Update on the “DC Madam”

No we're not talking about the new speaker of the house (at least I hope we're not); we're talking about Deborah Jeane Palfrey, the operator of an "escort" service that used to serve "well-heeled" clients in the DC area.

Please refer to the Chi-Square Distribution VOB entry from a few weeks ago for some background. The interesting thing about this case, at least from the Bruck perspective, is the fact that Ms. Palfrey was threatening to divulge her substantial list of clients, ostensibly to help pay for her legal fees. But a federal judge barred her from selling her records, effectively shutting down this handy little avenue for potential profit and extortion.

But there was nothing stopping her from giving away the list, which is what she apparently did, handing over 46 pounds of records to ABC News, no strings attached. The records apparently detail activity between 2002 and 2006, and contain information on 10,000 to 15,000 clients. ABC has already "outed" two of them, both in high level positions in the Bush administration, one of whom has already resigned, and the other of whom is stonewalling. In either case, somebody’s "got some 'splaining to do." You can look up their names and other details elsewhere on the web - I prefer to participate in the mudslinging from a safe distance!

You can imagine my mixed feelings about the records turnover. On the one hand, we've got some sunlight shining its antiseptic rays onto the smarmy underbelly of our nation’s capital, which from a taxpayer’s perspective, is always a good thing. But on the other hand, since the gatekeeper is a member in good standing of the mainstream media, I’m disappointed at the premise of having to wait until after the 2008 elections for anyone associated with the left side of the aisle to be outed. Maybe they’ll surprise me - they’re supposedly going to air a show on the topic on May 4^th, so I’ll reserve judgment till then. Meanwhile, I’m guessing that not too many of the 10,000 to 15,000+ clients on the list are sleeping well these days. And for that matter, if I were one of the escorts, I’d be sleeping with a good luck charm under my pillow. Like a Smith & Wesson or a Glock.

Meanwhile, the IRS has siezed the DC Madam’s considerable assets and savings. So you might be wondering, since she gave all of her records to ABC News, how exactly is she paying for her legal defense? Well, faithful readers, fear not, the almighty internet comes to the rescue! Palfrey set up a legal defense fund website, and it would appear that people actually donated to it. However, she is no longer panhandling by this medium. I quote from her “Donation Information” page:

I would like to thank all those who have thoughtfully donated to my legal defense fund. The monies have been wisely spent in my fight against the United States Government. Nonetheless, I have come to discover of late that the considerable press and subsequent attention shown me has had an ancillary benefit, in the form of various financial opportunities.

Therefore, I now find myself in a position whereby I no longer need to rely upon the kindness of strangers. Again, thank you to those individuals who sympathized with my plight and helped me.

Considering that the Son of Sam law prevents her from benefiting financially from criminal activity (alleged at this time, innocent till proven guilty, blah blah blah), we’re left wondering what those various financial opportunities are. But what I’m really wondering (and is this related to the “various financial opportunities?”) is:

Who are these “kind strangers” who donated money to her legal defense fund…?

…and why?

VA Tech Shooting - A Tribute

I’ve refrained from blogging on the subject of the VA Tech shooting so far - for one thing, millions of people are already doing it, and I suspect that I have not much to add in terms of useful insight and analysis. For another thing, every time I do try to write something sensible on any aspect of it, I just end up in a tirade. So for now I just want to offer a tribute to the fallen. I’ll tell you right now, this one’s a real downer, so if you’re looking for a light-hearted chuckle, you should probably scroll down past the end of it. Maybe next week we’ll talk some more about the pathetic radio stations in the DC area, or make a list of thing that taste bad after brushing your teeth, but for now, right now, it’s time for mourning.

I’ve got the song “Death Letter Blues” by Delta bluesman Son House on my iPod, and frankly it didn’t mean a whole lot to me before last week. I did listen to it occasionally as it’s a catchy blues tune in the Delta style, which I really enjoy. It basically captures the complex issues of love that are unavoidably dredged to the surface when one side of a relationship ceases to exist. I’m sure the late Mr. House wouldn’t have given it such a pointy-headed explanation, but who’s writing this column, him or me?

