Armstrong Ranch, Kenedy County, Texas
11 February 2006
Dick Cheney raised his gun and sent a blast of birdshot into a flight of quail. The birds, raised in captivity and unused to the experience of free flight, milled about uncertainly as the rain of lead pellets passed through their flock, and several fell to the ground, dead or injured. As he watched the rest of the flock scatter in confusion, he automatically reloaded.
The sight of the fallen birds left Cheney unmoved, except for a growing sense of dissatisfaction. Here he was, the power behind the throne of the greatest empire in human history, and he was shooting at a bunch of goddamned birds! What the hell kind of occupation was that for a man whose word was law? People lived and died on his say-so, he could order people killed, and did every day, and he was shooting at fucking birds!
"Hey there, good shootin' Dick," came a quavery voice from behind him. Cheney turned and saw that old fool Harry Whittington coming up behind him. I could shoot him, Cheney thought to himself. I could shoot him right now, and I could get away with it. I can do anything I goddamn well please. He raised his gun, and with calm deliberation fired at the startled lawyer.
Whittington fell to the ground, screaming in agony. Cheney felt a grin pulling his lips apart. He slowly approached the writhing figure, breaking open his shotgun and sliding another cartridge into place. This time, though, he put in one of the special buckshot cartridges he always kept in his pocket in case he saw a deer.
Whittington ceased to voice his agony long enough to say, "Jesus fuckin' Christ, Dick, what the hell did you go and do that for?"
"Apologize," said Cheney.
"What?"
Cheney raised the gun so the barrel was only inches from Whittington's face. "Apologize for making me shoot you," he told the bleeding figure.
"You -- you're joking, right?"
Cheney pulled back the hammer on the shotgun. "Do I look like I'm fucking joking? Say you're sorry for making me shoot you." His voice suddenly rose in a scream. "SAY IT! SAY IT!"
"I'm sorry! I'm sorry I made you shoot me! I'm sorry!" A sudden fetid odor told Cheney that Whittington had lost control of his bowels.
"Not good enough," said Cheney. "I want you to tell the world. I want you to hold a press conference and apologize to me for making me shoot you."
"Sure, Dick, sure, anything you say! I'll do it! I promise! Please! Please!" Whittington broke down and began to cry, his eyes screwed up like a baby's.
Cheney considered finishing him off anyway, but the idea of Whittington, his face scarred with birdshot, standing in front of a podium and apologizing for being shot was just too delicious to pass up. Seeing that would be worth letting him live. Besides, Aaron Burr had already killed a man while serving as Vice-President, and Cheney hated the thought of only being the second man to do something.
Cheney raised the gun up into the air and fired, and Whittington's scream of terror filled him with glee. He threw his head back and laughed and laughed and laughed . . .
Thursday, March 18, 2010
Wednesday, March 17, 2010
DBTL 77: The Little Finish
Klaipeda, Lithuanian Devo, Polish Commonwealth
15 January 2001
There is a man with two names. The name by which he is known to his co-workers and his family does not concern us. All we need to know about him is that when he appears on the commercial transweb provider Poland Online, it is under the screen name Candyman45.
Candyman sits in an office in a modest three-bedroom house in Klaipeda. His chair faces a desk which accommodates an inexpensive personal talos. The walls hold prints by M.C. Escher, astronomical posters, and a map of the world. Around him are shelves full of an eclectic mix of books. Some are history: The Guns of August by Barbara Tuchman, 1937 by George Orwell, Empire of the Atom by Stefan Kieniewicz. Some are historical fiction: With Fire and Sword by Henryk Sienkiewicz, Piłsudski by Witold Gombrowicz, The Right Stuff by Stanisław Lem. Some are science fiction: The Sound of His Wings by Robert A. Heinlein, Enemy Mine by Richard Wright, Refugee by Anne Frank.
As Candyman's talos wakes itself, he ponders a request from his wife. She knows of his hobby of creating uchronias, and she has asked him to design a world where Josef Stalin drowned at birth. This places the Branch Point, or BP, in 1879. However, except for rare cases like Queen Elizabeth I of England, people tend not to make an immediate impact on world history as soon as they are born.
So it is with Stalin. Initially the changes are invisibly small. There is one less child growing up in Gori, one less rebellious seminary student in Tiflis. As late as the Russian Revolution and Civil War, the changes are minor: someone else edits Pravda, someone else is Nationalities Commissar, someone else accompanies Budenny into southern Poland, someone else is General Secretary of the Central Committee.
Now the differences are becoming noticeable on a large scale. Whoever is now General Secretary (Kamenev? Bukharin? Surely not Trotsky!) may well not use the position to create a personal following among the Party hierarchy as Stalin did. Conventional wisdom is that Trotsky would have succeeded Lenin were it not for Stalin's machinations, but Candyman is minded of some chains on the uchronia group he frequents that bring this into question. Trotsky was viewed with deep suspicion by the rest of the Bolsheviks, and a power struggle leading to his eventual ouster may have been inevitable, unless Trotsky used his position as War Commissar to eliminate the other Bolsheviks and make himself military dictator of the USSR.
For the sake of contrariness, assume that Trotsky loses the power struggle and is expelled from the Party. With Trotsky gone, the glue holding the rest of the Bolsheviks together is gone also, and infighting begins.
The talos is fully awake, and Candyman brings up a composition portal. He also brings up the Poland Online portal and connects to the provider. A few clicks on the cat and he can hear a transweb feed from a Classic Klez station in Kiev. With Piast Aeroplane pouring from the talos's speakers, Candyman clicks his way to the Encyclopedia Rzeczpospolita node and queries the entry on Stalin. He notes the date of the dictator's birth.
Returning to the composition portal, Candyman begins to type:
15 January 2001
There is a man with two names. The name by which he is known to his co-workers and his family does not concern us. All we need to know about him is that when he appears on the commercial transweb provider Poland Online, it is under the screen name Candyman45.
Candyman sits in an office in a modest three-bedroom house in Klaipeda. His chair faces a desk which accommodates an inexpensive personal talos. The walls hold prints by M.C. Escher, astronomical posters, and a map of the world. Around him are shelves full of an eclectic mix of books. Some are history: The Guns of August by Barbara Tuchman, 1937 by George Orwell, Empire of the Atom by Stefan Kieniewicz. Some are historical fiction: With Fire and Sword by Henryk Sienkiewicz, Piłsudski by Witold Gombrowicz, The Right Stuff by Stanisław Lem. Some are science fiction: The Sound of His Wings by Robert A. Heinlein, Enemy Mine by Richard Wright, Refugee by Anne Frank.
As Candyman's talos wakes itself, he ponders a request from his wife. She knows of his hobby of creating uchronias, and she has asked him to design a world where Josef Stalin drowned at birth. This places the Branch Point, or BP, in 1879. However, except for rare cases like Queen Elizabeth I of England, people tend not to make an immediate impact on world history as soon as they are born.
So it is with Stalin. Initially the changes are invisibly small. There is one less child growing up in Gori, one less rebellious seminary student in Tiflis. As late as the Russian Revolution and Civil War, the changes are minor: someone else edits Pravda, someone else is Nationalities Commissar, someone else accompanies Budenny into southern Poland, someone else is General Secretary of the Central Committee.
Now the differences are becoming noticeable on a large scale. Whoever is now General Secretary (Kamenev? Bukharin? Surely not Trotsky!) may well not use the position to create a personal following among the Party hierarchy as Stalin did. Conventional wisdom is that Trotsky would have succeeded Lenin were it not for Stalin's machinations, but Candyman is minded of some chains on the uchronia group he frequents that bring this into question. Trotsky was viewed with deep suspicion by the rest of the Bolsheviks, and a power struggle leading to his eventual ouster may have been inevitable, unless Trotsky used his position as War Commissar to eliminate the other Bolsheviks and make himself military dictator of the USSR.
For the sake of contrariness, assume that Trotsky loses the power struggle and is expelled from the Party. With Trotsky gone, the glue holding the rest of the Bolsheviks together is gone also, and infighting begins.
The talos is fully awake, and Candyman brings up a composition portal. He also brings up the Poland Online portal and connects to the provider. A few clicks on the cat and he can hear a transweb feed from a Classic Klez station in Kiev. With Piast Aeroplane pouring from the talos's speakers, Candyman clicks his way to the Encyclopedia Rzeczpospolita node and queries the entry on Stalin. He notes the date of the dictator's birth.
Returning to the composition portal, Candyman begins to type:
21 December 1879
Gori, Georgia, Russian Empire
Ekaterina Djugashvili is shocked and dismayed to learn that her newborn child Josef has accidentally drowned while being washed by the midwife. Ekaterina has now lost a total of four children in infancy. She suffers a mental breakdown, becomes terminally depressed, and dies a month after baby Josef . . .
Tuesday, March 16, 2010
DBTL 76: Must Give Us Pause
This is the latest installment in the Drowned Baby Timeline, an alternate history where Adolf Hitler died at birth, and where the Holocaust and World War II never took place. The Danzig War of 1936 - 37 saw an aggressive German regime under Ernst Röhm defeated by the combined forces of Great Britain, France, and Poland, and the three nations are now the dominant powers of Europe. Germany was partitioned, with the eastern half being annexed to Poland and the western half being organized by the British and French into two successor states, the Kingdom of Hanover and the Republic of Bavaria. Since then, the Germans have been at the center of a movement for a united Europe, leading to the establishment of a European Union with its headquarters at Magdeburg . . .
Magdeburg, Kingdom of Hanover
17 February 1975
"You know," said Count Edward Raczyński as he marmaladed a slice of toast, "I had the most peculiar dream last night."
"Oh, really?" Eric Blair answered around a last mouthful of scrambled eggs. "Did visions of sugarplums dance in your head?"
"Not quite," Raczyński said with a laugh. "Anyway, it's a little late for that sort of dream. No, I dreamt about a man who said he was the King of Poland."
The two men were breakfasting with the British delegation to the European Parliament. Blair had a standing invitation from his former countrymen to join them for their morning meal, and he availed himself of it frequently, claiming that nobody else in Europe knew how to fix a proper breakfast. "Coffee and pastries," he would declare, "are not breakfast."
Raczyński had acquired a taste for marmalade during his years at the Polish embassy in London, and he sometimes joined Blair. Being the senior delegate at Magdeburg, as well as a former President of the Polish Commonwealth, entitled Raczyński to a few unofficial perks, and crashing other delegations' canteens was one of them.
The canteen at the British embassy was a curiously shabby affair. For some reason, it had been located in one of the building's basements, and the metal tables and chairs looked as though they had been picked up at auction from a cheap cafe that had gone out of business. When the place was busy -- as it was now -- the din was terrific. Raczyński and Blair had to lean close together to make themselves heard without shouting, and in deference to their hosts, the two were speaking English.
"I've met at least half a dozen men in my life who claimed to be the King of Poland," Blair replied as he helped himself to an unhealthy-looking sausage. "And not all of them in Poland, either. One of them was actually descended from one of the elected kings, I forget which. And he didn't speak a word of Polish."
"Not all the elected kings did, either," said Raczyński, "rather like those early Georges you had in England. No, this one spoke Polish, or at least I dreamed he did -- and I don't always dream in Polish. But he had a definite German accent, and he said his name was Friedrich Hohenzollern."
"A Hohenzollern, King of Poland?" said Blair with mild surprise. "Now, that's just peculiar enough to be true."
"It's certainly food for thought," Raczyński remarked. "Suppose, for instance, that the Prussians had established a satellite kingdom in Poznan after the Third Partition, instead of annexing the area outright, and placed some Hohenzollern prince on the throne? In that case, I think, the Poles would have been a good deal less susceptible to Napoleon's siren song, with who knows what consequences for Polish history? Especially if Kościuszko could be persuaded to remain, and fight alongside the Prussians."
"Oh, no, not you too!" Blair said with a pained expression.
Raczyński did not have to inquire about the source of Blair's dismay. Ever since that American historian had published his mock history of an unsuccessful American Revolution, there had been an intellectual fad for uchronias, as they were known. Blair had made no secret of his detestation for the whole business. "Eric, I know you've got philosophical objections to the practice, but the rest of us find uchronia to be a harmless mental exercise."
"There are no harmless mental exercises," Blair said darkly. "All ideas are weapons. Anyone who claims otherwise is trying to deceive someone, either himself or someone else. All you have to do is look at the original uchronia, Louis Geoffroy's Napoléon apocryphe, to see that it's little more than wish-fulfillment fantasy coupled with a clandestine attempt to resurrect the Great Man theory of history."
"Are you saying, then, that there are no turning points in history?" Raczyński challenged the younger (though still elderly) man. "That it's all a matter of impersonal forces, that individuals can't make a difference? Take Professor Sobel's book as an example. Suppose Burgoyne had won the Battle of Saratoga? Wouldn't that produce a completely different history from ours?"
"No, it wouldn't," Blair said firmly. "Even if Burgoyne had beaten Gates, it would have made no difference. The colonists would have kept on fighting, and they would have won, because you can't rule a politically conscious people from three thousand miles away unless they're willing to be ruled, and the colonists weren't. Once they declared their independence, there was no going back. The British had to win every battle against the Americans if they wanted to remain in control. The Americans only had to win once, and then the French would come in on their side, and the British would be doomed. If it hadn't been Saratoga, it would have been another battle later on. It wasn't fortuitous, it was inevitable."
"And I suppose you would say the same thing about Stalin coming to power in Russia," Raczyński observed. "Suppose Stalin had died robbing a train? Would everything that happened after Lenin's death still happen?"
"It had to," Blair insisted. "Lenin's ideology demanded it. Everything had to be subordinated to control of the Party, and everyone who resisted had to be eliminated. And the very nature of the Party that Lenin created ensured that the most ruthless man would end up in control. Take away Stalin and someone equally ruthless would appear in his place and do the same things he did."
Raczyński knew better than to try to argue further with Blair. His socialism might have abated with age, but his utter conviction that he knew what was right remained as firm as ever. And, really, given how well that conviction had served his adopted homeland over the last forty years, how could Raczyński fault him for it?
So Raczyński did not mention to Blair the disturbing vision "King Friedrich" had given him of a Europe dominated by a still-powerful Germany, with Poland reduced to a mere satellite kingdom. Even more disturbing was the notion of how much more likely a German-dominated Europe was than the union of equals they were building here in Magdeburg. If Hindenburg and Ludendorff had triumphed over the Allied Powers in the Great War, or someone with more military and diplomatic skills than Röhm had seized power in the 1930s, it might well have happened. Raczyński himself might be dead or imprisoned, or at best living in exile in America like poor Kościuszko.
Dismissing these unfortunate alternative selves from his thoughts, Raczyński turned to Blair and said, "Speaking of deterministic forces, you and I have to prepare for today's meeting with those French agriculture officials."
"Oh, God, don't remind me," Blair muttered. "Why on earth did I ever accept this post?"
"I thought it was your deep commitment to the ideals of European unity?"
"Deep commitment to masochism, more like. At my age, I ought to be relaxing in a cafe in Barcelona, not arguing with bureaucrats in Magdeburg in the dead of winter."
"Maybe in an alternative world, you are," Raczyński chuckled.
"It's more likely I'd be long dead on a battlefield somewhere," Blair said gloomily. Then, peering around at the canteen in particular, and at the European Parliament in general, he added, "Which would still be an improvement over this place."
Magdeburg, Kingdom of Hanover
17 February 1975
"You know," said Count Edward Raczyński as he marmaladed a slice of toast, "I had the most peculiar dream last night."
"Oh, really?" Eric Blair answered around a last mouthful of scrambled eggs. "Did visions of sugarplums dance in your head?"
"Not quite," Raczyński said with a laugh. "Anyway, it's a little late for that sort of dream. No, I dreamt about a man who said he was the King of Poland."
The two men were breakfasting with the British delegation to the European Parliament. Blair had a standing invitation from his former countrymen to join them for their morning meal, and he availed himself of it frequently, claiming that nobody else in Europe knew how to fix a proper breakfast. "Coffee and pastries," he would declare, "are not breakfast."
Raczyński had acquired a taste for marmalade during his years at the Polish embassy in London, and he sometimes joined Blair. Being the senior delegate at Magdeburg, as well as a former President of the Polish Commonwealth, entitled Raczyński to a few unofficial perks, and crashing other delegations' canteens was one of them.
The canteen at the British embassy was a curiously shabby affair. For some reason, it had been located in one of the building's basements, and the metal tables and chairs looked as though they had been picked up at auction from a cheap cafe that had gone out of business. When the place was busy -- as it was now -- the din was terrific. Raczyński and Blair had to lean close together to make themselves heard without shouting, and in deference to their hosts, the two were speaking English.
"I've met at least half a dozen men in my life who claimed to be the King of Poland," Blair replied as he helped himself to an unhealthy-looking sausage. "And not all of them in Poland, either. One of them was actually descended from one of the elected kings, I forget which. And he didn't speak a word of Polish."
"Not all the elected kings did, either," said Raczyński, "rather like those early Georges you had in England. No, this one spoke Polish, or at least I dreamed he did -- and I don't always dream in Polish. But he had a definite German accent, and he said his name was Friedrich Hohenzollern."
"A Hohenzollern, King of Poland?" said Blair with mild surprise. "Now, that's just peculiar enough to be true."
"It's certainly food for thought," Raczyński remarked. "Suppose, for instance, that the Prussians had established a satellite kingdom in Poznan after the Third Partition, instead of annexing the area outright, and placed some Hohenzollern prince on the throne? In that case, I think, the Poles would have been a good deal less susceptible to Napoleon's siren song, with who knows what consequences for Polish history? Especially if Kościuszko could be persuaded to remain, and fight alongside the Prussians."
"Oh, no, not you too!" Blair said with a pained expression.
Raczyński did not have to inquire about the source of Blair's dismay. Ever since that American historian had published his mock history of an unsuccessful American Revolution, there had been an intellectual fad for uchronias, as they were known. Blair had made no secret of his detestation for the whole business. "Eric, I know you've got philosophical objections to the practice, but the rest of us find uchronia to be a harmless mental exercise."
"There are no harmless mental exercises," Blair said darkly. "All ideas are weapons. Anyone who claims otherwise is trying to deceive someone, either himself or someone else. All you have to do is look at the original uchronia, Louis Geoffroy's Napoléon apocryphe, to see that it's little more than wish-fulfillment fantasy coupled with a clandestine attempt to resurrect the Great Man theory of history."
