Goldstein Page 14

  “I don’t suppose this is where you take out a pistol and shoot me in the head, is it?” asked Devin, too weak to even imagine fleeing down the sheer slope of the treeless mountain top.

  Morgenthau laughed. “Actually, no. I brought you here because I thought the view might make you more amenable.” Devin chuckled half-heartedly. “Unfortunately, the clouds have moved in.”

  “So what happens now?” Devin asked.

  The Director picked up a small stone and feebly tossed it over the edge. His throw managed to send the stone plunging downward over a thousand meters. Devin suddenly understood why the Director chuckled when Devin asked him about shooting him in the head. He listened for the sound of the rock hitting below and imagined his head smashing the boulders at terminal velocity. There was no sound. It was too far down.

  “I think the problem we’re having is a simple misunderstanding, Devin,” Morgenthau continued. A freezing breeze whipped his thin gray hair about giving him the aura of a mad scientist. “I don’t think you understand.”

  “What don’t I understand?” Devin asked.

  “You don’t understand our true purpose. I don’t think you understand what your options are. And I don’t think you understand what we are capable of, especially when national security is at stake.” Morgenthau took out his kerchief and wiped the mist from his leathery forehead. “Perhaps if you understood these things you would be more cooperative. Perhaps you would be more willing to help us. Perhaps you would tell us about The Delivery so that we might be able to do our job more effectively.”

  “I don’t think there’s anything to tell you,” Devin replied.

  Morgenthau lost patience. “Get him up! Bring him over here!” Two nats grabbed Devin and walked him to the edge of the precipice. With his arms held in painfully awkward positions behind his back, it felt as if his shoulders might dislocate from their sockets.

  Devin gazed downward into the hazy abyss as they held him at the ledge. It would be a long, long fall if he were to be thrown over. He prayed that he wouldn’t shriek while he plunged. He at least didn’t want to give them that satisfaction.

  “Look out that way,” ordered the Director as he pointed his bony finger into the fog. “There’s a hundred and fifty thousand square kilometers of barely habited wilderness out there. Isn’t that spectacular?”

  “Huh?” Devin replied.

  The Director gazed at him with an exaggerated, wide-eyed expression that some adults condescendingly apply to small children. “It wasn’t always that way, you know. There was a time when a million people lived back through there— a million bohemians with their pickup trucks and flannel. Why, I ask? What a waste it all was— a million unmonitored, inefficient, polluting citizens languishing in the wilderness. They were useless. They contributed nothing to society.”

  “What about farmers and ranchers and…”

  “Useless! Redundant! The Agricorps cartel does all that now. Agricorps armies can grow all the food we need. They can be rapidly deployed to combat any shortage,” Morgenthau explained as he tried to flatten his hair down against the bone chilling wind.

  “Why are there are so many shortages?” Devin asked.

  “Hoarders! Speculators! Anti-patriots! People are selfish, Devin. The selfishness of a few causes injury to us all. But we have employed the remedy.”

  “And what’s that?”

  “Why democracy, of course.”

  “Democracy?”

  “Of course. Democracy. Consensus. The political system aggregates preferences and empowers the institutions; empower them to reign in the selfish and the greedy.”

  “With guns and pulse emitters?”

  “Sometimes, but mostly with taxes and regulation and inflation. The institutions are quite good at grinding the selfish between the millstones of regulation and taxation.”

  “Didn’t Lenin say that?”

  Morgenthau disregarded Devin’s point. “Greed and selfishness creeps into society slowly, when our guard is down. The selfish tend to migrate into the rural areas where they can escape the order of society and live their polluting, wasteful, non-contributing lives.”

  “So what?”

  “We had to drive them back into the cities to control them, to force them to be productive. It was for the greater good.”

  “How?”

  “We did it by taking away their gasoline.”

  “…And I thought we ran out of oil,” Devin snarked.

