The Illuminati (11 page)
Hunt had soon settled into a routine of allowing Alton enough publicity to keep her current in the minds of the public, but otherwise behind the scenes.
Besides
, he mused as he glanced over at her on the platformâa picture of poise and beautyâ
she's beginning to warm up to me, so she must be okay with it
.
Had he been able to read Kathy Alton's mind, he might have reconsidered his attitude toward her.
A real show hound
, she thought as he strutted around the platform at a Washington press conference.
He's in his glory
. She chuckled silently as he puffed out his chest, obviously for her benefit.
He will learn, though
.
The failing economy provided the catalyst the liberals needed to step up the assault on Christians. In the first six months of the Hunt administration, Elder witnessed an alarming trend toward anti-Christian hostility in the media. All pretext of objectivity was gone, particularly at the biggest and most influential news network, the World News Network.
What had been a “situation” became a crisis when the FCC confirmed the ban of all Christian broadcast on radio and television. The last straw came when the administration pushed a bill through Congress taxing all church property and income. Elder pulled out the stops and rallied his followers to organize demonstrations protesting this blatantly unconstitutional action.
Without access to any public media, John Elder fell back to his only option: organizing “grassroots” committees to keep Christians informed. He and his group began printing weekly newsletters announcing protest rally dates and locations. Condensed versions were distributed through church bulletins in thousands of churches throughout the country.
Elder decided that a mass rally should be organized to confront the Washington politicians. As a forerunner, smaller planning meetings were scheduled in churches by the thousands.
Tony Moran was one of the group leaders whose function was to coordinate his church's participation. He received an urgent call from John Elder's headquarters instructing him to schedule a planning meeting for that evening. Some of Elder's contacts in Washington had notified him that President Hunt had decided to sign an executive order authorizing the so-called “Crack Babies Bill,” abolishing the babies' civil rights.
“Notify your group that we're going to march on Washington next Saturday,” Randy Cross, a leader in John Elder's Constitutional Rights Committee (CRC), told Moran.
“I don't know if we can get our group together than soon,” Moran said. Inside he had a sinking feeling that once they publicly made their move, there would be no turning back. He wasn't at all sure he was ready or willing to take that step.
“If we don't act now, it will be too late,” Cross warned him. “If the Crack bill becomes law, they'll begin processing the kids. John says we need to act now!”
Tony Moran put the phone down. His hand shook from the fear he felt welling up inside.
“What's wrong, Tony?” Susan Moran asked her husband when she saw his ashen face.
“The committee wants us to call an emergency meeting to plan a march on Washington Saturday.”
“We knew we'd have to take a stand sometime,” his wife said as she put her arms around him.
Susan spent the next three hours calling every member of their church's CRC group. The meeting was set for seven o'clock that evening.
“I don't think we should go tonight,” Tony said as his wife completed her last call. “We're taking an awful risk.”
“We have to take a stand sometime, Tony,” she replied as they sat down to eat. “First it was the ban on Christian radio, then television. Then the tax on church property, and now this terrible Crack Babies Bill. Who knows what may be next? Maybe they'll declare it unconstitutional to witness.”
“You don't understand,” Tony said grimly. “Remember Robert Barnes? Well, he got fired from his job this week because he insisted on reading his Bible at lunch. It's tough enough for us to make it now. What will happen if I lose my job?”
“I don't think a job is as important as a life, Tony. Besides, we're not plotting anarchy. We're just trying to protect those who can't defend themselves.”
Susan Moran sounded a lot more confident than she felt. She had seen the trend, even in their own neighborhood, toward religious intolerance. The more the government legitimized it, the more overt it became.
I wonder if this is the way persecution came to the Jews in Germany?
she thought.
Were they just eased out of society until nobody really noticed they were missing?
Even as the Morans were preparing to meet with their group, a meeting was taking place in the White House that would have a profound effect on their future.
“I simply can't believe this report, Cal,” President Mark Hunt remarked as he reviewed the document before him.
“Believe it, Mr. President. The FBI has firm evidence that the religious right is planning government assassinations as a part of their opposition to your Crack bill.”