"Are you saying, then, that there are no turning points in history?" Raczyński challenged the younger (though still elderly) man. "That it's all a matter of impersonal forces, that individuals can't make a difference? Take Professor Sobel's book as an example. Suppose Burgoyne had won the Battle of Saratoga? Wouldn't that produce a completely different history from ours?"
"No, it wouldn't," Blair said firmly. "Even if Burgoyne had beaten Gates, it would have made no difference. The colonists would have kept on fighting, and they would have won, because you can't rule a politically conscious people from three thousand miles away unless they're willing to be ruled, and the colonists weren't. Once they declared their independence, there was no going back. The British had to win every battle against the Americans if they wanted to remain in control. The Americans only had to win once, and then the French would come in on their side, and the British would be doomed. If it hadn't been Saratoga, it would have been another battle later on. It wasn't fortuitous, it was inevitable."
"And I suppose you would say the same thing about Stalin coming to power in Russia," Raczyński observed. "Suppose Stalin had died robbing a train? Would everything that happened after Lenin's death still happen?"
"It had to," Blair insisted. "Lenin's ideology demanded it. Everything had to be subordinated to control of the Party, and everyone who resisted had to be eliminated. And the very nature of the Party that Lenin created ensured that the most ruthless man would end up in control. Take away Stalin and someone equally ruthless would appear in his place and do the same things he did."
Raczyński knew better than to try to argue further with Blair. His socialism might have abated with age, but his utter conviction that he knew what was right remained as firm as ever. And, really, given how well that conviction had served his adopted homeland over the last forty years, how could Raczyński fault him for it?
So Raczyński did not mention to Blair the disturbing vision "King Friedrich" had given him of a Europe dominated by a still-powerful Germany, with Poland reduced to a mere satellite kingdom. Even more disturbing was the notion of how much more likely a German-dominated Europe was than the union of equals they were building here in Magdeburg. If Hindenburg and Ludendorff had triumphed over the Allied Powers in the Great War, or someone with more military and diplomatic skills than Röhm had seized power in the 1930s, it might well have happened. Raczyński himself might be dead or imprisoned, or at best living in exile in America like poor Kościuszko.
Dismissing these unfortunate alternative selves from his thoughts, Raczyński turned to Blair and said, "Speaking of deterministic forces, you and I have to prepare for today's meeting with those French agriculture officials."
"Oh, God, don't remind me," Blair muttered. "Why on earth did I ever accept this post?"
"I thought it was your deep commitment to the ideals of European unity?"
"Deep commitment to masochism, more like. At my age, I ought to be relaxing in a cafe in Barcelona, not arguing with bureaucrats in Magdeburg in the dead of winter."
"Maybe in an alternative world, you are," Raczyński chuckled.
"It's more likely I'd be long dead on a battlefield somewhere," Blair said gloomily. Then, peering around at the canteen in particular, and at the European Parliament in general, he added, "Which would still be an improvement over this place."
Monday, March 15, 2010
DBTL 75: Respect
This is the latest installment of the Drowned Baby Timeline, an alternate history where Adolf Hitler was drowned at birth and where the Holocaust and World War II never took place. Since joining the League of Nations in 1959, the United States has come under steady pressure from the League's Minorities Commission to end discrimination against its racial minorities . . .
Memphis, Tennessee, USA
14 September 1974
For Aretha Franklin, being back in Memphis was like visiting a peculiar alternate version of the past. Much of the city was just as she remembered it: the buildings, the parks, even the fire hydrants, were just as she had left them fifteen years before. But the people walking past those buildings, playing in those parks, parking illegally in front of those hydrants, were not quite the people she remembered from her childhood.
Take the man driving her limousine from the airport to her hotel. He was a good-looking white man several years her senior whose accent betrayed him as a Mississippian. Quite apart from the peculiar name displayed on his chauffeur's license, he behaved differently from any of the white men she'd known growing up. And if there was one word that summed up the difference between her driver and the white men she had known, that word was respect. After a lifetime's experience, Aretha knew perfectly well when a white man was only feigning courtesy, so when the driver tipped his hat and called her ma'am, she knew that he really meant it. Curious, she asked, "How long have you lived in Memphis?"
The driver's eyebrows drew together a bit in the rear-view mirror as he considered her question. "I'd say it's about twenty years now all told, ma'am," he finally answered. "I moved here from Mississippi back in '54."
"What made you decide to come to Memphis?"
"Well, ma'am, you might laugh to think of it, but I came here looking to be a musician." She could see a blush rising up the back of his neck. "Of course, nothing ever came of it. I wound up driving trucks for a living, and I've been driving ever since."
It was certainly an unexpected answer, and Aretha couldn't help reflecting on the irony. She herself had been born in Memphis, and she had moved away seeking a career in music. And her own success owed as much to God's grace as to her own talents. She could just as easily have wound up living the rest of her life as a waitress or chambermaid in New York . . .
"Do you play an instrument?" she asked the driver.
"Guitar," he answered, and there was definitely embarrassment in his voice. "At least, I used to. Been a while since I played it. I used to sing some, too."
She could understand his embarrassment. The accordion was the prestige instrument of pop music, and had been ever since the Vontzim had led the Yiddish Invasion back when she was just a little girl. The guitar, on the other hand, was the sort of instrument that your parents made you play. The parodist Buddy Holly had built a career out of using the guitar's schlemeil aura to comic effect, strumming away at classic klezmerol hits like Piast Aeroplane's "White Rabbi".
"It's all a matter of luck, you know," she assured the driver. "If Mr. Stokowski hadn't heard me singing in Central Park ten years ago, I'd still be waiting tables. All you can do is carry on playing, trust in the Lord, and keep an eye out for a break."
"Thank you, ma'am," said the driver. "Thank you very much. I'll keep that in mind."
Despite his words, Aretha could tell that the driver had already given up on music and resigned himself to life as a chauffeur. The music business could be cruel that way, even if your heart was true. For every star like Arlen Specter, there were a thousand people just as talented who went through their lives suffering heartache and disappointment. It left her feeling sad.
Her melancholy thoughts were brought to an abrupt halt when they came within sight of the hotel. Standing out front was a group of maybe twenty men dressed in white hooded robes and carrying signs. WHITE POWER was the least objectionable of the messages they conveyed.
Some distance away was another, considerably larger group. They also carried signs, but these said KKK GO AWAY and WE LOVE YOU ARETHA. Between the two groups was a double line of uniformed police, who were accompanied by a black man in a dark suit. At the moment, the two groups were preoccupied with each other, hurling insults back and forth across the blue-uniformed gap. Aretha knew, though, that it was only a matter of time before they spotted the limo, and then both groups would turn their contrasting attentions on her.
The driver, though, knew his business. "Now, don't you worry about a thing, ma'am. There's more than one way into that hotel." So saying, the driver deftly detoured around the driveway leading to the hotel and took the limo into the parking lot of a Piggly Wiggly further down the street. Steering around behind the supermarket, the driver took them past a series of tractor-trailers before turning onto a dirt road. "Used to use this road back when I drove a rig," he explained to her. The dirt road looped around before opening out into the rear parking lot of the hotel.
Pulling up to a side door hidden from the view of both sign-carrying groups, the driver got out, walked over, and gave two sets of knocks to the door. It opened, and Aretha saw Mr. Stokowski's business manager, Howard, lean out.
In a flash, the driver had Aretha's door open and was helping her out of the limo. Howard ushered her through the side door as the driver got back into the limo and drove off.
"What about my bags?" Aretha demanded as Howard led her inside.
"My dear lady," said Howard in his usual measured, sardonic tones, "you certainly don't believe that I would forget a matter of such monumental importance. Your bags are being conveyed to the front entry of this fine establishment, where the porters will perform the necessary maneuvers with the customary expertise for which they are so munificently compensated. The general populace gathered outside will have to content themselves with the resulting display of finely crafted travel accessories. I, meanwhile, will have the pleasure of escorting you to the accommodations which Mr. Stokowski has seen fit to procure."
As always, Howard's elaborately phrased reassurances left Aretha laughing out loud. As they were riding up the elevator she asked him, "Who was that man in the suit standing by the police?"
"I've been given to understand," Howard intoned, "that the distinguished Chairman of the Minorities Commission himself has chosen to honor us with his august presence."
"That was Dr. King?" Aretha was astonished.
"In the proverbial flesh," said Howard.
Aretha knew that beneath his ironic facade, Howard was just as impressed as she was that Dr. King was in Memphis on their behalf. He never let on that he felt anything but aloof amusement about anything, but even from Howard she felt an unmistakable aura of respect, and it was plain to her that his words disguised his admiration for Dr. King.
"Do you think we might get to meet him?" she asked.
"My dear," said Howard, his dark eyes glinting with affection, "I think you can count on it."
Mr. Stokowski was waiting for them when they reached their suite of rooms. Although he was in his nineties, Mr. Stokowski seemed endlessly energetic to Aretha. It seemed impossible to believe that he was nearly three times her age. He didn't smile when he saw her because he never smiled, but his accented voice lacked its usual acerbic edge when he said, "I see you've finally chosen to make an appearance, Miss Franklin."
"Which is more than her multitudinous admirers outside can say," Howard said.
Mr. Stokowski favored Howard with a withering glare. "Refresh my memory, please. Do I pay you to stand around and make fatuous observations?"
"In all honesty, Mr. Stokowski," Howard responded, "I've never been entirely clear about what it is you pay me to do."
It took an effort for Aretha not to laugh, as it always did when Howard traded barbs with Mr. Stokowski. "For now," the conductor answered, "it will be sufficient for you to show Miss Franklin to her room."
Howard did so, and after he was gone Aretha was able to lie back on the bed, kick off her shoes, and let out a sigh of relief. Another journey finished, and all too soon it would be time to start preparing for tomorrow's performance, but for now she could let herself relax.
She was starting to drift off to sleep when a knock on her door brought her back to full consciousness. "Miss Franklin?" came Howard's voice. "There's a gentleman out here who wishes to make your acquaintance. I can show him to the door if you'd like."
"Oh, Howard, don't you dare!" Shoes back on and a quick check in the mirror before she opened the door. Standing outside next to Howard was the Chairman of the League of Nations Minorities Commission, the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
"Miss Franklin," he said in that deep, familiar voice, "I hope you haven't been inconvenienced by the demonstrators outside."
"Not at all, Dr. King," she assured him. "That was nothing compared to the crowds we get in New York."
"Though our New York fans aren't known for their propensity for wearing bed linen," Howard observed.
"Oh, Howard, shush," said Aretha.
Dr. King was smiling. "The bed linen we can deal with. You're sure you're all right, Miss Franklin?"
Aretha knew what he meant. "I'm fine, Dr. King. Actually, I'm surprised there weren't more of them."
"They're not as popular as they used to be," Dr. King said with some satisfaction. "And when they do turn up, the Commission is always on hand to keep an eye on them."
Aretha found herself returning the smile. "Will you be staying to attend the performance tomorrow?"
"Well," said Dr. King, "I'm usually more partial to Mahalia Jackson than to Wagner, but I do plan to attend, yes."
The porters arrived then with Aretha's baggage, and Dr. King bid her and the others goodbye. Aretha watched him go as the porters entered her room and began to unpack her bags.
She was already thinking about tomorrow's performance.
Memphis, Tennessee, USA
14 September 1974
For Aretha Franklin, being back in Memphis was like visiting a peculiar alternate version of the past. Much of the city was just as she remembered it: the buildings, the parks, even the fire hydrants, were just as she had left them fifteen years before. But the people walking past those buildings, playing in those parks, parking illegally in front of those hydrants, were not quite the people she remembered from her childhood.
Take the man driving her limousine from the airport to her hotel. He was a good-looking white man several years her senior whose accent betrayed him as a Mississippian. Quite apart from the peculiar name displayed on his chauffeur's license, he behaved differently from any of the white men she'd known growing up. And if there was one word that summed up the difference between her driver and the white men she had known, that word was respect. After a lifetime's experience, Aretha knew perfectly well when a white man was only feigning courtesy, so when the driver tipped his hat and called her ma'am, she knew that he really meant it. Curious, she asked, "How long have you lived in Memphis?"
The driver's eyebrows drew together a bit in the rear-view mirror as he considered her question. "I'd say it's about twenty years now all told, ma'am," he finally answered. "I moved here from Mississippi back in '54."
"What made you decide to come to Memphis?"
"Well, ma'am, you might laugh to think of it, but I came here looking to be a musician." She could see a blush rising up the back of his neck. "Of course, nothing ever came of it. I wound up driving trucks for a living, and I've been driving ever since."
It was certainly an unexpected answer, and Aretha couldn't help reflecting on the irony. She herself had been born in Memphis, and she had moved away seeking a career in music. And her own success owed as much to God's grace as to her own talents. She could just as easily have wound up living the rest of her life as a waitress or chambermaid in New York . . .
"Do you play an instrument?" she asked the driver.
"Guitar," he answered, and there was definitely embarrassment in his voice. "At least, I used to. Been a while since I played it. I used to sing some, too."
She could understand his embarrassment. The accordion was the prestige instrument of pop music, and had been ever since the Vontzim had led the Yiddish Invasion back when she was just a little girl. The guitar, on the other hand, was the sort of instrument that your parents made you play. The parodist Buddy Holly had built a career out of using the guitar's schlemeil aura to comic effect, strumming away at classic klezmerol hits like Piast Aeroplane's "White Rabbi".
"It's all a matter of luck, you know," she assured the driver. "If Mr. Stokowski hadn't heard me singing in Central Park ten years ago, I'd still be waiting tables. All you can do is carry on playing, trust in the Lord, and keep an eye out for a break."
"Thank you, ma'am," said the driver. "Thank you very much. I'll keep that in mind."
Despite his words, Aretha could tell that the driver had already given up on music and resigned himself to life as a chauffeur. The music business could be cruel that way, even if your heart was true. For every star like Arlen Specter, there were a thousand people just as talented who went through their lives suffering heartache and disappointment. It left her feeling sad.
Her melancholy thoughts were brought to an abrupt halt when they came within sight of the hotel. Standing out front was a group of maybe twenty men dressed in white hooded robes and carrying signs. WHITE POWER was the least objectionable of the messages they conveyed.
Some distance away was another, considerably larger group. They also carried signs, but these said KKK GO AWAY and WE LOVE YOU ARETHA. Between the two groups was a double line of uniformed police, who were accompanied by a black man in a dark suit. At the moment, the two groups were preoccupied with each other, hurling insults back and forth across the blue-uniformed gap. Aretha knew, though, that it was only a matter of time before they spotted the limo, and then both groups would turn their contrasting attentions on her.
The driver, though, knew his business. "Now, don't you worry about a thing, ma'am. There's more than one way into that hotel." So saying, the driver deftly detoured around the driveway leading to the hotel and took the limo into the parking lot of a Piggly Wiggly further down the street. Steering around behind the supermarket, the driver took them past a series of tractor-trailers before turning onto a dirt road. "Used to use this road back when I drove a rig," he explained to her. The dirt road looped around before opening out into the rear parking lot of the hotel.
Pulling up to a side door hidden from the view of both sign-carrying groups, the driver got out, walked over, and gave two sets of knocks to the door. It opened, and Aretha saw Mr. Stokowski's business manager, Howard, lean out.
In a flash, the driver had Aretha's door open and was helping her out of the limo. Howard ushered her through the side door as the driver got back into the limo and drove off.
"What about my bags?" Aretha demanded as Howard led her inside.
"My dear lady," said Howard in his usual measured, sardonic tones, "you certainly don't believe that I would forget a matter of such monumental importance. Your bags are being conveyed to the front entry of this fine establishment, where the porters will perform the necessary maneuvers with the customary expertise for which they are so munificently compensated. The general populace gathered outside will have to content themselves with the resulting display of finely crafted travel accessories. I, meanwhile, will have the pleasure of escorting you to the accommodations which Mr. Stokowski has seen fit to procure."
As always, Howard's elaborately phrased reassurances left Aretha laughing out loud. As they were riding up the elevator she asked him, "Who was that man in the suit standing by the police?"
"I've been given to understand," Howard intoned, "that the distinguished Chairman of the Minorities Commission himself has chosen to honor us with his august presence."
"That was Dr. King?" Aretha was astonished.
"In the proverbial flesh," said Howard.
Aretha knew that beneath his ironic facade, Howard was just as impressed as she was that Dr. King was in Memphis on their behalf. He never let on that he felt anything but aloof amusement about anything, but even from Howard she felt an unmistakable aura of respect, and it was plain to her that his words disguised his admiration for Dr. King.
"Do you think we might get to meet him?" she asked.
"My dear," said Howard, his dark eyes glinting with affection, "I think you can count on it."
Mr. Stokowski was waiting for them when they reached their suite of rooms. Although he was in his nineties, Mr. Stokowski seemed endlessly energetic to Aretha. It seemed impossible to believe that he was nearly three times her age. He didn't smile when he saw her because he never smiled, but his accented voice lacked its usual acerbic edge when he said, "I see you've finally chosen to make an appearance, Miss Franklin."
"Which is more than her multitudinous admirers outside can say," Howard said.
Mr. Stokowski favored Howard with a withering glare. "Refresh my memory, please. Do I pay you to stand around and make fatuous observations?"
"In all honesty, Mr. Stokowski," Howard responded, "I've never been entirely clear about what it is you pay me to do."
It took an effort for Aretha not to laugh, as it always did when Howard traded barbs with Mr. Stokowski. "For now," the conductor answered, "it will be sufficient for you to show Miss Franklin to her room."
Howard did so, and after he was gone Aretha was able to lie back on the bed, kick off her shoes, and let out a sigh of relief. Another journey finished, and all too soon it would be time to start preparing for tomorrow's performance, but for now she could let herself relax.
She was starting to drift off to sleep when a knock on her door brought her back to full consciousness. "Miss Franklin?" came Howard's voice. "There's a gentleman out here who wishes to make your acquaintance. I can show him to the door if you'd like."
"Oh, Howard, don't you dare!" Shoes back on and a quick check in the mirror before she opened the door. Standing outside next to Howard was the Chairman of the League of Nations Minorities Commission, the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
"Miss Franklin," he said in that deep, familiar voice, "I hope you haven't been inconvenienced by the demonstrators outside."
"Not at all, Dr. King," she assured him. "That was nothing compared to the crowds we get in New York."
"Though our New York fans aren't known for their propensity for wearing bed linen," Howard observed.
"Oh, Howard, shush," said Aretha.
Dr. King was smiling. "The bed linen we can deal with. You're sure you're all right, Miss Franklin?"
