Great Uncle Vussihond Grabashko Wronski. Pictured here in 1890 in Paris at the Club Allegro Fortissimo. "Just us girls." That was his slogan. [Pick up line, it turns out.]
Uncle was ahead of the times. Way. He identified as a woman; or, that's what he said he did. Imagine that. Way back then. There probably were others of similar persuasion. But VGW was next level. [Typical of all Wronski's.] He put it out there. Some balls, if I may put it ironically.
Made for easy access in some circles. Most of his many escapades have gone undocumented. Except for recollections by some senior Wronski's of the tales told. But, here, in that photo we get a rare glimpse of Great Uncle in his glory. And whatever else he could get his hands on. And, from the looks of it, he indeed did have his hands full. It was hot in there. And, it was hot. You can imagine. BTW, everyone went away satisfied. Uncle, after all, had the Wronski kavorka. In full measure.
He was a bold one. As if that isn't already obvious. The story goes that he finagled himself into a job as a lifeguard in a mikvah. Definitely not kosher. But, when they finally had enough of his shenanigans, Uncle casually dropped, "So call me pisher".
No that's not Great Uncle. The Apple doesn't fall far from the tree. That's his oldest [of 13 kids, mind you — his words, "Lucky 13".] "Hollywood" Dave Wronski. My namesake. The story goes that he had a permanent phone at his table at the Beverly Hills Hotel Bar. And, also permanent, a rotating roster of stars, starlets, and aspiring actresses. He was a casting director. He had a fresh new couch installed almost on a weekly basis. It drove the studio property manager nuts. He not only needed a new sofa every week but insisted that it be different and even better than the previous.
But, I digress. Perhaps the most infamous of the small handful of stories that survive in memory, was the "Night of a Thousand Stars" party Uncle threw for his 40th birthday. On his hand calligraphed invites he coined the now-famous line, "If you can't be there, you be square". No doubt you've come across that chestnut a time or three?
So, as you would expect everyone was there. Clark, Carol, Hedy, Myrna, all the Dick's, Lucille, Norma, both Jimmy's, Charlie, Paulette, Cary, Ingrid ... And, on and on.
Here he is in an appropriately, suitable-for-all-ages retouched photo canoodling with a bevy of hopefuls. They got his hopes up too!
On this 2021 Memorial Day weekend, I can finally tell my story. The statute of limitations has run out and I can talk. Remembering my days as a government spy.
You may be able to tell from the photo that this boy was not a strack soldier. A bit of a renegade. Definitely not one to kiss ass to authority. Rocker of the boat. Iconoclast. Just what you want in a James Bond type.
The thing is that when you are a James Bond type, doing James Bond kind of stuff, you most definitely don't let on that you're a James Bond type, doin' James Bond kind of stuff. I'll leave to you to sort out fact from fiction. Net, net, mums the word. No one the wiser [that last one I got from dear old Mom].
Not to worry, dear reader. Nothing of any national security import or consequence will be revealed herein. The rules of the game require me to keep my lips sealed, to the grave. The details are in the vault.
My career in espionage and counter-espionage was under the aegis of the United States Army. Unlike with the CIA, which by charter only operates overseas, US Army Intelligence can go anywhere. And, I did.
My original training was in counter-intelligence. A security role, really. Making sure that property, personnel, and information are secure against enemy infiltration, coercion, and discovery. Within the purview of the Army itself, my role was to conduct background investigations on individuals who were being considered for sensitive classified jobs. It wasn't so much about digging into someone's dirty secrets; more to suss out whether their skeletons were such that they could be compromised ... blackmailed. And, of course, also vetting them for any links to subversive organizations and/or ties to enemies both within and without.
It was mostly background investigation until we were shipped out to a combat zone to evaluate a field headquarters deep in a dense forest the details I can't get into. We wore no rank insignia. That allowed us to interview personnel up and down the chain of command, particularly without intimidation from superior officers. Aerial bombardment went on the whole time. Those goofballs "beautified" the command tent with brightly painted rocks marking the pathways. Like they wanted to let enemy pilots know exactly where they were. Geez! Of course, we scotched that pronto. And, got out in one piece. No casualties in our small contingent. [It was quite the subject of interest among the enlisted men wondering about our rank. "Never mind that, just answer our questions."]
