Chapter 133

The night proved interesting; I spent time with all my mates talking, holding and making more decisions as to where JBG and we were going. I knew where I was going to be for the next year, at least.

Breakfast was really interesting with the kids, Mom, Dad, Jason and Lisa. The boys ate everything they ordered. I was impressed and surprised. The helicopters were going to carry them back to the island in an hour. I delayed my routine until they left.

At the security meeting the Iranians were up to their normal tricks of threatening their neighbors. They were going to start war games in the Arabian Sea to show the world their new weapons.

That’s fine I thought, we will have planes and ships watching closely - give us all your secrets as it will save lives, ships and planes later.

There were other skirmishes that were noteworthy today, Pakistan and India were saber rattling near ‘Gurdaspur’, a stone’s throw from the Chinese border. Tanks and artillery were moving in that direction, the Chinese were also moving troops and equipment into the same area.

In the African country of Mali the village of Goundham was overrun by Boko-haram. All the elders - both men and women - were brutally tortured then murdered before being dismembered. Over two hundred bodies had been recovered.

Young children were murdered, the rest were evidently taken hostage and gone, the village burned to the ground. It was the tenth village eliminated this year. I wondered if there was a pattern to the destruction - a direction they were going.

I ordered the General to begin an analysis of the raids and to begin a close-in surveillance with satellites to see if the rebels could be found.

The US military was not in the area but former Black Bear had a contract with Mali and several other countries in the area for training. We continued the contract. It would give training a whole new meaning if they were given an enemy to use for training.

After the security meeting there was a staff meeting where I would find out how well I did with the speech to the public. All the media ratings reports were in.

The first order of domestic business was California. The governor - instead of applying state pressure to end the riots - was saying things to encourage them like the true communist he was suspected to be. He was not alone; the legislature was copying his lead.

The homeless riots had expanded territory - now there were sixty city blocks of San Francisco involved. Homeless from other cities - Los Angeles, Sacramento and San Diego - had started making demands and areas of unrest and rioting.

I called Attorney General Dunne, ‘‘You and your top lawyers to the Oval Office in one hour, please.”

Then I called General Ingram, ‘‘Have the chiefs available this afternoon, I may have a need for an emergency meeting.”

I called my legal department and told them that I wanted the constitutional experts for the meeting.

In the meantime I did a VCATS with Andy about the Boko-haram and told him what I was doing on this end but that he needed to step up security and increase the size or our groups there. I didn’t want our people to become causalities there as Black Bear men had been. You may want to think air support if it is feasible.

I finally went to the staff meeting that was just beginning. The ratings for the State of the Union were the highest in a decade. I guess people just wanted to hear what the first woman President had to say. They stayed to the end of the speech and that was unusual, according to the people that studied such things.

There were several outfits that did the survey thing. Overall the speech was well received with a seventy percent favorable rating. I wondered if they did points for style and form like they did for figure skating.

‘‘I guess it will be safe to do the fund raiser Saturday night, I won’t have to worry about the tar and feathers,’’ I said.

Saturday night was the resumption of the fund raisers. This one was at the Las Vegas Convention Center. This one was for the middle class with hot dogs, hamburgers and the like. It was twenty five dollar admittance with music and show girls to open the show. There was a raffle for ten Browning shotguns and I was to draw the winning numbers. The anti-gun people were going to scream bloody murder.

Then Troy hit me with one I didn’t expect would be asked.

‘‘Would you vote for President Jones if she were to run?’’

‘‘Seventy five percent said - yes,’’ Troy said.

‘‘Only place to is go down if you believe in polls. I currently have no intention. It won’t be that high after I tackle California.”

The hour was up and everyone was waiting on me in the larger meeting room.

For four hours there was an aggressive debate about the mess in California from a legal and ethical standpoint. The homeless riots were spreading; Colorado had the first one today. The Denver mayor had it under control quickly, however activists were already headed there to stir the flames.