Aretha knew what he meant. "I'm fine, Dr. King. Actually, I'm surprised there weren't more of them."
"They're not as popular as they used to be," Dr. King said with some satisfaction. "And when they do turn up, the Commission is always on hand to keep an eye on them."
Aretha found herself returning the smile. "Will you be staying to attend the performance tomorrow?"
"Well," said Dr. King, "I'm usually more partial to Mahalia Jackson than to Wagner, but I do plan to attend, yes."
The porters arrived then with Aretha's baggage, and Dr. King bid her and the others goodbye. Aretha watched him go as the porters entered her room and began to unpack her bags.
She was already thinking about tomorrow's performance.
Sunday, March 14, 2010
DBTL 74: Enter the Dragon
This is the latest installment of the Drowned Baby Timeline, an alternate history where Adolf Hitler drowned at birth, and where the Holocaust and World War II never took place. Instead, Ernst Röhm seizes power in Germany 1932 with the backing of the unNazified but still violently anti-Semitic Freikorps. Röhm invades Poland in 1936, and loses. Germany is partitioned, with the eastern half being annexed to Poland and the western half being organized by the British and French into two successor states.
War breaks out between Poland and the USSR in October 1944, and Poland's Japanese allies attack the Soviets on 7 December. The Japanese fare as poorly against the Soviets as they did in OTL, and the Soviets eventually drive them out of China, and by 1950 succeed in conquering the Japanese home islands. The Chinese Civil War resumes after Mao Tse-tung's assassination in 1945, and following Stalin's death in 1946, his successors in the USSR decide to back Chiang Kai-shek. With Soviet help, Chiang defeats (but does not destroy) the Chinese Communists. However, the withdrawal of the Soviets from China in 1954 leaves Chiang back where he started -- at the head of a corrupt, unpopular government facing a fanatical insurgency.
Eighteen years go by . . .
Chungking, China
10 July 1972
Lee Jun Fan stepped down onto the platform of the small, dilapidated train station. A short, slim man in his early 30s, Lee knew he did not stand out among the passengers. Anonymity was his objective. After a cursory seach by station guards who were more interested in fondling attractive female passengers, Lee was able to enter Chungking.
For a citizen of Hong Kong like Lee, traveling to Chungking was like moving back in time forty years. Automobiles were rare, modern buildings even rarer. A few factories had been set up during the Japanese invasion, and the boots and foam rubber they produced were the city's main source of (legitimate) income. The people Lee moved among all had a furtive air about them, as though every single one of them was engaged in some shady business that had to be concealed from the world. Although Lee himself really was engaged in the shadiest of shady business, it required a constant effort to control his own naturally confident stride and force himself to skulk around like the rest of Chungking.
Lee had been able to spot his general objective as soon as he left the train station. The heart of Chungking was located atop a bluff, including a set of administrative buildings from which the Kuomintang ruled the city, Szechwan province, and, during the Japanese invasion, all of China. Lee squinted as he peered through the city's dusty air at the forbidding stone monoliths atop the bluff. One of those buildings held the man Lee had come to Chungking to find.
Lee knew that access to the bluff was restricted to Kuomintang officials and elite units of the Army. However, to a man of Lee's abilities there were no restricted areas. His superiors in Hong Kong had briefed him on the setup atop the bluff, and Lee already had a plan formulated.
The sides of the bluff ranged in their degree of steepness from near-vertical to vertical, and the only ways up to the top were an old winding stair and a recently-constructed system of cable cars. In his walk from the railroad station Lee kept a trained eye on the walls of the bluff, looking for a section that would suit his needs. He found it three quarters of the way around, along the imposing north face of the bluff. At this point the top of the bluff actually overhung the ground, and rockfalls kept the buildings of the city a safe distance away. Centering himself, becoming vibrantly aware of every muscle in his body and every square centimeter of his skin, Lee approached the rock face. He placed both hands against the rock and paused for a moment, then began to climb.
His fingertips felt the rough stone of the rockface and found handholds that would have eluded other men. Slowly but steadily Lee crawled up the face of the bluff, pausing from time to time to run the fingers of one hand over the pitted rock before resuming his climb.
Time ceased to have any meaning for Lee, as his consciousness narrowed down to an eternal present, and the face of the bluff became his entire existence. It was only when his fingers came into contact with grass, and Lee looked up to see that the rock had bent back from vertical to horizontal, that he realized that he had made it to the top of the bluff.
There was a crumbling brick wall a few meters ahead of Lee, and he crawled over the grass until he was resting against it. Then he allowed himself to relax, and time began to move at its accustomed rate once again.
The sun had dropped behind the towering western mountains, and night was falling, when Lee stood up next to the brick wall Here at the northern edge of the bluff, street lights were rare, and in his dark clothing Lee was able to walk unnoticed, a shadow among shadows. Twice he froze in place as people walked past him, and twice he was able to remain unseen.
As Lee approached the center of Chungking, the lighting became better, the streets more crowded, and the number of soldiers much higher. Once again, Lee relied on his talent for blending in with the crowd to conceal him from any watching eyes. Reaching his destination, Lee slipped easily into the shadows of a narrow alley. On one side was an office building, on the other was the Governor's palace. Lee looked up to scan the the cement face of the palace, his eyes quickly moving across the building's five stories. On the fourth floor, a window had been left open a few centimeters.
The palace dated back to the period when Chiang Kai-shek had ruled China (or at any rate, those parts of it not controlled by the Communists or the Japanese) from Chungking. In the course of forty years in Chungking's harsh climate, the palace's cement facade had become pitted and cracked. Centering himself once more, Lee placed his hands on the crumbling cement, then slowly began to climb.
Between the second and third floors, the palace's facade was set back two centimeters, and Lee paused there to rest for a time before resuming his ascent. A timeless interval later, his fingers came into contact with the projecting windowsill, and he slowly pulled himself up until he could see in through the open window.
The unlit room beyond was hidden behind a set of curtains. With a single fluid motion, Lee swung himself up onto the windowsill, then slid the window up a few more centimeters until he could slip silently through it.
Lee felt the curtains slide over his body as he dropped through the window onto the floor. He froze when he heard a strange sound coming from a meter to his left. The sound ceased, then was repeated a few seconds later, then ceased again. It was not until the third repetition that Lee finally recognized the sound of someone snoring. As his eyes grew accustomed to the dark, Lee realized that he had entered someone's bedroom. The sleeper lay on a bed to his left. There was a door in the wall on his right, and another door on the far side of the room.
The sleeper's snores ceased, and he turned over. Lee would have frozen if he hadn't already been motionless. Instead, he remained motionless for what seemed an eternity but was no more than twenty seconds until the sleeper resumed snoring. Lee began to move very slowly and very cautiously across the floor until he came to the door on the far side of the room. There was light coming underneath the door from beyond, and Lee was very careful not to place himself between the sleeper and the door. He rose up onto his feet, quietly grasped the door's knob, then swung the door open as little as was necessary for him to slip past it.
Lee was in well-lit hallway, and his eyes were in agony as he walked nonchalantly away from the room with the sleeper. There was nobody in view to see him leave the sleeper's room, and within a few seconds his eyes had adjusted to the brightness. Fifteen meters past the door he had gone through, the hallway reached a junction with a stairwell. One set of wooden stairs led upward to the fifth floor, while another led downward to the third. Discarding his dark jacket and drawing a clip-on necktie from his pants pocket, Lee buttoned up his white shirt and clipped the tie in place before descending the stairs. With the white shirt and tie, Lee had changed his appearance from that of a nondescript man-on-the-street to that of a nondescript clerk. He passed half a dozen men on his way down the stairs to the palace's basement, and not one of them so much as gave him a second look.
Lee moved through the palace's basement with the self-assurance of a man who has every right to be wherever he is. The information provided by his superiors brought him to an unusually solid metal door with an unusually robust lock. Standing next to the door was a tall, well-built young man in an army uniform with a grounded rifle. As Lee approached the door, the soldier quickly brought the rifle up and pointed it in his direction. "Halt!" the soldier commanded.
Lee did not halt. Ducking under the rifle's line of fire, Lee turned a forward somersault that brought him within striking distance of the rifle's barrel. A kick, and the rifle flew out of the soldier's hands. To Lee's dismay, the soldier fended off his next kick with a lightning-quick strike of the hand. It wasn't often that Lee's job brought him into contact with another adept of the martial arts. It was an unworthy thought, but Lee found himself wishing that the soldier would just let him knock him unconscious.
Lee expected the soldier to raise the alarm. Instead, he settled into position, hands raised, and waited in silence for Lee to attack. Lee understood: the soldier's pride would not allow him to call for reinforcements against an unarmed man. He was determined to defeat Lee by himself.
Very well. Lee bowed to the soldier, and the gesture was returned.
The next five minutes passed in a flurry of feints, blows, and kicks, and ended with the soldier unconscious on the ground. A quck search of the soldier's belt turned up a set of four keys, and an informed guess let Lee open the door with the first key he tried. The metal door swung open to reveal a room crowded with bookshelves, a single desk and chair, and a startled man in his early seventies.
"Chang Hsueh-liang," said Lee, "it is time for you to go."
"Who are you?" said Chang.
"My name is Lee," said Lee. "I've been sent to Chungking to free you from Chiang's prison."
"Sent by whom?" said Chang with suspicion in his voice.
"I'm not at liberty to say at present," said Lee. "You should be aware that time is short. I need you to come with me right now."
"And if I do not?" said Chang stubbornly.
"Then I will leave now without you," said Lee. He turned and began to walk back towards the stairwell.
"Not quite so fast, if you please," said Chang as he hurried out past the metal door. "I'm not as young as I used to be, and I don't get much exercise."
The two men climbed the stairs at a measured pace, and walked side by side through the lobby of the Governor's palace. They had actually made it out past the front doors before one of the soldiers standing guard pointed at Chang and said, "Wait! That's the Young Marshal!"
The soldiers undoubtedly expected Lee and Chang to try and make a break for it, so Lee turned around and leapt at the soldiers. Before they could react, he was among them, where they could not shoot at him for fear of hitting each other. The first soldier who tried to seize him got an elbow in the side and a blow to the side of the head. The second got two quick kicks to the stomach, while the third was redirected headlong into the fourth.
In the street below the palace there was a man standing agape beside the open door of an automobile. Lee grabbed a stunned-looking Chang and dragged him to the automobile. A quick snatch got him the car keys from the man's hand, and he had Chang bundled into the passenger seat and the car door slammed shut before the man could react. The man was pounding on the driver's side window when Lee pulled away from the palace. The car gained two bullet holes before they turned a corner out of the soldiers' line-of-sight.
The people of Chungking had excellent reflexes, diving out of the speeding car's way with plenty of room to spare. As Lee was negotiating the twisted streets with his foot on the pedal and his hand on the horn, Chang demanded again to know who had sent him.
"Governor-General Mountbatten," Lee answered as he swerved to avoid another car.
It was several seconds before Chang answered. Perhaps he was having difficulty accepting the idea, or perhaps he was distracted by the row of caged chickens Lee had just sideswiped. In any event, Chang finally said, "You're from Hong Kong?"
"That's right," said Lee as a basket full of peaches bounced off the windshield.
"What would the English want with me?" Chang wondered as two workmen abandoned a large pane of plate glass to its unhappy fate.
"We want you to return to Manchuria," Lee answered as he brought the car fishtailing to a halt. They were near the eastern edge of the bluff, and the cable car terminus was less that fifty meters away. Lee dragged Chang from the car and hurried through the crowds to the embarkation point. Cutting in front of a group of people who were about to enter a newly-vacated car, Lee pulled Chang inside and slammed the door in the angry faces of the would-be passengers. A carefully placed kick released the brake, and the car began to slide down the cable.
Peering curiously down the length of the cable, Chang said, "Please explain what interest Her Majesty's government could have in whether or not I return to Manchuria."
"The Communists are on the march," Lee began.
"Still?" said Chang. "You mean to say that after almost fifty years of trying, Chiang still hasn't managed to defeat them?"
"Not only are they not defeated," said Lee, "they are growing stronger, and Manchuria is their primary target. Ever since the dissolution of the Soviet Union, Manchuria has been in chaos. The old state-directed economy has collapsed, and what little market economy exists has been taken over by a handful of corrupt bureaucrats. The Manchurian people are desperate, and desperate people are meat and drink to Chou En-lai's partisans. If they seize control of Manchuria, they will have a secure base from which to attack China proper, and they will be unstoppable. Only one man can keep Manchuria out of Chou En-lai's hands, and that man is you." With another kick, Lee re-engaged the brake, and the cable car came to a shuddering halt five meters above the Yangtze. A barge loaded with a cargo of foam rubber was passing downstream below them.
Lee turned to look at Chang as he opened the cable car's door. "Young Marshal, the choice is yours," he said, then turned and jumped out.
The barge had almost drifted past the cable car when Chang finally jumped.
War breaks out between Poland and the USSR in October 1944, and Poland's Japanese allies attack the Soviets on 7 December. The Japanese fare as poorly against the Soviets as they did in OTL, and the Soviets eventually drive them out of China, and by 1950 succeed in conquering the Japanese home islands. The Chinese Civil War resumes after Mao Tse-tung's assassination in 1945, and following Stalin's death in 1946, his successors in the USSR decide to back Chiang Kai-shek. With Soviet help, Chiang defeats (but does not destroy) the Chinese Communists. However, the withdrawal of the Soviets from China in 1954 leaves Chiang back where he started -- at the head of a corrupt, unpopular government facing a fanatical insurgency.
Eighteen years go by . . .
Chungking, China
10 July 1972
Lee Jun Fan stepped down onto the platform of the small, dilapidated train station. A short, slim man in his early 30s, Lee knew he did not stand out among the passengers. Anonymity was his objective. After a cursory seach by station guards who were more interested in fondling attractive female passengers, Lee was able to enter Chungking.
For a citizen of Hong Kong like Lee, traveling to Chungking was like moving back in time forty years. Automobiles were rare, modern buildings even rarer. A few factories had been set up during the Japanese invasion, and the boots and foam rubber they produced were the city's main source of (legitimate) income. The people Lee moved among all had a furtive air about them, as though every single one of them was engaged in some shady business that had to be concealed from the world. Although Lee himself really was engaged in the shadiest of shady business, it required a constant effort to control his own naturally confident stride and force himself to skulk around like the rest of Chungking.
Lee had been able to spot his general objective as soon as he left the train station. The heart of Chungking was located atop a bluff, including a set of administrative buildings from which the Kuomintang ruled the city, Szechwan province, and, during the Japanese invasion, all of China. Lee squinted as he peered through the city's dusty air at the forbidding stone monoliths atop the bluff. One of those buildings held the man Lee had come to Chungking to find.
Lee knew that access to the bluff was restricted to Kuomintang officials and elite units of the Army. However, to a man of Lee's abilities there were no restricted areas. His superiors in Hong Kong had briefed him on the setup atop the bluff, and Lee already had a plan formulated.
The sides of the bluff ranged in their degree of steepness from near-vertical to vertical, and the only ways up to the top were an old winding stair and a recently-constructed system of cable cars. In his walk from the railroad station Lee kept a trained eye on the walls of the bluff, looking for a section that would suit his needs. He found it three quarters of the way around, along the imposing north face of the bluff. At this point the top of the bluff actually overhung the ground, and rockfalls kept the buildings of the city a safe distance away. Centering himself, becoming vibrantly aware of every muscle in his body and every square centimeter of his skin, Lee approached the rock face. He placed both hands against the rock and paused for a moment, then began to climb.
His fingertips felt the rough stone of the rockface and found handholds that would have eluded other men. Slowly but steadily Lee crawled up the face of the bluff, pausing from time to time to run the fingers of one hand over the pitted rock before resuming his climb.
Time ceased to have any meaning for Lee, as his consciousness narrowed down to an eternal present, and the face of the bluff became his entire existence. It was only when his fingers came into contact with grass, and Lee looked up to see that the rock had bent back from vertical to horizontal, that he realized that he had made it to the top of the bluff.
There was a crumbling brick wall a few meters ahead of Lee, and he crawled over the grass until he was resting against it. Then he allowed himself to relax, and time began to move at its accustomed rate once again.
The sun had dropped behind the towering western mountains, and night was falling, when Lee stood up next to the brick wall Here at the northern edge of the bluff, street lights were rare, and in his dark clothing Lee was able to walk unnoticed, a shadow among shadows. Twice he froze in place as people walked past him, and twice he was able to remain unseen.
As Lee approached the center of Chungking, the lighting became better, the streets more crowded, and the number of soldiers much higher. Once again, Lee relied on his talent for blending in with the crowd to conceal him from any watching eyes. Reaching his destination, Lee slipped easily into the shadows of a narrow alley. On one side was an office building, on the other was the Governor's palace. Lee looked up to scan the the cement face of the palace, his eyes quickly moving across the building's five stories. On the fourth floor, a window had been left open a few centimeters.
The palace dated back to the period when Chiang Kai-shek had ruled China (or at any rate, those parts of it not controlled by the Communists or the Japanese) from Chungking. In the course of forty years in Chungking's harsh climate, the palace's cement facade had become pitted and cracked. Centering himself once more, Lee placed his hands on the crumbling cement, then slowly began to climb.
Between the second and third floors, the palace's facade was set back two centimeters, and Lee paused there to rest for a time before resuming his ascent. A timeless interval later, his fingers came into contact with the projecting windowsill, and he slowly pulled himself up until he could see in through the open window.
The unlit room beyond was hidden behind a set of curtains. With a single fluid motion, Lee swung himself up onto the windowsill, then slid the window up a few more centimeters until he could slip silently through it.
Lee felt the curtains slide over his body as he dropped through the window onto the floor. He froze when he heard a strange sound coming from a meter to his left. The sound ceased, then was repeated a few seconds later, then ceased again. It was not until the third repetition that Lee finally recognized the sound of someone snoring. As his eyes grew accustomed to the dark, Lee realized that he had entered someone's bedroom. The sleeper lay on a bed to his left. There was a door in the wall on his right, and another door on the far side of the room.
The sleeper's snores ceased, and he turned over. Lee would have frozen if he hadn't already been motionless. Instead, he remained motionless for what seemed an eternity but was no more than twenty seconds until the sleeper resumed snoring. Lee began to move very slowly and very cautiously across the floor until he came to the door on the far side of the room. There was light coming underneath the door from beyond, and Lee was very careful not to place himself between the sleeper and the door. He rose up onto his feet, quietly grasped the door's knob, then swung the door open as little as was necessary for him to slip past it.
