Statesman by Piers Anthony Read Free Book Online Page A

sea of blank faces. They could hardly grasp what I was saying; they wondered if it were a joke. Then the military personnel I had arranged to alert swung into action. Every member of the nomenklatura in the entire region of Kraine was politely apprehended. The cameras showed the complete astonishment of these officials; they had had no warning.
    Ivan himself was arrested and brought to me. He alone had known of this. On camera, I asked him:
    “Comrade Ivan, do you understand that your power has been dissolved, and that of all in your administration?”
    “Preposterous!” he spluttered.
    “Take him away,” I said.
    The men escorted him away. This was part of my promise to him: He had cooperated fully, and now I was protecting him by making an example of him. None of the nomenklatura would seek revenge against him, because he was obviously as much a victim as they. But he would be reassigned to an equivalent post elsewhere, where he would administer a similar brand of progressive socialism, as would others of the deposed staff, as warranted. I had all their names, thanks to Ivan's information. The majority would be less kindly treated; they would be incorporated into the working force at low levels and barred from administrative positions. This was the first abrupt step in the disenfranchisement of the most powerful class in the Union of Saturnine Republics. I was commencing the hatchet job for Khukov.
    “Now we shall establish the good element,” I continued, as if this audacious and amazing act were routine. “Each collective farm bubble will hold an election to choose representatives to come to me in the next few days. From these I will choose new administrators. Their job will be to facilitate production by any reasonable means, and to distribute the rewards for success.” I smiled, seeing more blank faces on the monitors. “We are instituting what I term progressive socialism. I do not question the validity of your political or economic system; I am merely amending it slightly. There will now be direct material rewards for every bubble that improves its performance over that of the past season: special privileges and higher pay for every worker in it. The bubble that improves the most will receive additional rewards. And the region that shows the most sustained improvement over the coming years will have the first choice of the Dream.”
    Then I told them of the Dream of galactic colonization. “The technology has not yet been properly tested,” I cautioned them. “But Chairman Khukov is working on it, and in two years there will be a practical test. If this is successful, he will proceed to the major project—and if Kraine has contributed significantly to this by providing the rich harvests needed to support such an effort, Kraine will have the chance to colonize a complete new planet elsewhere in the galaxy, and the leading bubble will have the first choice of location on that planet.”
    I continued, clarifying it for them, but that was the essence. They might not believe me immediately, but what I said was to be confirmed by Chairman Khukov, and then the belief would come. The broadcast was limited to Kraine, but of course the news would leak out, and then the rest of Saturn, and indeed the rest of the Solar System, would quicken with interest.
    Of course this is simplified; the neglect and mismanagement of centuries is not reversed by a single speech. My address was mostly a statement of intent. What counted was the follow-through, and Spirit handled that. As always, I was the figurehead, she the reality. She had long experience in Jupiter government, and before that in the Jupiter Navy, organizing chains of command and implementing effective programs. We had already formed a nucleus of solidly committed personnel to operate the new system. The new people sent by the collective farms would come first to me for screening; that was my talent, and while I do not disparage it, I have always been aware that