On Deception Watch

by David H Spielberg

  “Never before has the economic cost of bad governance been assessed against a nation by a third party. For the first time in human history, the cost of oppression, of looting the nation’s treasury, of creating policies that destroy the nation’s business infrastructure and vitality, and the cost of not governing well will all be calculated. A franchise maintenance fee will be determined for each franchisee nation by relating governance to economics. A calculation protocol will assess the cost of forcing submission rather than promoting allegiance and loyalty. Some countries do better than others. All will be judged by a stability index. The formula for calculating the index will be published shortly by the corporation. However, the worse the index, the higher the assessed franchise maintenance fee will be.

  “Some countries will be found to have crossed the line of acceptability that the corporation will soon publish for all to see. Those nations will be ineligible for a franchise until and unless they change their policies so that they change their index. The corporation will work with those countries by invitation only to help them achieve eligibility. Some countries may have once been eligible, but over time, slipped into practices that lead to revocation of their franchise. Again, the corporation, by invitation only, will work with those expelled nations to help them return to eligibility. In all events, only bona fide franchisee nations will have access to lunar Helium-3.

  “The economic benefits to be accrued by applying for a franchise and meeting the eligibility requirements will provide the economic incentive for each nation to reassess its policies and its practices of governance. Nations are free to govern in whatever manner fits the culture, history, and wishes of that nation’s people. A happy people will lead to social and, hence, economic stability. Submission through force and violence, the method most commonly used in the past to achieve social stability, will no longer serve. The lost opportunity cost of poor governance will be persuasively great.

  “If I may borrow a concept understood well by our partner in this joint venture, the People’s Republic of China, a legitimate government is one that enjoys the ‘mandate of heaven.’ For those nations that apply for a franchise that do not have a system of representative government whereby public sentiment is exposed through voting, kingdoms for example, well, they will soon come to learn the meaning of ‘the mandate from heaven.’ But I can assure you it will no longer be based on intuition and subjective assessment. There will be a strict monetary value attached to a claim of governmental authority.

  “While this all may sound revolutionary, we must give credit to the European Union for leading the way in creating at the 1993 Copenhagen European Council meeting economic criteria for membership in a multination union. This union allowed individual states to retain their sovereignty, but required allegiance to certain economic principles and to social principles designed to promote economic stability. It was a union of sovereign nations not forged by the consequences of war, as were the League of Nations and the United Nations, but peacefully, motivated by economic common interests. I say again, we applaud the European Union for its first tentative step in the direction of assessing the economic cost of governing policies. We believe, however, that the EU had and still has certain systemic flaws that the World Federation addresses more directly and more forcefully.

  “Let me be absolutely clear. It is by maintaining sole control over lunar Helium-3 and other material resources of the moon that the World Federation intends to maintain franchisee discipline. The moon is thereby declared off-limits to any space vehicles from all nations other than the United States and the People’s Republic of China. I say again, the moon is henceforth off-limits to all other countries.

  “The World Federation is declared, now and forever, the sole owner and controlling authority of the moon and all its resources. This declaration will be enforced, if necessary, with whatever means are necessary, including military, of the principal stockholders of the World Federation, namely, the United States and the People’s Republic of China. Any vehicles attempting to land on the moon in violation of this declaration will be destroyed.”

  The president stopped and turned to the man standing beside him now. “We are honored to have with us today Prime Minister Chen Shaoqi of the People’s Republic of China, who, I am sure, would like to share his thoughts with you.”

  The prime minister shook hands with President Llewellyn and stepped to the microphone.

  “Ladies and gentlemen of the press and ladies and gentlemen of the world, for I am certain that what we are saying here today is being seen and heard by people all over our earth, I welcome this opportunity to express the same enthusiasm and the same faith in the mission of this new world body, the World Federation, as your President Llewellyn has just expressed.

  “The People’s Republic of China has become inextricably entwined with the economy of both the United States and of the rest of the world. To my government, the world body described to you today is a crucial investment in the future for our people and for all people. It heralds a new era of international cooperation based not on military compulsion, but on reasoned and sustainable self-interest. I know these sound like surprising capitalist terms coming from a communist country, but you must remember that China has the longest continuous history of any people on earth. We sustained ourselves over the millennia, not by a dogmatic attachment to methods or ideologies, but rather by a flexible adherence to one overriding principle: does it work?

  “China has not survived as long as it has by living in denial of reality. The reality we see now is that we must, I repeat, we must forge and invite others worldwide also to forge new economic strategies if we are to survive as a happy human community on this earth. Petty intrigues, civil wars, brutality against one’s own people, destruction of the environment, abuse and waste of the world’s resources, and the support of forces of local and international economic and political instability can no longer be tolerated if we are all to survive. So if you are searching for the motivation that led my people to form this partnership with the United States, it is based on simple and direct imperatives, namely, reasoned and sustainable self-interest.

