Chapter 47

"Ladies and Gentlemen ... I give you the President of the United States!" The public address announcer introduced me, a band played "Hail To The Chief," and I stepped out on the stage to accept the Presidential nomination from the National Party Chairman. The primaries were a joke. The token opposition came from a comedian, who was quite funny, and kept everything light, and everyone loose. I won all fifty primaries, which you would expect, being that I more or less ran against no-one.

As the delegates cheered, jumped up and down, waved flags, and generally acted like very happy children, I watched Colleen, Rebecca, Regina, Beth Ann, and Winnie, surrounded by Millie, Jim, Jack, and about two dozen Secret Service Agents, watching me.

News of my unexpected / expected marriage to Beth Ann was well received. We managed to leak little by little, that I had a love life, and (gasp) slept with my lovers. Once the media got over their fake outrage upon discovering that the president was heterosexual, single, and liked sex as much as everyone else, the country pretty much yawned and went back to the morning paper.

Many commentators couldn't imagine why the public refused to obsess about my sex life, since the media was so obsessed about it. MCNBC was the worst, playing the same clip of me sneaking a kiss (intentionally in front of the photographer) from Beth Ann, after giving a speech in Los Angeles.

Rachel Maddow was positively apoplectic upon "discovering" that presidents have private lives. You would have thought I got caught playing house with an intern in the Oval Office, the way she babbled on and on about the damage she thought I did to the office of the President, by dating a woman.

The voters couldn't possibly care less, and according to our internal pollsters, every time MSNBC did a hit piece on my heterosexuality, their ratings suffered.

I guess we really do live in an enlightened age...

My acceptance speech was short, dramatic, humorous, self-depreciating, and intentionally gentle. I was facing a retread from the opposition party, who thought this was the year, and that the fact that I got married during my term was proof that I was uncommitted to leading America. His rants weren't going over well, and I was told that their fundraising was dreadful. As much money as the party wasted attacking me for being male, straight, and married, you would think they were the Puritanical Party, instead of the party of anything goes.

The voters had heard all they wanted to hear about my sex life, and I could bring my ladies out of the shadow anytime I wished, because my enemies plowed the road for me, ahead of time, by turning everyone off with their hypocritical rants on the subject.

The next six weeks would be the last time I had to worry about the media as far as my private affairs were concerned, so I let the stupid babblers babble on about how evil I was for wanting a wife.

The after party following my acceptance speech, lasted most of the night, but I missed almost all of it. We agreed to head for Branson and a long weekend of rest and recuperation, in preparation for the grind of the campaign.

One big change for me was having the Secretary of Defense ban the media and everyone else, not critical to doing my job, from flying aboard Air Force One. The bombing of Air Force Two gave cover for the Secret Service to declare my plane off limits until further notice, and not one press outlet complained. The death of Ken Stanton was still far too fresh on everyone's mind to quibble about no more free rides on the President's plane.

I still spent over ninety percent of my nights at Camp David, and the press was still prohibited from setting foot up there, so we had lots of privacy, and I commuted on Marine One to the Oval Office every morning. The lifestyle we carved out seemed to please us all, equally, and Benjamin the most, because he got to stay in the woods and have the run of the place.

Colleen, Regina, and Beth Ann were wonderful mothers, and our four partner marriage was still loving, erotic, and fulfilling. The women who interfaced with me at the White House seemed to understand that I was really and truly off the market, and left me alone. Sarah herded them like a sheep dog and anytime she discovered a female staffer with a crush, they were moved out very quickly.

Everyone who came to work at the White House came to work, not play.

That was how things stood on the first official day of my campaign for President, as the official nominee.

The Monday morning sun shined in around the curtains and woke me well before my usual six-thirty A.M. I couldn't wait to slide quietly out of bed, shower, and get ready to begin the campaign. We would be traveling on a seven-seventy-seven that I leased personally for the campaign, and my ladies and babies were going with us.

The party absolutely LOVED my taking financial responsibility for my own transportation, as it saved them barrels of money, which they wouldn't be using this campaign. The opposition was amusing, but not serious and we chose to avoid engaging in a battle of witty comebacks with him and his handlers.

The ban on media and non-essential persons on any flight bearing the President, or Vice President was still in place, so we had no worries about having to deal with nosey, self-righteous, media hounds while we were moving from place to place.

I was speaking at the traditional campaign kick-off breakfast, then meeting the rest of my family aboard the leased, temporary, Air Force One for a trip to California, Washington State, and Oregon, with a quick stop in Anchorage, Alaska to prove that we do care about their issues. It was a good day to get this stuff out of the way, so we could get back to the serious work we were dedicated to completing.

With Cutler, Jason, and Stanton and his merry men out of the way, we felt a certain assurance that I was safe, at least for the time being. Steve Grosse obsessed with the safety of me, Hawk, and our families, while his boss, Victorello, obsessed with everything going on everywhere.

Once we were airborne, I called Hawk and asked how his day was going. "I'm riding in Air Force Two, sitting in a private office, enjoying a hot, late breakfast of fresh pastries, and fruit. Everywhere I turn someone wants to do something for me, and you ask how's it going?

"Seriously?

"IT'S GOING GREAT!

"Seriously though, the campaign schedule is insane. How come I get Waterloo, Iowa, and you get Seattle? I go to Alexandria, Minnesota and you head off for LA ... Me thinks there is a foul plot afoot, here ... If anyone demands I kiss their pet pig, I quit!"

We laughed, chatted a bit more and then I took a call from Victorello. "Mr. President. We have a bit of unsettling news to share with you. I have the Vice President on speaker phone, so you both hear this.

"CIA is telling us that Stanton was behind Cutler's attack on Shirley and Casey Thornton. They claim to have forensic data showing extensive phone contact, transfer of campaign secrets, and money that went from Stanton's not-so-secret offshore accounts, to Cutler's not-so-secret Cayman's account.

"The interesting thing is that it appears Cutler had no idea who he was dealing with. Stanton kept him entirely in the dark and manipulated him like a marionette.

"I am sorry to tell you this, but it looks like everything rolls back to Stanton, which means we've missed some very key information and need to seriously reconsider the safety of you two. When you both arrive at your intended destinations, you will find you are at an alternative field, relatively nearby, and Marine One and Two will ferry you in for your appearances. Your travel detail is being increased, along with the ground support, fighter escort, and overall safety blanket that we maintain over you all the time.

"Forgive me for bringing this bad news. We will make a sincere attempt to impact your activities as little as possible, but we will be prepared to take extraordinary action if something unexpected were to happen. Our biggest concern is what else might Stanton have put in place to carry out his plot to become President? With no real idea how his mind worked, we are limited in how much we allow ourselves to speculate.