remained. It was a collection of yachts, clubs and dignitaries.
Robert reflected that beneath the apparent chaos of their days, there was always an order to everything. His life and Tracie’s had been well planned from birth. His father was one of the highest-ranking oil company executives in the country; the kind you never saw on TV, but one whom Washington insiders wanted to know. Robert had been given everything necessary for success, including private tutors, influential friends, and straight teeth. His life had been orchestrated to be picture perfect. His career had begun with ideal credentials. Magna Cum Laude from Brown University, Summa Cum Laude from Harvard Law School, published in the Harvard Law Review, and a beautiful, debutante wife who was well educated at Swarthmore, and came from a family listed in the Social Register. The photo wall reflected their latest levels of connections and power.
Robert’s accomplishments had allowed him to move smoothly through the political landscape. Opportunities came looking for him. A friend had sought him out to help with the campaign to re-elect Senator Tom Baxter. Six years later he had distinguished himself as a regional campaign manager, helping to achieve the Presidency for Senator Baxter. When Baxter stood to take his Presidential oath of office, Robert stood three rows back, and fourth seat to the right during the ceremony. Two days later he became the United States Associate Attorney General.
The printer finished and Robert sat down to look through the list. He rested his forearms on the desk as he thumbed through, occasionally taking a sip of the wine. Hunt seemed to be a common name amongst lawyers. It was a very long list.
Robert’s head jerked up from the desk, the noise of the slammed garage door still echoing through the house. Blinking the film from his eyes, he ignored his expensive watch and poked the face of his phone to see the time: it read eleven-thirty. He remembered briefly waking when Alicia had brought the boys home and put them to bed. He’d only cracked one eye open, hoping they would fall asleep and be quiet. Then he’d promptly fallen asleep again—the exhausted sleep of the overworked. Somehow being that tired made his solid wood desk feel comfortable. Now, looking up, he realized that the screen on the portable computer read, “Timed Out – Disconnected”. The wine in the half full glass sat next to his hand. A saliva oval, where his mouth had rested, had sunk into one of the pages below his face. He could hear Tracie going up the stairs to the bedroom.
Giving up on finding a connection to Hunt, he remembered that he’d groggily turned to searching the government archives and public domain for OPOV security references and inferences. Yawning more and more often during his search, he’d come up with little more than the overblown political rhetoric and public hoopla that surrounded any government program. He found a lot of bloggers whining about “big government,” or “privacy implications” in both new and saved links, but no unusual information.
Numerous texts droned on about the missteps of previous administrations, and how, as the information age took hold, the government of the United States continually implemented and then retreated from problem-laden programs. Most writings focused on apocalyptic consequences, extravagant overspending, and “pork barrel” appropriations. Others discussed public election debacles, or theorized alternative approaches to democratic processes and programs. Most of what Robert found was typical of the battleground between self-professed “conservatives” and so-called “liberals,” with a dash of political academia and lobbying added for spice.
The compilation only emphasized why the public had embraced the idea of OPOV. As economic conditions had worsened, and the divide in party politics had ignored the average citizen, the people had lost trust in the representative voting process. They became anxious for a change. OPOV offered One Person, One Vote on an Internet-based user interface, with a government-controlled, dedicated electronic communications backbone for best-in-class security. In addition to local and state votes, federal voting would be conducted on th
e system, and delegation actions such as the archaic and political favor-laden Electoral College would be abolished in favor of each citizen’s choice. The reality of every vote counting in the election of the President would be achievable.
In fact, each vote and each election would be more accessible, and more accountable. The program would streamline a number of government intermediaries by dispensing with them. It was a rare moment of both parties having desires align in the reality of reducing unnecessary government, while allowing each citizen to be heard.
Of course there had been obstacles. Voting through delegates or the Electoral College had been created to tackle the issues of a widespread public lacking timely access to voting centers and the country’s leaders, the problem of illiterate citizenry and common language issues, and the impracticality of leaving farms and businesses for political matters, as well as slow or nonexistent communications. While these issues had, for the most part, been conquered in U.S. society, the Electoral college and delegates had no wish to lose the benefits of their positions—and those who appointed them were loath to lose the leverage and reward system. Politicians had mounted fear campaigns against OPOV, and decried its reliability, but the idea of seeing each vote become more meaningful, and thereby holding politicians more directly responsible for their representation had won out. Immediately the system in DC had begun to see changes, including lobbyists’ attention being redirected to the public.
In President Baxter’s Senatorial campaign he’d declared that politicians were not the solution. He’d sought to change the role of government, touting a reduction in federal and state governments alike. He had surrounded himself with young visionaries, as well as established scholars, who worked jointly on rebuilding the role of government. They concluded that installing a structure, which would give people the power to choose how they would be governed, was not only necessary, but also possible. They had come up with the simple and brilliant OPOV.
One Man Two Votes (The Robert Carlton Series Book 1) Page 6