“But they've never been violent in any of their past protests. They shout and scream a lot, but in the end they adjust,” the president said as he reread the document about members of a religious group, calling themselves the Constitutional Rights Committee, who were planning to assassinate several Senate leaders and federal judges. It went on to say that the FBI had also uncovered a plot to assassinate President Hunt if he signed the so-called “Crack Babies Bill.”
The Humanitarian Action Legislation, dubbed the “Crack Babies Bill” by the religious right, was legislation Hunt had just sponsored while in the Senate. Nearly twelve million babies born of crack and cocaine addicts over the last decade were wards of the government; over $48 billion a year of taxpayers' money was required to care for them. Hunt had been genuinely surprised that there had been such an outcry in the Christian community when he first introduced legislation to utilize the crack babies for the good of otherwise hopeless people. His researchers had irrefutable evidence that these crack babies had less learning ability than a chimpanzee. And other than a few animal rights radicals, nobody minded using the chimps for the good of mankind. Not only would using the crack babies' organs help many terminally ill people, but it would also bring more than $6 billion a year into the government and eliminate the drain of nearly $50 billion to support and sustain them.
Virtually the entire country supported the bill, except the Christians. They had succeeded in getting the bill delayed in Congress, but one of his campaign promises had been to get the bill passed into law, which he planned to do by executive order immediately. The procedure on the crack babies would be done humanely. Those who were diagnosed as mentally deficient would be sent to government hospitals where they would be injected with coma-inducing drugs. From there they would be transported to organ banks throughout the world where their organs would be used to help productive people live useful lives.
Hunt slammed the report down on the Jeffersonian desk that had been used by so many previous presidents. “I want this made public, Cal. Get it leaked to the press so that it doesn't look like we did it. But get it done!”
“I'll do it, Mr. President,” Rutland promised as he picked up the report.
Perfect
, he thought as he returned the report to the pouch labeled “Top Secret.”
I knew how he'd react to that part about his bill
. Rutland smiled as he visualized the reaction to the article in the press.
The religious right can protest all they want, but the more they protest, the more they will appear guilty. As long as we control they media, the public will accept what we say as truth
.
“John! You're not going to believe this! Come here! Hurry!”
Pastor John Elder knew his wife was watching the morning news. For her the latest news, along with the current weather forecast, was a daily routine before starting breakfast. Julia Elder was a typical Baptist minister's wife most of the time, but lately her life was being reshaped. As a pastor's wife, she was accustomed to life in a “fishbowl” within the confines of their church membership, but as her husband was being thrust even more into the public eye in the protests against the government, she was being placed in a much larger “fishbowl.”
“What's wrong, honey? Is the weather girl topless again?”
The comment was meant to be amusing, but Julia was not in a humorous mood. She looked like she was about to vomit. “You'd better get in here, John. You're on television.”
Elder hurried into the living room. As he entered, he heard the announcer from WNN say, “The FBI report states that an underground religious group known as the Constitutional Rights Committee, or the CRC, led by the Reverend John Elder, a Baptist preacher from Atlanta, Georgia, has made several threats on politicians who oppose the group's teachings. Elder, who heads a fifteen-thousand-member organization, has led many protests in the past, including the notorious âmidnight run' on Congress.”
“That's a lie!” Julia Elder shouted. “We had nothing to do with breaking into the congressional building. Those were not our marchers.”
“Of course, they weren't,” Elder said, trying to calm her down. “Don't worry about it, dear.” It wasn't surprising that his group was getting the blame. He had irritated both the politicians and the press when he led several thousand peaceful demonstrators in a march on Washington to protest the government's blatant assault on religious freedoms.
The misinformation was created when the vandals who had been arrested claimed to be members of the CRC. Later he learned that they had done so in exchange for representation by the National Civil Liberties Union. All of those arrested received small fines and suspended sentences. Yet when some members of the Constitutional Rights Committee struggled with the D.C. police along the parade route, they had been arrested, cited for assault, and sentenced to three years in prison. In addition, CRC's demonstration permit had been permanently revoked, and as group organizer, Elder had received ninety days in jail for contempt of court. All the public saw were the short clips of his CRC members shoving the police. What the media didn't show was that the marchers had just been struck by night-stick-wielding police officers.