Lee was in well-lit hallway, and his eyes were in agony as he walked nonchalantly away from the room with the sleeper. There was nobody in view to see him leave the sleeper's room, and within a few seconds his eyes had adjusted to the brightness. Fifteen meters past the door he had gone through, the hallway reached a junction with a stairwell. One set of wooden stairs led upward to the fifth floor, while another led downward to the third. Discarding his dark jacket and drawing a clip-on necktie from his pants pocket, Lee buttoned up his white shirt and clipped the tie in place before descending the stairs. With the white shirt and tie, Lee had changed his appearance from that of a nondescript man-on-the-street to that of a nondescript clerk. He passed half a dozen men on his way down the stairs to the palace's basement, and not one of them so much as gave him a second look.
Lee moved through the palace's basement with the self-assurance of a man who has every right to be wherever he is. The information provided by his superiors brought him to an unusually solid metal door with an unusually robust lock. Standing next to the door was a tall, well-built young man in an army uniform with a grounded rifle. As Lee approached the door, the soldier quickly brought the rifle up and pointed it in his direction. "Halt!" the soldier commanded.
Lee did not halt. Ducking under the rifle's line of fire, Lee turned a forward somersault that brought him within striking distance of the rifle's barrel. A kick, and the rifle flew out of the soldier's hands. To Lee's dismay, the soldier fended off his next kick with a lightning-quick strike of the hand. It wasn't often that Lee's job brought him into contact with another adept of the martial arts. It was an unworthy thought, but Lee found himself wishing that the soldier would just let him knock him unconscious.
Lee expected the soldier to raise the alarm. Instead, he settled into position, hands raised, and waited in silence for Lee to attack. Lee understood: the soldier's pride would not allow him to call for reinforcements against an unarmed man. He was determined to defeat Lee by himself.
Very well. Lee bowed to the soldier, and the gesture was returned.
The next five minutes passed in a flurry of feints, blows, and kicks, and ended with the soldier unconscious on the ground. A quck search of the soldier's belt turned up a set of four keys, and an informed guess let Lee open the door with the first key he tried. The metal door swung open to reveal a room crowded with bookshelves, a single desk and chair, and a startled man in his early seventies.
"Chang Hsueh-liang," said Lee, "it is time for you to go."
"Who are you?" said Chang.
"My name is Lee," said Lee. "I've been sent to Chungking to free you from Chiang's prison."
"Sent by whom?" said Chang with suspicion in his voice.
"I'm not at liberty to say at present," said Lee. "You should be aware that time is short. I need you to come with me right now."
"And if I do not?" said Chang stubbornly.
"Then I will leave now without you," said Lee. He turned and began to walk back towards the stairwell.
"Not quite so fast, if you please," said Chang as he hurried out past the metal door. "I'm not as young as I used to be, and I don't get much exercise."
The two men climbed the stairs at a measured pace, and walked side by side through the lobby of the Governor's palace. They had actually made it out past the front doors before one of the soldiers standing guard pointed at Chang and said, "Wait! That's the Young Marshal!"
The soldiers undoubtedly expected Lee and Chang to try and make a break for it, so Lee turned around and leapt at the soldiers. Before they could react, he was among them, where they could not shoot at him for fear of hitting each other. The first soldier who tried to seize him got an elbow in the side and a blow to the side of the head. The second got two quick kicks to the stomach, while the third was redirected headlong into the fourth.
In the street below the palace there was a man standing agape beside the open door of an automobile. Lee grabbed a stunned-looking Chang and dragged him to the automobile. A quick snatch got him the car keys from the man's hand, and he had Chang bundled into the passenger seat and the car door slammed shut before the man could react. The man was pounding on the driver's side window when Lee pulled away from the palace. The car gained two bullet holes before they turned a corner out of the soldiers' line-of-sight.
The people of Chungking had excellent reflexes, diving out of the speeding car's way with plenty of room to spare. As Lee was negotiating the twisted streets with his foot on the pedal and his hand on the horn, Chang demanded again to know who had sent him.
"Governor-General Mountbatten," Lee answered as he swerved to avoid another car.
It was several seconds before Chang answered. Perhaps he was having difficulty accepting the idea, or perhaps he was distracted by the row of caged chickens Lee had just sideswiped. In any event, Chang finally said, "You're from Hong Kong?"
"That's right," said Lee as a basket full of peaches bounced off the windshield.
"What would the English want with me?" Chang wondered as two workmen abandoned a large pane of plate glass to its unhappy fate.
"We want you to return to Manchuria," Lee answered as he brought the car fishtailing to a halt. They were near the eastern edge of the bluff, and the cable car terminus was less that fifty meters away. Lee dragged Chang from the car and hurried through the crowds to the embarkation point. Cutting in front of a group of people who were about to enter a newly-vacated car, Lee pulled Chang inside and slammed the door in the angry faces of the would-be passengers. A carefully placed kick released the brake, and the car began to slide down the cable.
Peering curiously down the length of the cable, Chang said, "Please explain what interest Her Majesty's government could have in whether or not I return to Manchuria."
"The Communists are on the march," Lee began.
"Still?" said Chang. "You mean to say that after almost fifty years of trying, Chiang still hasn't managed to defeat them?"
"Not only are they not defeated," said Lee, "they are growing stronger, and Manchuria is their primary target. Ever since the dissolution of the Soviet Union, Manchuria has been in chaos. The old state-directed economy has collapsed, and what little market economy exists has been taken over by a handful of corrupt bureaucrats. The Manchurian people are desperate, and desperate people are meat and drink to Chou En-lai's partisans. If they seize control of Manchuria, they will have a secure base from which to attack China proper, and they will be unstoppable. Only one man can keep Manchuria out of Chou En-lai's hands, and that man is you." With another kick, Lee re-engaged the brake, and the cable car came to a shuddering halt five meters above the Yangtze. A barge loaded with a cargo of foam rubber was passing downstream below them.
Lee turned to look at Chang as he opened the cable car's door. "Young Marshal, the choice is yours," he said, then turned and jumped out.
The barge had almost drifted past the cable car when Chang finally jumped.
Saturday, March 13, 2010
Rain on my parade
Today is Parade Day in America's First Resort, and as the people in their parade floats and kilts marched down Broadway past my house, I did what I usually do during the parade: I slept. Because that's how you spend your mornings when you work the graveyard shift, like I do. In this case, it was just as well, because today the Northeast is enjoying what the folks in New England refer to as a nor'eastah, which is a lot of rain that's driven sideways by a lot of wind.
I slept through the parade last year, too, but on that occasion it was a bright, sunny day with temps in the 50s, so after I woke up I took the dogs out on a nice, long walk. The streets of Newport were full of people taking advantage of the nice weather to get out and about, and needless to say many of them had been drinking steadily for the previous twenty-four hours. There was a lot of screaming, which seems to be a common reaction among certain people to inebriation, and the dogs soon had their fill of that, so we took a side street away from the partying and wandered among the colonial-era architecture. We still passed by an occasional celebrant, but none of them were screaming, so the dogs didn't mind. All in all, a much more pleasant way of spending the day than going out into the wind-lashed rain, which is how we spent a few minutes today while the dogs took care of their business.
I slept through the parade last year, too, but on that occasion it was a bright, sunny day with temps in the 50s, so after I woke up I took the dogs out on a nice, long walk. The streets of Newport were full of people taking advantage of the nice weather to get out and about, and needless to say many of them had been drinking steadily for the previous twenty-four hours. There was a lot of screaming, which seems to be a common reaction among certain people to inebriation, and the dogs soon had their fill of that, so we took a side street away from the partying and wandered among the colonial-era architecture. We still passed by an occasional celebrant, but none of them were screaming, so the dogs didn't mind. All in all, a much more pleasant way of spending the day than going out into the wind-lashed rain, which is how we spent a few minutes today while the dogs took care of their business.
DBTL 73: Today's Tom Sawyer
This is the latest installment of the Drowned Baby Timeline, an alternate history where Adolf Hitler drowned at birth, and where World War II never took place. In the United States, the appointment of the first negro to the Supreme Court in 1941 and the desegregation of the armed forces by President Taft the following year are highlights of the slow but steady retreat of institutionalized racialism . . .
Afro-Objectivism? The mind boggles
--Carlos Yu, 17 September 2001
San Francisco, California, USA
24 June 1968
A modern-day warrior
Mean mean stride
Today's Tom Sawyer
Mean mean pride
Waiting in the green room at the KNTV studio, Bobby Seale stood in front of a mirror, adjusting his black beret and smoothing his mustache before a production assistant came for him. He was led out onto the set during a station break, where he was met by a white man around his age who shook his hand.
"A pleasure to meet you, Mr. Seale," the man said. "I'm Jerry Brown, and I'll be conducting the interview."
"Likewise, Mr. Brown," Seale said in his best Establishment voice. He'd heard of Brown; a native of the Bay area, Brown's father had been the state's Attorney General before an unsuccessful run for Governor back in '58. Brown himself had gone into journalism, working for the Examiner before joining KNTV.
"Please, call me Jerry," said Brown.
"Thank you, Jerry," Seale replied. "And you can call me Mr. Seale."
Oakland, California, USA
25 June 1968
Though his mind is not for rent
Don't put him down as arrogant
His reserve a quiet defense
Riding out the day's events
The river
Bobby Seale walked through the streets of West Oakland like a king walking through a realm that he held by sword-right. As co-founder and chairman of the Afro-Objectivist Movement, Seale was indeed the uncrowned king of Oakland, and he knew it.
The Man knew it too. Ever since the Boycott the police had been treating the city's Afro-American community with kid gloves. Shoot at The Man and he'll just shoot back, but cut off The Man's money and he'll treat you like a Prince.
Seale's eyes were drawn to the words spraypainted across a brick wall: Who is John Prince? You saw that everywhere in Oakland these days. Even people who had never read Atlas Shrugged knew who John Calvin Prince was.
"Bobby!"
A man was calling to Seale from across the street. Looking over to see who it was, Seale winced. It was Eldridge Cleaver.
San Francisco, California, USA
24 June 1968
What you say about his company
Is what you say about society
Catch the mist, catch the myth
Catch the mystery, catch the drift
The red ON AIR sign went on, and the anchorman did a short intro for the interview before going to Brown.
"Thank you, Brad," said Brown. "I'm speaking today with Bobby Seale, founder and chairman of the Afro-Objectivist Movement. In the last two years, the AOM has mushroomed from a local organization to a national phenomenon with chapters in twenty-three cities. The AOM is best known for organizing a six-week boycott of white-owned businesses in Oakland early last year in response to the killing of a member named Huey Newton by police. Mr. Seale, I understand that the idea for the boycott originally came from Ayn Rand's novel Atlas Shrugged."
"That's correct, Jerry. Miss Rand wrote her novel after taking part in the Montgomery Bus Boycott, and she based the events in Atlas Shrugged on Doctor King's struggle against the Jim Crow racial-collectivists."
"Mr. Seale, some of Miss Rand's other followers have denounced your boycott, and indeed the whole of the civil rights movement, as being itself a form of collectivist action. How do you respond?"
Seale knew that Brown was trying to get an angry denunciation from him against his fellow Objectivists. He didn't hold it against him; after all, Brown was a reporter and stirring up controversy was his job. "The effort to free the Afro-American people is and always has been an effort by independent individuals to bring down a collectivist tyranny. If we act in concert, that only shows that the goal of freedom is one that all people can objectively recognize as a desirable one, and mutual co-operation is an objectively optimal means of reaching that goal. I regret that some of my fellow Objectivists have misinterpreted our actions as collectivist, and I sincerely hope that one day they will join with Miss Rand herself in supporting our efforts."
Oakland, California, USA
25 June 1968
The world is, the world is
Love and life are deep
Maybe as his skies are wide
A year older than Seale, Eldridge Cleaver had been part of the Movement right from the start. Articulate and impassioned, Cleaver more than anyone else had drawn the nation's attention to the Boycott with his fiery pen and helped make it a success.
But something had happened to him. Right after the Boycott ended, Miss Ayn had come to Oakland to share in the victory. She and Cleaver had hit it off immediately, and he had remained behind after the celebration in her hotel room. The next morning, Seale had found him in the Movement's office, curled up in a corner, shaking like a leaf, his face streaked with tears. Cleaver had never talked about what had happened to him, but whatever it was had broken him. He had dropped out of the Movement, and Seale hadn't seen him in over a year.
Reluctantly crossing the street, Seale greeted Cleaver with the Movement's raised fist salute. "What's up, my man?" he asked, forcing himself to look into the other man's haunted eyes.
Cleaver started in on a long, rambling explanation of how he was in a jam and needed fifty dollars to straighten it out. Silently, Seale pulled out a money clip and peeled off some bills. "Here, man, no problem," he muttered as he handed them over.
Cleaver responded with effusive thanks and promises to repay Seale in the future. Seale turned and walked away as fast as he could without seeming to hurry. He breathed a sigh of relief as he turned a corner and fell out of earshot of the other man.
San Francisco, California, USA
24 June 1968
Today's Tom Sawyer
He gets high on you
And the space he invades
He gets by on you
"Mr Seale," said Brown, "let's turn now to the upcoming All or Nothing rally in Washington. Many Americans are still uncomfortable with this country's membership in the League of Nations, and they find control of our atomic weapons by the League's Atomic Control Commission intolerable. Once more, your fellow Objectivists are among the League's most vocal critics. And yet, with the All or Nothing rally, the AOM is advocating even greater League control over America. How do you reconcile this with your movement's basic principles of self-determination?"
"Jerry," said Seale, "the Afro-Objectivist Movement sees the Minorities Commission as a moral authority in an amoral world. It stands for the things we stand for: creative expression in a world of suffocating conformity; individuality in a world of collectivism; and freedom in a world of enslavement. If the government fears to let its actions be scrutinized by an objective institution, then the government threatens the freedom of the individuals it claims to govern."
Oakland, California, USA
25 June 1968
No his mind is not for rent
To any god or government
Always hopeful yet discontent
He knows changes aren't permanent
But change is
When he reached the Movement's offices, Seale was met by David Hilliard, his Chief of Staff. "How's the road trip looking?" Seale asked.
"Looking good," Hilliard answered, quoting Jack Nicholson's catch phrase from Welcome Back, Casey. "We've got five buses chartered. We're set to go on the 29th, and we're scheduled to hit D.C. on July 3rd."
"Right on," Seale exclaimed. The upcoming All or Nothing rally was shaping up to be the biggest protest march in the country's history, and the Afro-Objectivist Movement was one of the major players making it happen.
Back when the League of Nations was founded, the Allied nations had set up a Minorities Commission to monitor compliance with the Covenant's articles on minority rights. All the newly-created Central European nations had been required to submit to the Commission's oversight, while the West European imperialist nations had carefully exempted themselves and their colonial empires.
After the Danzig War, the Poles had formulated their All or Nothing Doctrine: either all League members had to submit to the Minorities Commission, or none of them had to. One by one over the course of the 1940s, the imperialist nations had given in to the combined pressure of the Warsaw Pact nations and their own people and adopted the All or Nothing Doctrine. Portugal had been the last to capitulate in 1953 as quid pro quo for being admitted into the European Customs Union.
When the United States finally joined the League in 1959, it had done so without accepting the All or Nothing Doctrine. The other League members, anxious to finally have the American atomic weapons program under formal League control, had let the matter slide.
The rest of the world might let it slide, but the American civil rights movement wouldn't. All through the 1960s support for the Doctrine had been growing. Now the Nixon-Humphrey bill was being debated by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and was expected to reach the Senate floor after the August Recess.
Seale shook his head in amazement. Whoever would have thought that Senator Knowland's protégé would end up on the side of the angels? But they didn't call him Tricky Dick for nothing, and it was looking more and more certain that Nixon would be able to ride his newfound support for the Doctrine to the Republican presidential nomination, and maybe even to the White House.
San Francisco, California, USA
24 June 1968
What you say about his company
Is what you say about society
Catch the witness, catch the wit
Catch the spirit, catch the spit
"Mr Seale," said Brown, "would you care to comment on the rumors that have been making the rounds that Senator Nixon will be addressing the All or Nothing rally?"
"The All or Nothing rally was conceived as a non-partisan event, and it remains a non-partisan event," said Seale carefully. "While we in the Afro-Objectivist Movement, along with the other participating organizations, applaud those members of the political Establishment who choose to support our goals, we are independent of any political affiliation, and we intend to remain so. If Senator Nixon, or even President Warren, wish to address the rally, we would not in principle be opposed, provided that they respect the purpose of the rally and do not attempt to inject their own partisan concerns into the proceedings."
Oakland, California, USA
25 June 1968
The world is, the world is
Love and life are deep
Maybe as his eyes are wide
Bobby Seale walked the streets of West Oakland, a Prince of the city, two armed bodyguards in his train. The people he passed by, brothers and sisters, raised their fists in salute. The Movement had given them pride, made them see themselves as strong, self-reliant individuals, masters of their own destiny. Some of them would be going to Washington with the Movement's caravan, but more would find their own way there. They would be joined by hundreds of thousands more from across the country, showing The Man the power of the individual.
Let Tricky Dick stand up and make a speech. Let him think that he could walk to the White House on the backs of the Movement. The Boycott had only been the beginning, and the All or Nothing rally was only a single step. The power of the minorities, especially the Minority of One, was growning, and in time all of America, all the world, would recognize that power.
Bobby Seale was going to make it happen.
Exit the warrior
Today's Tom Sawyer
He gets high on you
And the energy you trade
He gets right on to
The friction of the day
Afro-Objectivism? The mind boggles
--Carlos Yu, 17 September 2001
San Francisco, California, USA
24 June 1968
A modern-day warrior
Mean mean stride
Today's Tom Sawyer
Mean mean pride
Waiting in the green room at the KNTV studio, Bobby Seale stood in front of a mirror, adjusting his black beret and smoothing his mustache before a production assistant came for him. He was led out onto the set during a station break, where he was met by a white man around his age who shook his hand.
"A pleasure to meet you, Mr. Seale," the man said. "I'm Jerry Brown, and I'll be conducting the interview."
"Likewise, Mr. Brown," Seale said in his best Establishment voice. He'd heard of Brown; a native of the Bay area, Brown's father had been the state's Attorney General before an unsuccessful run for Governor back in '58. Brown himself had gone into journalism, working for the Examiner before joining KNTV.