I was also once assigned to a covert operations group, so I did a little actual spy stuff myself. Here are a few examples: Receiving classified documents at a public location that was under heavy surveillance by clandestine enemy operatives. Then, eluding them en route to my drop spot. Then there was that scouting and planning a raid on a known spy gathering spot. Perks of the job, it was a whiskey bar.
In the public sphere, outside of official Army jurisdiction, I free-lanced to blow the lid off a big-time eavesdropping operation at a major international corporation. Their key management offices were suspected to be bugged according to my reliable confidential informant. I was tasked to give them the bad news and arrange for a meeting where the appropriate law enforcement personnel could gain access to ferret out the bugs and stop the perpetrators. Just a little tidbit: the meet-up was at Schraft's in the Chrysler Building in NYC.
Sometimes in the course of doing my duty, my activities were, as they say, "off the books". Once in the junior years of my career I bungled it; I was caught red-handed and arrested by the military police at Fort Meade Maryland, the headquarters for U.S. Military Intelligence. As they say, I took one for the Gipper. Steep learning curve. I can't get into the details, just to say a McDonald's Hamburger was involved.
During my tenure in covert ops, I rubbed elbows with one Steven Rubell. You know who he is, of Studio 54 infamy.He was known to me as "Fucking Rubell". Something to do with how he wasn't "one of the boys". I can't say I was, nor can I say I wasn't, in on the sting that got him and his partner sent to jail. Just to say his operation was busted big time for tax evasion. In the end, he got fucked. No pun intended. FYI he died of Aids; enough said.
So that's all I want to reveal at this time. Watch for the book. I'll include such juicy items as that late-night repast on that breezy waterfront in Beirut. Prowling the dark, oily back streets of Munich. A deadly middle-of-the-night surprise encounter in London. Dalliances with well-endowed strippers. Anxiously crossing on the Star Ferry from Kowloon, not knowing where to rendevous, and with whom. Living the high life cruising around Manhattan with powerbrokers, movers, and shakers; cocktails and gourmet dinner on a multi-millionaire's yacht in the balmy early summer evenings. Stowing away on a PanAm cross country flight; getting caught, but skating away. Posing as a head waiter catering to New York's rich and famous. Bar manager at the notorious after-hours Club Taboo. Carrying a king's ransom in cold cash on the subway en route to the drop-off. To mention only a few. Like I said, stay tuned.
PS Spy life isn't all that glamorous. Even though it might look that way sometimes. Whatever the moment and circumstances, you are always on guard to not get found out. Nerves of steel have to be part of your going-in DNA; you can't teach that stuff. Not to say you can't have a good time at it; just it's an act, and you have to stay in character. I got out alive. That's success enough in the spy game. Lived to tell about it. If only a little. Gotta be true to the corps, you know.
Who's Gael Greene? Ms. Greene was the food editor at New York Magazine in 1968 the year I first showed up in the Big Apple to begin my meteoric Mad Ave, Ad Biggie career. She started with that you-must-read-if-you-are-a-New-Yorker magazine since its beginnings, and then on for another 40 years.
There's a lot you can look up about her. Let's just say she was the shiz. Made food and restaurant going a thing. Some say she was the original "Foodie". Flamboyant, outspoken, colorful. She was famous for going incognito* [that explains the hat] to New York City restaurants ... to get the real deal, not the celebrity treatment. "The Dorothy Parker of restaurant critics."
* On that incognito schtick. She was famous for wearing hats that covered her face so she wouldn't be recognized. And, even using credit cards under pseudonyms. When I think about, it I'm wondering if her wearing those hats wasn't in fact a tip-off. Like the maitre'd would say, "See, of all the patrons in the room ... there, the one trying to go incognito. That's Gael Greene!"
A real trip to read.
For me personally, a real trip too.
So how did little 'ol me get to hang with the likes of that famous Gael Greene? There's a backstory.
Like I said, I was a shiny new Ad Biggie in the making in NYC at J. Walter Thompson. New York Magazine ran a contest. It wasn't for the general reader circulation. A notice for the contest was tipped into comp copies distributed only to advertisers in the magazine.
