The Means (20 page)

“Jesus,” says Tom. “That boy's seriously hurt.” He moves out of his row and starts back to check on the boy.

Peter puts a hand on Tom's shoulder. “It was an accident.”

“I know that. I'm not angry with anyone. He's goofing around and the Secret Service has a job to do.”

Dan Cullen stands with his hand on his own chest. It looks like the boy is breathing fine and starting to move a bit. Dan says to Peter, “These kids come into campaigns. It's a crazy place. They're not kids very long.”

44

“Sir, I understand where Ron wants to spend money in this last month, but I need to highlight to you that we're running low. If we do everything Ron says, we're going to dip below a zero balance.” Derek Hamilton is budget director for Mitchell Mason's campaign. He's in the back of the Suburban with Mason and Ron Stark for a private conversation. For Mason to have an audience this small at this stage of the campaign that includes the budget director is rare. The only others in the car are Secret Service, who for the purposes of the content of the meeting are deaf and mute.

“Then pull in some money.” Mason says this in the tone of telling a thirsty child to pour himself some water from the enormous pitcher in front of his face.

“We're trying.” The funding for Mason's campaign is down from four years ago, in part because he hasn't put in the time for as many fund-­raisers and in part because the enthusiasm is down a bit as well. He now finds himself in a race that's a few points closer than he expected it to be with only one month to go and he wants money.

“You're not looking in the right places.”

“I'm sorry, sir. Where do you mean?” Derek is a thirty-six-year-old investment banker from Goldman Sachs on leave to help the campaign in the hopes of making enough contacts to return to Goldman as a rainmaker of new business. He looks like a Goldman banker. Perfect haircut, perfect shave, nice suit, precision to his movements and mind. He never makes wild gestures. His hands never go beyond the span of his shoulders and when he talks his forehead tips out over his nose and he talks in a clear, quiet voice.

“Ron, I'm going to read the paper for a moment while you and Derek talk privately.” This is mostly a joke since they are all three just inches away from each other but Mason actually picks up the
Wall Street ­Journal
.

“From the PAC, you jackass,” says Ron Stark.

Derek sits with his hands in his lap, realizing in stages that are each separated by a few seconds that he's been told to do something illegal and the president is in the car but he's reading the paper and this is a private conversation with Ron Stark. “How should I go about that? I'm not supposed to have even a conversation with them.”

“You find a way,” says Ron. “Your job is to find a way. That's why we hired you. Has this campaign hired a person who can't do his job?”

“I can do my job,” says Derek. He finds some haughtiness for his voice, remembering he's a Goldman man. “I'm a banker so I know how to manage your finances. I don't know the outer edges of campaign fund-raising law.”

Ron pulls out his iPhone. “Skadden Arps has a good Federal Election Commission practice. I'm emailing you the contact information for an attorney there. Call him, get to know the important parts of the law. I'm also going to put you in touch with a couple campaign veterans who are creative thinkers.”

“Okay.”

Ron hits send on the email. “From there you figure it out, Derek. The next thing the president and I want to hear on this is that there's plenty of gas in the tank. Nothing from you before then, and I want to hear it soon.”

“Yes, sir.”

Mitchell crumples the paper in his lap. “You boys finished?”

“Yes, sir,” says Ron. Derek nods.

“Derek, let me tell you a little story,” says the president. He doesn't look at Derek. He looks out the window. “A couple decades ago I was an active surrogate for a candidate in a tight race. At that time, there was a one-point-three-million spending cap in Iowa. We needed Iowa. We needed it for momentum and we viewed it as key and we were going to be goddamned if we weren't going to spend a hell of a lot more than one-point-three million on Iowa. So you know what we did?”

It's rhetorical but Derek is so rapt that he says no and Mitchell had left enough time for the response.

“We booked all campaign flights into Illinois, then rented cars in Illinois and drove into Iowa. That was all billed against Illinois, where we knew we'd never spend near the cap. We set up our phone banks in Missouri and that was billed against Missouri, not Iowa. We did that every turn we could. We spent more than ten million dollars on Iowa and exactly one-point-three million was billed against Iowa.”

Derek smiles.

Mitchell continues. “Now this was all legal to the letter of the law. I hope you'll be as fortunate. The following year, campaign finance law caught up to these tricks and shut them down, but my point is that where there's a will, there's a way. Or should I say, where there's greater determination, there's a way.”

“I'll find a way, sir.”

The president is enjoying his talk too much to stop. “A smart campaign is always ahead of the campaign finance law. It's the same as with steroids in sports. Think of all the hundreds of billions of dollars to be had through success in sports. Add up all the prize money and endorsements for all the sports from humans to horses. Globally, it could be trillions. And how much money is spent policing the cheating? Maybe a few tens of millions? There's much more will, read will as money, on the side of cheating than on the side of policing. Barry Bonds was getting his steroids from a few guys in a lab that was basically a garage, and they managed to design something undetectable. The only reason Bonds got caught was a whistle-blower.”

