There is no reason to explain further either the opinions about developers or the developers themselves. The word itself, as it comes from the pen, falls like the blade of the guillotine: developers!" -- Pierre Marcabru's comments on the view of Giraudoux's "Madwoman of Chaillot," elaborated upon by Louis Chevalier in (his magnificent) The Assassination of Paris.

One of the great thrills of my teenage Broadway life was seeing Bancroft (as Annie Sullivan) whirling (ten-year-old?) Patty Duke (as Helen Keller) around by the waist...while the tiny icon held onto a chair in defiance. Arthur Penn, the director, had her lock onto the seat until she had spun around at least twice..."threatening" the audience with her tightly gripped weapon...before she finally released it, bouncing toward the back wall of the stage setting.

All those professionals deserve the praise they got for mounting the William Gibson play back in the early 60s, especially Bancroft today...on the day following her death.

But none of the performances rose to the heights --or should I say the depths?-- of what I was subjected to the other night...as I attended a "real estate" seminar at the fancy shmancy Toll House in Los Gatos. All those potential (filthy rich) buyers of property in Paris...and the rest of France sat hypnotized as the main salesperson delivered his awesome Zig Ziglar rap. (1A)

My evening with the group was for the purpose of determining whether or not there was something of investment value to be had for past patrons, Francophiles from a former family business. The blurb in the local paper simply noted that a free gathering was taking place...wherein one could learn the latest about *property potential* overseas.

I expected to learn stuff I didn't know...and I certainly did. For one, I was enlightened about exactly how different the French are vis-ŕ-vis the sale and rental of property...when contrasted with Americans and other Europeans. They are a singular case study, to say the least, and the details of their Napoleonic Code and other laws (dating back to 1694)...which they still honor...to the letter...absolutely...are matters that all engaged, international activists should explore. Without some knowledge of this realm --the property tax aspect of which is the basis for 22% of all French tax revenue-- citizens of the world are spewing unclean steam out of their blowholes. Their attitudes and fixed practices and enormous influences are as mind-boggling --in Western terms-- as anything the more obvious Japanese culture has to offer. Foreign ground on which most of us don't know enough about to tread lightly on often enough, in our rush to right the world's wrongs. (1B)

Yes, I learned a lot that evening, but it's only the horror aspect of the speaker and the audience I want to share at present.

Neither one of them had any scruples respecting the poor of this world...or the changes they have wrought...will continue to wring out of our cultural heritage. That from pre-seminar talk. Beauty...and the beasts. For they are all hell-bent on destroying what the speaker referred to as the "last communist state in the world." Cavalier acknowledgement about "caring" in the air...in France. The evening was so much about getting around barriers that were designed to protect the blue collar man in the street that I wanted to puke. Putting niceties aside...and ravaging the countryside where Van Gogh once roamed and Klee lit up. And so on.

What was done to Paris --which I merely touched upon lightly in a recent (June 8th) entry at http://oxtogrind.org/today's-alternative-blind-dates/-- is slated to be done to the rest of France. At the behest of many French citizens, of course. But done, nonetheless.

At breakneck speed. And zero will slow their momentum. Which is why I desperately wrote about Mau Mau moving against such morbidity recently (2A), hoping "the word" would be passed around.

His Money-Grubbing Excellence, the speaker, led off The Pitch with references to Sharon. He had served in the IDF under the Obese One in a significant capacity; in fact, he looked quite a bit like the Israeli leader. Other allusions designed to delude the audience came under the Rothschild Umbrella. You know, "I'm not only a Jew...I'm a well-connected Jew...who You can't stop." Bulldozed his way through.

I was tremendously impressed...aghast...at the fast track he was on. He was the kind of character who could exude the angelic good intentions of an Annie Sullivan, but turn (on a wooden nickel) into the Lemony Snick Jim Carey character, slickly capable of leaving (Unchosen) children on a train track, trapped in a car...with an engine bearing down, to smack sick sense into them.

People pay good (foul) money for that kind of show. With their lives.

Or should. But that takes us back to Mau Mau mentality and slit throats in the middle of the night. And I'd like to offer up something else here today. I am horrified at the thought that nothing short of short-circuiting the lives of wealthy and middle-class perpetuators will do the trick. (2B) Will change our pallor. The cast. This plot being enacted.

It's a heart wrenching conundrum, a life-sucking nightmare...that such performances are gaining in popularity. Everywhere one turns there's such a show going. Quite a show. Neon lights now reduced --for very practical reasons-- to mini-screens held in palms. But still directing Man's worst impulses into a supposedly profitable realm.

