ALL IN: Race for the White House (10 page)

“Morning, Mom.”

“Are you going to have breakfast with your brother?”
 

“Where’s Dad?” I asked.
 

“He’s out starting the men on their chores. Jack, after breakfast, your father would like your help in the barn.”
 

When I turned sixteen the ranch was about a thousand acres. It had a long dirt road that spanned half the length of the place, about a hundred feet behind the barn. Every spring, once mud season was over, Dad would get out his John Deere and drag the road. He’d add a fresh gravel mix of small stones and clay to flatten it out and remove any potholes that developed over the winter. Everything on the ranch was well cared for. Dad took pride in keeping things up.
 

The setting was picturesque; the main drive to the house was lined with hundred-year-old oaks and behind the trees stood a white wooden fence. There has always been a lot of work to do on the ranch, and Dad had two hired hands to help out.
 

I made my way out to the barn - it was bright white clapboard on the front with two large black wooden doors. The sides were shaker shingles stained gray. The house side had three windows left open to give the horses air.
 

When I opened the door, I saw Dad shining a vintage Chevy step side. The truck was awesome, red with the grill painted out to match the body. It had white wall tires on red steel rims, a small block V-8 and the short bed he knew I liked.
 

“Happy Birthday, Son,” Dad called out. Everyone was smiling. I looked behind me and saw Mom and Roger back by the open door.

Dad joked, “Now you can help with some of the hauling around here!” Mom put her arm around me.
 

I told her, “I have two presents, an amazing truck, and Roger home.”

Mom leaned and whispered in her sweet voice, “Happy Birthday, Jack, this is a wonderful day.”

The truck was a surprise - in all the excitement of having my brother back, I hadn’t even remembered it was my birthday.

“Happy Birthday, Jack,” Sandy’s voice called out as she entered briskly into the office. “I got you something.”

She placed a small package on the desk saying, “Senior Staff in five minutes.”
 

“Sandy, have Bill bring Tom in if he can find him; I have a few thoughts for the stump speech.”

Tom Gardener reported to Bill and was a key member of his support staff. Tom was our lead speechwriter and we called him in whenever we had ideas. He was from Alabama and graduated from Auburn University. In his late 30’s, he’d gotten his masters in history from Brown and had been a lecturer there. He was sharp, articulate and had authored a book on political history for college students. He was the guy you didn’t want to match wits with because he was so quick. You had to know Tom to understand his quirky sense of humor. He was the person in the office who sent off-color emails and remembered every word of the TV shows he’d watched as a kid. The first time Bill introduced me to Tom he warned, ‘the guy’s a little weird, but his text reads like oration’.
 

After everyone settled, I spoke, “Tom, can you work something up with this, ‘can you be full if another man is hungry, can you be safe if your homeland is in danger, what are we if we can’t be free?’” Tom shook his head and snickered, “Sounds a little over the top, sort of Martin Luther King channeling you.”
 

Tom was dead on; I pictured King speaking those words on the National Mall when I wrote them.
 

“How about if I tone it down a little and make it a little more Jack Canon?”

“Okay, Tom, good call; nobody knows how to write me better than you!” I said laughing.

CHAPTER TWELVE

Everything in nature follows a form shaped like a bell curve, the consultant told us. After interviewing dozens of firms, we hired Patch and Patch, a consulting group whose specialty was helping companies with major product launches. The group was famous in corporate circles for the introduction of My Basket, a personal life management system that intuitively kept a person organized. My Basket collected and stored everything the user did by cell phone - through verbal and keystroke commands and by following every click on other keyboards programmed in by the user. The software listened to phone conversations, followed emails, and based on a compilation of all the data, continually searched the internet to help with anticipated needs. It was amazing and if I had thought of it, we wouldn’t need the Saudis’ money to win the election.
 

The only problem with the Patch group is they looked a little too smart and young and that was annoying.
 

The consultants had been talking for a while when I zoned back in to hear. “You follow, for example, at an entrance to a supermarket, you’ll see that folks will park concentrated toward the entrance, pushing out like a bell in the center and tapering off at the sides. If there are two entrances, like with two stores at a mall, there will be two distinct bell curves.”
 

“Broccoli, trees, cauliflower, everything follows this natural tendency. Whole plants follow the curve rising up to a gradual peak, then taper off with each individual stock or section following the trend down to the smallest leaf. We at Patch feel campaigns can follow this curve as well, and we believe that allowing us to time your advertising would maximize its effectiveness.”
 

It made sense; I remember Sarah says to me while we were rushing to get into Disney World, ‘head to the end, there’s fewer people.’ I also remembered something else about that trip - a guy I barely knew saw us, screamed from a hundred feet away, and approached me as if we were best friends. People love the familiar, the further a person is away from home the happier they are to see a familiar face.
 

I stopped daydreaming and rejoined the conversation. “Isn’t this just ‘follow the herd’ mentality? When I was younger and Sarah and I would be on trips alone together, for fun I used to step off the curb before the walk signal, New York, Vegas, anywhere there were lots of people, you’d be surprised how many would begin walking.”
 

Lisa said, “Great, did you get anyone killed?”
 

“I don’t do it anymore... but I’m making the point - people tend to follow the bandwagon.”

The consultant said, “You’re right, they do and to the extent these graphs show, the number of people who jump off the curb early with you will quickly peak and just as fast fall off if they discover there’s danger. Our research shows the quicker the rise, the faster the fall. The research we’ve done indicates the Canon campaign should….”

The meeting went on into the morning, with intermediate staff brought in at various times to hear how the consultant would fine tune individual components.
 

The session was finishing when the consultant told us, “We’ve taken a look at data on your media coverage and we’ve put together a proposal. Did you realize your highest positive numbers are when you’re with your wife and girls at home in Kentucky?”

