"Mr. President, before you go into the meeting, could I steal you for a second?" Abby asked, sliding into his path as he headed for the open door.
"Sure, no problem." He said with a glance to his watch. "I still have five minutes before the meeting starts."
"You requested to visit a school recently, to see how history class is being taught." She said, reminding him of the project he'd wanted to start. One of the things he'd promised during his election campagne was to teach more black history, and overall, more world history in schools.
"Yes exactly, have you found a set date?"
"Yes. Tomorrow."
"Already?" He asked. "That's quite short notice."
"I wanted it to be before you're interview with CNN which is on Saturday, don't forget that please, so tomorrow is the last day possible." Her point made sense. His visit was something he could use to show that he was working towards his goals, and if it was a sucess the reporters might be in a better mood while interviewing him.
"Alright. Have you moved all my meetings up, then?"
"Of course. I've already done that this morning before you came."
"Wonderful, I'm looking forward to going to school again." He said with a smile. It wasn't meant sarcastic at all; he was excited. School had been the place where he'd discovered his interest in history; not necessarily because it was taught well, but he'd gotten introductions into true stories that were both inspiring and terrifying. "Thank you for telling me, I've got to go though, Abby." With a thank you he pushed past her and entered the room where he'd spend the next two and a half hours debatting on wether it was in the states budget to lower health care costs; or make it entirely free.
The concept of free healthcare had been in heated debates for years. Healthcare was something that burdened so many american citizens, most of their debts were due to healthcare, operations they couldn't pay for, monthly payments that were simply too high, or simply, bad coverage from the care they could afford. President Bowmore supported the idea of free healthcare, but he knew it would still be a few years, or even a decade, until it was half-likely to be possible.
"If we don't find the funding now, we never will." The Secretary of Health and Human Services argued. "The money is here, we can make cuts to other programs, less important ones, and put the money into our healthcare system."
"Where do you want to cut the money?" The President asked.
"As much as I hate the idea, we could cut some funding by education-."
"No way." The President interrupted. "Forgive me for interrupting Mr. Morgan, but education is something we have to continue promoting and encouraging. I think it's equally as important as healthcare."
"I absolutely agree." One of his other advisers said, chiming in to the conversation.
"We could cut somewhere else, let's take military spending," the Secretary offered.
"That won't work, especially at a time like this. Think about what the Americans would think, Mr. Morgan, if I went out there and said, during the war in the Ukraine, and the confilict in Gaza and God knows what other stuff could pop up, we're cutting our military funding. They'd think we're crazy." Most of the advisers nodded along, the Presidents point was valid. At times of war, even if one's own country wasn't involved, cutting military spending was not a good choice. "You're going to have to come up with something that makes sense."
The Secretary of Health and Human Services leaned back and, spreading out his arms, spoke a sentence that fueled the fire of the debate again. "If we don't start investing in healthcare now, we're going to have to do it at the same time we invest in other things, for example education or, take your example of the Climate Crisis Mr. President; we're going to need to allocate money to deal with natural catastrophes. The hurricanes in florida, colder winters in NYC." Murmers of agreement followed his speech. President Bowmore put his face in his hands for a second, when he looked up again everyone was staring at him, waiting for his response.
"Alright." He said with a sigh. "Where else could we cut? Anybody have any ideas that don't have to do with the military, education or, please, not taxes."
***
"They proposed to implant a new tax on Pharma companies and use the money to pay for healthcare; or at least make it much cheaper for the general public." Bowmore explained as he unbuttoned his shirt. "It's not a bad idea, but they're not going to be pleased. Especially because we recently signed more laws on enviromental protection. I'm going to get lots of complaints..."
"Maybe, but you're doing the right thing." Monica answered. "You should feel good about that." She gave him a kiss on the cheek as she passed by. He was surprised; she hadn't been in such a good mood for ages. "But why can't you just make them lower the prices for medicine."
"Wouldn't work. Think about it, people from other countries would buy our products because they'd be cheaper than the pills in their own countries."
"You're responsible for America, not all the countries in the world."
"I know. But I don't want to rattle foreign relations, and, if you think about it logically; the prices would go up again because the demand would be so high that the companies would have to make much more, which would take a while. It's all simple economics; supply and demand."
"Well, I don't know anything about that. You'll talk it over again, right?"
"Next week on Monday. Sometime in the afternoon I think."
He was still too immersed in the healthcare crisis for it to cross his mind that he might dream about Hitler again. He fell asleep working on the concept of the new taxation.