"Please, call me Jerry," said Brown.
"Thank you, Jerry," Seale replied. "And you can call me Mr. Seale."
Oakland, California, USA
25 June 1968
Though his mind is not for rent
Don't put him down as arrogant
His reserve a quiet defense
Riding out the day's events
The river
Bobby Seale walked through the streets of West Oakland like a king walking through a realm that he held by sword-right. As co-founder and chairman of the Afro-Objectivist Movement, Seale was indeed the uncrowned king of Oakland, and he knew it.
The Man knew it too. Ever since the Boycott the police had been treating the city's Afro-American community with kid gloves. Shoot at The Man and he'll just shoot back, but cut off The Man's money and he'll treat you like a Prince.
Seale's eyes were drawn to the words spraypainted across a brick wall: Who is John Prince? You saw that everywhere in Oakland these days. Even people who had never read Atlas Shrugged knew who John Calvin Prince was.
"Bobby!"
A man was calling to Seale from across the street. Looking over to see who it was, Seale winced. It was Eldridge Cleaver.
San Francisco, California, USA
24 June 1968
What you say about his company
Is what you say about society
Catch the mist, catch the myth
Catch the mystery, catch the drift
The red ON AIR sign went on, and the anchorman did a short intro for the interview before going to Brown.
"Thank you, Brad," said Brown. "I'm speaking today with Bobby Seale, founder and chairman of the Afro-Objectivist Movement. In the last two years, the AOM has mushroomed from a local organization to a national phenomenon with chapters in twenty-three cities. The AOM is best known for organizing a six-week boycott of white-owned businesses in Oakland early last year in response to the killing of a member named Huey Newton by police. Mr. Seale, I understand that the idea for the boycott originally came from Ayn Rand's novel Atlas Shrugged."
"That's correct, Jerry. Miss Rand wrote her novel after taking part in the Montgomery Bus Boycott, and she based the events in Atlas Shrugged on Doctor King's struggle against the Jim Crow racial-collectivists."
"Mr. Seale, some of Miss Rand's other followers have denounced your boycott, and indeed the whole of the civil rights movement, as being itself a form of collectivist action. How do you respond?"
Seale knew that Brown was trying to get an angry denunciation from him against his fellow Objectivists. He didn't hold it against him; after all, Brown was a reporter and stirring up controversy was his job. "The effort to free the Afro-American people is and always has been an effort by independent individuals to bring down a collectivist tyranny. If we act in concert, that only shows that the goal of freedom is one that all people can objectively recognize as a desirable one, and mutual co-operation is an objectively optimal means of reaching that goal. I regret that some of my fellow Objectivists have misinterpreted our actions as collectivist, and I sincerely hope that one day they will join with Miss Rand herself in supporting our efforts."
Oakland, California, USA
25 June 1968
The world is, the world is
Love and life are deep
Maybe as his skies are wide
A year older than Seale, Eldridge Cleaver had been part of the Movement right from the start. Articulate and impassioned, Cleaver more than anyone else had drawn the nation's attention to the Boycott with his fiery pen and helped make it a success.
But something had happened to him. Right after the Boycott ended, Miss Ayn had come to Oakland to share in the victory. She and Cleaver had hit it off immediately, and he had remained behind after the celebration in her hotel room. The next morning, Seale had found him in the Movement's office, curled up in a corner, shaking like a leaf, his face streaked with tears. Cleaver had never talked about what had happened to him, but whatever it was had broken him. He had dropped out of the Movement, and Seale hadn't seen him in over a year.
Reluctantly crossing the street, Seale greeted Cleaver with the Movement's raised fist salute. "What's up, my man?" he asked, forcing himself to look into the other man's haunted eyes.
Cleaver started in on a long, rambling explanation of how he was in a jam and needed fifty dollars to straighten it out. Silently, Seale pulled out a money clip and peeled off some bills. "Here, man, no problem," he muttered as he handed them over.
Cleaver responded with effusive thanks and promises to repay Seale in the future. Seale turned and walked away as fast as he could without seeming to hurry. He breathed a sigh of relief as he turned a corner and fell out of earshot of the other man.
San Francisco, California, USA
24 June 1968
Today's Tom Sawyer
He gets high on you
And the space he invades
He gets by on you
"Mr Seale," said Brown, "let's turn now to the upcoming All or Nothing rally in Washington. Many Americans are still uncomfortable with this country's membership in the League of Nations, and they find control of our atomic weapons by the League's Atomic Control Commission intolerable. Once more, your fellow Objectivists are among the League's most vocal critics. And yet, with the All or Nothing rally, the AOM is advocating even greater League control over America. How do you reconcile this with your movement's basic principles of self-determination?"
"Jerry," said Seale, "the Afro-Objectivist Movement sees the Minorities Commission as a moral authority in an amoral world. It stands for the things we stand for: creative expression in a world of suffocating conformity; individuality in a world of collectivism; and freedom in a world of enslavement. If the government fears to let its actions be scrutinized by an objective institution, then the government threatens the freedom of the individuals it claims to govern."
Oakland, California, USA
25 June 1968
No his mind is not for rent
To any god or government
Always hopeful yet discontent
He knows changes aren't permanent
But change is
When he reached the Movement's offices, Seale was met by David Hilliard, his Chief of Staff. "How's the road trip looking?" Seale asked.
"Looking good," Hilliard answered, quoting Jack Nicholson's catch phrase from Welcome Back, Casey. "We've got five buses chartered. We're set to go on the 29th, and we're scheduled to hit D.C. on July 3rd."
"Right on," Seale exclaimed. The upcoming All or Nothing rally was shaping up to be the biggest protest march in the country's history, and the Afro-Objectivist Movement was one of the major players making it happen.
Back when the League of Nations was founded, the Allied nations had set up a Minorities Commission to monitor compliance with the Covenant's articles on minority rights. All the newly-created Central European nations had been required to submit to the Commission's oversight, while the West European imperialist nations had carefully exempted themselves and their colonial empires.
After the Danzig War, the Poles had formulated their All or Nothing Doctrine: either all League members had to submit to the Minorities Commission, or none of them had to. One by one over the course of the 1940s, the imperialist nations had given in to the combined pressure of the Warsaw Pact nations and their own people and adopted the All or Nothing Doctrine. Portugal had been the last to capitulate in 1953 as quid pro quo for being admitted into the European Customs Union.
When the United States finally joined the League in 1959, it had done so without accepting the All or Nothing Doctrine. The other League members, anxious to finally have the American atomic weapons program under formal League control, had let the matter slide.
The rest of the world might let it slide, but the American civil rights movement wouldn't. All through the 1960s support for the Doctrine had been growing. Now the Nixon-Humphrey bill was being debated by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and was expected to reach the Senate floor after the August Recess.
Seale shook his head in amazement. Whoever would have thought that Senator Knowland's protégé would end up on the side of the angels? But they didn't call him Tricky Dick for nothing, and it was looking more and more certain that Nixon would be able to ride his newfound support for the Doctrine to the Republican presidential nomination, and maybe even to the White House.
San Francisco, California, USA
24 June 1968
What you say about his company
Is what you say about society
Catch the witness, catch the wit
Catch the spirit, catch the spit
"Mr Seale," said Brown, "would you care to comment on the rumors that have been making the rounds that Senator Nixon will be addressing the All or Nothing rally?"
"The All or Nothing rally was conceived as a non-partisan event, and it remains a non-partisan event," said Seale carefully. "While we in the Afro-Objectivist Movement, along with the other participating organizations, applaud those members of the political Establishment who choose to support our goals, we are independent of any political affiliation, and we intend to remain so. If Senator Nixon, or even President Warren, wish to address the rally, we would not in principle be opposed, provided that they respect the purpose of the rally and do not attempt to inject their own partisan concerns into the proceedings."
Oakland, California, USA
25 June 1968
The world is, the world is
Love and life are deep
Maybe as his eyes are wide
Bobby Seale walked the streets of West Oakland, a Prince of the city, two armed bodyguards in his train. The people he passed by, brothers and sisters, raised their fists in salute. The Movement had given them pride, made them see themselves as strong, self-reliant individuals, masters of their own destiny. Some of them would be going to Washington with the Movement's caravan, but more would find their own way there. They would be joined by hundreds of thousands more from across the country, showing The Man the power of the individual.
Let Tricky Dick stand up and make a speech. Let him think that he could walk to the White House on the backs of the Movement. The Boycott had only been the beginning, and the All or Nothing rally was only a single step. The power of the minorities, especially the Minority of One, was growning, and in time all of America, all the world, would recognize that power.
Bobby Seale was going to make it happen.
Exit the warrior
Today's Tom Sawyer
He gets high on you
And the energy you trade
He gets right on to
The friction of the day
Friday, March 12, 2010
Unimpressed and irritated
It's the St. Patrick's Day weekend here in Newport, and that can mean only one thing: a lot of people marching through the streets waving Irish flags. Every year, when I see all those people marching past my house, I remember something Newt Gingrich said on Hannity & Colmes back on March 30, 2006:
the American people, frankly, when they see a huge crowd in a city carrying flags other than the U.S., I think they're pretty unimpressed, and frankly, a little bit irritatedSo put those Irish flags away, folks, because, as Newt says, you're making the American people a little bit irritated.
Happy St. Patrick's Day!
DBTL 72D: The Six Million Złoty Man, Act IV
This is the latest installment in the Drowned Baby Timeline, an alternate history where Adolf Hitler drowned at birth and where the Holocaust and World War II never took place. In the absence of our timeline's Manhattan Project, nuclear weapons have been developed independently in Italy, France, Great Britain, and the Polish Commonwealth. To avoid a European nuclear arms race, the four nations join together in September 1946 to create the Atomic Control Commission, tasked with maintaining a global monopoly on nuclear weapons. Twenty years later, that mission continues . . .
"Lublin, I can't hold her, she's breaking up, she's breaking --"
--------------------------------
Enoch Powell.
Rocketman.
A man barely alive.
"We can rebuild him," Dr. Mengele assured Director-General Clarke. "We can make him better than he was. Better . . . stronger . . . faster . . . "
----------------------------------
Up Up and Away
Somewhere in Transvaal, South Africa
17 September 1966
After a lifetime spent being annoyed at the incompetence of those around him, Enoch Powell was experiencing something new: annoyance at someone else's competence. Powell had been waiting, quite patiently he thought, for the South African soldier guarding him to allow himself to be distracted, or approach within striking distance, or make some other error that would allow Powell to overpower him. Unfortunately, the soldier knew his job all too well, and Powell remained his captive while being led down four flights of stairs and escorted to a cell with good, thick walls and a solid steel door that would take far too long for even him to batter down.
Powell didn't have long to ponder his unfortunate circumstances, for he had been in the cell less than half an hour when the guard spoke up. "You've got company, soutspiel, so stand back from the door. Any monkey business and I'll fill you full of lead." Powell stepped back, and the door swung soundlessly open (they'd taken good care of the hinges, no question of that) to reveal that the soldier had been joined by an officer, by his uniform a major-general in the South African Air Force. His name tag read VERSTER, which would make him Jacobus Verster, the number three man in the SAAF. Both Verster and the soldier were armed with automatic rifles (Kalashnikovs, he noted idly) pointed directly at his chest.
Verster gave him an appraising look. "Ah, Group Captain Enoch Powell, so it is you. Now, what on Earth would a retired rocket pilot being doing out in the middle of nowhere, breaking into the most highly secret military establishment in South Africa?"
"I got lost in the dark," said Powell. "I came inside to ask directions back to Pretoria, but everyone was gone."
"And you were hoping to find your back to Pretoria by looking through top secret files?"
"I was searching for a map," said Powell.
Verster fired his rifle, and Powell felt the slug impact the wall an inch to his left, spraying his shoulder with plaster shrapnel. "Lie to me again," he remarked conversationally, "and the next shot will blow your arm off. Now, why are you here?"
"I've been sent here by the Atomic Control Commission to search for evidence of illegal atomic weapons research," said Powell.
"That's better," said Verster. "Now that you've admitted to being a spy, I can have you executed out of hand." He swung the rifle to point at Powell's head.
"Except that you don't know just how much I've found out," said Powell calmly.
"That hardly matters," said Verster, "since I'm about to kill you."
"And you also don't know whether I'm working alone, or how much information I've been able to pass along to Geneva."
Verster fired again, and the slug brushed against Powell's hair before hitting the wall.
"It doesn't matter how much you know," the general said, "or even how much Geneva knows. Our plans are too advanced for anyone to stop them."
"Meaning that you're ready to send those MiGs of yours off to their targets," said Powell. "Specifically, the weapons facilities at Lublin, Alice Springs, Tripoli and Nantes. Though it's a pity that you can't reach the ones at Nizhnevartovsk and Los Alamos, since those are the ones that are going to strike back at you."
Now at last an emotional expression crossed Verster's face, an emotion of contempt. "How little you hypocrites understand us. When those jets take off, they won't be going to Alice Springs or Tripoli, they'll be going to Rome, Paris, Warsaw, London! We'll show you keffir-loving land thieves that we will not be pushed around!"
He fired a third time, but Powell's head wasn't there to stop the bullet. Shoving against the back wall with his legs, Powell had already launched himself across the cell. Before either of his captors could aim their rifles, Powell had left the cell and slammed both against the corridor. Two quick blows from his bionic fist crushed their skulls.
Seizing their rifles, Powell raced along the corridor and up the flight of stairs at the end. A kick sent the stairwell door flying across the room, followed by Powell himself. A stream of bullets from each Kalashnikov sent the room's occupants diving for cover, while Powell charged across to the building's entrance, and then out into the African dawn.
Zigzagging back and forth, firing at whatever human targets presented themselves, Enoch Powell ran full tilt among the scattered buildings of the compound until he came at last to a separate, fenced-off area whose long, hangerlike buildings could only be hangers. Leaping the fence, Powell dodged weapons fire from the growing number of soldiers running about the field. A flying kick took him through the side of the nearest hanger, rewarding him with the sight of a MiG-12 being readied for flight. Running past the aircraft, he sent a burst of gunfire into its half-filled fuel tanks, which ignited even as he left the hanger with another flying kick through the wall.
Despite his speed, Powell could feel the heat of the explosion behind him as the billowing flames briefly kept pace with him. Still zigzagging at sixty miles per hour, Powell reached a second hanger, and another flying kick took him inside. This time the MiG was already finished fueling, and was being towed out of the hanger towards the runway. Another burst of gunfire, and Powell was outracing another explosion.
Powell didn't have to bother with the third hanger, for its occupant had already left, and was taxiing towards the takeoff position. Powell felt his right-hand Kalashnikov run out of ammunition, and as he ran past the MiG he sent the rifle speeding towards the aircraft's number three jet intake. A glance back showed him that that damaged engine was tearing itself apart, and twisting the wing into a useless length of scrap metal.
The fourth MiG had already reached its takeoff point, and was beginning its final accelleration before takeoff. Angling across the runway, Powell fired the last rounds of the remaining Kalashnikov, then threw the rifle itself, to no avail. As the jet began to outpace him, he leapt up and grabbed the tail by his bionic hand.
In flight now, the MiG-12 quickly gained altitude despite the drag provided by Powell's body. Closing his left eye, Powell dug in with his right hand and began kicking away at whatever sections of the jet he could reach. Working methodically, he sent piece after piece of the jet's tail assembly spinning away towards the distant ground below. Engrossed in the task, it wasn't until he noticed a change in the light that he realized that the jet had gone into a tailspin.
A hatch in the fuselage blew away, and a man jumped from the plane, passing less than thirty feet to Powell's right. Powell jumped from the jet just as a second man emerged from the hatch, and the two collided. Disabling the man, Powell wrenched his parachute loose, then kicked away. Holding an undamaged strap clenched in his right hand, Powell pulled the ripcord with his left. Both strap and hand proved equal to the task of remaining whole through the shock of the parachute's opening.
Hanging beneath the unfolded parachute, Powell watched the MiG-12 spin down into the rolling grassland below. There was a small town visible perhaps 15 miles to the northeast. Letting go of the parachute as he touched down, Powell started running for the town at a leisurely thirty miles per hour, feeling that after his recent exertions he deserved a rest.
Half an hour later, Powell had reached the town, which he learned was Francistown, Botswana. His ACC identification got him into the local telephone exchange, and he was able to use the town's satellite link to reach Geneva. Within minutes, he was speaking with his superior, Dr. Feynman. He quickly brought the scientist up to speed.
"Hell's bells!" Feynman exclaimed. "They were going to nuke all those cities?"
"So I was told," Powell replied.
"But why? What could they hope to gain?"
"Revenge," Powell said simply. "For the last twenty years, the South Africans have been growing more and more isolated. They've watched as the European colonial powers granted independence to their colonies, surrounding South Africa with black-ruled states. They've watched President Warren dismantling segregation in the United States, and Prime Minister Menzies opening Australia to Asian immigration. Worst of all, they've had to endure the humiliation of seeing their mandate over South West Africa revoked by the League of Nations, and being forcibly driven out. The South Africans have come to see the whole world as their enemy, and they meant to strike back."
"Enoch," said Feynman, "if I didn't know better I'd swear you were expressing sympathy for the South Africans."
"Not at all, Dick," Powell assured the other man. "Don't mistake my meaning. I can understand why the South Africans act as they do, but I could never sympathize with them."
"Lublin, I can't hold her, she's breaking up, she's breaking --"
--------------------------------
Enoch Powell.
Rocketman.
A man barely alive.
"We can rebuild him," Dr. Mengele assured Director-General Clarke. "We can make him better than he was. Better . . . stronger . . . faster . . . "
----------------------------------
Up Up and Away
Somewhere in Transvaal, South Africa
17 September 1966
After a lifetime spent being annoyed at the incompetence of those around him, Enoch Powell was experiencing something new: annoyance at someone else's competence. Powell had been waiting, quite patiently he thought, for the South African soldier guarding him to allow himself to be distracted, or approach within striking distance, or make some other error that would allow Powell to overpower him. Unfortunately, the soldier knew his job all too well, and Powell remained his captive while being led down four flights of stairs and escorted to a cell with good, thick walls and a solid steel door that would take far too long for even him to batter down.
Powell didn't have long to ponder his unfortunate circumstances, for he had been in the cell less than half an hour when the guard spoke up. "You've got company, soutspiel, so stand back from the door. Any monkey business and I'll fill you full of lead." Powell stepped back, and the door swung soundlessly open (they'd taken good care of the hinges, no question of that) to reveal that the soldier had been joined by an officer, by his uniform a major-general in the South African Air Force. His name tag read VERSTER, which would make him Jacobus Verster, the number three man in the SAAF. Both Verster and the soldier were armed with automatic rifles (Kalashnikovs, he noted idly) pointed directly at his chest.