  Morgenthau laughed. His sparse hair flailed about wildly in the wind. “Ran out? There’s fifteen trillion barrels of oil still under those mountains out there just waiting to be sucked out of the rock. It had nothing to do with running out. We’d probably never have run out. No, it was a planned transition— The Great Transition. And it broke our addiction.”

  “Addiction?”

  “The oil addiction. Oil is a subversive force, Devin. It’s just like a drug. It creates dependency. It promotes hedonism, individualism. It’s evil.”

  “But oil’s just a resource. It powers transportation. It gave people mobility. Mobility was liberty. How can something that gave people liberty be evil?”

  “Liberty is anarchy, Devin. Anarchy is evil because people acting freely will destroy themselves. We couldn’t let the country destroy itself. We had to declare war on the addiction.”

  “War on a condition? How do you win such a war?”

  “Winning is not the intent.”

  “How does it end, then?”

  “It never ends, Devin. America has always been at war with something. Wars are necessary to mobilize democracies. An un-mobilized democracy is a country on the road to self-destruction and anarchy.”

  “Sounds to me like a mobilized democracy is on a road to slavery,” Devin added.

  “Wars are necessary. Great democracies are always at war. We had the war against the British crown, the war on the Indians, the wars on fascism, the war on communism, the war on poverty and the war on inflation. We had the war on drugs and the war on racism and the cold war and the war on terror. We had the war on greed and the war on recession and the war on carbon and the war on oil. War! It’s both the means and the end of the democratic state- it’s tool and it’s purpose. War is productive. War is useful. War is elegant.”

  “Goldstein exists without war. They hate war,” Devin replied.

  “You’re wrong, Devin. Goldstein needs war, too. They need war with Amerika. Without Amerika, Goldstein too would devour itself. But Goldstein is nothing compared to Amerika. It’s a tiny bug that will be squashed at our whim.”

  “You’re wrong. No one in Goldstein would profit from war. There’s great wealth there. They have too much to lose. They just want to be left alone.”

  “Lies!” Morgenthau shouted. “Goldstein wants it. They need it. Selfishness has turned them into nihilists. They yearn for the ultimate nihilism- suicide. They seek Gotterdammerung.”

  “That’s wrong. They choose life. They principles.”

  “Principles are a liar’s tool of self deception.”

  “America had principles, once.”

  “And what were they? That all men are created equal? Lies! What about blacks, Devin? Were they treated equal? What about the Indians? Ever hear of the Trail of Tears? What about the Japs in World War II? What about women? When were they finally granted suffrage?”

  “I agree. Those were contradictions, but the principles of America eventually triumphed over the politics.”

  “Let him go,” Morgenthau ordered. The nats released Devin and stepped back. “Oh, Devin. Then what about the homosexuals? What about the handicapped? They were not protected. What about the mentally ill? What about the unintelligent, untalented, unhealthy, unattractive and unmotivated? Were they created equal, Devin? How can they achieve the American dream? How can an advantaged person be equal to a disadvantaged one in a laissez faire system? It’s impossible. It isn’t fair. It isn’t equal. None of us are created equal, Devin. The Founding Fathers were frau
ds and hypocrites.”

  “You can’t build up the weak by just hobbling the strong. It doesn’t work that way.”

  “Yes we can! Equality is all that matters. Equal outcomes are the only quantifiable measure and we are all keeping score of it all the time. Without equal outcomes, tensions arise, then society cannibalizes itself.”

  “So in response, you do the cannibalizing in advance?”

  “It’s all pragmatic, Devin. Society must be governed by pragmatism and not ideology.”

  “Pragmatism is a lie. It’s an excuse used by tyrants to justify theft and murder,” Devin argued.

  “Theft and murder are moral concepts. It’s all relative. Everything is relative in the real world. Pragmatism accepts that constraint and idealism does not. In order to save democracy, you must be pragmatic. You have to take away freedom in order to keep people free.”

  “That makes no sense.”