  “Those goals have guided China for more than five thousand years, and hopefully will for another five thousand years.

  “You may ask, why did we form this partnership with the United States instead of with, for example, the European Union? The combined economic weight of the nations of the European Union make up about 25 percent of the world’s economic package. So they are and will continue to be a serious player in any economic strategy. But the EU is a community of very different cultures, languages, and viewpoints. The United States is one country, with one infrastructure of government. The European Union is an umbrella organization with separate nations covered below it. To form a partnership with the EU would be like creating an umbrella for an umbrella. We hope for the future that individually or collectively, the nations of the European Union become franchisees of the World Federation.

  “The World Federation is already active. It is currently nearing the final stage of negotiations with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, namely, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand, to be our charter franchisees. The World Federation is in various, less advanced stages of negotiations with numerous other nations.

  “Formal opening ceremonies for the World Federation will take place in Beijing in approximately three months. President Llewellyn will be with me then in Beijing, as I am with him here now. We both look forward to seeing many of you ladies and gentlemen of the press in Beijing.

  “Thank you, and thank you Mr. President.”

  With that the two men again shook hands. The President and the Prime Minister left the room and the president’s press secretary took the microphone to field questions from the press. The questions were allowed to continue for an hour.

  119

  “It looks to me like you boys are fucked,” Jeb Paxton said.

  “We’ll get together on this later
, but let me assure you, there will be a cost for what they are doing. Does this government think they can destroy perhaps two hundred trillion dollars’ worth of our assets and there will be no price to pay,” Sandy Campbell said into his cell communicator.

  “I believe you better think your next step over very carefully, son, and not get back to me on it. I’ll read about it if I have to. Get my drift?” Paxton asked.

  “We’d better cut it off at this point, Senator. Goodbye,” Campbell said, and folded his communicator shut.

  120

  Special Agent London waited for FBI Director Brock to answer his call. When she did he said he needed to meet with her. “Mi casa es su casa” was her reply.

  “Tonight,” he asked.

  “Wonderful. Always a pleasure to see you, Teddy. See you tonight.”

  He had about four hours to wait before he could see Brock so he went back to his computer to sort out some missing pieces. Things were not going well for oil and coal interests. Homeland Security had the Americas, Africa, and the Middle East covered. Any operatives from those stakeholders were known, being watched or expelled.

  No threat from fossil fuel stakeholders was going to be homegrown. But perhaps a sleeper cell. Again, London figured he had to trust Homeland Security and the FBI’s own internal antiterrorist people. The Secret Service would have President Llewellyn covered and Slaider had his own forces for protection. But then he saw how ineffective that had been in Slaider’s case. He was awaiting the call from Tomlinson, but it was his assumption that the intruder had neutralized the security system before entering the farmhouse.

  He was pretty sure he knew who had intruded on Slaider and Tomlinson. He went over the notes on the meeting at Layland’s cabin outside of Gatlinburg. Paxton was there with Layland, of course. And there was Fred Baxter. Horrible, cadaverous critter, London thought. He might hire people to do his dirty work, but he himself—never. No, Thornton Campbell, a.k.a. Sandy Campbell, was much more interesting. Campbell wasn’t exactly a loose cannon, but he was a cannon—very capable of any covert activities. London had already read the FBI file on him.

  He picked up his communicator and punched a number, coded in, and asked for a record of the tracking data on Thornton, a.k.a. Sandy Campbell, for the last thirty-six hours. He waited until his communicator beeped, indicating the data he wanted was being downloaded to him. As he suspected, the hours from 9:00 p.m. to midnight were not accounted for. Campbell had given the trackers and the tracking system the slip. He had an ample time window to have been the intruder at Slaider’s farmhouse.

  For a man as talented as Campbell though, it was a pretty sloppy operation, bursting in, camera flashing, trying to obtain sexually incriminating photos. Maybe he was wrong. Or maybe Campbell underestimated the job. Campbell, if it were he, would not make that mistake again, London thought. Besides, it would have been clear to Campbell also that he was barking up the wrong tree about Tomlinson and Slaider. So London could assume something more serious next time and he was sure there would be a next time. He could also assume Slaider would be the target.

  London was not happy with this mission creep of protecting Slaider. He should just turn over everything he had and his concerns to Tomlinson and let the military worry about Campbell. His focus needed to return to his primary mission: getting something on Slaider that was chargeable. But even the point of that was no longer clear to London. With Llewellyn installed as the new president, Slaider became of secondary importance. He may have once been the power center of the attack on the constitution, but now he was at most the power behind the throne.