Verster gave him an appraising look. "Ah, Group Captain Enoch Powell, so it is you. Now, what on Earth would a retired rocket pilot being doing out in the middle of nowhere, breaking into the most highly secret military establishment in South Africa?"
"I got lost in the dark," said Powell. "I came inside to ask directions back to Pretoria, but everyone was gone."
"And you were hoping to find your back to Pretoria by looking through top secret files?"
"I was searching for a map," said Powell.
Verster fired his rifle, and Powell felt the slug impact the wall an inch to his left, spraying his shoulder with plaster shrapnel. "Lie to me again," he remarked conversationally, "and the next shot will blow your arm off. Now, why are you here?"
"I've been sent here by the Atomic Control Commission to search for evidence of illegal atomic weapons research," said Powell.
"That's better," said Verster. "Now that you've admitted to being a spy, I can have you executed out of hand." He swung the rifle to point at Powell's head.
"Except that you don't know just how much I've found out," said Powell calmly.
"That hardly matters," said Verster, "since I'm about to kill you."
"And you also don't know whether I'm working alone, or how much information I've been able to pass along to Geneva."
Verster fired again, and the slug brushed against Powell's hair before hitting the wall.
"It doesn't matter how much you know," the general said, "or even how much Geneva knows. Our plans are too advanced for anyone to stop them."
"Meaning that you're ready to send those MiGs of yours off to their targets," said Powell. "Specifically, the weapons facilities at Lublin, Alice Springs, Tripoli and Nantes. Though it's a pity that you can't reach the ones at Nizhnevartovsk and Los Alamos, since those are the ones that are going to strike back at you."
Now at last an emotional expression crossed Verster's face, an emotion of contempt. "How little you hypocrites understand us. When those jets take off, they won't be going to Alice Springs or Tripoli, they'll be going to Rome, Paris, Warsaw, London! We'll show you keffir-loving land thieves that we will not be pushed around!"
He fired a third time, but Powell's head wasn't there to stop the bullet. Shoving against the back wall with his legs, Powell had already launched himself across the cell. Before either of his captors could aim their rifles, Powell had left the cell and slammed both against the corridor. Two quick blows from his bionic fist crushed their skulls.
Seizing their rifles, Powell raced along the corridor and up the flight of stairs at the end. A kick sent the stairwell door flying across the room, followed by Powell himself. A stream of bullets from each Kalashnikov sent the room's occupants diving for cover, while Powell charged across to the building's entrance, and then out into the African dawn.
Zigzagging back and forth, firing at whatever human targets presented themselves, Enoch Powell ran full tilt among the scattered buildings of the compound until he came at last to a separate, fenced-off area whose long, hangerlike buildings could only be hangers. Leaping the fence, Powell dodged weapons fire from the growing number of soldiers running about the field. A flying kick took him through the side of the nearest hanger, rewarding him with the sight of a MiG-12 being readied for flight. Running past the aircraft, he sent a burst of gunfire into its half-filled fuel tanks, which ignited even as he left the hanger with another flying kick through the wall.
Despite his speed, Powell could feel the heat of the explosion behind him as the billowing flames briefly kept pace with him. Still zigzagging at sixty miles per hour, Powell reached a second hanger, and another flying kick took him inside. This time the MiG was already finished fueling, and was being towed out of the hanger towards the runway. Another burst of gunfire, and Powell was outracing another explosion.
Powell didn't have to bother with the third hanger, for its occupant had already left, and was taxiing towards the takeoff position. Powell felt his right-hand Kalashnikov run out of ammunition, and as he ran past the MiG he sent the rifle speeding towards the aircraft's number three jet intake. A glance back showed him that that damaged engine was tearing itself apart, and twisting the wing into a useless length of scrap metal.
The fourth MiG had already reached its takeoff point, and was beginning its final accelleration before takeoff. Angling across the runway, Powell fired the last rounds of the remaining Kalashnikov, then threw the rifle itself, to no avail. As the jet began to outpace him, he leapt up and grabbed the tail by his bionic hand.
In flight now, the MiG-12 quickly gained altitude despite the drag provided by Powell's body. Closing his left eye, Powell dug in with his right hand and began kicking away at whatever sections of the jet he could reach. Working methodically, he sent piece after piece of the jet's tail assembly spinning away towards the distant ground below. Engrossed in the task, it wasn't until he noticed a change in the light that he realized that the jet had gone into a tailspin.
A hatch in the fuselage blew away, and a man jumped from the plane, passing less than thirty feet to Powell's right. Powell jumped from the jet just as a second man emerged from the hatch, and the two collided. Disabling the man, Powell wrenched his parachute loose, then kicked away. Holding an undamaged strap clenched in his right hand, Powell pulled the ripcord with his left. Both strap and hand proved equal to the task of remaining whole through the shock of the parachute's opening.
Hanging beneath the unfolded parachute, Powell watched the MiG-12 spin down into the rolling grassland below. There was a small town visible perhaps 15 miles to the northeast. Letting go of the parachute as he touched down, Powell started running for the town at a leisurely thirty miles per hour, feeling that after his recent exertions he deserved a rest.
Half an hour later, Powell had reached the town, which he learned was Francistown, Botswana. His ACC identification got him into the local telephone exchange, and he was able to use the town's satellite link to reach Geneva. Within minutes, he was speaking with his superior, Dr. Feynman. He quickly brought the scientist up to speed.
"Hell's bells!" Feynman exclaimed. "They were going to nuke all those cities?"
"So I was told," Powell replied.
"But why? What could they hope to gain?"
"Revenge," Powell said simply. "For the last twenty years, the South Africans have been growing more and more isolated. They've watched as the European colonial powers granted independence to their colonies, surrounding South Africa with black-ruled states. They've watched President Warren dismantling segregation in the United States, and Prime Minister Menzies opening Australia to Asian immigration. Worst of all, they've had to endure the humiliation of seeing their mandate over South West Africa revoked by the League of Nations, and being forcibly driven out. The South Africans have come to see the whole world as their enemy, and they meant to strike back."
"Enoch," said Feynman, "if I didn't know better I'd swear you were expressing sympathy for the South Africans."
"Not at all, Dick," Powell assured the other man. "Don't mistake my meaning. I can understand why the South Africans act as they do, but I could never sympathize with them."
The Footnotes of God
Back in college, I took a course in Japanese history, and among the assigned reading was The Pillow Book by Sei Shōnagon. This was basically a blog written on rice paper by a thirtysomething lady-in-waiting at the Imperial Japanese court around the year 1000. The edition I read was the 1967 translation by Ivan Morris.
Morris' translation included copious endnotes and appendices on life and culture during Sei Shōnagon's lifetime, including information on the calendar, festivals, government, geography, chronology, clothing, musical instruments, and so on. It's a good thing he did, too, because the milieu in which Sei Shōnagon lived was so different from life in our current industrial age that otherwise it would be difficult to understand a lot of the things she wrote about.
Although it's a classic work of literature in Japan, The Pillow Book is pretty obscure in the English-speaking world, which is what you would expect of a cultural artifact from such a distant time and place. And yet, there's another cultural artifact from an even more distant time and place that holds such an influential place in our culture that we refer to it simply as The Book. The reason The Book is so important while The Pillow Book is so obscure is that The Book is at the center of our culture's main religion.
The Book's oldest narratives go back over 3000 years, and even its most recent ones go back nearly 2000, all of them set against a milieu even more alien to us than that of The Pillow Book. However, unlike The Pillow Book, The Book is usually published without any notes explaining the alien culture that produced it. And what's particularly troubling is that a lot of this country's most powerful, influential people think that they can just crack open The Book and start reading, and they'll understand everything it has to say.
Even worse is the fact that these people have adopted an ideology that requires them to believe that there is absolutely no ambiguity to be found in The Book. They insist that The Book contains no metaphors, no similes, no figurative language of any sort. (Well, they actually do admit in an abstract sense that The Book contains figurative language, but they refuse to accept that any particular passage might.) Everything in The Book has to be read literally -- except, of course, for the parts that don't, especially the parts that contradict their ideology.
This is why it might be useful to require that anyone who reads The Book be required to read The Pillow Book first. The experience of trying to understand a product of the culture of Heian Japan would make them less certain that they understand everything they read in The Book.
Morris' translation included copious endnotes and appendices on life and culture during Sei Shōnagon's lifetime, including information on the calendar, festivals, government, geography, chronology, clothing, musical instruments, and so on. It's a good thing he did, too, because the milieu in which Sei Shōnagon lived was so different from life in our current industrial age that otherwise it would be difficult to understand a lot of the things she wrote about.
Although it's a classic work of literature in Japan, The Pillow Book is pretty obscure in the English-speaking world, which is what you would expect of a cultural artifact from such a distant time and place. And yet, there's another cultural artifact from an even more distant time and place that holds such an influential place in our culture that we refer to it simply as The Book. The reason The Book is so important while The Pillow Book is so obscure is that The Book is at the center of our culture's main religion.
The Book's oldest narratives go back over 3000 years, and even its most recent ones go back nearly 2000, all of them set against a milieu even more alien to us than that of The Pillow Book. However, unlike The Pillow Book, The Book is usually published without any notes explaining the alien culture that produced it. And what's particularly troubling is that a lot of this country's most powerful, influential people think that they can just crack open The Book and start reading, and they'll understand everything it has to say.
Even worse is the fact that these people have adopted an ideology that requires them to believe that there is absolutely no ambiguity to be found in The Book. They insist that The Book contains no metaphors, no similes, no figurative language of any sort. (Well, they actually do admit in an abstract sense that The Book contains figurative language, but they refuse to accept that any particular passage might.) Everything in The Book has to be read literally -- except, of course, for the parts that don't, especially the parts that contradict their ideology.
This is why it might be useful to require that anyone who reads The Book be required to read The Pillow Book first. The experience of trying to understand a product of the culture of Heian Japan would make them less certain that they understand everything they read in The Book.
Thursday, March 11, 2010
DBTL 72C: The Six Million Złoty Man, Act III
This is the latest installment in the Drowned Baby Timeline, an alternate history where Adolf Hitler drowned at birth and where the Holocaust and World War II never took place. In the absence of our timeline's Manhattan Project, nuclear weapons have been developed independently in Italy, France, Great Britain, and the Polish Commonwealth. To avoid a European nuclear arms race, the four nations join together in September 1946 to create the Atomic Control Commission, tasked with maintaining a global monopoly on nuclear weapons. Twenty years later, that mission continues . . .
"Lublin, I can't hold her, she's breaking up, she's breaking --"
--------------------------------
Enoch Powell.
Rocketman.
A man barely alive.
"We can rebuild him," Dr. Mengele assured Director-General Clarke. "We can make him better than he was. Better . . . stronger . . . faster . . . "
----------------------------------
Under African Skies
Somewhere in Transvaal, South Africa
16 September 1966
Dr. Werner Schwietzke's Ford Enterprise slowed to a halt, its driver unnerved by the glaring ex-rocketman who had held him by the throat for three full hours. In the darkness beyond the car's high beams, Enoch Powell could see the distant lights that might, or might not, mark the location of a secret atomic research facility.
Powell reached forward with his left hand and switched off the car's engine, pocketing the keys. Releasing Schwietzke's throat at last, he said, "Now then, Herr Doctor Professor, please get out of the car. I would advise you to make no attempt to escape. You couldn't possibly outrun me." His hands shaking, Schwietzke did as he was ordered. Powell followed him out of the car, then motioned him towards the back. Still watching Schwietzke, Powell fished the keys out of his shirt pocket and unlocked the car's boot.
"Thank you, Group Captain Powell, it was starting to get cramped in there," came a voice from within the boot. Surprised, Powell looked inside. Lying on his side, still wearing a prison uniform, Nelson Mandela grinned up at Powell before climbing out of the boot.
"Mandela, what on earth are you doing in there?" Powell demanded.
"After you broke me out, Group Captain, I decided I'd like to stay out," said Mandela, still smiling while flexing various muscles, an understandable response to three hours spent in a crouch. "I went to the car park and hid in the boot there."
"How did you come to choose Dr. Schwietzke's car?"
"The engine was still warm," said Mandela, "so I figured this car was most likely to be leaving soon."
Powell was astonished, for it was what he himself would have done in Mandela's situation. "Very well, Mr. Mandela, I'll fill you in on the situation. Dr. Schwietzke here has just led me to what he claims is a secret atomic research base, and I mean to have a look round. If Schwietzke has tried to mislead me, I'll soon learn the truth and return here within an hour to question him again. If this really is the atomic base, I won't be needing either Schwietzke or his car, and so I shan't be returning. So if I'm not back within one hour, both the car and Schwietzke are your concern."
"Got it, Group Captain," Mandela said with a nod.
"My God," Schwietzke protested in German-accented English, "you mean to leave me here at the mercy of this criminal, this terrorist, this, this keffir? What kind of a policeman are you?"
Powell looked at Schwietzke with disdain. "To the best of my knowledge, Dr. Schwietzke, Mr. Mandela here has never engaged in any illicit atomic research. Any other activities on his part are beyond my jurisdiction. Now, as soon as you're secured in the boot, I can be on my way."
After a certain amount of difficulty, Schwietzke had been bound and gagged and locked in the boot. Powell gave Mandela the car keys, then set out for the distant glow of the alleged research base.
The ocular prosthetic that had replaced Powell's right eye allowed him to use infrared to navigate through the dark veldt. Keeping his speed down to thirty miles per hour, Powell was able to reach the base's perimeter fence in ten minutes. Like the fence at the previous facility, this one was fifteen feet high, with an elaborate arrangement of barbed wire at the top. Powell jumped the fence, and cautiously made his way to a building constructed of plywood and corrugated metal, as Mandela's prison had been. Once more, Powell created an opening using his prosthetic right arm, and ducked in.
Instead of a bare prison cell, Powell found himself looking at a typically cluttered laboratory. Tables were scattered across a large room with lathes, centrifuges, motors, and other items of manufacturing equipment. Apparently he had been sufficiently persuasive with Dr. Schwietzke after all. He wondered idly where Mandela would go with Schwietzke's car, and what would become of the physicist, then dismissed the thought as irrelevant to the business at hand.
First he would have to discover if the South Africans had succeeded in building any atomic devices. If they had, he would have to locate and disable them, before escaping and reporting back to his superiors in Geneva. Presumably the facility's administrative center would have the answers he was seeking, so Powell ducked back out of the building he had broken into and began scouting his way through the facility, using infrared to avoid the occasional patrol.
Like the previous camp, the administrative building for this one was located near the front entrance. It was built of concrete cinder blocks and plaster rather than sheet metal and plywood. Powell was able to jump up to the roof of the three-story structure, and a methodical search turned up a trapdoor. Although locked shut, the trapdoor yielded to the pressure of Powell's bionic right arm, and he was able to climb down a ladder into a darkened service closet. Seeing no light coming from beneath the door, Powell eased it open and entered a corridor with bare plaster walls and a tile floor.
Powell came to a door labelled ACCOUNTING. It was locked, but a twist of his bionic hand opened the door. Not bothering with the lights, Powell closed the door and made his way to the file cabinets. They too were locked, but like the doors they too proved no match for Dr. Mengele's handiwork. A quick but thorough search of the accounting files soon provided Powell with a panoramic accountant's-eye view of Operation Gunstock, as the South African atom bomb project was known. He was quietly appalled to learn that Gunstock had recently acquired four surplus MiG-12 long-range bombers from the Russian Federation. President Gromyko was going to have to answer some pointed questions from Director Teller.
Powell's contemplation of financial records was ended by a rattling doorknob. There was no time to hide as the door to the office opened and the lights came on. Unfortunately, before Powell could rush him, the soldier had his pistol out and pointed at him.
"Don't move or I'll fire!" the soldier warned him.
Powell didn't move.
"Lublin, I can't hold her, she's breaking up, she's breaking --"
--------------------------------
Enoch Powell.
Rocketman.
A man barely alive.
"We can rebuild him," Dr. Mengele assured Director-General Clarke. "We can make him better than he was. Better . . . stronger . . . faster . . . "
----------------------------------
Under African Skies
Somewhere in Transvaal, South Africa
16 September 1966
Dr. Werner Schwietzke's Ford Enterprise slowed to a halt, its driver unnerved by the glaring ex-rocketman who had held him by the throat for three full hours. In the darkness beyond the car's high beams, Enoch Powell could see the distant lights that might, or might not, mark the location of a secret atomic research facility.
Powell reached forward with his left hand and switched off the car's engine, pocketing the keys. Releasing Schwietzke's throat at last, he said, "Now then, Herr Doctor Professor, please get out of the car. I would advise you to make no attempt to escape. You couldn't possibly outrun me." His hands shaking, Schwietzke did as he was ordered. Powell followed him out of the car, then motioned him towards the back. Still watching Schwietzke, Powell fished the keys out of his shirt pocket and unlocked the car's boot.
"Thank you, Group Captain Powell, it was starting to get cramped in there," came a voice from within the boot. Surprised, Powell looked inside. Lying on his side, still wearing a prison uniform, Nelson Mandela grinned up at Powell before climbing out of the boot.
"Mandela, what on earth are you doing in there?" Powell demanded.
"After you broke me out, Group Captain, I decided I'd like to stay out," said Mandela, still smiling while flexing various muscles, an understandable response to three hours spent in a crouch. "I went to the car park and hid in the boot there."
"How did you come to choose Dr. Schwietzke's car?"
"The engine was still warm," said Mandela, "so I figured this car was most likely to be leaving soon."
Powell was astonished, for it was what he himself would have done in Mandela's situation. "Very well, Mr. Mandela, I'll fill you in on the situation. Dr. Schwietzke here has just led me to what he claims is a secret atomic research base, and I mean to have a look round. If Schwietzke has tried to mislead me, I'll soon learn the truth and return here within an hour to question him again. If this really is the atomic base, I won't be needing either Schwietzke or his car, and so I shan't be returning. So if I'm not back within one hour, both the car and Schwietzke are your concern."
"Got it, Group Captain," Mandela said with a nod.
"My God," Schwietzke protested in German-accented English, "you mean to leave me here at the mercy of this criminal, this terrorist, this, this keffir? What kind of a policeman are you?"
