Creating America: My campaign manager was Roosevelt

Chapter 33 Dancing with the Devil

Allegheny Hilltop Club is located on a hilltop overlooking the city at night on the outskirts of Pittsburgh.

This is the private property of Pittsburgh's elite.

Its membership list includes all the most powerful people in the city.

Bankers, lawyers, CEOs of large corporations, and heirs to old money families that have been passed down for generations.

An ordinary Pittsburgh citizen, no matter how hard they strive their whole life, could never step through the gates of this city.

Leo, wearing his secondhand suit, took a taxi to the heavily guarded entrance of the club.

He gave his name.

The security guard at the entrance opened the heavy, ornate iron gate only after confirming the information via walkie-talkie.

A waiter in a tuxedo was already waiting at the door.

He led Leo through a corridor lined with classical oil paintings to a private cigar room.

An elderly man, dressed in a dark vest, with gray hair but a sprightly spirit and sharp eyes, was sitting on a huge leather sofa, holding a glass of whiskey in his hand.

He is Douglas Morganfield.

Chairman of Morganfield Industries, the true uncrowned king of Pittsburgh.

He saw Leo come in, stood up, and gave a kind smile.

He extended his hand to Leo.

"Welcome, Mr. Wallace." His voice wasn't loud, but it was strong. "Please have a seat."

Leo shook hands with him and sat down on the sofa opposite him.

"Kid, you've been making quite a stir in Pittsburgh lately," Morganfield said. "I've seen your videos; they're well-made and very provocative."

"I see right through the little tricks those idiots in the city council are playing." He shook his head. "They're only thinking about how to squeeze money out of you, while you genuinely want to do something for this city."

Morganfield's words surprised Leo.

He had assumed this would be a trap.

But to his surprise, the other party immediately adopted the posture of an elder praising a junior.

Morganfield proposed a collaboration that shocked Leo.

"I heard that your project is currently stalled by the city council, is that right?"

Leo nodded.

"I can help you with this," Morganfield said casually. "With just one phone call, Speaker Daniel Murphy will be happy to reconsider his proposed amendment and approve your project."

He looked at Leo, waiting for his reaction.

"In return," he continued, "I would like to request that your community renovation projects prioritize the use of products from one of our building materials companies within the Morganfield Group."

"Don't worry, I won't make things difficult for you," he added. "I will supply all the products to you at cost price. I guarantee that this will be the lowest price you can find in all of Pittsburgh."

Leo couldn't understand Morganfield's attitude, so he asked the Roosevelt in his mind.

"Wasn't it his political agent, Senator Warren, who was trying to obstruct our application for this funding in Washington?"

"Logically, we should be enemies, so why is he helping me?"

Roosevelt replied, "What enemy is there, boy?"

"For people like them who stand at the top of the pyramid, there are only two things in this world: assets that they can control and risks that they cannot control."

"Previously, you were preparing to ask Washington for a sum of money beyond their control to reshape their territory. To them, you were an unpredictable risk, so they were going to use all their power to strangle you as soon as possible."

"But now, the situation has changed."

"The money is already in your hands, you have become an asset with control over two and a half million dollars, their plan to kill you failed, so they immediately changed their strategy."

"Their goal now is to control this newly emerging asset and make you serve their interests."

"They never gamble; they always bet on both sides."

"Mayor Cartwright has been their political proxy for the past decade or so. But they also see very clearly that Cartwright is a hopeless idiot. He can't even handle a young upstart like you. His political value is almost exhausted."

"And you, Leo Wallace, have shown tremendous potential in this battle. You know how to mobilize public opinion, you know how to deal with Washington, and you know how to get money out of their pockets."

"So what they're doing now is creating a risk hedging strategy between you and Cartwright."

"They will bet on both you and Cartwright, and whoever gains influence in Pittsburgh politics in the future, they can guarantee that their own interests will not be harmed."

Roosevelt's explanation made Leo suddenly realize the truth.

Looking at the smiling old fox in front of him, he understood the way these capitalist oligarchs thought.

They have no stance, no loyalty, and no ideology.

Their sole belief is to maximize profits and minimize risks.

Morganfield raised his glass and gestured to Leo.

"How about it, kid?" he said with a smile. "This is a mutually beneficial proposal. Cooperating with me will make your future much easier."

Leo knew that this was the most dangerous and crucial decision he had faced since entering politics.

By accepting his proposal, he could immediately escape his current predicament and smoothly advance his plans.

But the price he will pay is that he will be shackled by the Morganfield family and become another pawn they have planted in the city.

If he rejects his proposal, he will have to continue to fight against the city's most powerful interest groups.

His Pittsburgh revitalization plan will also face significant obstacles.

Leo remained silent for a long time.

He gazed at the amber liquid in the glass, sensing the aura of power in the room.

He was having a rapid mental exchange with Roosevelt.

“I should refuse him,” Leo said. “The Morganfield family has exploited the working class in Pittsburgh for a century. To cooperate with him would be to betray the workers who support me in the streets.”

"No, son," Roosevelt immediately rejected him. "Politics is not a black-and-white children's fairy tale. Simply refusing will only make you look like an ignorant fool and put you back in the dead end of being besieged by those hyenas of the city council."

"We must learn to dance with the devil, but only if we lead the rhythm of the dance and decide when to end it."

Under Roosevelt's guidance, Leo raised his head and looked directly into Morganfield's sharp eyes.

He proposed his terms for cooperation.

"Mr. Morganfield, I can accept your proposal in principle," Leo said. "We can purchase products from Morganfield Building Materials Company, but the price must be the true cost price."

Leo continued, "All procurement contracts must undergo rigorous auditing by a third-party accounting firm I commissioned, which has ties to the steelworkers' union. The price of every screw, every bag of cement, must be transparent and open."