I decided to enter. The deal was that you had to 1. correctly decipher the scrambled letters of the names of ten of the magazine's top advertised restaurants, and 2. make it a creative entry. Judging was on both accuracy and creativity.
My wife and I figured out the names of the restaurants. Then we hopped into our trusty Citroen 2CV and drove around town one Saturday to collect matchbooks from each of those ten joints.
Now for the creative part. Using colorful construction paper I fashioned a small round columnar kiosk with the requisite roof and pasted the matchbook covers all around. Then I installed it in a box-shaped container which when you took off the top — Voilร ! — the four sides fell away flat to reveal the kiosk.
And, we won! Our prize: lunch with Gael Greene and the magazine's founding publisher George Hirsch at our choice of any one of the ten restaurants featured in the contest. We chose Cafe Chauveron; 139 East 53rd Street. At the time it was among a very small handful of luxury restaurants in the city. Top tier. Seated 100, staff of 52. Lux. Get it? The kind of place where if you just happen to glance at a waiter he'd be there at your side prontissimo.
Now the story.
Here we are all happy sitting there with Gael Greene and George Hirsh. Looking over the menu I see "Champignons". I say "Champignons", correctly I should add. I don't remember why I said that out loud; I think it might have been that I thought they were a particularly special thing. It wasn't a question; more an exclamation. Gael — Gael! — promptly takes me to school: "Those are Mushrooms." I did happen to know that. At the time it seemed to me that she took that as an opportunity to let me know where I stood in her midst; me, definitely looking up. I said nothing though. The current me would probably have made some exaggerated gesture and exclaim something like, "Well, how about that! Who would've guessed?" Some nerve on that one. Trying to one-up me, and I was her guest! That kind of behavior schtick went around in those days. Still does; but, I don't travel in snooty circles no more. It's the kind of behavior that in my book brands the perpetrator a champ asshole. [Sort of like I see through how the pols manipulate and pander to their voter bases.]
After a nice lunch — I don't remember if in fact I ordered that something with "Mushrooms" — there's dessert. Gael is having Mousse au Chocolat — that's Chocolate pudding, you should know. [See, there, how I did that bit with you? Now, who's my bitch?] After a few bites, she summons the waiter and asks, "Did you change the Chocolate?" He comes back from making an inquiry with the chef and reports that, yes, in fact they did change the Chocolate; something about how their usual choice was not available.
I said nothing. Just registered a very strong suspicion that the lady engineered the whole bit of drama ahead of time to impress us rubes. Can't say for sure. Just makes for a better story, don't you think? Again, I should have made some over-the-top reaction to how she had such an exquisitely finely tuned palate. And/or, sent the waiter back to the kitchen to ask if my pudding should be so thick and full of air? No. I was a gentleman in those days. Not like now with too many years of too much of other people's bullshit behind me.
Looking back, she did add Mas Sabor to the lunch. Much remembered, Dear Ms. Greene.
We may be passing through a portal that seems to beckon at the other side of it a whole new redefinition of, what? Well, just about everything.
I recently was called a "troll" in a social media thread. It was a political topic. So, if you know about politics on social media, you keep clear, or you venture where angels fear to tread. My name is David Daniel, so I'm disposed of by genetics to tackle injustice and iniquity and inequity fearlessly when I see it. [Well, maybe not those two bruisers I saw coming out of the Bagel bakery this morning. Michele is the muscle between the two of us.]
An Internet troll as I read it is someone who purposely tries to incite and/or upset. Disrupt. I do have leanings in that category. Mostly, though, with trying to be a smart-ass, wise guy or comedian. [Mixed reviews there.] But in the case to which I'm referring the guy called me a troll because he disagreed with my position and I failed to be cowed into agreement. Troll. No. So call me pisher.
Which brings up the larger topic. Seems words are now highly fungible. [Well, in my day, sonny ... boys were boys, and girls were girls. Now, "Have you always been a female is an everyday pickup line".] Parents are even encouraging their very young to consider which gender to go with. Drag queen boys are celebrated.
On top of the list ... "Infrastructure". Well, in Joe-World, it's anything you want it to be. No big deal when its a topic at a cocktail party. But, when it comes to how government spending is directed ... bone up on the news. [Which makes me think how ironic it is that Trump 45 is a crown prince of infrastructure. But, no. We have Joe and Kamala to steer us down that road. We'll see. Let us pray.]