I got a letter this mornin’, how do you reckon it read?
It said, "Hurry, hurry, gal you love is dead"
Got a letter this mornin’, how do you reckon it read?
You know it said, "Hurry, hurry, a’cause the gal you love is dead"

I grabbed up my suitcase, took off down the road
When I got there she was layin on a coolin' board
I grabbed up my suitcase, and I said and I took off down the road
I said, but when I got there she was layin on a coolin' board

I cued up Death Letter Blues on my iPod a couple of days ago on my way home from work. When I listened to Son House deliver these lyrics, the realization of the depth of the tragedy that occurred last week hit me like a wrecking ball. To no avail I tried to blink away the tears as I considered the number of lives, mostly young ones, snuffed out so pointlessly, and imagined the “death letters” that had to be delivered by various means that dark day. This was on a crowded commuter train; I was hoping the other riders didn’t notice.

Well, I walked up right close, looked down in her face
Said, the good ol' gal got to lay here 'til the Judgment Day
I walked up right close, and I said I looked down in her face
I said the good ol' gal, got to lay here 'til the Judgment Day

Looked like there was 10,000 people standin' round the buryin' ground
I didn't know I loved her 'til they laid her down
Looked like 10,000 were standin' round the buryin' ground
You know I didn't know I loved her 'til they began to let her down

It brought me back to my own college experience, which was a little more than five years ago. A lot of people think of college as “the best years of your life.” I wouldn’t say that’s the case for me; there were a lot of good times and a lot of bad times. I don’t regret it; I’m just saying I wouldn’t call them my best years.

Bruck, I thought this was going to be a tribute to the VA Tech shooting victims, not your personal pity party! Yes, I know, I know. Here’s what I’m getting at: the thing that kept me going through all the pressure, turbulence, and confusion during that time was hope: hope that all the hard work was going to pay off later with a good job and financial independence; hope that the throes of a turbulent love life was somehow going to lead to a stable, satisfying marriage and family; hope of eventually cashing in one way or another on all the deferred gratification.

Maybe I’m wrong, but I’m guessing that at least some of the students who were cut down that morning were in the same place I was at that time. So my heart is crushed by the specter of their hope being taken away from them, needlessly, just to satisfy the hideous cravings of a vengeful, hate-filled madman. They only had a few seconds, or perhaps agonizing minutes, to realize that their hopes were in vain.

Well, I folded up my arms, I slowly walked away
I said, "Farewell honey, I'll see you Judgment Day"
Ah, yeah, oh, yes, I walked away
I said, "Farewell, farewell, I'll see you Judgment Day"

You know I didn't feel so bad, 'til the good lawd sun went down
I didn't have a soul to throw my arms around
I didn't feel so bad, 'til the good lawd sun went down

I did not personally know any of the students or faculty who died. The closest I come is knowing people who know people who know people who died. Whatever I know about the victims personally is drawn from the bios in the newspaper and some of the individual stories that have been floating around the news and internet. Aside from the heroic efforts on the part of professor Liviu Lebrescu, not much about them really stands out for me - they were strangers before the shooting and they’re strangers now. It’s not so terribly relevant here which one was studying French and which one aspired to be a veterinarian, and I’m certainly not going to go into a tiresome discourse about how they might have done so much for mankind had they only been allowed to live.

What is important is that these were real people, and now 32 sets of hopes and dreams are shattered; 32 sets of family and friends now have the unenviable chore of holding funerals and burials that absolutely did not need to happen. 32 obituaries will discuss what the victim was studying or teaching, and in most cases, what direction they were planning to sail in their wide-open horizons. 32 sets of family and friends are left with only memories of what their loved ones said and felt and did before their encounter with fate in the cruelest month.