  “That’s because you’re naïve. Democracy is the highest ideal. It trumps all other ideals, even liberty.”

  “Democracy is rule by mob. It’s tyranny by consensus. It’s fifty one percent looting the other forty-nine.”

  “What would you have us be then, Devin? A dictatorship? A monarchy?”

  “No, a Republic ruled by just laws, not a democracy ruled by whims.”

  “And who would write the laws?”

  “No one. There is only one law- ‘Thou shalt not steal’.”

  Director Morgenthau laughed. His laughter was a contagion that spread to the nats lurking behind Devin, ready to pounce. Morgenthau’s hair blew about wildly in the gusting wind. “I like you, Devin Moore. I’ve always had a soft spot for idealists. There’s something to be said for your kind- fools that you are.”

  “I wasn’t always this way.”

  “What changed you?”

  Devin wanted to say, “You and your thugs!” but he thought better of it. He remained silent.

  Director Morgenthau continued. “We’re the last bastion of democracy, Devin. We have to fight these wars internal and external because no one else will. Amerika is exceptional and with exceptionalism comes great responsibility. Tell me, do you think England will fight? They’re bankrupt. They’re slaves to their German uber-lords. Funny how the Huns eventually took it all over, anyway. France, you ask? They have no political will. They’ve had fifteen percent unemployment for twenty years. Scandinavia? They’ve closed off their borders and isolated themselves from the world. They’re a frozen bastion of neo-Viking pagans. What about the Islamic Republic of Spain? One election from Caliphate. Russia? At war with China. Fascists and communists: ideological twins that just can’t seem to get along. Why? Canada? Never-ending civil war. Quebecois and English blowing up each other’s schools. Mexico? Theocrats and warlords too busy hacking each other to death over drug profits. There’s no one left, Devin. Without Amerika, the entire world would be lost. It would be a new Dark Age- Europe just after the Romans.”

  “It sounds like it already is”, Devin thought to himself.

  “We’ve accomplished great things in the last fifty years,” Morgenthau continued. “We’ve eliminated the oil addiction. We’ve shackled the libertarians and the free thinkers to corporate careers, mind-numbing holovision, and bloated mortgages. Now everyone lives in manageable, surveillable, metropolitan corridors with their children properly indoctrinated in state schools, all of them one missed paycheck from utter dependence upon the state. Think of the savings in infrastructure costs! Amazingly, we did it all without a civil war. We concocted a little hysteria and injected a little unearned guilt about destroying the earth or enriching Muslims and the people turned over their freedom with barely a whimper.

  We’ve stabilized the economy, too. We’ve cartelized all of the major industries into government cooperatives fed by credit issued by a single banking monopoly: Fedbank. Demand falls, Fedbank prints money. Prices rise, Fedbank sells bonds and draws it out. If that fails then President just slaps on the price controls. It’s amazing what capitalism can accomplish when the state takes total control of it.”

  “That’s the opposite of capitalism,” Devin thought.

  “We are safer now, too. We store pictures and audio of everyone and every conversation in every public setting- even many private ones, too. We know everything everyone does. It is all dumped into the database. We can tap it and solve crimes with mere keystrokes. Security enforcement is remarkably efficient!”

  “What about privacy?”

  “You have nothing to worry about if you are being good,” Morgenthau grinned while trying to comb down his wind-tasseled hair. “Everyone is cared for from cradle to grave. There’s free healthcare, free education, free housing, free food, free transportation.”

  “What about freedom?”

  “Freedom of what?” Morgenthau sneered. “We gave everyone the ultimate freedom- we gave them freedom from want.”

  “You gave it to them? How? Who pays for it?”

  “We gave it to them by making them pay for it.”

  “You extorted them in order to give it back to them?”

  “Let me use a metaphor here. Amerikans are like the ancient Chinese junk boat crews who would go out and hire a taskmaster to beat them so they would stay on schedule. In Amerika, the state is the taskmaster.”

  “You merely turned them into domesticated animals. They’re helpless and brainless, now.”

