Unlikely Dialogue

(telephone rings)

Mr. Richard MacMillan: Hello

(silence)

Mac: Hello

(silence, click, pause)

Voice on other end of line: May I speak to Mr. Richard MacMillan, please.

Mac: You've got him. Who's calling?

Voice: I am calling from Prove What You Want Research Associates to ask you a few questions. This is not a sales call. It will only take ten minutes, and you will be eligible to win a $25 Amazon gift card simply for participating in this survey. May I begin?

Mac: Not interested...

Voice: But sir, you should be interested. Here is your opportunity to take part in the great American democratic process (small "d", of course), and to make a contribution to building our economy and creating jobs, all in ten, short minutes. And then, there's that Amazon gift card...

Mac: I am not interested...

Voice: Please...I need you to be interested. This is my 456th call today, Mr. MacMillan, and not one person has taken the survey or received the gift card. I am sure you would like to be first to do your patriotic duty, and to help me keep my job as well. Please, please, let me ask you these silly questions. I know, they're designed to get the answers Prove What You Want is being paid to get. But I can tell you are a just man, not wanting to be the cause of little old me losing her job. Besides, I can tell you’re a man with a sense of humor. Please, O please, play along with me. What have you got to lose?

Mac: Besides my sanity? Well, OK, you win; fire away.

Voice: Thank you, O thank you. You won't regret a minute of these ten.

Mac: Humph!

Voice: All-righty; here's number 1: Which robocall would you rather receive after midnight: one from Rachel concerning your gas bill, or one from the Captain offering you a really cheap Caribbean cruise?

Mac: Ehh...neither? I don't want either call any time, especially not after midnight.

Voice: Oh, I am so sorry, Mr. MacMillan–”neither" is not an acceptable answer. This is a forced choice kind of test...well, except it's not a test, you know. It's a survey to find out your preferences. So, which would it be?

Mac: Well actually, it's still neither. But given the choices, in the middle of the night I'd rather hear about a cruise than about gas...though I did kind of like the sound of Rachel's voice.

Voice: Good; then you'd like to be robocalled about a really cheap Caribbean cruise after midnight...

Mac: Well, not really...

Voice: On to question number 2: On a scale of 1 to 5, where 1 means "sometimes a little tiny bit annoyed" and 5 means "this is more fun than sex"...on that scale, how do you feel about robocalls when you get them?

Mac: That's my range of choices–from "a little bit annoyed" to "more fun than sex"? I hate robocalls, hate them all more than I hate boiled turnips.

Voice: Oh, Mr. MacMillan, you have such a way with words! But surely you cannot indiscriminately hate them all. Perhaps your extreme reaction has something to do with your relationship to your mother. Have you considered that?

Mac: My "relationship to my mother"? Where do you get off at? What kind of a survey is this...is this some kind of a psychological assessment or something?

Voice: Well, yes, actually it is. We want to know what various kinds of robocalls do for your sex life when you get them after midnight. Judging from your responses so far, the answer is, "they do wonders."

Mac: Oh, for Christ's sake. I've had enough. I'm hanging up.

Voice: Not so fast, Mr. MacMillan. In order to get your Amazon gift card, you need to answer three more questions. I will say that they are for statistical purposes only, because that's what this coffee-stained cheat sheet says I am supposed to say, but (her voice getting softer and more seductive) you should also know I am looking for a man...

Mac: A man?

Voice: A man...so just answer the questions if you know what's good for you...if you know what I mean.

Mac (succumbing): Yes, dear. Shoot.

Voice: How old are you?

Mac: Fifty-six.

Voice: On scale of 1 to 5, where 1 means "good for my age" and 5 means "stunning for any age," how sexy are you?

Mac: A solid 5, baby; a solid 5!

Voice: And finally, can we meet for a drink tonight?

Mac: Sure, but it will have to be after midnight.

Whose Point of View?

Some thoughts about editorial integrity at Cleveland’s barely-daily newspaper, but leading to wider implications...

