NOTE: If you haven’t been following this from the beginning, and if you want to know the full sequence of events, start with the introduction. Click on Archives on the right.
Theo Tinderbrush pulls up at the Hadron Shopping Center opposite me just as I get out of my car. We are both heading for lunch. I follow him out of the heat and the sound of helicopter rotors beating the humid air over head. He gallops down the steep cool stairs to the entrance of the Emperor Babur Restaurant, in the basement, under The Ab. and Cheek Fitness Center. Hundreds if not thousands of different colored strings hang across the windows on either side of the Bose Gallery’s glass door at the bottom of the stairs. Unsurprisingly the show is called, “Strings Attached”. Under the announcement I am told in Copper Plate Gothic Bold, ‘reading Buddhist scripture inspired the artist’s interest in pain and attachment’.
Indranil, the manager is standing to the right under the pointed arch at the entrance to the Emperor Babur. When he sees Theo he walks out and greets us with his palms together, and a bow.
“Ah Mr. Theo, are you having the buffet today?”
“As always.”
Theo shakes his hand and Indranil then shakes mine with a brilliant smile under his thick black moustache. He turns and points out a table then leads the way.
“Please, this way.”
Walking past occupied tables in the busy dining room, I can see Frans Banning Cocq sitting across the room by the wall with Albrecht. The top of his head is bald with long strings of light blond hair falling from the back over the collar of his red tee shirt.
Albrecht doesn’t notice us although he is facing this way. Theo puts his brief case down on his chair.
“I left Boston about five hours ago and haven’t had a bite to eat since.”
“Not even peanuts?”
“They don’t do free peanuts any more.”
“Your case looks heavy.”
“Yeah, conference materials.”
We go back to the Buffet in front of the bar. Theo opens the top of the first chafing dish and yellow scented rice fills the air with saffron.
“So Fred, what’s new in Fauxmont?”
“I haven’t seen a copy of the neighborhood newsletter in over a year.”
“Haven’t you got the web address?”
“No, I used to get a copy in the mail.”
Theo loads his plate of rice with dhal, curried goat, and now butter chicken.
He is about to close the lid on the chafing dish,
“You doing any of this?”
“Always Theo.” He leaves it open for me.
“Fred there hasn’t been a paper news letter since 2014, now it’s an email attachment or you can see it on FoxmontHood.org.”
“Sounds Hiphop!”
“No, Macadamia! Albrecht has put a link in there to the Armond Macadamia campaign site.”
“Albrecht is sitting over there, look.”
“Yeah, is that the militia guy with him?”
“I thought Macadamia’s campaign had folded.”
“That’s what the media say, but I checked out the link and ended up on Shrinkrap.”
“Albrecht for Macadamia? I thought he would be for Trump!”
“Fred you have to get on line! Shrinkrap has a piece saying his campaign never did fold. It reorganized.”
“So where did that story come from?”
“Who knows? So much info out there is simply mistaken or designed to mislead. One thing about air travel, it gives me time to browse on my tablet.”
“Theo, Mac is tied up in the Axel Ensor deal in Europe.
“I saw that too, about the tower in Brussels … by the way, I want to talk to that Militia guy, ah, what’s his name again?”
“Banning Cocq.”
“I should have remembered. You know, Daisie told me that’s the name of one of the leaders in some painting by Rembrandt.”
“I think she’s right, it’s called the Night Watch.”
“Well she’s our local Rembrandt, she ought to paint him.”
“She could use the commission.”
“Any way, being a militia guy, he is snuggling up to Macadamia. I’ll bet that’s why he is lunching with Albrecht, you know, getting his ‘troops’ in line!”
We return to our table and the Hispanic waiter with a turban offers us a wine list, which we refuse. Theo requests tea. The turban serves us both aromatic tea he calls Masala Chai. The waiter turns to serve others.
“I thought Chai was Russian!”
“Fred, it is also Hindi and Turkish and some other languages use it too.
“I don’t see how Armond Macadamia can run Theo. Mac is getting old. I hear he needs Jake Trip to take care of business for him.”
“Fred, he doesn’t have to do much he can’t do from his office. For instance his campaign is using Fibonacci Corp’s enormous PR databases to identify various constituencies.”
Theo’s red hair is graying, his gut keeps him back from the table.
“You sound pretty cynical today.”
“Not at all! My researches on the web led me to Adam Curtis’s documentary, The Century of Self, you can catch it on You Tube. I’ll send you the link if you are interested. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eJ3RzGoQC4s) It’s about Edward Bernays, called the father of Public Relations.”
“Not a well known name.”