An "insurrection." Arguable term. Witness the two sides of that issue. On one side Republican Representative Andrew Clyde taking issue with that term relative to the January 6 Capital violence. Also, putting a pretty tasty piece of fish for Nancy to pounce on over how things on that day appeared. In case you are not up to speed on the nitty-gritty of that kerfuffle, take a look:
Who can forget "Kids in cages". Or, as AOC put it, "Concentration Camps". Under Joe 45 we have a zillion more kids in custody, but compassionately; behind plexiglass partitions.
Speaking of AOC here's her at her logical best on the point of calling what's been happening on Joe's border:
If you are engaged by this article then you're probably wondering what that girly-boy photo has to do with it. It bears on the subject of how things have gotten so relative. As I said, I grew up in a time when boys were boys, and girls were girls. If you wanted to tell the difference all's you had to do was pull down their genes.
Now, well ... anything goes. Parents are now proudly encouraging their youth to choose their gender. The media refer to it as "inspiring". [By the way, in case it has escaped you, this "born that way" trope has no scientific validation whatsoever. Take that, you who cry the righteous banner of Science! Prove me wrong.]
Reader Advisory: If at any time reading this you're inclined to call this an apologia pro vita sua of Republicans in general or Trump supporters in particular, you friend have made my point.
This is a rant about how politicians frame. Of course, everyone has a point of view. You can only look into your own heart and conscience to see whether that perspective is accurate and uncolored by prejudice, bias, or hard-held beliefs. Politicians live to get your vote. This necessitates positing a world with those who are in the right, those who are in the wrong. Winners, and losers. We live in times where the art of such divisiveness has reached a level where sides are so sharply divided that it is not at all surprising that some will literally take up arms to make their point.
Who's to blame. Politicians. Us too, for swallowing their rhetoric whole and undigested. Pols are particularly adept at slanting facts, twisting them, coloring them, omitting facts that get in the way of their message, cherry-picking facts also to suit their message. Offering opinions as facts. Then there's the faux shock and outrage, at the "obvious" error(s) of their opponents' ways. Too many people are inclined to believe something someone in authority says just for the simple fact that they are in authority. Or, that they utter their propaganda and rhetoric with seeming heartfelt and fully formed conviction.
What to do? Gautama Buddha has his usual sage advice: “Do not believe in anything simply because you have heard it. Do not believe in anything simply because it is spoken and rumored by many. Do not believe in anything simply because it is found written in your religious books. Do not believe in anything merely on the authority of your teachers and elders. Do not believe in traditions because they have been handed down for many generations. But after observation and analysis, when you find that anything agrees with reason and is conducive to the good and benefit of one and all, then accept it and live up to it.”
For the master class of this political artform witness in the provided video below one Member and Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, D-CA 12th District [San Francisco], Nancy Pelosi. You'll see her on full display with every trick in the bag, also replete with supporting tonal and cadence variation and facial and hand gestures lifted right out of the silent movie playbook. Think of her as the judging mother-in-law always on the ready to be filling your wife's ear with shade on you.
The video concerns a statement by a House Republican making it out that he [and his Republican colleagues] would have us believe the violence and mayhem on January 6 in the U.S. Capital was just another tourist day visit; a walk in the park. Really! Nancy! If you're inclined to despise the Republicans going in, then you may entirely miss little Nancy's spin. And, just like Patty Hurst ... buy it.
If you're open-minded, then you will be able to judge for yourself how much of what's coming from politicians is fact, and what is narrative frame spin.
Oh, I'll get to the Republicans, be assured. Sneak peek: Harping on those big hot button, drum-beater tropes: Socialism!, Communism!, and the big juicy "They'll take away your guns!".
Let's not let the so-called journalistic media off the hook. So thoroughly politicized in this day and age that a reasonable person would have a hard as hell time just finding out the truth of things.
Word to the wise: society coheres on a fabric of trust. It can get frayed, threadbare, and torn. Perish the thought that we should see it unravel; in our lifetime, or ever. But, history suggests that it does; and, that it will. We live in interesting times. No?
