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Authors: John Dalmas
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country was going to founder and fail. The exchange of all-out bombing raids between Iran and Iraq, that had resulted in crude oil prices of $67 a barrel, had been the trigger. Followed by wage and price controls, rationing of gasoline and fuel oil, demonstrations when work was accelerated on nuclear power plants, and violent counter-demonstrations against the antinukes...
Most of the Congress, on both sides of the aisle, had felt as he did—that the country was going down. That's why, with the collapse of Wall Street and the banks, it had been possible to so quickly ram the Emergency Powers Act through the resistive minority in each house. Just hours ahead of the first major street fighting. Some said it had triggered the fighting, but hardly anyone in Congress really believed that. There'd been some ugly riots before that.
Meanwhile here he was, Robert Jesse Morrows, Bachelor of Political Science magna cum laude from Cal State Northridge, junior United States senator from California, ex-state senator, ex-state assemblyman, attending a state-of-the-nation address by a president who'd never been elected to anything and apparently had no training in government or politics.
He was probably a Pentagon front, a false face for military dictatorship. Which might be what was needed. If it hadn't been for martial law, this building would be a looted, burnt-out shell right now. But sooner or later, if the country was to mean anything, if democracy and freedoms were to persist here—maybe if they were to persist anywhere—the United States would have to return to representative democracy.
Benjamin Franklin had said it after the Constitutional Convention, and Lincoln, generations later: Democracy was an experiment; there'd been no assurance it would persist, or any real instruction manual on how to keep it running decently. But what a damned shame if it should end.
Two men walked out onto the dais. The bald-headed one was Kenneth Lynch, Irish-born Speaker of the House. The bandylegged Jewish leprechaun was Senate president pro tem Louis Grosberg. Grosberg was eighty-one, but he'd aged well, standing straight and moving briskly, his shock of white hair semi-erect above bushy black brows.
Then Haugen walked out. From his seat close to the dais, Morrows examined him. The President of the United States was heavy-set, and looked solid and strong in his precisely fitted dark blue suit. He stood perhaps five feet eight. His hair had long since thinned, but there was enough of it, showing enough yellow amid the white, to mark him as a genetic blond. The skin beneath it was tanned: His mouth was wide, the broad face square rather than round, the cheekbones prominent. Thin-rimmed glasses perched on a blunt nose. Haugen had never been close to handsome, Morrows decided, but he emanated a sense of power that grew only partly from thick shoulders, chest, and neck. And a sense of relaxed self-control that aligned well with the impression of physical strength.
If people wanted a strong man with an aura of stability and judgment, the senator told himself, Haugen might be the one. Morrows glanced at his watch: 6:30 P.M. and thirteen seconds. Apparently the new president was also punctual.
He was looking down at the lectern, arranging cards or papers there. Morrows caught himself wishing this Arne Haugen well, at least for the time being. His arranging finished, the president scanned the audience, then seemed to choose someone among them to direct himself to.
"My name," he began, "is Arne Haugen. And to my surprise, as much as yours, I find myself President of the United States. I want to thank Congress for letting me speak here. This talk, however, is to the whole nation, and not to the Congress alone.
"This will not be the usual kind of inaugural address. Because while ordinarily a president takes office well-known to the people, in this case you do not know me. So while I'll be telling you how I intend to operate as president, I'll also
Most of the Congress, on both sides of the aisle, had felt as he did—that the country was going down. That's why, with the collapse of Wall Street and the banks, it had been possible to so quickly ram the Emergency Powers Act through the resistive minority in each house. Just hours ahead of the first major street fighting. Some said it had triggered the fighting, but hardly anyone in Congress really believed that. There'd been some ugly riots before that.
Meanwhile here he was, Robert Jesse Morrows, Bachelor of Political Science magna cum laude from Cal State Northridge, junior United States senator from California, ex-state senator, ex-state assemblyman, attending a state-of-the-nation address by a president who'd never been elected to anything and apparently had no training in government or politics.
He was probably a Pentagon front, a false face for military dictatorship. Which might be what was needed. If it hadn't been for martial law, this building would be a looted, burnt-out shell right now. But sooner or later, if the country was to mean anything, if democracy and freedoms were to persist here—maybe if they were to persist anywhere—the United States would have to return to representative democracy.
Benjamin Franklin had said it after the Constitutional Convention, and Lincoln, generations later: Democracy was an experiment; there'd been no assurance it would persist, or any real instruction manual on how to keep it running decently. But what a damned shame if it should end.
Two men walked out onto the dais. The bald-headed one was Kenneth Lynch, Irish-born Speaker of the House. The bandylegged Jewish leprechaun was Senate president pro tem Louis Grosberg. Grosberg was eighty-one, but he'd aged well, standing straight and moving briskly, his shock of white hair semi-erect above bushy black brows.
Then Haugen walked out. From his seat close to the dais, Morrows examined him. The President of the United States was heavy-set, and looked solid and strong in his precisely fitted dark blue suit. He stood perhaps five feet eight. His hair had long since thinned, but there was enough of it, showing enough yellow amid the white, to mark him as a genetic blond. The skin beneath it was tanned: His mouth was wide, the broad face square rather than round, the cheekbones prominent. Thin-rimmed glasses perched on a blunt nose. Haugen had never been close to handsome, Morrows decided, but he emanated a sense of power that grew only partly from thick shoulders, chest, and neck. And a sense of relaxed self-control that aligned well with the impression of physical strength.
If people wanted a strong man with an aura of stability and judgment, the senator told himself, Haugen might be the one. Morrows glanced at his watch: 6:30 P.M. and thirteen seconds. Apparently the new president was also punctual.
He was looking down at the lectern, arranging cards or papers there. Morrows caught himself wishing this Arne Haugen well, at least for the time being. His arranging finished, the president scanned the audience, then seemed to choose someone among them to direct himself to.
"My name," he began, "is Arne Haugen. And to my surprise, as much as yours, I find myself President of the United States. I want to thank Congress for letting me speak here. This talk, however, is to the whole nation, and not to the Congress alone.
"This will not be the usual kind of inaugural address. Because while ordinarily a president takes office well-known to the people, in this case you do not know me. So while I'll be telling you how I intend to operate as president, I'll also
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