The Quadrate smiled. "Precisely. I feel it should be pretty casually introduced. But don't worry—I won't ruin its news value. I think you'll agree with me when I'm ready for the top spot on your broadcast and for the front pages, I'll have something that will—how do you put it?—make people suddenly sick. Point is, I want them to be unconsciously thinking along the right lines first, so that when they get through being sick and stop to think about it, it will make sense."
He was careful. It was difficult to maintain the curious bantering way of speech these people continually employed. An end-product, of course, of their emotional degeneration, and therefore as difficult to perfectly imitate as a provincial misuse of the language. But it was not as difficult as at first....
"Sure Doug—what you're talking about is done all the time, every day of the week. That part's easy enough—too damn easy. But—you keep saying 'it.' 'It' will make sense. What are you gunning at?"
"Suppose I give you an example. The final development of that statement you weren't clear on. 'New sources of military manpower yet waiting to be tapped.' What it will mean, when the time comes, is the UMT drafting of children ten years old. Thirteen at first."
"The what?" The man Grayson looked almost ludicrous. His mouth hung foolishly open, and there was no sound coming from it.
"I'm afraid you not only heard correctly, Carl, but that I had better tell you that if you're thinking of sending for the booby-wagon for me, you'll have to send for about thirty others for the rest of the committee. Next week, the Blair Defense Preparedness Committee will introduce a bill for unlimited lowering of the draft age, for either war or peacetime use. Within a month after its passage—and I can guarantee you that it will be passed—the committee will give you what you'll need for your first big story on it. It will urge, and then it will demand that all male youths from the present draft age of 17 down to the age of thirteen be immediately registered for selective service."
"Good Lord, Doug—"
"The committee is strong, Carl. It is strong because I knew how to pick it. I did not pick it, I assure you, on the basis of intelligence or learning or capability. I picked it in terms of personal political and financial influence, and in terms of my capability in persuading its members to my way of thinking. That was not too difficult—they're all band-wagon men.
"But to the point. On the heels of the new Blair Law's invocation, the committee will again make a demand—registration of all youngsters down to and including the age of ten years."
"Doug for God's sake—"