I focus on the Democrats. Not that Republicans don't deal in that truck, just that the Dems are particularly good at it; both in terms of skillful sly verbal delivery and sheer amount. That latter point, witness the 24/7/12/365 ongoing onslaught against 45 and his group of deplorable supporters. The average citizen would be hard-pressed not to believe so much of it by dint of it being drummed on so incessantly. If you object and say that the criticisms are justified, have you really sorted things out for yourself and come to that conclusion? Or, is it just that it fits your already formed opinions. Or, that those laying this out for you and me to lap it up must know what they're talking about. After all, look at their high position.
I’ve been seeing a rather [to me] consistent and regular pattern in the political landscape. Particularly obvious among the Democratic pols and those who vote for them. It came to its exquisite apotheosis during the term of President Trump. It continues on, encouraged by the success of voting him out of a second term. New grounds, but with a big dose of "how bad was that Trump".
As in ...
A gentleman has just tucked in for the night on the sleeper car of the train (the vintage ones, not that long ago, with several stacked berths closed with privacy curtains). No sooner does he fall asleep when he is awakened by an old lady moaning in a thick accent: “Boy, am I thoisty. Boy, am I thoisty. Boy, am I thoisty. Boy, am I . . .”
This is apparently not going to stop until the lady gets her drink. The young man gets out of his berth and fetches a glass of water. “Tank you, sonny. That’s a good boychick.”
Finally, he gets back to sleep.
But, soon after, what does he hear, “Boy, vas I thoisty. Boy, vas I thoisty. Boy, vas I thoisty. Boy, vas I . . .”
The Democrats have become masters of spin. Framing everything from, and about, their political opponents in the most worst possible light. Selective omissions and emphasis out of context. Modifying statements of fact — or choosing to use only an advantageous partial fact — with colorful and strong pejorative modifiers. So and so just didn’t do some this or that; they did so with ...
"depravity"
"appallingly"
"sadly"
"outrageously"
"dishonestly"
"beyond the pale"
"treasonously"
"seditiously"
"treacherously"
"regrettably"
Let's not forget:
"false"
"crazy"
"insane"
"brazen"
"unbelievable"
"idiotic"
"ignorant"
"imbecilic"
"impetuous"
"incompetent"
"ill-conceived"
"impious"
"inept"
"infantile"
"insane"
"ridiculous"
And, that's not even mentioning the arms-length list of other such you could get from my ex-wife on any given day.
Am I making my point?
It occurs to add conflating, deflating, and from the stench of it ... flatulating.
Correspondently, those who buy all that. I'm truly wondering just how much of their opinions have been shaped by such tricky wordsmithing. Unwitting most of them may be to the bias confirmation.
Confirmation Bias: Hearing only what you want to hear, or accepting what you hear on account of it fits your preconceived opinions. Also, let's not forget those who prey on our unconscious motivations intentionally by telling us what we want to hear. And, for what? A vote.
Now is the time we can have a royal cluster fuck arguing over how that President 45 was clearly a quadrazillion times worse than that devil himself. [Is it sexist to refer to the devil as male? Mea Culpa. Fact is, he may be going for a transition himself. She does keep up with the times.]
And, just watch how the brainwashed will assiduously argue that their opinions are based on nothing but the logical conclusions to the fact(s) of it all. Witness how they not only strongly disagree with opposing opinions, but are so righteously justified in being on God's side of things as to not only denigrate opposing arguments and those who make them, but also to want no part of them as members of society. [Enter Maxine Waters as the high priestess of this genre.] As in, if you don’t like it, get the hell out. You are wrong and therefore we delegitimize you. Shun you. Expel you.
Suggesting that they have bought the framing uncritically only makes you an apologist for Republicans and Trump. Kind of like if you criticize Israeli policy and practices vis-a-vis the Palestinians. Anti-semite! [This Spring 2021 things have turned bloody again in the, ahem, Holy Land. And, mirabile visu, Israel is taking some major heat from around the world. The tables may be turning.]
Do they not see, even consider the possibility, that our leaders are treating us like children lacking any intellectual depth. Recent examples: Mayor of NYC Bill de Blasio offering a free portion of French Fries after you get your vaccination [but, you gotta buy the burger]. Or, Governor of New Jersey, Phil Murphy, offering a free beach pass and a glass of wine. And, this just in, Governor Cuomo will give a free lottery ticket.
