Jack of Harts

The Second Great Depression was not as great an issue in Hawaii as it was in other areas of America. Make no mistake that there were hardships, but the Hawaiians had a far more important issue to deal with while the Federal Government on the other side of the world was losing its hold on reality. The governor of Hawaii was a crook. And not merely the garden-variety corrupt politician that voters had long since become accustomed to. He was crooked. He took bribes before handing out lucrative government contracts. And if a company didn’t have one of his children on their board of directors they never got the premium contracts. Banks gave his family members generous loans or were audited. He fired prosecutors investigating companies that avoided safety rules to the detriment of hundreds of thousands of people, and women and children all over the islands feared his creepy touching. His crimes against the people of Hawaii were legion, and they actually voted him out in an overwhelming no-confidence vote that left them far more concerned about who would succeed him, than whatever it was the corrupt politicians in Washington DC were crying about.

American Samoa is home to America’s primary military base in the South Pacific Ocean. It is actually a reserve, multi-service base manned almost entirely by local Samoans who maintain the historical naval base buildings for tourists to visit. The permanent garrison is small, and most of its duties include air and sea shows for the locals and tourists, or saving people from accidents and natural disasters. They also serve as a recruiting center for locals who are interested in serving in the military. But beneath the surface, literally, is an entire military complex devoted to protecting Samoa from any stray Chinese, Russian, or other agency that may not have Samoa’s best interests at heart. Undersea and underground defenses surround the base, and highly classified training runs suggest it can deploy all turrets, walls, and other parts of the defense and attack grids into combat positions in a matter of minutes. And though the defenses have never been needed against a human foe, they were deployed in 2156 to block a tsunami from rushing into the harbor and destroying the city. That one act recouped every dollar sunk into the base over the centuries, and few locals begrudge the investment into what is otherwise a glorified tourist trap and recruitment center.

American Samoa is much like the Midwestern States in many ways, if you replace the endless tracks of fields with endless tracks of ocean. Small towns or clan gathering areas of between a hundred and a thousand people dot the various islands, both natural and manmade. They farm fish instead of wheat or corn for a living, and they work long hours to keep their boats and nets working. Samoan fishers are trained in the old ways, without relying on personal fishing assistants to do their work, just as they are taught in school to do their own math and remember their history from their own memory rather than using a personal computer. The granting of personal computer and personal assistant is a coming of age ceremony in modern Samoa, proof that the child is one step closer to becoming an adult. The work ethic they learn as children is one of the traits that make Samoans so effective when they go to seek success in the big city of Pago Pago and beyond.