Without money-grubbing support, perhaps Bancroft's 60s performance would never have seen the light of day. But that cannot be an excuse for permitting the "angels" (2C) to continue their backing of...tearing down all four walls of the stage we call Life.

As theatergoers --who, in fact, participate in this drama every bit as much as the citizens of classical Greece did...when they slid out of their seats (as Aeschylus' audience did) to take part as members of The Chorus...routinely-- , whether or not they like it ...angels, applauders and lords of linguistics are obliged to...stop the show from going on.

But will not without "major force" applied --that is the horror-- with or without this or that one in office. An orifice we're not prepared to fill properly.

And the talented Bancroft's. And men like her Mel Brooks. The easy laughs, the careening careers, and...everything. Everyone, with whatever they're involved in, no matter the marks they make or the impressive deutsch marks they wield...are wet with guilt, dripping in Macbethian blood up to their fashionable turtlenecks. (3)

Back to the shell game.

During the Q&A, when potential investors asked what the French thought about American investors...the response was a red herring: "They don't even know they're there." In such a disingenuous atmosphere one is not encouraged to raise the specter of "terrorists" making some strides vis-ŕ-vis the Montparnasse Tower. Or to ask the odds that Gay Paree will see itself transformed into a vast Pere Lachaise Cimetiere overnight.

And speaking of the dead, Ann and Annie rest in peace. And Patty and Mel rang their last living bells long ago. Helen Keller, of course, saw and did more than all of them ensemble...if we're talking about an imprint of activism, a social consciousness manifested in daily life. Alas, talent can be the greatest deterrent to such engagement.

But there is a war to address. One that goes way beyond the specific of Iraq. And it's not being confronted by the blind, deaf and dead who envelop you. And is not slated to be dealt with fairly by the living greedy, bent by and for profit. The ones who seem to require a slit throat...to reconsider priorities...as per the Mau Mau. (4)

Developers...and their followers.

James W. Loewen, in Lies Across America, points out

"Ivy Green, Helen Keller's birthplace in Tuscumbia, disables Helen Keller more completely than the childhood fever that made her blind and deaf. The site presents her as a bland source of optimistic inspiration to our youth -- while omitting everything she stood for, every cause she cared about." (5)

That's quite a development, turning Keller's lifelong struggle to communicate into a token tribute which, essentially, holds her "incommunicado in her own home," to use Prof. Loewen's words. It reminds me of the muting of Paris' eternal struggle. And of something connected with the Palestinians.

The question is are you blind, deaf...or dead with regard to what goes by the boards? Just remember, before you answer, that both Arthur Penn, prestigious director of "The Miracle Worker" AND his famous son Sean would never get another day's work --and have to sell their property in France-- if they ever really insisted that the Helen Keller's of this world be allowed to speak their minds in more than a token way. If they dared to take part in the "protracted debate between business interests and advocates of...construction." (6)

By the way, Sharon does have something to do with construction, yes? Development?

If it's truly "the safest investment in the world" (buying property in France), as guaranteed by Sharon's old IDF colleague, it certainly seems like a good bet that the sorry show will go on.

After all, who could bring down the curtain? Who might even try?

Richard Oman's writing et plus can be found at www.oxtogrind.org.

Footnotes Breaking a Leg and New Ground:

(1A) Zigzag but don't get snagged by him at http://www.olemiss.edu/mwp/dir/ziglar_zig/

(1B) Be the first on your block to get some lefty to acknowledge where hubris has taken over for a little called for humility. Too little seen in these tangled activist woods.

(2A) See http://oxtogrind.org/archive/53

(2B) See http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20050607/ap_on_bi_ge/wealth_survey_1 to get a hit of some of the common denominators for the two groups.

(2C) For those who don't know, "angels" is a term that's been used traditionally for financial backers on Broadway.

(3) Just like Bianca of Italy says ( "I believe no one of us is totally innocent of what is being done to the Iraqi people. Nobody…") in the Answers That Smart section of Ox to Grind (http://oxtogrind.org/answers-that-smart/). Of course, I speak here of far greater complicity than that of specific Iraqi-related abominations...which are, by any standards, quite enough.

(4) See "Something of Value?" at http://oxtogrind.org/archive/53

(5) I can send you a hard copy of the book for free upon request; the quotation is on p. 243 of the New York/New Press/'99 paperback, heading off the segment titled "Confining Helen Keller under House Arrest."

(6) See the June 8th entry in the Alternative Blind Dates section at http://oxtogrind.org/today's-alternative-blind-dates/ for a particular example covered/elaboration.