“No, given his extraordinary influence, he should be up there with Einstein and Freud, household names.”
“So famous, and so little understood!”
“Iconic”
“Come to think of it what was his influence?”
“He realized that most people react emotionally and intuitively, not thoughtfully when it comes to voting and buying products.”
“Do you believe that?”
“I think it is historical fact. Just think about all the successful promotions in our lifetimes?”
“Well yes, our candidates are presented just like products.”
“Way back in 1952, Eisenhower reluctantly did a series of tv spots for his presidential campaign. He felt it was beneath him to do ads, but said he “Its time for a change” in various contexts. (https://www.c-span.org/video/?188176-1/eisenhower-answers-america) Sound familiar?”
“You notice how successful modern candidates have all run on change?”
“and the more things change Theo, the more they stay the same!”
“Change is a wonderful slogan. Makes you think things will get better, if the pitch is right.”
“Okay, so what is Mac offering.”
“His whole campaign is on line, no tv spots.”
Oh so the Fib. can craft messages precisely to relatively small groups.”
“Individuals even!”
“The Republicans have chosen. Isn’t it too late?”
“He is running as an Independent, a sort of post party candidate, with a variety of messages, a lot of nostalgia centering around strength.”
“Military strength…”
“What else?”
“American soaps are big and emulated all over the world. American Hiphop is catching on too, I have heard both Christian and Moslem Rappers. How’s that for power?”
“Yeah, but that is soft, commercial and cultural power.”
“Oh yes, military power is sexy.”
“Profitable too.”
“Well, young people all over the place love rap …”
“… and it gets the extremist Mullahs excited too, goes against their ideas of purity and all that.”
“They too have learned to tell people what they want to hear!”
“Yup, and they are huge online.”
“Interesting how jazz, rock, British Pop and now hip hop all came out of our poorest black population and took off!”
Our waiter refills the teacups and offers more Naan, which Theo is glad to have.
“You think Mac is stealing Trump’s thunder then?”
“Partly, he is banging the war drums. War is where men prove themselves, and women do their duty at home, gory glory … you know!”
“Right, the oldest play in the book…”
“ … and it works Fred. It just keeps on working!”
“Wars are great for the party in power.”
“Oh yes! You can call the opposition traitors!”
“Though it didn’t work that way for Lyndon Johnson.”
“It may have been good for Mac’s generation but not now…the heat has gone out of it. It’s cooled off, do you really think it will fly?”
“Look what Bush did after 911.”
“Yes, if there is another attack, maybe Mac has a point.”
“I’ve seen a variety of his posts on line showing Mac as a sort of Col. Sander’s fried chicken figure, friendly, avuncular, with flowing white hair, selling Southern fried prejudices and taking a dig at illegal immigrants. He takes a dig at Wall Street for Liberals like us. For conservatives he points to eight years of Obama’s socialism, and his cowardly foreign policy. Appeasing the Iranians instead of getting in there and taking them out. It all depends which segment he is messaging. He’ll be a kinder gentler more thoughtful Trump.”
“Yeah broader appeal … maybe he is on to something.”
“So, we must all be pretty unhappy with the status quo.”
“Look at the insurgent candidates from right and left. Now we are called consumers rather than citizens. At the same time a lot of people are losing jobs to technology, so they can’t consume as happily as ‘When America was Great’.”
“We are so attached to our possessions, not to mention our beliefs.”
“Oh I know, look at all the Snaz Self Storage places Jake Trip has opened around town.”
“Yes, he is sponsoring Laticia Lantern’s Spin Show’ now, ‘Keep your dreams and memories safe at Snaz Self Storage!’
“That is all Mac’s capital at work.” Theo wipes his mouth and drops the napkin. “I don’t even remember my dreams.”
“You don’t have to. Our commercial tv culture provides endless ways to remember and realize them.”
“Yeah, some kind of Nirvana! reality tv is the bottom of the barrel tough.”
“It is no more real than other shows.”
“Well right, but if we all start thinking about reality there is no knowing what might happen.”
“Sounds painful.”
“Yes, and therefore unlikely!”
“Are you still working on this sir?”
“All through thanks, nothing left to work on!” Theo backs up his chair to pick up his napkin from the floor. He strains to lean down but can’t reach over his own bulk.
“I will get that for you sir … see, no problem.”
Our waiter stoops down easily for the napkin and flips it over his shoulder, then takes away our plates. We are the only customers left in the place.
Indranil is walking over to us.
“Mr. Theo, Mr. Fred, did you enjoy your meal?”
He puts the check on the table for us in a lotus leaf shaped leather folder, skillfully tooled with a rendering of the Emperor in yellow.