There’s a political columnist with the Cleveland Plain Dealer whose work often makes me wonder where he is coming from. He is Kevin O’Brien, and his role the paper is more that that of one columnist among several. He is also assistant editor, not only editing others’ columns, but also selecting everything that appears in the PD’s Forum section. He’s one influential man in the paper’s/media group’s stable, and though his choice of material for the Forum is fair and diverse, his own writing drives me nuts.

It’s not that Kevin O’Brien is conservative. I understand and accept the rightness of a newspaper presenting opinion writers who offer a range of perspectives and viewpoints. My problem with O’Brien is that he is, to my mind, an off-the-edge-of-the-cliff conservative who is so far right that he rarely lets facts get in the way of his rants.  He makes Charles Krathammer sound middle-of-the-road and George Will sound smart (which he probably is). He is Rush Limbaugh on printer’s ink, a male Maureen Dowd.

O’Brien has so upset me that I have written to the Plain Dealer twice to suggest that he be fired, despite the fact I am usually tolerant of diverse viewpoints and always defend the need to present them. But that is how much he irks me. I’ve been told he is really a nice guy, but I do not doubt for a moment that he would banish me and my liberal kind from the face of the earth if he could.

So, when Ted Diadiun, who is sort of the Plain Dealer’s ombudsman, wrote a column headed “Columnists give off sparks that illuminate multiple points of view” for the October 13 PD, I read it with great interest, wondering what he would tell us about my old nemesis. Diadiun began by explaining that “a columnist’s work [does not go] into the paper unedited. But the editor is there mainly to be sure that the column makes sense, is grammatical and won’t get the paper into legal difficulty.” He quotes Chris Quinn, vice president for content of the Northeast Ohio Media Group, as saying that “as long as the column is factual, and well-reasoned and fair, it goes in. But it does have to be those three things.”

Even though I believe Kevin O’Brien’s work often falls short of those standards, I have no energy for doing the work necessary to prove it again. Why bother? I have tried before and he is still there at the Plain Dealer, spewing out words that sometimes make no sense and often fall far short of being “factual, and well-reasoned and fair.”

But as I read further I witnessed O’Brien doing himself in. 

Diadiun reports that O’Brien said "he doesn’t write his columns necessarily to persuade,” and then quotes the man himself:

“I don’t write for people who disagree with me. If they read it and think about what I say, great. But as a conservative in Northeast Ohio, I’m writing for the minority who think the way I do, and who deserve to have someone in the media taking their side, and giving them some affirmation.”

So: when I read Kevin O’Brien’s words I read not his own thoughts but rather his take on the group-think of a minority (funny: conservatives often claim they speak for a majority). He sees himself as representing conservatives, and as responsible for affirming them. He submits his individual independence as a columnist to those who hold points of view broadly like his in order to take their side and urge them on, no matter how wrong or irrational they may be. Perhaps he is uninterested in persuading others to see things as he sees them because he doesn’t know how he sees things apart from the views of those he represents. Being “factual, and well-reasoned and fair” is not required unless the right-wingers for whom he is a shill should someday become that way.

But now O’Brien is no longer a shill for conservatives, because he’s outed himself. He has revealed his own secret. We don’t have to read him anymore. We just have to attend to the rantings and ravings of the Tea Party and we are inside Kevin O’Brien’s head.

How many other columnists and opinion shapers see themselves in the service of particular constituencies or groups? Conversely, how many think and write out of their own hearts and convictions, conscious of their particular point of view, but unwilling to bend everything they offer to that point of view, especially when facts take them to another place? I’d like to read columns that tell me why a thing is so, even when I wish that thing were not so, so I might learn something new and, if possible, speak and act upon it myself. I would even like such informed and independent thinking from the pens and keyboards of “liberal” writers and commentators.