Derek nods again.

“You are determined and you have resources, Derek. You stay one step ahead.” The president is smiling as he says this, then he stops smiling and points a finger at Derek. “Get me that money.”

The Suburban is driving south on the Florida Turnpike to Miami. The president is going underground for two days of preparation before the debate in Tampa. He travels in greater style and with greater security than Pauley. He also has a full-time job but his focus for the next month is to keep the job.

The ride is smooth and safe behind the bullet- and soundproof glass. The sun through the window is on Mason's lap and it makes him hot. “I'm looking forward to November when all this crap is behind us. Four years isn't much time when you factor in all the hell you have to endure to get and then keep the damned job.”

The Suburban passes exits for Fort Lauderdale and Mason thinks of all the people living different lives and wonders if those are happier lives or if that's just the kind of pitiful thinking a person has in a weak moment.

45

The campaign to reelect Mitchell Mason pulls into the Tampa Intercontinental Hotel at three p.m. The convoy is bigger and more glamorous than Pauley's but has all the same building blocks. The notion of checking into the hotel is absurd. The Secret Service advance team has been at the location for more than a week.

There is enough daylight between Mason and his entourage for only a tight photograph. Otherwise he moves at the center of a mass of bodies that provide the propulsion so Mason doesn't have to. He feels his feet don't touch the ground.

Once inside, security fans out, knowing where to go and staying in touch wirelessly. The president's agenda is known by security and aides so Mason follows the lead man but the pace is set by Mason.

Hotel employees keep their distance and stare at their elected leader. Everyone is frozen except for the eyeballs moving across the white space of their eyes as he moves by.

The first meeting is an emergency core staff meeting called by Ron Stark. The meeting will include only the president and Stark along with Jack Boothe, chief strategist, and Ted Knowles, press secretary. Others are excluded, which has offended them.

The president follows the lead agent to the lobby-level conference room of the hotel. The entire hotel has only campaign staff, Secret Service, and hotel employees screened by Secret Service.

“What's this all about, Ron?”

“I'll make it quick. Problem, solution.” The four men sit around a table too big so there are unusual distances between them and an awkward moment as they select chairs. Stark sits next to Mason who sat first. Jack Boothe sits across the narrow side of the rectangular table from Mason and Ted Knowles sits a couple chairs down from Boothe. “The problem is that the
Standard
is going to run a story in two days outlining your extramarital activity.”

“All this crap was vetted by the media four years ago!”

“I'm hearing they have new stuff.”

“Susan?”

“I don't think she's the source, but she's the topic.”

“You're sure?”

“Yes.”

“Well, if she's not the source, they don't have crap.” Mitchell wonders how Susan's conversation with her husband went. It would have been a few years ago. She never mentioned it again and he never followed up. Hammermill crosses his mind too. That son of a bitch.

“I'm hearing they will claim sources inside the administration.”

“Unnamed, of course,” says Mitchell. The entire conversation is between Mason and Stark. Knowles and Boothe seem uncertain if it's safe to speak.

“Yes.”

“Cowards.” Mitchell picks up a bottle of water that has been placed at his seat. “Fuck.” He twists the cap and drinks. “You said something about a solution.”

“There's only one play,” says Stark. He looks at Press Secretary Knowles. “We get out in front of the story. We anticipate that it's coming out and we shape it before it even gets there.”

“Absolutely,” says Ted.

“We need a friendly,” Stark says back to him, still looking right at Knowles. “Who have you got?”

Knowles leans back, trying to think of a person at a credible outlet he could hit up for a big favor. Someone who would let him craft the writing. “I don't know,” he says. “There are certainly some people favorable to the campaign, but I don't think you're going to get the level of control you're looking for. Not from anyone with a good reputation.” Knowles comes from the media and values journalistic standards. He has never been on the campaign side of things before.

Jack Boothe leans forward with determination. The other three notice his physical entry to the conversation and look at him before he speaks. “I have an idea.”

“Out with it, Jack,” says Mason.

“It's tricky and I'll have to think of the best way to present it to him, but it may work the best. It's actually karmicly correct.”

“Please tell us the idea, Jack,” says Stark, saving Mason the trouble.

“Randy Newhope at
Newsweek
.”

“Heard of him,” says Stark. “Why him?”

“Because I happen to know something about him.”

The three men are sick of pulling the information from him so they wait.

“I know that he's married,” says Jack. “I also know that he's taken up with a hot little gal following the Pauley campaign.”