You know, it's hard to love someone don't love you
Ain't no satisfaction, don't care what in you do
Yeah, it's hard, …love someone don't love you
You know it don't look like satisfaction, don't care what you do

Got up this mornin', just about the break of day
A-huggin' the pillow where she used to lay
Got up this mornin', just about the break of day
A-huggin' the pillow where my good gal used to lay

Hush, thought I heard her call my name
If it wasn't so loud and so nice and plain

Bruck, what kind of tribute is this? Personally, I don’t think a tribute comprised of empty words is going to do much for anybody. I think the most fitting tribute that those of us who were spared violence that day can pay to those who weren’t, is to embrace life, and to wholeheartedly pursue the dreams that we are allowed to continue to hold, and appreciate all the more the opportunity to do so.

Unintended Consequences

“There was a sign in the elevator that said, ‘Do Not Urinate in Elevator’.”

…quoth two close acquaintances of Bruck. They shall remain nameless, don’t even ask, and no, neither of them was your faithful editor. The setting was a condominium complex in sunny Florida, and the time was long ago, during Bruck’s chronological adolescence, which, along with any applicable statute of limitations, has long since come and gone.

As far back as I can remember, indoctrination has played a substantial role in the communications between well-intended adults and younger audiences. It is delivered through the various cultural media, including school, TV, radio, movies, and print, and over the past several years, it really seems to be racheting up. Self-appointed social engineers avail themselves of every captive audience to do battle with the bogeymen du jour including racism, sexism, “homophobia,” smoking, drinking, bullying, all forms of harrassment, “unsafe sex,” intolerance of anything they would prefer that you tolerate, and tolerance of anything they’d prefer you didn’t.

And I’m here to report that it’s not working. It didn’t work back in the good ol’ days, and it isn’t working now. Young people are far more perceptive than we give them credit for. Aside from endowing them with endless fodder for locker room humor, the only benefit of these heavy-handed attempts at thought control is greater levels of sensitivity and precision in the calibration of their BS detectors. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not in favor of destructive attitudes and actions, I’m just saying… I’m just saying, if you have so much as a shred of understanding of the teenage mind, you’ll easily comprehend the futility of merit-based proscriptions against a moving range of objectionable behaviors.

Such as urinating in elevators.

I would never be so naïve as to claim that I have all the answers, or even most of them; I sure don’t, but one advantage I do have over most other adults of my generation is my own failure to attain significant emotional maturity beyond that of a 17-year-old. This is also why I’m really looking forward to my children reaching that age, which, for the oldest, is right around the corner. Meanwhile, like I say, I think I do have a leg up on understanding the mind of a teenager.

Not to worry, I’m not going to digress into a tedious discourse on teenage psychology, nor am I going to tell you how to raise your kids. The fact of the matter is, parents don’t have anywhere near as much influence as they think on how their spawn “turn out.” Some teens never did have any inclination to do anything wrong, then when they don’t, you have to endure smugly-dispensed “wisdom” from their sanctimonious parents on how they managed to raise such angels, while other teens can drive their parents, neighbors, and local law enforcement nuts, independent of parental input or lack thereof.

Let me just offer a few pointers from the perspective of my own suspended adolescence. What doesn’t work: nagging, preaching, arguing, and excessive prohibitions. What does work: respect, listening, articulating standards and expectations, listening, giving them opportunities to succeed, listening, and setting a genuine good example (kids’ ability to detect hypocrisy and double standards starts at a very early age).

One thing that definitely doesn’t work: social engineering.

Bruck’s acquaintances continued:

“If we hadn’t seen the sign that said, ‘Do Not Urinate in Elevator,’ it would never in a million years have occurred to us to urinate in the elevator.”

As I said, I did not personally violate the elevator, but in the spirit of full disclosure I can’t honestly say that at the time I would not have succumbed to the temptation. In fact my inner adolescent wants to go back to that condo complex in Florida right now…

Bureaucrat Olympics

One day last week, Jim, a co-worker of mine, came back to my desk wearing a big grin and said, “Bruck, you would have been proud! Last night I got to the Crystal City Metro station at 5:09 and made the 5:12 train!” Actually, he didn’t say Bruck; he called me some different name that I’m still trying to figure out.

