The Balkanization of America (2 page)

“Yes, sir.”

“Sir, why within a few minutes?”

“I don’t want leaks or one of them to be able to call and tip off the others. Surprise is a dish best served hot.”

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Two days after the march a front door bell rings in Ashburn Virginia, “Hello Mr. Johnson, I’m Mrs. Gray, the President of the homeowner's association. Mr. Johnson, we’re very sorry for the loss of your son. I know this is a very difficult time for you as the President of the homeowner's association it's my duty to inform you that you’re in violation of the homeowner's association’s rules concerning signs in the subdivision. We don’t allow the display of signs or flags on our properties. We’re asking you very nicely to remove the large black ribbon from the front door of your house.”

“Wait a minute, I’m not flying a flag nor have I posted a sign.”

“We consider the ribbon a sign. Your son’s funeral is tomorrow; we’re asking; we’re demanding you remove the ribbon before sundown tomorrow.”

“My son was ten years old; he was holding my hand when a bullet came out of nowhere; instantly killing him. We were peacefully protesting the President’s recent decisions when my son was murdered. The DC police told me they were not going to investigate his death. They said it was an accident. I carried his body in my arms to my car; I drove him to the hospital where they pronounced him dead on arrival. I was there when he was born; I was there when he died. His mother died last year from cancer. He was all I had left and now he’s been taken from me. I’ll keep my ribbon displayed to remember my son.”

“Mr. Johnson, under the revised homeland security rules we can have you classified as a domestic terrorist if you don’t follow the agreed-upon rules.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“The Department of Homeland Security has revised the rules and definition of domestic terrorism, anyone who upsets the domestic tranquility, which you are clearly doing by being in breach of our agreed to rule. May I remind you, you signed a copy of the association’s rules before you moved into your house? Your signature on this receipt for the association’s handbook clearly shows you’ve received the manual, as such you’re aware of the regulations that you are clearly in violation of. The new DHS rules say those who are veterans, which you are, who own firearms, which we know you do; can be classified as a domestic terrorist. It would be horrible if they had to arrest you right after the funeral of your son. Which is why we’re giving you till sundown tomorrow to remove the ribbon. Good day, Mr. Johnson.” 

“Mrs. Grey I know where you live.”

“Mr. Johnson, are you threatening an elected official? That means I have no choice, but to call DHS right now.”

“Wait a minute, I didn’t mean anything, I just lost my son, come on, why don’t we start all again?”

“Good day Mr. Johnson.”

Thinking, what a bitch, he walks back into his house slamming the front door behind him. He has to prepare for his brother and sister who will arrive in the morning, to attend his son’s funeral. At 11:00 PM he goes to bed since he hasn’t been able to sleep since his son’s death he takes a sleeping pill washing it down with a beer. He falls into a deep dreamless sleep. At 3: 30 AM he's awakened by his front door being kicked in. Ten armed men dressed in all black rush into his house, they kick in his bedroom door, he sits up starting to yell, “What, who?” As he lifts his hand to block the bright flashlight beam in his eyes, five shots are fired, hitting him in the chest instantly killing him.

“Sergeant why did you fire?”

“LT, he was reaching for something, I had to protect the team. No big deal, another domestic terrorist bites the dust. Since he was on the list, the only paperwork we have to do is cross his name off.”

“Before we leave, search the house for his contacts and his computer, we’ll pick up everyone on his social network, these birds of a feather always fly together.”

Chapter 2

The next day all 535 members of Congress get a knock on their front door by three men in their mid-twenties. All are clean cut; each wears their hair cut very short, their jeans are pressed, it’s clear to the people they’re visiting these young people are members of the military. In each case, the message is the same, “Hello congressperson I’m Mr. Smith, we have a sealed message for you from General Brownstone. He asks that you read the message. We’ve been instructed to wait for your reply.”

The Congressman, woman, Senator breaks the wax seal to open the envelope. Most stand in their doorway while they read the message; some invite their visitors inside to wait, almost everyone reading the message smiles, they turn to the message carriers; the usual answer is, “Tell the General to count me in, when do we leave?”

“We’re your security detail; we’ll leave as soon as you’re packed.”

“Are you armed?”

“If you want to know, the answer is yes. We’re licensed to carry firearms as security contractors for VIPs.”

“Please give me a few minutes to pack. Where is your car?”

“We’ll call it when you’re ready; we didn’t want to park a military style vehicle in your driveway since it might excite your neighbors.”

“Please call for it, I think my neighbors need to be shaken a bit.”

Two vehicles arrive at the congressperson’s home; one’s a large black MRAP, the other is a black HUMMER, and both wear the DHS logo on their front doors.”

“DHS? I would have thought you’re military.”

“We are; the black paint and logo help keep certain undesirables away.”

Laughing, he says, “Let’s go.”

The member of Congress with their new security detail leave for the secret location provided by General Brownstone and his ex-Marines.

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The President enters the executive conference room joining his cabinet, he announces, “Ladies and gentlemen, I’m going to sign a new revenue generation executive order, anyone who is deemed to be a domestic terrorist will have all of their personal assets confiscated by the Department of the Treasury. This will stop the right wing racists in their tracks; they fear nothing more than becoming poor. Also, it’ll provide us with additional revenue.”

