The voice on the other end of the phone shouldn't have surprised me, but it always does.
Gadsden Jevic was back.
Gadsden is one of my oldest, and closest friends. Over the years, we grow apart, but somehow he always manages to find me and it doesn't take long before we're like twin sons from different mothers again.
Anyway, Gadsden had been off doing what Gadsden always seems to do, which is find himself in the middle of something. In this case, it was the Occupy Wall Street protests, although I'm not sure he ever actually made it to Wall Street. He might have been in Atlanta, or more likely Greensboro.
But as always, he came back having gone off the deep end - again.
And I mean, waaay off the deep end.
Gadsden came back preaching about the evils of corporate America. For example:
- CEO's should, by law, not be allowed to make more than 20 times that of the lowest paid employee of the company. For example, if your lowest employee makes $40,000 a year, the CEO can't make any more than $800,000 a year. And if the CEO wants to make more, the company has to raise the salary of the lowest-paid employee first.
-- Banks should, by law, not be allowed to have any more than a set amount of assets that is appropriately in proportion to the smallest clients. Gadsden hadn't thought this one out as well as he had the first one; or maybe he just didn't explain it to me well enough for me to remember.
But then .... then .... THEN ...
"We shouldn't stop at Wall Street,'' Gadsden said. "It should apply to every day situations. No one person is better than another. Everyone's talents and gifts should be recognized as having equal value."
Which means? Again, in Jevic's words:
"You go into the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art, and see all these paintings considered 'masterpieces,''' he said. "I think they should be side-by-side with some of those from those 'starving artists' you see who sell their stuff from a rented ballroom at a Days Inn. Or with the pictures from elementary school kids who could be inspired by seeing their art hanging in a famous museum. Imagine the sense of self-worth that would give them!"
It didn't end there.
"Let's take baseball,'' my buddy went on. "What's considered an excellent batting average? .300. But this year, Detroit's Miguel Cabrera hit .344. The Mets' Jose Reyes hit .337. I think baseball should make a rule that every hit a guy gets that puts his average one point over .300 should be credited to someone who isn't hitting anywhere close to .300. What would Delmon Young have given for another couple dozen hits that might have gotten him closer to .300? A new contract, better able to take care of his family, improved sense of self-worth.
"Or football. You love college football. We know once a team wins seven games it's guaranteed a winning season and a bowl game. That's all that should matter. So take LSU or Alabama or Oklahoma- every win above their seventh should be credited to Ole Miss or Kentucky or Kansas. That way those coaches don't lose their jobs, those players feel good for giving good effort. The Alabamas and Oklahomas can continue to play hard and win games, but those wins are credited to the needy and less fortunate!"
As bizarre as Gadsden began to sound, I could see his thinking as the logical extension of the Occupy Wall Street nobody-is-better-than-anybody else mentality.
Here's the thing: I knew Gadsden didn't go to hang out at one of those "Occupy ...'' movements because he believed in it. He saw it has a great place to pick up girls. That's one of the great traditions of protests: the girls are always passionate about the 'movement,' while guys realize passionate girls are emotionally vulnerable and ... well, at least that's what I've heard.
Have you listened to the way these protesters communicate? Repeating everything the 'leader' says? The first time I heard it (at the rejection of Civil Rights legend John Lewis at the Occupy Atlanta movement - see it here ) I couldn't help but think of that scene from Monty Python's “Life of Brian” where Brian, who has been mistaken for the Messiah, shouts to the crowd, “You are all individuals!” And the crowd shouts back: “We are all individuals!”
It's ridiculous, of course, like George Orwell's Animal Farm come to life.
"We have a process!" Gadsden said he chanted, along with the protesters.
Unfortunately, of course, no one knew what that process was.
Except the leaders. Of which, technically, there should be none because that would lead to the same mess the protesters were protesting.
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