Jerzy Kosinski

Waiting for a train one morning on 5th Avenue, I fell into conversation with a fellow going to his job at the central library in Portland.

He told me how he secured his job, which I won't get into; suffice to say it was not through what might be considered normal channels.

You see, he was a contract laborer. Our conversation turned to wages and how the American economy has been stymied by the wages versus costs gap, the inflationary reality we love to hate, which is a terrible problem for a vast segment of low-income workers in the U.S. and has been for years.

Naturally enough, the conversation turned to the day the free-fall of real wages for workers started, which we agreed was the day Ronald Reagan became president and over the next eight years when the effects of Reaganomics took hold. I mean, this fellow and I, about the same age, were in sync about this.

We commiserated some more, recalling that when the bad actor-turned president died, a vast outpouring of sentimentality seized the nation, perpetuated by the contrived sentimentality of big-assed corporate media.

Why?

My new friend was quick with it, knew the score, had been around the block a few times, had read the news, was in tune, had been there and done that, had been a witness to history, had felt the hard hand- slap of fate, was down with it, was as clear as the Oregon sky on a rare good day, was hip and knowing, etc.

He said, "Because Americans are stupid."

That was the correct answer, exactly what I wanted to hear! And this was a stranger, honest to God, not some crony in the street, or a planted co-conspirator of mine tempting passers-by to berate us.

This was an honest-to-God citizen of Portland, a beautiful character, a truth-teller.

Then, being brilliant but perhaps lacking a few synapses like the rest of us, he said Reagan always reminded him of Peter Sellers in that movie...what was it called...you know…Seller plays this...

Ronald Reagan was Chauncey Gardener in Being There, the Jerzy Kosinski satire about an ignoramus thought to be a sage.

The train rolled to a stop in front of me and this brilliant man I'd come to know so well after only five minutes.

We got on, certain we had solved one of the great mysteries of life, and went our separate ways.


TS