The Secretary of the Treasury responds, “Mr. President, we’re having trouble borrowing additional funds. China, Russia, Japan, even the Europeans have informed us they won’t lend us any more money, none of them will buy our bonds, I offered to double the interest rate, and they still refused. I think we’re dealing with a right wing conspiracy. Somehow the Coke brothers must have something on the other world leaders. Sir, we’re having a very serious cash issue. No one is willing to lend us additional funds. Our current debt is $19.8 trillion dollars; China has said unless we pay six month's interest in advance, and in gold they’re not only not going to lend us any additional funds, in addition, they, have closed our lines of credit for any imports. Sir, we are on the verge of going bankrupt and defaulting on our payments. I don’t think you’re new plan is going to bring in enough revenue soon enough to have an impact on our liquidity issue.”

President Obsma looks concerned asking, “What happened to all of the money we saved by reducing the size of the military?”

“Sir, we spent those funds and more on our new social programs.”

“What happens if we stop making interest payments to our lenders?”

“Mr. President are you suggesting we intentionally default?”

“You just said we’re on the verge of being bankrupt, Isn’t it better if we decide which payments to make and which not to? In either case if what you’ve just reported is true do we have a choice?”

The Secretary of the Interior suggests, “Sir, maybe we can sell some assets.”

President Obsma smiles saying, “There’s an excellent idea, sell some land, we have millions of acres under federal control, we can later take it back under imminent domain.”

The Secretary of the Treasury says, “Mr. President, maybe we could delay a couple of weeks making this month’s disability and welfare payments. A short delay may allow us to sell some assets and be able to get current with the rest of our payments.”

President Obsma looks down, at the table. He picks his head up to look into the eyes of his Secretary of the Treasury, “You can start delaying disability, the military’s retirement, benefits and Social Security, those seniors won’t be here much longer, they cost us too much versus any possible return they bring us. Delay payments to doctors and hospitals under the Affordable Care Act.”

The Secretary of Health and Human Services says, “Mr. President delaying those payments might force a couple of hospitals to close, we’re already months behind in our payments. If we delay paying the doctor's many may decide to stop seeing affordable care insured people. This could cause us a major PR problem.”

“Madam Secretary, I’ll issue an executive order forbidding the hospitals from closing and stopping any doctor from dropping patients. Does this solve your issues?”

“Yes sir, it does. Sir, I’m sure the people thank you too.”

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Three national news anchors jolt awake when their bedroom lights are turned on. They look at the clock radios next to their beds; it’s 3: 30 AM. “What’s going on, Oh no, not again. I did what you asked. It’s not my fault the censors cut me off. You saw I tried. What do you want now?”

Sitting in each of the reporter’s bedrooms are three armed men, the team leaders say, “Hello again. We have another request to make of you.”

The reporter is shaking, “No, we had a deal, if I made the report you wanted, you said we were done. I made the report you wanted. I held up my end of the deal. Why are you back?”

“We just told you; we need you to report a story for us. This one will break your heart and the hearts of your viewers. A man was killed today killed a day before he was going to bury his dead ten-year-old son who was shot at the “Hands-Around-DC” rally. The father was killed because he had a black ribbon on his front door; he had a disagreement with the President of his local homeowners association. She reported him as a domestic terrorist to the DHS, who broke into his home at 3: 30 AM killing him in his own bed. We want you to report this story, drive the point home that the government has stretched the rules on defining what a domestic terrorist is. We want you to explain to your viewers that anyone could be marked as a terrorist. Anyone classified as a domestic terrorist will lose all of their assets. We want the American people to realize any of them at any time can be classified as a terrorist.”

“How do you suggest I do this without it being censored?”

“That’s the easy part, here’s a disk, just insert it into your office computer.”

“Will it damage the network? Will our IT people be able to trace it back to me?”

“Nope, if anything it’ll point to the government censor in your office.”

“Leave the disk by my car keys, that way I won’t forget it.”

“You won’t forget it, if you do, you’ll die on air tomorrow evening.”

“What?!”

“Just do what we ask, or you’ll have the biggest rating boost in your show’s history.”

“If I do this are we done? Am I done with these middle of the night meetings?”

“We’ll see how well you handle the story. Get some rest, you need to be well-rested tomorrow.”

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The next day, three national broadcast anchors slip a CD-ROM into their office laptops. The disk sucks data out of the network’s servers that it sends to a secret server farm. At the same time, it inserts a hydra worm into the networks’ computer networks, the worm finds its way into the DHS censor’s laptop moving into and infecting the DHS computer network. One of the worm’s tasks is to collect DHS’ information on various patriot organizations. After the worm sends the patriot’s data back to the General’s servers, it erases the data in the government servers. At 6:30 PM, the three nationally broadcast news programs lead off with a tragic story of a man who lost his son in the “Hands-around-DC” march. He was then falsely classified as a domestic terrorist and killed in his own bed. While they’re reporting the story, the embedded government censors try to cut them off, another task the worm performs is to deactivate the censors “spike” function. The entire story with the gory images gets broadcast across America.