Jim went on to detail this adventure, which I’ll share with you after a bit of background:

Jim and I work in the same office and live in the same general neck of the woods, so we follow the same route to work. This entails riding a commuter train to a subway station, and then taking the subway the rest of the way to our building. He and I board the commuter train at different stations and often get on at different times, but aside from that, our commuting paths are identical. It’s a fairly stress-free commute, except for the approximately 1/2 mile walk between the commuter train station and the subway platform.

The shortest route between the commuter train and the subway takes Jim, me, and thousands of fellow passengers through the “Crystal City Shops,” which is basically an indoor shopping arcade. It’s full of quaint little stores (Mad About Bears, Puppet Palace) plus some practical ones (Radio Shack, CVS), and some restaurants and fast food places including the ubiquitous Starbucks. So after every commuter train expels its riders, a thundering herd of briefcase- and backpack-wielding bureaucrats storms through the Crystal City Shops, past the kitschy, catchy stores and restaurants, on its way to the bowels of government and free enterprise. Pamplona’s got nothing on us!

In the other direction, in the afternoon, it’s more of a steady stream of rushing, stumbling bureaucrats, as the subways drop off smaller numbers of passengers at the Crystal City station on a more frequent basis, and only a portion of each load is destined to the commuter train. Generally these commuters are more relaxed as well, and only get worked up if they’re in danger of being late for their afternoon train home. I’ve been in that situation a number of times myself; my “best time” so far is about 5 minutes. Normally it takes 8 to 10 minutes, but a few minutes can be shaved off when needed. Personally I find it distasteful to run while wearing a coat and tie, but will accede if compelled.

A short walk shouldn’t be stressful; in fact it should be an invigorating, relaxing experience, but for several reasons, this one is not. For one thing, there are shoppers and other non-commuters in the mall. They have every right to be there of course, but they do present a hazard in that they have entirely different reasons for being there, and they neither share nor support ours. Another stress-inducer is the commuters themselves - often one person’s concept of sprightliness diverges from another’s, which itself is fine, but the slower ones frequently coagulate and block those of us who wish to move faster. A third stress-inducer is the route itself. It includes crossing a busy street, then once inside the arcade, there are numerous right angle turns, changes in elevation, and bottlenecks.

Seasoned VOB readers may be old enough to remember the OJ Simpson (still combing the golf courses of southern California in search of the real killer) advertisements that show him running through an airport, hurdling rows of chairs, etc., to get from one end of it to the other. I can’t remember what they were advertising, but it was a rather striking ad. I was reminded of it by Jim’s story of making the trip from the subway to the commuter train station in 3 minutes.

Jim went on, “I got to the Crystal City metro at 5:09 and thought, ‘should I go for it, or just accept the fact that I’m late, waste 40 minutes at the Hamburger Hamlet, and get on the next train?’ I thought, no, I’m going for it! So I pretty much sprinted up the stairs and through the mall, and when I got to the entrance, I could see the train at the station, but my heart sank when I saw that I still had to cross Crystal Drive, and the traffic was moving.

“I was thinking, ‘(expletive deleted), foiled!’ But in an instant, something in me said no, I’ve made it this far, I’m not going to waste it! So I rushed out into the street, stopped traffic, and ran across. Horns were honking and people were yelling at me, but I just waved and kept going. I ran to the platform and jumped into the train just as the fat conductor was hoisting himself up the stairs and turning around to close the doors.”

I’ve often thought, why not invent olympic sports based on practical situations, rather than carry on the usual contrived, anachronistic ones like throwing a javelin (we have guns now) or pole-vaulting (I usually just take the escalator)? I’m thinking of things like a young mother getting through a crowded food court with a tray of chicken fingers and lemonade, pushing a stroller and corraling a 2-year-old while carrying on a cell phone conversation. Parallel parking school buses would be fun to watch. I’d take that over ice dancing any day.

So I’m thinking, getting through a crowded shopping center without knocking over any of the meandering shoppers or shuffling gawkers would at least be a good exhibition sport in the 2008 games. But then I’m thinking, wait a minute, with people like Jim around, why would I invent a sport where the best I can personally hope for is silver?