Powell looked at Schwietzke with disdain. "To the best of my knowledge, Dr. Schwietzke, Mr. Mandela here has never engaged in any illicit atomic research. Any other activities on his part are beyond my jurisdiction. Now, as soon as you're secured in the boot, I can be on my way."
After a certain amount of difficulty, Schwietzke had been bound and gagged and locked in the boot. Powell gave Mandela the car keys, then set out for the distant glow of the alleged research base.
The ocular prosthetic that had replaced Powell's right eye allowed him to use infrared to navigate through the dark veldt. Keeping his speed down to thirty miles per hour, Powell was able to reach the base's perimeter fence in ten minutes. Like the fence at the previous facility, this one was fifteen feet high, with an elaborate arrangement of barbed wire at the top. Powell jumped the fence, and cautiously made his way to a building constructed of plywood and corrugated metal, as Mandela's prison had been. Once more, Powell created an opening using his prosthetic right arm, and ducked in.
Instead of a bare prison cell, Powell found himself looking at a typically cluttered laboratory. Tables were scattered across a large room with lathes, centrifuges, motors, and other items of manufacturing equipment. Apparently he had been sufficiently persuasive with Dr. Schwietzke after all. He wondered idly where Mandela would go with Schwietzke's car, and what would become of the physicist, then dismissed the thought as irrelevant to the business at hand.
First he would have to discover if the South Africans had succeeded in building any atomic devices. If they had, he would have to locate and disable them, before escaping and reporting back to his superiors in Geneva. Presumably the facility's administrative center would have the answers he was seeking, so Powell ducked back out of the building he had broken into and began scouting his way through the facility, using infrared to avoid the occasional patrol.
Like the previous camp, the administrative building for this one was located near the front entrance. It was built of concrete cinder blocks and plaster rather than sheet metal and plywood. Powell was able to jump up to the roof of the three-story structure, and a methodical search turned up a trapdoor. Although locked shut, the trapdoor yielded to the pressure of Powell's bionic right arm, and he was able to climb down a ladder into a darkened service closet. Seeing no light coming from beneath the door, Powell eased it open and entered a corridor with bare plaster walls and a tile floor.
Powell came to a door labelled ACCOUNTING. It was locked, but a twist of his bionic hand opened the door. Not bothering with the lights, Powell closed the door and made his way to the file cabinets. They too were locked, but like the doors they too proved no match for Dr. Mengele's handiwork. A quick but thorough search of the accounting files soon provided Powell with a panoramic accountant's-eye view of Operation Gunstock, as the South African atom bomb project was known. He was quietly appalled to learn that Gunstock had recently acquired four surplus MiG-12 long-range bombers from the Russian Federation. President Gromyko was going to have to answer some pointed questions from Director Teller.
Powell's contemplation of financial records was ended by a rattling doorknob. There was no time to hide as the door to the office opened and the lights came on. Unfortunately, before Powell could rush him, the soldier had his pistol out and pointed at him.
"Don't move or I'll fire!" the soldier warned him.
Powell didn't move.
Wednesday, March 10, 2010
DBTL 72B: The Six Million Złoty Man, Act II
This is the latest installment in the Drowned Baby Timeline, an alternate history where Adolf Hitler drowned at birth and where the Holocaust and World War II never took place. In the absence of our timeline's Manhattan Project, nuclear weapons have been developed independently in Italy, France, Great Britain, and the Polish Commonwealth. To avoid a European nuclear arms race, the four nations join together in September 1946 to create the Atomic Control Commission, tasked with maintaining a global monopoly on nuclear weapons. Twenty years later, that mission continues . . .
"Lublin, I can't hold her, she's breaking up, she's breaking --"
--------------------------------
Enoch Powell.
Rocketman.
A man barely alive.
"We can rebuild him," Dr. Mengele assured Director-General Clarke. "We can make him better than he was. Better . . . stronger . . . faster . . . "
----------------------------------
The Running Man
Pretoria, South Africa
16 September 1966
The trouble with running after a car going thirty miles an hour was that it tended to draw attention. Powell had learned to reduce his visibility by switching from road to sidewalk and back again, running beneath lorries, and cutting across open land wherever possible. He managed to do this until they left the built-up areas of Pretoria and entered the empty veldt, at which point he left the road completely and shadowed Schwietzke from a point two hundred feet to his left.
Powell knew that he would be able to maintain his pace for at least six hours if necessary, since the mechanical analogues to muscles within his bionic legs did not tire the way flesh and blood would. Eventually, though, the rest of his body, especially his still-organic left arm, would build up enough fatigue toxins to require him to stop and rest.
Fortunately for the sake of his mission, Schwietzke's car turned off the paved road fifty miles north of Pretoria and began negotiating a rutted dirt road at a much lower rate of speed. Powell continued to shadow him from two hundred feet away until they came to a compound fenced in by a fifteen-foot chain-link fence topped with an impressive amount of barbed wire. As Schwietzke stopped to confer with two uniformed men at a guard post, Powell jumped the fence.
Powell knew that he was in one of fifteen similar compounds scattered throughout South Africa. The Atomic Control Commission knew that one of them concealed South Africa's secret atomic research facility, but not which one. That left the ACC with the choice of either finding out which was the real base, or trying to seize all fifteen. Powell couldn't be absolutely certain that Schwietzke had led him to the correct base unless he inspected the facility personally.
Atomic research facilities tended to be spacious, with the various buildings scattered far from each other. This was meant as a safety precaution in case of an accidental release of radiation or (in the case of illegal facilities) a pre-emptive attack by the ACC. The nearest building to Powell was a concrete monolith near the entrance that most likely served as the base's administrative center. Powell decided to save it for last, since it was likely to be the most heavily guarded on the base. Instead, he struck out west to have a look at a more ramshackle ediface built from corrugated metal and plywood.
He avoided the building's doors, and effected an entrance by rapidly punching several holes in one of the plywood walls. A final punch sent a rough plywood circle into the building, and Powell dove in after it.
He found himself in a bare room with sheet metal walls. The room held a black man, a privy pot, the plywood circle, and himself.
"How did you do that?" the black man asked him in English.
"Vitamins," said Powell shortly, before diving out through the wall again. The black man followed him, and soon the two of them were a hundred yards away from the building.
"Who are you?" the black man asked.
"Group Captain Enoch Powell, Atomic Control Commission. What is this place?"
"A prison," the black man answered. Once Powell got a good look at the man, he found that he recognized him.
"You're Nelson Mandela," Powell stated. Mandela had been arrested by the South African government for subversive activities and membership in a terrorist organization called the African National Congress. It required only a moment's thought for Powell to realize the situation. Only one of the fifteen compounds was the real atomic research base, so the South African government must be using the other fourteen compounds to house prisoners, of which the country had a large and growing number. He had hoped that Schwietzke would lead him to the real research center, but the scientist had led him on a wild goose chase.
Powell heard gunshots, and he was instantly up and running at top speed. A zigzag path brought him back to the fence, and he was over it and into the veldt within seconds.
When he was sure he had shaken off his pursuers, Powell paused to take stock. He could safely eliminate this particular base, which left the ACC with fourteen other possibilities for the true research center. Powell could theoretically visit each of the other bases in turn until he found the research center, but he thought he knew a better way.
A quick run through the veldt brought him to the intersection of the dirt road with the paved highway back to Pretoria. The sun had already set and night was closing in when Powell saw the Ford Enterprise approach. Schwietzke paused at the highway to look for oncoming traffic, as Powell knew he would, and in that moment Powell was able to run up to the car, wrench open the passenger side door, and join Schwietzke. Clamping his right hand around Schwietzke's windpipe, Powell said, "Now, Herr Doktor, it is time for us to pay a call on your colleagues at the real research base."
"Lublin, I can't hold her, she's breaking up, she's breaking --"
--------------------------------
Enoch Powell.
Rocketman.
A man barely alive.
"We can rebuild him," Dr. Mengele assured Director-General Clarke. "We can make him better than he was. Better . . . stronger . . . faster . . . "
----------------------------------
The Running Man
Pretoria, South Africa
16 September 1966
The trouble with running after a car going thirty miles an hour was that it tended to draw attention. Powell had learned to reduce his visibility by switching from road to sidewalk and back again, running beneath lorries, and cutting across open land wherever possible. He managed to do this until they left the built-up areas of Pretoria and entered the empty veldt, at which point he left the road completely and shadowed Schwietzke from a point two hundred feet to his left.
Powell knew that he would be able to maintain his pace for at least six hours if necessary, since the mechanical analogues to muscles within his bionic legs did not tire the way flesh and blood would. Eventually, though, the rest of his body, especially his still-organic left arm, would build up enough fatigue toxins to require him to stop and rest.
Fortunately for the sake of his mission, Schwietzke's car turned off the paved road fifty miles north of Pretoria and began negotiating a rutted dirt road at a much lower rate of speed. Powell continued to shadow him from two hundred feet away until they came to a compound fenced in by a fifteen-foot chain-link fence topped with an impressive amount of barbed wire. As Schwietzke stopped to confer with two uniformed men at a guard post, Powell jumped the fence.
Powell knew that he was in one of fifteen similar compounds scattered throughout South Africa. The Atomic Control Commission knew that one of them concealed South Africa's secret atomic research facility, but not which one. That left the ACC with the choice of either finding out which was the real base, or trying to seize all fifteen. Powell couldn't be absolutely certain that Schwietzke had led him to the correct base unless he inspected the facility personally.
Atomic research facilities tended to be spacious, with the various buildings scattered far from each other. This was meant as a safety precaution in case of an accidental release of radiation or (in the case of illegal facilities) a pre-emptive attack by the ACC. The nearest building to Powell was a concrete monolith near the entrance that most likely served as the base's administrative center. Powell decided to save it for last, since it was likely to be the most heavily guarded on the base. Instead, he struck out west to have a look at a more ramshackle ediface built from corrugated metal and plywood.
He avoided the building's doors, and effected an entrance by rapidly punching several holes in one of the plywood walls. A final punch sent a rough plywood circle into the building, and Powell dove in after it.
He found himself in a bare room with sheet metal walls. The room held a black man, a privy pot, the plywood circle, and himself.
"How did you do that?" the black man asked him in English.
"Vitamins," said Powell shortly, before diving out through the wall again. The black man followed him, and soon the two of them were a hundred yards away from the building.
"Who are you?" the black man asked.
"Group Captain Enoch Powell, Atomic Control Commission. What is this place?"
"A prison," the black man answered. Once Powell got a good look at the man, he found that he recognized him.
"You're Nelson Mandela," Powell stated. Mandela had been arrested by the South African government for subversive activities and membership in a terrorist organization called the African National Congress. It required only a moment's thought for Powell to realize the situation. Only one of the fifteen compounds was the real atomic research base, so the South African government must be using the other fourteen compounds to house prisoners, of which the country had a large and growing number. He had hoped that Schwietzke would lead him to the real research center, but the scientist had led him on a wild goose chase.
Powell heard gunshots, and he was instantly up and running at top speed. A zigzag path brought him back to the fence, and he was over it and into the veldt within seconds.
When he was sure he had shaken off his pursuers, Powell paused to take stock. He could safely eliminate this particular base, which left the ACC with fourteen other possibilities for the true research center. Powell could theoretically visit each of the other bases in turn until he found the research center, but he thought he knew a better way.
A quick run through the veldt brought him to the intersection of the dirt road with the paved highway back to Pretoria. The sun had already set and night was closing in when Powell saw the Ford Enterprise approach. Schwietzke paused at the highway to look for oncoming traffic, as Powell knew he would, and in that moment Powell was able to run up to the car, wrench open the passenger side door, and join Schwietzke. Clamping his right hand around Schwietzke's windpipe, Powell said, "Now, Herr Doktor, it is time for us to pay a call on your colleagues at the real research base."
Tuesday, March 9, 2010
DBTL 72A: The Six Million Złoty Man, Act I
This is the latest installment in the Drowned Baby Timeline, an alternate history where Adolf Hitler drowned at birth and where the Holocaust and World War II never took place. In the absence of our timeline's Manhattan Project, nuclear weapons have been developed independently in Italy, France, Great Britain, and the Polish Commonwealth. To avoid a European nuclear arms race, the four nations join together in September 1946 to create the Atomic Control Commission, tasked with maintaining a global monopoly on nuclear weapons . . .
"Lublin, I can't hold her, she's breaking up, she's breaking --"
--------------------------------
Enoch Powell.
Rocketman.
A man barely alive.
"We can rebuild him," Dr. Mengele assured Director-General Clarke. "We can make him better than he was. Better . . . stronger . . . faster . . . "
----------------------------------
Marching to Pretoria
Pretoria, South Africa
16 September 1966
Colonel Enoch Powell of the League of Nations Atomic Control Commission strode down the gangway from the exit hatch of the BOAC jetliner with some satisfaction. While he didn't actually feel a physical need to stretch his bionic legs, the ten-hour flight from London to Pretoria had been uncomfortable, particularly to a man who had once traveled similar distances in a matter of minutes. It was a shame that suborbital ballistic flights couldn't be made commercially profitable. Colonel Powell felt, as he frequently did, that if only he could devote enough of his time and technical skills to the problem, he could provide the solution.
Unfortunately for the commercial aviation field, he had more important matters to deal with.
Powell stood in queue with what patience he could muster while South African Customs processed the other members of his flight. Had he wished, he could have bypassed the customs check, but that would have required him to identify himself as an ACC agent, and his current mission involved traveling incognito. When at last his turn came, he was pleased by how thoroughly the customs men searched his carry-on baggage. Powell hated to see sloppy work of any sort, and besides, there was nothing the least bit incriminating in his bags. All his secrets were concealed within his own body.
After another wait to pick up the rest of his baggage, Powell left the airport and motioned to one of the taxis waiting outside. The driver helped him stow his bags in the boot, then opened the door for him. Once he was behind the wheel, the driver said, "Where to, sir?" From his English, Powell judged that the man's parents had immigrated from Suffolk, though the driver himself had most likely been born in South Africa.
"Carrington's," Powell answered curtly. "Do you know the way?"
"Yessir," said the driver. Powell resisted the temptation to provide directions anyway. If the driver took a wrong turn, deliberately or otherwise, Powell would let him know.
However, there proved to be no need. The driver took the optimal route from the airport to Carrington's Hotel, and Powell gave him a suitably calculated tip as he picked up his bags and left the taxi. It had always struck Powell as absurd that one should provide extra money to someone simply for doing their job, but it was customery, and Powell was wise enough to follow the local customs wherever he went. Besides, it was his job to blend in, and tipping the help the average amount would reduce his visibility.
The bellhops at Carrington's received equally calculated tips, and no doubt forgot him as soon as he was in his room. After unpacking, he had the front desk call him another taxi. This time the driver spoke with an Afrikaans accent. Powell fought down the urge to give him directions in that language.
Once again the driver took him to his destination by the optimal route; Powell was becoming favorably impressed with the honesty displayed by these South African taxi drivers. He actually considered tipping the man extra for a moment before reason reasserted itself.
The main campus of the University of Pretoria was located east of the city's center, and it was there that Powell went to see Dr. Werner Schwietzke. The physicist was in his office when Powell arrived.
"Herr Dr. Schwietzke?" Powell said, though he recognized the man from his dossier.
"I am he," Schwietzke answered in German. "And you are?"
"My name is Powell, Herr Doktor, Enoch Powell."
The scientist nodded in recognition. "Of course, the rocket pilot. What can I do for you, Herr Powell?"
"I've come to ask you about some of the work you've been doing recently for the South African government," said Powell.
"I don't know what you mean," said the physicist, though Powell could tell that he did. "I am an academic. I do not work for the government."
"Come, come, Herr Doctor Professor, we both know that you have been employed for the past ten years building atomic bombs for South African." Now Powell produced his ACC identification.
A lesser man would have begun to wilt at this point, but Schwietzke was made of sterner stuff. "If we were really building atom bombs, you wouldn't be standing here talking to me. You'd be raining your ballistic missiles on our country."
"The Commission has changed, Herr Doktor," said Powell. "Ever since the Los Alamos crisis, it has been ACC policy to avoid taking military action against centers of unauthorized atomic research." Powell himself privately disagreed with the policy, but there was no need to inform Schwietzke of that. "These days we prefer to use more . . . indirect means to accomplish our goals."
Schwietzke began to tense himself. "Meaning assassination?"
"Meaning persuasion. Bribery. Arm-twisting. In your case, your past unfortunate association with the Röhm regime in Germany would be forgotten, and you would be allowed to return to Europe."
The scientist began to glare at Powell. "I have neither need nor wish to return to Europe. The South Africans are indifferent to the slanders about the Fatherland that have been spread by the Jewish press."
"I daresay they are," said Powell. "Very well, Herr Doctor Professor, I shall take up no more of your time. Good day, sir." Leaving Schwietzke's office, Powell walked out of the campus building and took up a position behind it. He had no trouble deducing which of the windows looked out from Schwietzke's office, and he used his ocular prosthetic to magnify the view until he could clearly make out the scientist's face. As he had suspected from the office's layout, Schwietzke had his face towards the window while talking on the phone. Powell was able to read the German's lips to get his side of the conversation.
"-- don't know how much he knows. Yes, quite definitely, he showed me his identification card. I don't know. Perhaps. How should I know? Very well, I should be there within the hour. Goodbye."
Within minutes, Schwietzke was out the door and walking across to the building's car park. He got into one of the parked vehicles (a dark blue 1961 Ford Enterprise, Powell noted) and drove off. Powell followed.
"Lublin, I can't hold her, she's breaking up, she's breaking --"
--------------------------------
Enoch Powell.
Rocketman.
A man barely alive.
"We can rebuild him," Dr. Mengele assured Director-General Clarke. "We can make him better than he was. Better . . . stronger . . . faster . . . "
----------------------------------
Marching to Pretoria
Pretoria, South Africa
16 September 1966
Colonel Enoch Powell of the League of Nations Atomic Control Commission strode down the gangway from the exit hatch of the BOAC jetliner with some satisfaction. While he didn't actually feel a physical need to stretch his bionic legs, the ten-hour flight from London to Pretoria had been uncomfortable, particularly to a man who had once traveled similar distances in a matter of minutes. It was a shame that suborbital ballistic flights couldn't be made commercially profitable. Colonel Powell felt, as he frequently did, that if only he could devote enough of his time and technical skills to the problem, he could provide the solution.
Unfortunately for the commercial aviation field, he had more important matters to deal with.
