"Oh? You know the President and I have many differences, and some of them are very serious differences, but I can't remember when we've had a President who was willing to commit cold-blooded murder, and I certainly will not accuse our President of that," Fowler said in his best statesman's voice. He'd meant to say nothing at all - that's what statesmen's voices are for, after all, either nothing or the obvious. He'd kept a fairly high road for most of his presidential campaign. Even Fowler's bitterest enemies - he had several in his own party, not to mention the opposition's - said that he was an honorable, thoughtful man who concentrated on issues and not invective. His statement reflected that. He hadn't meant to change United States government policy, hadn't meant to trap his prospective opponent. But he had, without knowing it, done both.
The President had scheduled the trip well in advance. It was a customary courtesy for the chief executive to maintain a low profile during the opposition's convention. It was just as easy to work at Camp David - easier in fact since it was far easier to shoo reporters away. But you had to run the gauntlet to get there. With the Marine VH-3 helicopter sitting and waiting on the White House lawn, the President emerged from the ground-level door with the First Lady and two other functionaries in tow, and there they were again, a solid phalanx of reporters and cameras. He wondered if the Russians with their
"
Even as he walked over to the roped enclosure of journalists, the President knew that it was a mistake, but he was drawn to them and the question as a lemming is drawn to the sea. He couldn't not do it. The way the question was shouted, everyone would know that he'd heard it, and no answer would itself be seen as an answer of sorts.
"The United States," the President said, "does not kill innocent women and children. The United States fights against people who do that. We do not sink down to their bestial level. Is that a clear enough answer?" It was delivered in a quiet, reasoned voice, but the look the President gave the reporter made that experienced journalist wilt before his eyes. It was good, the President thought, to see that his power occasionally reached the bastards.
It was the second major political lie of the day - a slow news day to be sure. Governor Fowler well remembered that John and Robert Kennedy had plotted the deaths of Castro and others with a kind of elitist glee born of Ian Fleming's novels, only to learn the hard way that assassination was a messy business. Very messy indeed, for there were usually people about whom you didn't especially want to kill. The current President knew all about "collateral damage," a term which he found distasteful but indicative of something both necessary and impossible to explain to people who didn't understand how the world really worked: terrorists, criminals, and all manner of cowards - brutal people are most often cowards, after all - regularly hid behind or among the innocent, daring the mighty to act, using the altruism of their enemies as a weapon against those enemies. You cannot touch me.