Morganfield raised an eyebrow.

Leo didn't give him time to think and went on to propose a second condition.

"The city council must permanently repeal that temporary amendment regarding tendering for municipal works, instead of just reconsidering it, as you have suggested."

"What I want is a permanent solution to this problem, not to have them use the same excuse to hold me back halfway through my project."

"Finally," Leo's tone became extremely serious, "I need your promise."

Morganfield held up his glass, gesturing for him to continue.

"What promise?"

"This commitment concerns the future leadership of this city," Leo said, emphasizing each word.

This statement caused Morganfield to pause for a moment.

Leo made his point very clear.

"Mayor Cartwright is a competent city administrator, but he is not a competent leader. He can only maintain the status quo; he cannot lead Pittsburgh out of its predicament, and you know this better than I do."

"What this city needs is a leader who truly understands its history and dares to plan for its future. Someone who can unite all classes and, like me, bring real money back from Washington to do real things for Pittsburgh."

He didn't explicitly say "I want to run for mayor," but every word he uttered conveyed that meaning.

"Therefore, my third condition is that when the leadership of this city needs to change, I need you and your Morganfield Industries to show sufficient goodwill toward the real winner."

After Leo finished speaking, the entire cigar room fell silent.

Morganfield looked at Leo, the kindness and appreciation in his eyes gone, replaced by a blank expression.

He didn't expect that this seemingly harmless young man would not only not be intimidated by his aura and circumstances, but would also dare to sit here and discuss with him the issue of who holds the highest power in the city.

This young man was not at all the idealist he had imagined who could be easily bought off and controlled.

He was a lion cub who had just bared his fangs.

Morganfield remained silent for a long time, so long that even Leo began to feel a little nervous.

"Mr. President," Leo asked Roosevelt in his mind, "did I say too much? Wouldn't it have been better to reveal our greatest ambitions directly to him and quietly accumulate strength?"

Roosevelt's voice was calm and firm.

"No, child. Quietly accumulating power is the way assassins and spies operate, not the posture of a political leader. At the table of power, you must demonstrate your value and your threat to the other players from the very first moment."

"For someone like Douglas Morganfield, weakness and humility are invitations for him to devour you. If you only make him think you're a community activist content with the status quo, he might help you today, but tomorrow, when you're no longer of any use to him, he can crush you without hesitation."

"But today you showed him that you have the ability and ambition to vie for the highest power in this city. This will elevate him from a pawn he can discard at any time to a potential partner he needs to take seriously, or a formidable enemy in the future."

"He wouldn't help a naive Boy Scout, but he'd be happy to invest in a future winner."

Just as Leo and Roosevelt were having this rapid exchange, Morganfield finally responded.

He suddenly burst into laughter.

The laughter was loud and powerful, echoing throughout the entire room.

"Interesting! He's the most interesting young man I've ever met!" He stood up and personally filled Leo's glass with whiskey. "Much more interesting than that idiot Cartwright, who only knows how to ask for money but can't even manage his own backyard!"

He picked up his wine glass.

"Okay, I agree. I will accept all your conditions."

A few days later, the Pittsburgh City Council convened another emergency meeting.

Speaker Daniel Murphy stated at the meeting with great distress that, after an "in-depth study" by his legal team, they discovered that some provisions of the previously passed temporary amendment were suspected of violating Pennsylvania's Antitrust and Fair Competition Act.

In order to uphold a fair business environment in Pittsburgh, the council decided to unanimously repeal the resolution it had passed just a week earlier.

Leo's "Pittsburgh Renewal One" project has finally cleared the last obstacle.

The local Pittsburgh media outlets, however, displayed a surprising unity and silence regarding the city council's ludicrous and unpredictable policy changes.

The Pittsburgh Chronicle only reported the city council's decision to repeal the amendment in a corner of its municipal news section.

No media outlet questioned the real reasons behind this, and no reporter inquired why a bill that had just been passed would become "suspected of being illegal" within a week.

"Look at these so-called fourth estates, these self-proclaimed uncrowned kings of the media." Roosevelt's voice echoed in Leo's mind, full of undisguised sarcasm.

"They dared to bark at a young man with no background, portraying him as a dangerous radical, but when the real master, Douglas Morganfield, who provided loans to their newspaper and aired GG on their television station, simply coughed lightly."

"They all turned into docile lapdogs, not daring to utter a single fart."

A month later.

The groundbreaking ceremony for the "Pittsburgh Revitalization One" project was officially held in an abandoned community park in South Pittsburgh.

Leo stood on a makeshift stage, behind him were dozens of unemployed workers who had just been hired and were wearing brand-new work clothes.

Below the stage were thousands of community residents and media reporters who had come spontaneously to participate in the ceremony.

Leo gave a brief speech.

He was simply telling everyone that from today onward, Pittsburgh taxpayers' money would truly begin to serve Pittsburgh taxpayers.

After his speech, a huge bulldozer, amidst cheers from the workers, demolished the long-rusted, abandoned slide in the park.

This symbolizes that everything old will be torn down, and everything new will be reborn here.

Leo stood on the construction site, looking at the skyscraper in the city center that belonged to the Morganfield Industries Group in the distance.

He knew that he was only temporarily using this crocodile lurking deep in the city.

The real battle has not yet begun.

Roosevelt's voice echoed in his mind.

"Well done, kid."

"You've learned how to exploit one enemy's greed to defeat another. You've also learned how to win the biggest chips for yourself at the devil's poker table."

"Now, let's spend those two and a half million dollars beautifully. Let's fix the roads, build the parks, and put real jobs into the hands of the workers."

"Let all the people of Pittsburgh see for themselves who is the one who can truly bring about change for them."

"When the time is right, the mayor's office will naturally open its doors to you."