  Constitutional law and government had been reestablished. Congress and the courts at all levels were functioning again. The actions taken by the Executive Council had been ratified by the Congress and the people as well, through their overwhelming support in the People’s Poll. There was still the matter of nonmilitary deaths, total number unknown, by that now missing Jeremy Leach. The director is convinced Leach was working for Slaider. So there is plenty of dirty wash where Slaider is concerned.

  But it all was beginning to seem to Special Agent London simply like collateral damage from a much larger operation. The military mind, and many in the political arena he was aware of ,would simply say you had to break some eggs to make an omelet and this new World Federation was quite the omelet. He’d never expected anything like this. China and the United States forming a world corporation! This was brilliant and everyone thought so. It seemed to bode well for the first real change in how the world organized itself since the concept of nationhood above tribe or clan took hold.

  Political, religious, and military power centers no longer seemed to matter. This was a world organization that would make Adam Smith a happy man, he thought. A world power structure based on economic stability measured by the lost opportunity cost of bad governance. A world corporation! Multinational corporations and the global entwining of economies pointed to this. It makes sense now. Once the deed was done it seems so logical. But how did we get to this point? London was amazed by it all. It’s like everyone was blindsidedbut not really. It all made so much sense. Economic stability will promote social and political stability for those countries who want access to lunar Helium-3.

  The only fly in that ointment are the religious fanatics who are motivated by their version of a higher calling. There’s not much we can do with them but be vigilant. They can’t really do any serious damage. Less than your average hurricane really, which we manage to survive regularly. So they are annoying but no longer a serious threat once the media simply got bored with their antics and the Middle East oil interests realize it’s cheaper to control them than support them. No one cared about the Palestinians anymore. They had missed one opportunity for peace too many and people gave up on them and their leadership. They were simply stuck in the mud of their intransigent hatreds. That gets boring after a while in this information age, when opportunities for peace become known worldwide and people asked, “Why not accept this peace? You can build on it when good faith is established.” And now, the influence of oil interests in the Middle East and their satellite organizations have been marginalized by the World Federation.

  The common wisdom used to be that the Arab-Israeli conflict would end when the Arabs ran out of oil and no one would care anymore about the Arabs or their rage. Well, the world has not run out of oil, but oil is no longer the choke-hold on civilization that it once was. Or shortly, it won’t be as the World Federation takes root and fossil fuels become over time just fossil chemicals. There is still a lot of money to be made from petroleum and coal, but its worth has dropped already on the futures markets, and ultimately, it will probably be worth about two dimes on the dollar from what it’s worth now. At least that’s what the pundits are saying.

  The bright side is a world governed by bean counters, usually a bad thing for innovation and progress because of the short time horizon bean takers live by. They want economic good news daily or at most monthly in order to produce a good annual financial statement. They don’t often take the long view. But that’s a business corporation I’m thinking of, London reasoned. With this new business entity, a world corporation, a longer economic view will simply be in its nature.

  If Slaider is behind all this, then perhaps some broken eggs were worth it. And that’s where London found himself stunned by his thinking and lost in the confusion of his assessments. He understood his duty as an investigator, and he knew serious crimes were almost certainly committed by General Slaider. But here we are now at the beginning of the first real chance for curbing humanity’s mad impulse to war and to the destruction of the other guy. It really seems possible, London thought. Do I want to do anything that might jeopardize that experiment? A taint on Slaider might easily create a taint on the whole system he has created.

  President Llewellyn was too new, too much under a cloud of marginal legitimacy himself to weather a real storm coming out of General Slaider’s “collateral damage.” Slai
der practically anointed Llewellyn president. Senator Paxton’s support was important, but Paxton evidently believed he was supporting a friend to the oil patch. Things did not turn out quite as Paxton expected with this China deal, so his support for President Llewellyn can be considered soft at best now. But the people are behind him and politicians like to keep their jobs. Eventually, Llewellyn will be safely secure in his role. But not yet. Not now. How much did Special Agent London want to risk upsetting the applecart of history? Could justice afford to be blind just now? Maybe really great people have to be held to a different standard. Did he want to be known as the overzealous agent, the dumb shmuck who didn’t get the message, who brought down the government and maybe jeopardized a peaceful future for humanity at last?

  He needed to talk with Director Brock. He needed clarification of his mission. He needed a direction from Amanda Brock that he could just follow to the best of his ability.

  He decided he was thinking too much.

  121

  Dick Scully journal entry, August 12, 2027:

  The World Federation Holdings Incorporated was not a treaty arrangement. It was a business arrangement. Or was it? Did the senate have to ratify US participation or was it within the jurisdiction of the executive branch to formulate and participate in international business relationships? Did Congress need to authorize the funding of such deals or could the president use his discretionary funds? Did it matter?