Breakpoint by Richard A. Clarke Read Free Book Online

mother made me promise to take you ovah her place for lunch. Wants ta hear about your dad. And see you, of course,” McDonough said, putting away the PDA.
    Foley looked questioningly at his boss. “You should do that, Jimmy,” Susan said firmly. “Besides, I have to meet up with Professor Myers, and that’s likely to go on and on. I’ll hop on the Red Line two stops and we can meet up later at the Charles.” She turned to McDonough. “This has been very helpful, Lieutenant, but there is one thing I do have to ask.” She paused. “Why is it called the New Reactor Diner? Spicy hot food?”
    â€œHell, no, the food sucks here,” McDonough bellowed, laughing loudly. “The diner’s name’s cuz these MIT nut jobs have a fuckin’ nuclear reactor other side a the alley.” In the nearby booths, a dozen heads briefly popped up from laptops and looked around as if sniffing the air for something. And then they went back down, down into cyberspace.
    Susan thought about what could happen if another white van filled with RDX went down the alley. As they walked into the ruin of the building in yellow hard hats, a video-surveillance camera across the street zoomed in on their faces.
    1055 EST
Summers Hall, Allston Campus
Harvard University, Boston
    â€œSo it’s all very well to say that big government is bad and that big government backing big science projects is worse,” said the woman behind the podium. “I know some of you think the American corporation is the highest achievement of efficiency that humanity has ever produced…but when you say all of that, my dears, remember not only that big bad old government created the internet but that the private sector would never, repeat never, have done so. There was no single company, no group of companies that either would have or could have accomplished it, including the single very large phone company we once had in this country.”
    Margaret Myers stepped out, taking the microphone with her, as she spotted Susan in the back row of the amphitheater-style class room. “The private sector found all sorts of things to do with the internet, and that has changed the way we live, but they would never have built it.” Thinking of Susan’s role in the Islamyah crisis, she continued, “The private sector would also have continued producing gas-guzzling cars, paying for overseas oil to make into gasoline, until the last drop of oil was pumped and the last dollar was spent on it. Only because of the government of Islamyah and its research and its investments in companies in the U.S., can we say that half the cars in this country are now powered by either hybrid engines or by ethanol from corn, sugarcane, and switch grasses.
    â€œSo your assignment for next week is a short essay, no more than two thousand words, on some technology problem of your choice that only a government can solve in the first instance, thereby creating opportunities for the private sector to build on. See you next week.” Students immediately flocked around the short professor, asking questions, introducing friends, offering things for her to read. Susan thought her friend and one-time advisor looked older, more gray in her curls, her broad shoulders beginning to slouch. Still, she radiated a physical and intellectual strength and presence that lit up the room. Susan knew that some students would hang on, following Myers back to her office, so Susan signaled that she would meet her there.
    The lecture hall and the professor’s office were across the river on the Boston side, in Summers Hall, part of Harvard’s new Allston Campus. The picture window in the office offered a stunning view of the old Cambridge campus, causing Susan to be lost in thought until Myers shut the office door behind her. The two embraced. “I hoped you would get a chance to work on the internet bombings when I heard about them,” Myers