  “But they’re free from want. That’s all they really wanted out of life, anyway.”

  “That’s not living. That’s existing. What about the innovators and the inventors and the entrepreneurs? How can you expect standards of living to increase without them? What about growth? What about the next generation being better off? What about the future, the long run?”

  “In the long run we’re all dead. The steady state economy is more manageable. Technology just creates displacement and inequality. Inequality foments political dissent. Political dissent leads us back to chaos and anarchy. We actually have a zero growth policy, Devin. Fedbank performs these economic maneuverings with great precision. Think of living standards as quality of life over quantity of goods consumed.”

  “And who defines quality?”

  “The Democracy, of course! You’re not listening. You don’t appreciate what it took to get here. It took a lot of tribulation. We had to write off the quadrillions of dollars we amassed during the wars and The Transition.”

  “How?”

  “We monetized it. Twenty years of printing money will do wonders for a government’s balance sheet.”

  “The Great Inflation?”

  “We had to fund five hot wars and three hundred million people on the dole. It was the only way.”

  “Hyperinflation wiped out my grandparents. It was a terrible time.”

  “Inflation and price controls were the only way, Devin. We’ve done it before on a much smaller scale. That’s how we got out of the first Great Depression. We print money, then pay people to dig holes and fill them back up again. We pay farmers to plow their fields under. We pay old people to stop competing for jobs. We pay the corporations who play ball with fat contracts to build pointless weapon systems and bridges to nowhere and mars rockets that will never work. Then we regulate the noncompliant corps out of existence. Then, when the price inflation takes off, we get into another war so the people are amenable to price controls and rationing.”

  “So we’re back to the war thing again.”

  “The toll was heavy but we made it through. Now things are manageable, steady state, zero growth, no displacement, no chaos, no inequality. There’s reasonable life expectations, social order, an egalitarian society with the wealth spread around.”

  “Sounds more like the spreading around of poverty and misery. No reward for achievement? It sounds just like Marxism,” Devin observed.

  “Don’t spew that vomit. We’re not Marxists. This is Amerika! This is a capitalist country.”

  “In what way?” Devin thought but he bit his
tongue.

  “We call it ‘managed capitalism’ or ‘the mixed economy’. People need their institutions in order to survive. It’s really quite progressive if you think about it. No one can go it alone. Everyone needs everyone else. Everyone is co-dependant. Everyone is everyone’s keeper.

  Perhaps what’s even more important is we’ve created something in their lives that’s bigger than their own selfish, petty, meaningless existence. We’ve given them a greater cause, a more noble purpose, and now everyone can make a contribution to it.”

  “So you brought me here to tell me all this?” Devin asked, praying that Morgenthau’s rant was finished.

  “I never get tired of talking about the realization of the Great Society but there’s actually a specific reason we brought you here…”

  “What is it? To throw me over this cliff?”

  “You told us to bring you here, or at least your brain did when we hotwired you.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You seem to have a desire to return to the wilderness. Well, this isn’t quite Alaska but it’s pretty close. We got a lot of images from your brain, Devin. There’s a lot of animosity towards authority in there as well. That’s how we know, Devin.”

  The two nats stepped forward and grabbed Devin by the arms again, this time taking him right up to the ledge and leaning him over. Devin’s heart began to race as he stared down into the hazy abyss.

  “Know what?” He asked trying not to shriek.

  “We know that you are the one making The Delivery. You have the motivation. You have the requisite hatred. You have parameters that are off the charts. We know what you are, Devin. You’re a soldier, a soldier motivated by hate who wants to complete his mission of terror and return home to his Alaskan wilderness.”

  “I have no love for Goldstein. They exiled me,” Devin screamed.

  “Don’t expect us to fall for that. You see, Devin, the state owns you. The state owns everyone. Or let me put it more aptly- we all own each other and there is no escape. But you do have choices. You are in an exceptional position for an anti-patriot.”