Meeting the Great Unwashed Pt. 3

Upon the Stoa, I will once again put the serious issues of the day to the side in order to make the teenagers in our local High School laugh.

The sun rose over the Mississippi river. The dawn was warm and pleasant. The morning was busy as patrons ordered big fancy breakfasts at the restaurant along the river. This was an older crowd. In a place like New Orleans, the young would be hung over and in bed.

The Moderator moved from table to table growing more frustrated at the obvious ignorance of the population. Because his show targeted the intelligent and the educated he had no idea that the general population appeared so far below the curve.

He came to a table with a single couple in their early 60s. They were well dressed and just finishing up their breakfast.

"I'm with the Moderator Forum and I'd like to ask you a few questions." The couple seemed happy to be involved in the program.

"What do you think about the President's latest budget proposal?"

The woman spoke up first, "If the Congress will just pass his legislation then things will get better. If the fat cats in Wall Street will just get behind his proposals and pay their fair share, then we can heal as a nation."

The Moderator was delighted that he had someone intelligent to talk to, "Financial experts say that adding $1.3 trillion debts for the next 10 years will ruin the country, so should his proposals be passed without further thought?"

The woman looked like she had eaten a lemon, the man chuckled silently. "I am a lawyer and I'm familiar with the way the economy works. You are a journalist. What can you know of, let alone understand, the larger world." She said with a fairly condescending tone.

The Moderator, non-plussed, went on, "The United States became wealthy and powerful on real growth and productivity. The debt being proposed in next year's budget is more than all the years of this nation's debt since before Obama."

"Why you racist! The country has been ruined and it will take unprecedented, even heroic measures to save it!!" She was quickly incensed by the Moderator's even-toned question.

"Ma'am, if the goal is economic growth, you don't take all the money from the rich, saddle the middle-class with generational debt, and enslave the poor on government hand-outs. The issue is growth, not the inequities of income." The Moderator thought that this well-reasoned, intellectual discussion should spur on further, deep debate.

Instead, a half drank glass of orange juice slashed him straight in the face and down his $2,000 suit. "Come on, Dan, I can't listen to this bigot any more!" The woman stamped away from the table, the man throwing money quickly down on the table. The man refused to make eye contact with the Moderator.

Coward, he thought.

Wiping the orange juice from his suit, he turned to the camera man, "Boy, I hope this day gets better."

The camera man gestured to the back of a broad brimmed sun hat to his left.

The Moderator straightened his suit and placed his left hand on the woman's shoulder, "Ma'am, I'm with...aaaaaaahhhhh"

The woman snatched his hand and twisted two fingers back until they broke. She screamed, "HEP, HEP, I'M BEING RAPED!!" She let go of his hand only after pulling him to one side, where he had to catch himself by dropping the microphone and gripping the wooden table. A fruit carving knife followed, pinning his hand fast to the table.

The woman spun over and fell into the arms of a group of University fraternity men. The one group in the city not drunk.

"LOOK AT MAH BLOUSE, HE WAS GRABBIN' AT ME!"

Through the mayhem and the pain, the Moderator barely saw the blue and gold shirts that hurled over the table at him. For a moment he saw the greek letters: Alpha Tau Omega and then his hand tore free from the table.

He must have blacked out because the next thing he knew, there were flashing blue lights in his eyes. A woman, sobbed while speaking to a policeman, her large brimmed hat fluttered in the breeze, showing shoulder length black hair.

The next time he woke up he was in a New Orleans hospital being treated for two broken fingers, a severe laceration of the right hand, a broken nose, blown eye orbit, crushed cheek bone, three broken ribs, and two missing teeth.

Sitting next to him was a Louisiana State trooper informing him, now that he was conscious, that he was under arrest for assault and attempted rape.

How in the world does this stuff happen to him. That little monster gets him in trouble and keeps going free!

More later, folks.

Live well.

--Zavost