So again I ask, why does the Plain Dealer need Kevin O’Brien? Why do they pay him to say things straight out of the scripts of a particularly partisan minority group? Let the right-wing pay him, so that the Plain Dealer can hire a conservative columnist and editor capable of thinking and writing for him or herself, willing even to try to persuade me. I can subscribe to that.

God of the Gun

The Holy Book in my heart–my shield against all enemies. My means of attack under the jacket of my pagan western-style clothes (all black), so out-of-place on Nairobi's streets, but not here, in this playground of the rich.

God and guns. Great good. Death’s dearest wish.

The car at an open back entrance to the mall (the work of an inside accomplice). I, through the shadows, now inside, and in a casual stroll toward the central transept, to my assigned place (no notice, please!). Others here, too, on time. Perfect planning.

From behind the northwest pillar, a clear view of the ignorant masses. Gun now in hand in plain sight, arm horizontal. No retreat now. Finger at trigger: CRACK! CRACK! CRACK! A dozen explosions of blood and fleshy pieces. Screams of men, women, and children in the chaos. No near exit, no safe place for any of them. None! Retribution and victory over the infidel, even fellow believers different in their believing. CRACK! CRACK! CRACK! So purifying, so satisfying, so cleansing, so just: blood sacrifice for the almighty's glory. Righteous terror, clean execution!

But in a flash, a bullet with my name on it into my heart. From where? From whom? Blood and arm and gun down to the floor. Blurring vision. Gurgles of blood in my throat. A muffled scream (my turn): "God...good!" in the death of the innocent, and of me, now guilty.

"Gun?...God?...Good?" Yes, and in Ohio, too.

One Scene, Two Points of View

The vaulted living room of the million-dollar McMansion glowed with the light of celebrity. The near-rich and the almost-famous who inhabited the faux-opulent space filled it with vacuous chatter about one another. Richard fit right in here, and he knew it. His most recent film had garnered praise enough to be noticed and criticism enough to be interesting. His easy good looks were sure to attract the attention he craved.

He surveyed the scene in a way that he hoped would not be noticed. To his left there stood a small group of young film makers with whom he might be able to network his path to another success. The couple standing near the fireplace–an older, highly-respected producer and his wife–might be a good contact. How could he introduce himself without fawning?

Then his eyes fell on a woman whose beauty and bearing stopped his search. Who was she? He couldn't recall her. His mind ran through all the starlets he'd encountered along the way to his modest accomplishment, but she was not among them. His imagination undressed her and transported her to being alone with him. Thoughts of spending much time with anyone else that evening were overwhelmed by his desire to be with her. She was alone, and apparently available.

As he took his first step in her direction, she turned slightly to her left and headed toward the entry hall. Had she seen his approach? Was she leaving already? Had she forgotten something, or was someone she knew coming to join her? Richard hesitated, not wanting to seem to be chasing her, yet not wanting to lose her. In Richard’s moment of doubt she left the room and his sight.

+++++

At a little past nine I arrive at the Brown's home just outside Beverly Hills. I am sure I have been invited because of the decent, if not great, reviews Sleeper in Seattle got, and Dave and Marge think I might be useful to their growing company. But I also know I have a lot to gain from being seen here, both because of the other professional contacts I can make, and because you never know who you might meet at a big party. Reasons enough to attend alone...better not to have to worry about anyone except me.

I am not entirely comfortable in this tux, but that's required. Just have to trust my smile and my looks. Just inside the door of the living room I stop, stand tall, and casually look over the crowd. Who could be most useful to me? The young, aspiring folks like me, or the older, more connected men and women of the industry? I have to chose carefully, given this singular opportunity. 

Then I see her. My heart stops. I don't recognize her at all, and I think I've met most the young actresses in Hollywood, even spending quality time alone with many of them. Something about her, not just her beauty, but the way she stands and carries herself, even with no one else around her, makes me burn to meet her, to spend the evening with her. To hell with professional contacts.

I take a step in her direction, and she moves. O shit! She's headed to the door. On her way out? To meet someone else? She disappears from my sight, and I am alone again.