Powell stood in queue with what patience he could muster while South African Customs processed the other members of his flight. Had he wished, he could have bypassed the customs check, but that would have required him to identify himself as an ACC agent, and his current mission involved traveling incognito. When at last his turn came, he was pleased by how thoroughly the customs men searched his carry-on baggage. Powell hated to see sloppy work of any sort, and besides, there was nothing the least bit incriminating in his bags. All his secrets were concealed within his own body.
After another wait to pick up the rest of his baggage, Powell left the airport and motioned to one of the taxis waiting outside. The driver helped him stow his bags in the boot, then opened the door for him. Once he was behind the wheel, the driver said, "Where to, sir?" From his English, Powell judged that the man's parents had immigrated from Suffolk, though the driver himself had most likely been born in South Africa.
"Carrington's," Powell answered curtly. "Do you know the way?"
"Yessir," said the driver. Powell resisted the temptation to provide directions anyway. If the driver took a wrong turn, deliberately or otherwise, Powell would let him know.
However, there proved to be no need. The driver took the optimal route from the airport to Carrington's Hotel, and Powell gave him a suitably calculated tip as he picked up his bags and left the taxi. It had always struck Powell as absurd that one should provide extra money to someone simply for doing their job, but it was customery, and Powell was wise enough to follow the local customs wherever he went. Besides, it was his job to blend in, and tipping the help the average amount would reduce his visibility.
The bellhops at Carrington's received equally calculated tips, and no doubt forgot him as soon as he was in his room. After unpacking, he had the front desk call him another taxi. This time the driver spoke with an Afrikaans accent. Powell fought down the urge to give him directions in that language.
Once again the driver took him to his destination by the optimal route; Powell was becoming favorably impressed with the honesty displayed by these South African taxi drivers. He actually considered tipping the man extra for a moment before reason reasserted itself.
The main campus of the University of Pretoria was located east of the city's center, and it was there that Powell went to see Dr. Werner Schwietzke. The physicist was in his office when Powell arrived.
"Herr Dr. Schwietzke?" Powell said, though he recognized the man from his dossier.
"I am he," Schwietzke answered in German. "And you are?"
"My name is Powell, Herr Doktor, Enoch Powell."
The scientist nodded in recognition. "Of course, the rocket pilot. What can I do for you, Herr Powell?"
"I've come to ask you about some of the work you've been doing recently for the South African government," said Powell.
"I don't know what you mean," said the physicist, though Powell could tell that he did. "I am an academic. I do not work for the government."
"Come, come, Herr Doctor Professor, we both know that you have been employed for the past ten years building atomic bombs for South African." Now Powell produced his ACC identification.
A lesser man would have begun to wilt at this point, but Schwietzke was made of sterner stuff. "If we were really building atom bombs, you wouldn't be standing here talking to me. You'd be raining your ballistic missiles on our country."
"The Commission has changed, Herr Doktor," said Powell. "Ever since the Los Alamos crisis, it has been ACC policy to avoid taking military action against centers of unauthorized atomic research." Powell himself privately disagreed with the policy, but there was no need to inform Schwietzke of that. "These days we prefer to use more . . . indirect means to accomplish our goals."
Schwietzke began to tense himself. "Meaning assassination?"
"Meaning persuasion. Bribery. Arm-twisting. In your case, your past unfortunate association with the Röhm regime in Germany would be forgotten, and you would be allowed to return to Europe."
The scientist began to glare at Powell. "I have neither need nor wish to return to Europe. The South Africans are indifferent to the slanders about the Fatherland that have been spread by the Jewish press."
"I daresay they are," said Powell. "Very well, Herr Doctor Professor, I shall take up no more of your time. Good day, sir." Leaving Schwietzke's office, Powell walked out of the campus building and took up a position behind it. He had no trouble deducing which of the windows looked out from Schwietzke's office, and he used his ocular prosthetic to magnify the view until he could clearly make out the scientist's face. As he had suspected from the office's layout, Schwietzke had his face towards the window while talking on the phone. Powell was able to read the German's lips to get his side of the conversation.
"-- don't know how much he knows. Yes, quite definitely, he showed me his identification card. I don't know. Perhaps. How should I know? Very well, I should be there within the hour. Goodbye."
Within minutes, Schwietzke was out the door and walking across to the building's car park. He got into one of the parked vehicles (a dark blue 1961 Ford Enterprise, Powell noted) and drove off. Powell followed.
Monday, March 8, 2010
The Jon Swift memorial repost
It usually takes a few days for news to bubble its way across the intertubes and into my brain, so it's only now that I've learned of the death of reasonable conservative Jon Swift. He inspired many throughout the blogosphere, including me. In particular, he inspired me to do as he had so often done, and write a review of a book without reading it, which I posted here all the way back on December 24, 2007. As a tribute to one of the sharpest satirists of our time, I now repost my unread book review of Catch-22:
Reasonable conservative Jon Swift is widely regarded on the internets for his series of Amazon.com book reviews -- though not by Amazon.com itself, which removed most of them from its website. It's been said that flattery is the sincerest form of imitation, so I have decided to produce a flattering set of imitation Jon Swift book reviews. I cannot post them on Amazon.com itself, since you have to actually buy something off of their website in order to be allowed to post reviews to it, but that's just as well; in all likelihood, my sincere flattery of Mr. Swift's work would result in my own reviews also being removed from the Amazon.com website. Fortunately for both Amazon.com and myself, I can further flatter Mr. Swift by imitating his solution: posting the reviews here on my blog. As my first subject for review, I have chosen the novel Catch-22 by Joseph Heller.
I have not read this book, and I was initially disappointed when I found out that it was not, as I had at first assumed, about fishing. My disappointment vanished, though, when I realized that it was actually about World War II. Mr. Heller was apparently one of the earliest writers to write about what Tom Brokaw has dubbed the Greatest Generation and its wonderful battle against fascism (which was, as Jonah Goldberg reminds us, actually an early form of liberalism). In fact, Mr. Heller himself was apparently a member of the Greatest Generation who actually served in the European Theater during World War II. Although it is extremely suspicious behavior for someone writing about a war to actually take part in it, Mr. Heller probably deserves a pass, since he lived in a time before it became firmly established that the people who cheerlead a war are at least as important and as deserving of praise as the people who fight in it. Mr. Heller's tribute to the brave officers and men who battled against Eurolibrofascism in the 1940s is as timely today as when it was first published in 1961.
Reasonable conservative Jon Swift is widely regarded on the internets for his series of Amazon.com book reviews -- though not by Amazon.com itself, which removed most of them from its website. It's been said that flattery is the sincerest form of imitation, so I have decided to produce a flattering set of imitation Jon Swift book reviews. I cannot post them on Amazon.com itself, since you have to actually buy something off of their website in order to be allowed to post reviews to it, but that's just as well; in all likelihood, my sincere flattery of Mr. Swift's work would result in my own reviews also being removed from the Amazon.com website. Fortunately for both Amazon.com and myself, I can further flatter Mr. Swift by imitating his solution: posting the reviews here on my blog. As my first subject for review, I have chosen the novel Catch-22 by Joseph Heller.
I have not read this book, and I was initially disappointed when I found out that it was not, as I had at first assumed, about fishing. My disappointment vanished, though, when I realized that it was actually about World War II. Mr. Heller was apparently one of the earliest writers to write about what Tom Brokaw has dubbed the Greatest Generation and its wonderful battle against fascism (which was, as Jonah Goldberg reminds us, actually an early form of liberalism). In fact, Mr. Heller himself was apparently a member of the Greatest Generation who actually served in the European Theater during World War II. Although it is extremely suspicious behavior for someone writing about a war to actually take part in it, Mr. Heller probably deserves a pass, since he lived in a time before it became firmly established that the people who cheerlead a war are at least as important and as deserving of praise as the people who fight in it. Mr. Heller's tribute to the brave officers and men who battled against Eurolibrofascism in the 1940s is as timely today as when it was first published in 1961.
DBTL 71: Conflict of Interest
This is the latest installment of the Drowned Baby Timeline, an alternate history where Adolf Hitler drowned at birth and where the Holocaust and World War II never took place. As the world enters the 1960s, the pace of change accelerates. In Europe, the fall of Communism in the Soviet Union leads to the fall of the Soviet Union itself. In the United States, the crumbling of racial segregation leads to growing violence. And in New York City, a respected journalist is about to get some bad news . . .
New York City, USA
22 November 1963
Jack Kennedy sat at his news desk while the woman powdered his face. It wasn’t a very manly position to be in, but Kennedy knew damn well that a good makeup job was the difference between looking like a human being on the television screen and looking like a three-day-old corpse. Tom Wagner had taught him that lesson – he had made the mistake of ignoring it the night of his first debate with Earl Warren, and it had ended up costing him the election.
A godawful thing to lose an election over, but Kennedy knew from personal experience that there were worse ways. The memories were twenty-three years old, now, but they still had the power to make him wince. Father had always dreamed of being the first Catholic president, and the dream had seemed to be within his grasp. Sure, he was only Senator Barkley’s running mate, but he didn’t care what Cactus Jack Garner said about the Vice-Presidency. Barkley was an old man, and if Teddy Roosevelt and Calvin Coolidge could back into the White House, so could Joe Kennedy.
Then it had all come out, all the sharp dealing on Wall Street, the rum-running, even that thing with Garbo. Father always swore afterwards that if he had been a Protestant, nobody would have given a damn about any of it. Barkley had stood by Father – his Kentucky sense of honor wouldn’t let him do otherwise – and the ticket had gone down to defeat. Four years later, Barkley had run again and won, but he had done it without Joe Kennedy.
With his own ambitions blasted, Father had passed them on to his sons – and seen each one reject them in turn. Joe Junior had gone into finance, and was now as big a wheel on Wall Street as Father had ever been. Jack himself had been emboldened by his older brother’s defiance, and pursued his dream of being a reporter; now he was the anchor of the Metropolitan Evening News. Bob had stuck to the law, and now he was head of the biggest law firm in Boston.
In the end, Father found himself looking to his youngest son, and Teddy at least had not disappointed him. Two terms in the Massachusetts State Senate had earned him a reputation as a go-getter, and today he had announced that he was running for Congress.
The clock was counting down the seconds to airtime, and the makeup woman finished her touch-up and moved out of the shot. Kennedy faced the camera as the associate director counted down the last seconds and the red light came on.
“Welcome back,” said Kennedy to the camera as the next story appeared on his autocue. “Today, an attempt by Senate Democrats to filibuster the Civil Rights Act was narrowly defeated by Majority Leader Everett Dirksen, who was able to . . . .“ Kennedy went through the stories with the ease of years of practice. In due course, he gave his signature sign-off, “And that’s the news for now. Good night from Metropolitan,” and the red light above the camera went off.
Kennedy was in his dressing room taking his various medications and removing the make-up when a knock came at the door. Usually such a knock heralded the arrival of one of his numerous female admirers -- ah, the life of a television personality -- but Kennedy wasn’t expecting one tonight. He and Carol were due at his brother’s townhouse for dinner later on.
“Come in,” he called.
The door opened to reveal no less a figure than David O. Selznick, the president of the network. Whatever it was he wanted, Kennedy knew, would be important – especially since Selznick usually left the building at five o’clock sharp. That meant that he had almost certainly stayed late specifically to speak to Kennedy.
Fixing a smile on his face, Kennedy said, “Good to see you, Mr. Selznick. What brings you here at this time of night?”
Selznick did not return Kennedy’s smile, which meant that it was bad news. Kennedy began steeling himself for it.
“Jack,” said Selznick, “a situation has come up.”
“What sort of situation?” said Kennedy, as his own expression matched the other man’s somber one.
“The Board has become concerned that a conflict of interest might arise.”
“Involving me?” said Kennedy.
Selznick nodded. “Involving you. It’s your brother Edward. He just announced that he’s running for a seat in Congress, and the Board is concerned that it might not look right if you had to report on the race.”
Enough preliminaries, Kennedy decided. “Give it to me straight, Mr. Selznick.”
“Effective immediately,” said Selznick, “you are being reassigned from the anchor desk.”
Kennedy didn’t ask whether Selznick was joking. David O. Selznick wasn’t the kind of man who joked about business. “Reassigned where?”
“To Moscow.”
“I’ll be replacing Brinkley, then?” he asked.
Selznick nodded.
Despite the shock of being fired from the anchor desk, Kennedy found himself perking up. Ever since the Soviet Union had broken up, Moscow had been the scene of dramatic events. Kennedy had even found himself envying David Brinkley as he covered the upheavals accompanying Russia’s rocky transition to capitalism. In addition, Kennedy himself had picked up some Russian and made some contacts back when he was covering the Soviet occupation of Japan for the New York Journal American, so he wouldn’t be coming to Russia completely cold. “Right,” he said. “When do you want me to head on over there?”
Selznick visibly relaxed. Kennedy supposed the network president had been worried that he would cause a scene, or quit. Kennedy, though, prided himself on his self-control and professionalism. And there was no question that the Moscow bureau was one of the top field assignments at Metropolitan News.
“A week from Monday will be fine,” Selznick answered. Then, hopefully, “No hard feelings, Jack?”
“No, Mr. Selznick. I understand. You need an anchorman who can stand above the fray and be impartial.”
“If your brother loses the election,” Selznick added, “I’m sure the network will be pleased to bring you back to the anchor desk.”
Kennedy found his smile returning. “Teddy won’t lose, Mr. Selznick. He’s a Kennedy!”
New York City, USA
22 November 1963
Jack Kennedy sat at his news desk while the woman powdered his face. It wasn’t a very manly position to be in, but Kennedy knew damn well that a good makeup job was the difference between looking like a human being on the television screen and looking like a three-day-old corpse. Tom Wagner had taught him that lesson – he had made the mistake of ignoring it the night of his first debate with Earl Warren, and it had ended up costing him the election.
A godawful thing to lose an election over, but Kennedy knew from personal experience that there were worse ways. The memories were twenty-three years old, now, but they still had the power to make him wince. Father had always dreamed of being the first Catholic president, and the dream had seemed to be within his grasp. Sure, he was only Senator Barkley’s running mate, but he didn’t care what Cactus Jack Garner said about the Vice-Presidency. Barkley was an old man, and if Teddy Roosevelt and Calvin Coolidge could back into the White House, so could Joe Kennedy.
Then it had all come out, all the sharp dealing on Wall Street, the rum-running, even that thing with Garbo. Father always swore afterwards that if he had been a Protestant, nobody would have given a damn about any of it. Barkley had stood by Father – his Kentucky sense of honor wouldn’t let him do otherwise – and the ticket had gone down to defeat. Four years later, Barkley had run again and won, but he had done it without Joe Kennedy.
With his own ambitions blasted, Father had passed them on to his sons – and seen each one reject them in turn. Joe Junior had gone into finance, and was now as big a wheel on Wall Street as Father had ever been. Jack himself had been emboldened by his older brother’s defiance, and pursued his dream of being a reporter; now he was the anchor of the Metropolitan Evening News. Bob had stuck to the law, and now he was head of the biggest law firm in Boston.
In the end, Father found himself looking to his youngest son, and Teddy at least had not disappointed him. Two terms in the Massachusetts State Senate had earned him a reputation as a go-getter, and today he had announced that he was running for Congress.
The clock was counting down the seconds to airtime, and the makeup woman finished her touch-up and moved out of the shot. Kennedy faced the camera as the associate director counted down the last seconds and the red light came on.
“Welcome back,” said Kennedy to the camera as the next story appeared on his autocue. “Today, an attempt by Senate Democrats to filibuster the Civil Rights Act was narrowly defeated by Majority Leader Everett Dirksen, who was able to . . . .“ Kennedy went through the stories with the ease of years of practice. In due course, he gave his signature sign-off, “And that’s the news for now. Good night from Metropolitan,” and the red light above the camera went off.
Kennedy was in his dressing room taking his various medications and removing the make-up when a knock came at the door. Usually such a knock heralded the arrival of one of his numerous female admirers -- ah, the life of a television personality -- but Kennedy wasn’t expecting one tonight. He and Carol were due at his brother’s townhouse for dinner later on.
“Come in,” he called.
The door opened to reveal no less a figure than David O. Selznick, the president of the network. Whatever it was he wanted, Kennedy knew, would be important – especially since Selznick usually left the building at five o’clock sharp. That meant that he had almost certainly stayed late specifically to speak to Kennedy.
Fixing a smile on his face, Kennedy said, “Good to see you, Mr. Selznick. What brings you here at this time of night?”
Selznick did not return Kennedy’s smile, which meant that it was bad news. Kennedy began steeling himself for it.
“Jack,” said Selznick, “a situation has come up.”
“What sort of situation?” said Kennedy, as his own expression matched the other man’s somber one.
“The Board has become concerned that a conflict of interest might arise.”
“Involving me?” said Kennedy.
Selznick nodded. “Involving you. It’s your brother Edward. He just announced that he’s running for a seat in Congress, and the Board is concerned that it might not look right if you had to report on the race.”
Enough preliminaries, Kennedy decided. “Give it to me straight, Mr. Selznick.”
“Effective immediately,” said Selznick, “you are being reassigned from the anchor desk.”
Kennedy didn’t ask whether Selznick was joking. David O. Selznick wasn’t the kind of man who joked about business. “Reassigned where?”
“To Moscow.”
“I’ll be replacing Brinkley, then?” he asked.
Selznick nodded.
Despite the shock of being fired from the anchor desk, Kennedy found himself perking up. Ever since the Soviet Union had broken up, Moscow had been the scene of dramatic events. Kennedy had even found himself envying David Brinkley as he covered the upheavals accompanying Russia’s rocky transition to capitalism. In addition, Kennedy himself had picked up some Russian and made some contacts back when he was covering the Soviet occupation of Japan for the New York Journal American, so he wouldn’t be coming to Russia completely cold. “Right,” he said. “When do you want me to head on over there?”
Selznick visibly relaxed. Kennedy supposed the network president had been worried that he would cause a scene, or quit. Kennedy, though, prided himself on his self-control and professionalism. And there was no question that the Moscow bureau was one of the top field assignments at Metropolitan News.
“A week from Monday will be fine,” Selznick answered. Then, hopefully, “No hard feelings, Jack?”
“No, Mr. Selznick. I understand. You need an anchorman who can stand above the fray and be impartial.”
“If your brother loses the election,” Selznick added, “I’m sure the network will be pleased to bring you back to the anchor desk.”
Kennedy found his smile returning. “Teddy won’t lose, Mr. Selznick. He’s a Kennedy!”
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