“How do you know it?” asks Ted Knowles.

“Doesn't matter. I know it. It's certain.”

“So you want to use this?” asks Stark. Stark will take over the questions so Mason doesn't have to speak while the plan is formed. It doesn't absolve Mason, but it's something.

“I'll just let Randy know in a very kind and humorous way that I know he's having a good time. I'll then let him know that the
Standard
is planning a story about the president having a good time. I'll give him some good ideas for a story to come out in the next twenty-four hours. Maybe that the days of the media judging a president by his personal life are long over and that only hacks do that. Maybe that citing unnamed sources in an administration is classic bullshit journalism. We'll craft a few things. Then I'll remind him that I met his wife at a reception one time and what a nice lady I thought she was.”

Mason stays staring at Booth with his expression unchanged but nodding.

Knowles puts his palms flat to the table. He's angry. “Blackmail? Your plan is to blackmail Randy Newhope?”

Nobody wants to put words to the affirmative, but Jack nods yes. He's certain this is three to one against Knowles.

“Mr. President,” says Knowles, “this is a very dangerous strategy. If this backfires, we're screwed.” Knowles is smart enough not to argue this on moral grounds, even though that is what persuaded him.

Stark answers instead of Mason. “Like Jack says, it all depends on how we present it to Randy Newhope. It doesn't have to be blackmail. Newhope is having an extramarital affair right now. This could be just a meeting of the minds that an affair is not such a big deal, especially when it comes to judging a sitting president on his job performance.”

“Wow,” says Knowles. He never says “shit” or “Christ” at any time. It's a self-discipline he practices so that he doesn't say those words in a White House press briefing in front of the media.

All four are silent. The case is laid out and they're waiting for the verdict from the boss.

After a moment, the president leans back in his chair, clasps his hands across his stomach, and looks at the ceiling. “Ted, let me tell you something about politics.” He loves not to look at a person when he talks to him. “This is something I know to be true.” He makes a closed-lip smile to himself. “In the beginning, a young person will come to a campaign because he believes in a cause. If that cause doesn't move forward, there will be real harm to the country. So he believes. He'll volunteer for a campaign because he'll find the candidate who can champion that cause. Soon, he'll come to think that only this candidate can be the real champion for the cause. He'll love his cause and his candidate equally, and put them first.”

The president pauses for water then continues. “This young man will be dedicated to victory. Remember, his guy needs to win or the whole country's in trouble. This young man will come to believe in the philosophy of whatever it takes. That in elections for which the country is at stake, the ends justify the means. You see, the ends are what we all live with every day. Who wins the election, what makes it to the news headlines. It's what everyone sees and lives. Only a few of us get to see the means. And have to live with it.

“So our young man who was cause-driven and wide-eyed and innocent at the start will come to face a series of moral decisions, a series of crossroads. He will cross them. Believe me. People on Pauley's campaign are crossing them right now. Derek Hamilton, our own budget director, is crossing over one right now. You, Ted, need to cross over.” Mason sits forward to look right at Knowles. “Barack Obama won elections because people around him wanted it more. They felt a moral duty to get him elected and they placed that moral duty above all other moral duties. David Axelrod is not a wimp.”

Boothe and Stark look back and forth between the president and Knowles. They're not sure if they're watching an education or an execution. Knowles looks uncomfortable.

The president breaks the silence. “Let me tell you something else! And this is something I've never told anyone. There's more to it, because the craziest thing happens next.” He sips his water again. “The candidate comes to believe he's the only person who can serve the cause. And he crosses over. I crossed over. I don't mean crossing over on little moral issues. I mean crossing over to true indoctrination. Self-indoctrination.” Mason looks across the three of them. He knows this must sound crazy but he tries to sound calm and not crazy.

They stare back until Mason laughs again. “Everyone who has ever held the nomination of his party has crossed over. Reagan, Obama, both Bushes. Clinton, both Clintons actually. The only difference among us is self-awareness. I know I crossed over. The Bushes knew. Bill Clinton crossed and kept going. He thinks he's the fulcrum point in the history of mankind, but he knows he's crossed. I don't think Obama knows. Hammermill either.”

Now everyone is uncomfortable. It's fascinating but nobody wants more of this. But one thing in common that the three listeners think at once is that the man is fucking honest.

The president brings the conversation back to the main point. “Ted, what do you think is the relationship between our political system and human nature? Is it containment? Is it promotion? Is it a bad system rescued by good people? Or, Ted, is it the best we can do given who we always turn out to be?”

Ted Knowles hopes this is all rhetorical and he can wait it out and not have to answer. Boothe knows that his plan is approved and that Knowles will support it. Time to speak with Randy Newhope.