"William W Johnstone - Ashes 32 - Destiny in the Ashes (txt)" - читать интересную книгу автора (Johnstone William W)

Mike laughed. "I wouldn't go that far, Jersey, but he seems to give her
fairly good advice. At least he has so far."

"Is there any report of widespread unrest among the citizens?" Harley
asked. "I would think after all Claire's failures and what it's cost the
country, the common people would be standing in line to get rid of her."

Ben laughed out loud. "You underestimate the greed of what is laughingly
called a citizen of the USA nowadays," he said. "As long as Claire keeps
the welfare state pouring money out to the scum who never think they
ought to have to work to earn it, the bums will keep her in office over
the objections of the masses who pay taxes."

Mike nodded. "That's about the size of it, Harley. So far,

10

there've been some scattered pockets of rebellion, but nothing so big
Claire's Army couldn't handle it."

"Damn shame," Harley said.

"Oh, I don't know," Anna, Ben's adopted daughter, chimed in, glancing at
Harley, whom she adored, sitting next to her. "At least with Claire, we
know what we have... an idiot who couldn't plan a major war if her life
depended on it." She shrugged her shoulders. "Who knows? The person who
replaced her might even give us more trouble than Claire has."

Ben smiled. "Anna's right. Claire's been a huge pain in the neck, but
she's also been so incompetent that each time she's moved against us,
we've come out on top."

"At the cost of thousands of lives," Dr. Buck said.

"Thankfully, more thousands of USA lives than SUSA lives," Hammer
Hammerlick reminded the doctor.

"So, to sum up, nothing north of our borders to worry about?" Ben asked
Mike.

"Not from the USA, but there are some happenings across the ocean I've
been monitoring rather closely.

"What in particular?" Ben asked.

"The situation in Iraq is becoming increasingly unstable," Mike said,
pulling a pouch of tobacco out of his pocket and adding a pinch of brown
leaf to his pipe, again tamping it down with his finger. "A man over
there is raising all kinds of hell."