Our group listened and studied the graphs as Patch and Patch covered data on everything right down to what I should be wearing. No pinstripes—makes you look too slick. No red, they said—too aggressive.
 

The recommendation was for me to wear blue ties with angled stripes for debates, a white shirt – no tie with a jacket on factory floors. They told me a man of the people shouldn’t over dress.
 

Bud said, “Well, thank you, people, this has been informative,” and he started to end the meeting, not finishing when one of the consultants added, “We didn’t know if we should bring this up, but.”

“Go ahead,” Bud, said. “What is it?”

“Well, when Mr. Canon speaks about women in any capacity…” I, and everyone else in the room, had known what she was getting at—in the first run, I had a gaffe in one of the debates when the question – ‘whether a Canon Cabinet would include women in key positions.’ I answered the truth—I thought women worked harder, but men are better figureheads. Then I tried to make a joke – ‘If England had a king instead of a queen, they wouldn’t appear so weak on the world stage’… we were roasted on that one.
 

The consultant continued, ‘Had we been managing that situation we would have steered the coverage toward a fast rise and equally quick fall, remember the Starr Jones wedding disaster?’
 

“So,” I said, “You would have us begin our message slowly, raising the intensity over time, peaking just before the election - then who cares.”
 

“Exactly!” The consultant said, “It’s all intensity, Senator. Each facet of your message is given time to build. To help with fund-raising, we have a donation area on My Basket that should do really well.”

“Call me Jack,” I said, “I have a feeling we are going to be calling you guys a lot over the next twelve months.”
 

Everyone cracked up.
 

“It’s a wrap, then,” Bill said, “leave the data and we’ll pour through it and be in touch with any questions.” The last thing I said was to Lisa specifically and the group, in general, “Hey, Lisa, have your people look over this stuff and see how we can use it to fit in with your overall strategy.”

As she was gathering her things Lisa said, “Will do, Jack.”
 

“Lisa I’ve had a lot of consultants walk through here thinking they have the answer. If they had the formula, they would be president and wouldn’t be in here peddling to us. We have to let some of the ideas breathe a little.”

“What about the My Basket fund-raising button,” Lisa asked?

“Go with that and push the ads in New Hampshire; I have a good feeling about their research. Work with Bud and get his input on both.”

“Got it.”

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Thanksgiving Day came and we had invited Bill and his son Steve to join us at our home in Kentucky.
 

I bent down to put the leash on our little one-year-old cocker spaniel, Sophie Mae, who was looking my way and standing by the front door. Speaking in a childlike tone I said, “Sophie’s got her leash - want to go outside like a big girl?”

Sarah had draped the dog’s leash on her back. Sophie was well trained to go to the door when she needed to go out. Sarah worked with her as a puppy - taking her out every two hours - even in the middle of the night. We loved that dog.
 

As I fastened Sophie’s leash, Bill said, “I’ll join you.”

We stepped out onto the porch, standing on its shiny gray boards before walking towards the yard. Sophie energetically bounced down the three steps, pulling to the end of her leash.
 

“What a good girl... so smart,” I said in a playful tone reserved for her.
 

Bill and I moved toward the open yard of bluegrass mowed twice for the occasion, to a stone patio area on the side of the house. The area had seating for eight and a fire pit in the center - we split our outdoor time between the patio and the nearby screened porch, enjoying many nights listening to the crickets chirping while talking about our plans for the White House.
 

I attached Sophie’s leash to a hook I had placed in the ground a year ago when we bought her - then sat on one of the patio chairs. Bill was pulling up one of the ottomans to rest his feet. Sarah decorated the outdoor patio with fabric to coordinate with and flow out from the house. Everything was decorated for the occasion.
 

Our people had invited the usual press to show up on cue, and as an added bonus - leaked to the national press – that we would be announcing sometime over the Thanksgiving Holiday.
 

Bill said, “Are you up for this?”

I pushed my hand to my eyes, thumb on the left eye three fingers on the right eye and squeezed, rubbing then dropping my hand back to the armrest and rolling my neck for a crack.
 

“We have to be,” I said. My bottom two fingers scratching my forehead, “We can’t let this country continue on this path. Ready or not, here we go!”

“You know, Jack, I’ve been thinking... I wanted to get this out there before you announce tomorrow. Believe me, no one else would say this to you.”
 

I interrupted, “Bill, don’t finish. There’s something you don’t know, and you’ll be the first person outside my immediate family, for Pete sakes, even the kids don’t know this, Bill—my dad’s got Alzheimer’s. I’m forty-three; if we wait, what could well be eight years, even as VP, which we could have bought, it would be a gamble. Imagine a picture of my dad with dementia next to my hand on the button, insinuating the disease runs in the family.”

Bill said, “I’m sorry, I didn’t know your dad was ill, he seems so vibrant lately.”

“This run has got him excited. He’s looking forward to my being president - sometimes I think more than I am. This is my one shot to help folks who are hurting. Our message will resonate that Americans need to take back the production side of the market. To make this more than an empty campaign promise, we have to produce enough of our own energy to control the market. Ten percent will drop the world price of oil and help everyone on the planet. Once we get to our goal of twenty percent, we’ll have control of energy. There’ll be a hole in demand for Middle East Oil, forcing them to dump it anywhere they can. Bill, every person in this country should have a garden and grow this stuff; we’re all in this together, like a victory garden during the war!”
 

Sophie came over to me and I bent over her, kissing her face, saying in the voice, “Sophie’s such a good girl; what a nice girl.”
 

Bill and I got up and walked back through the side entrance of the house.
 

I was singing, “I kissed a dog and I liked it.”
 

Martha called out disgusted, “You’re so weird-ah Dad!”

I called out, “Sophie - Martha such a good girl,” teasing her, adding her name to the dogs.