Or, Joe 46. Promising $2,000 for your vote, then making it $1,400 on account of you already got the $600. Not the same thing about framing the conversation to put shade on the opposition. I toss that in to illustrate the tricky way pols can do their verbal jiu jitsu.
Or, the political theater masquerading as those recent impeachment attempts. The witness who supposedly blew the whistle ... never showed up. The uprighteous Adam Schiff with his "incontrovertible" proof of malfeasance. Jerry Nadler with his proof "beyond a shadow of a doubt". Say what you will about President Trump's words and actions. But, do they rise to the level of impeachment? I'm inclined to say, no. Yet, just for the fact that there were impeachment proceedings plus the fact that they were voted down in the Senate on party lines, that leaves a bad taste in the mouth if you happen to believe impeachment(s) was warranted. Score a big one for the Dems in the 2020. [Now, as a result, we have Joe ... or, who he really is: "NOT TRUMP".]
Then there's the U.S. Representative Adrew Clyde R-Athens honeyhole. The summation headline there is that "the Republican's 'excuse' being against House and Senate commissions to investigate that event because the January 6 attack was only just some normal tourists in the building". Like it wasn't really such a big deal.
Here's what he said: “There was an undisciplined mob. There were some rioters, and some who committed acts of vandalism. But let me be clear, there was no insurrection and to call it an insurrection in my opinion, is a bold faced lie. Watching the TV footage of those who entered the Capitol, and walk through Statuary Hall showed people in an orderly fashion staying between the stanchions and ropes taking videos and pictures, you know.”
Per Robbie Sequeira writing in The Times on May 14, 2021: "U.S. Rep. Andrew Clyde, R-Athens, said Wednesday that calling the Jan. 6 storming of the U.S. Capitol an insurrection is a "bald-faced lie," and his reference to a “normal tourist visit” has been picked up by media far and wide.
"The events of Jan. 6 saw rioters storm the Capitol building in an attempt to overturn the results of the 2020 general election that confirmed a victory for then president-elect Joe Biden."
Fair enough.
The Republicans in fact are against House and Senate inquiries into the events of that day. They call it out as political theater. After all, there are independent agency investigations already underway.
The actual facts per an article in Slate by Jim Newell on May 18, 2021: "McCarthy gave three reasons for his opposition: that Pelosi had spent too much time politicking during the negotiations, that it would be duplicative of the investigatory work already being done by law enforcement and other congressional committees, and that it has a “shortsighted scope” that “does not examine interrelated forms of political violence in America.” Among those other “forms of political violence in America,” he cited “the political violence that has struck American cities, a Republican Congressional baseball practice, and, most recently, the deadly attack on Capitol Police on April 2, 2021.”
Clyde for reasons that are not clear to me said that infamous "like tourists" line. He said that in a specific reference, not about the whole of it. There's nobody who doesn't decry and condemn the violence of that day. Clyde is also guilty of arguing against calling it an "insurrection". Arguable point. But, no. Democrats have tried to make hay again on that one, suggesting that he is pitching for having it be just a little blip, a walk in the park. Normal. Business as usual. Really!
Here's a video that covers Clyde's statements followed by the rhetorical response by Nancy at her propaganda spin best:
My Mother, Catherine, at home in Detroit mid-1970s
I am thinking about how our mothers share in our lives. Our joys are theirs. And our sorrows.
Our sharing is not just in terms of outer events, like getting together and keeping in touch. Stories. But, in some mysterious way, more directly and intimately in the conduct of our lives and our experiences. It may be that our mothers feel us living inside them. Maybe not directly as such. But, in a shared resonance.
Also, Mother Earth, doesn't she also share in our lives. And, maybe, in a way more visible and apparent. When we live heedless of our surroundings, the Earth . . . that has consequence to the environment . . . in the air we breathe, the water we drink, the food we grow and consume.
Looks like the Pandora's Box has been opened at Starbucks. There's now this thing they're seeing — and dealing with — where customers are placing custom orders with an arms-length list of add-ins.
We want to be right up there. Maybe with the toppers of 1. served in a Faberge Egg and 2. stirred with a piece of the True Cross.
