Brewsters Billions

"I've been dealing with skeevy lawyers since the Eighties," he thought to himself, "What are congressmen really other than a bunch of lawyers made out really good?"

.

Brewster looked up at the suits fidgeting behind their nameplates, and noted that most of them had worked up a good sweat under the lights of the camera coverage. He waited patiently until the old guy with two first names called the inquiry to order.

.

There was a good deal of "State your name" stuff which he handled without problem. So far, this seemed like it was going to be pretty easy. Brewster figured he might be on the street with his money in hand in plenty of time to catch the second half of he Yankees game.

.

"How did you get into the insurance business, Mr. Brewster?"

.

"Well, sir, I came into a good deal of money after my uncle passed and using what could only be described as very, um, unique strategies, I parlayed that into an even bigger stack."

.

"Could you be more specific?"

.

"I was told that if I could lose $30 million in a month, I would win $300 million. Which I did. And also I won the heart of an attractive accountant."

.

"This doesn't sound very American."

.

"On the contrary, Mr. Congressman, it's the most American story there is. It even includes baseball, the stock market, and an election!"

.

"Hmm. So this was in 1987?"

.

"Yes. So after I took down the 300 large and fought off a few minor law suits, I said to myself, 'Monty? You know what's better than $300 million? $300 Billion!"

.

"Indeed. "

.

"So I figured if i applied the lessons I learned from my Uncle's experiment, I would be a billionaire in no time."

.

"Well that does sound pretty American"

.

"Sure it is! I bought a little insurance company called AIG and we started writing some really funky policies. We invented a whole new language even."

.

"So far so good, Mr. Brewster."

.

"Not really, Congressman. At first the money was rolling in. People couldn't buy enough of these policies even though nothing ever went wrong. It was a total disaster! There were some nights when I thought to myself, 'I'm never going to get rid of all this cake!' "

.

"But you took it too far, Mr. Brewster, didn't you!"

.

"On the contrary, Congressman! It just took a little longer than I expected, but finally I guess we'd written enough policies such that I became much bigger than the market. Then Bear collapsed and shortly after the other investment banks I was geared to followed right down. It was really just a matter of days and we ran dry. "

.

"You are a charlatan."

.

"It kind of takes your breath away, doesn't it?"

.

"And now what, Mr. Brewster?"

.

"Well, the money's gone, every cent, and I have nothing to show for it but the Manchester United shirt on my back."

.

"And?"

.

"And I'd like my $300 billion now."

More Margarita Ruminations

Equatorial sunsets don’t offer much in the way of twilight. The mustachioed bartender flicked on a string of little illuminated plastic sombreros. In your apartment, this kind of decoration would be depressing, but here, they imbued the bar with warmth that made the patrons lean in a little closer.

“You ever see ‘Braveheart’?”

His tongue was getting a little fatter, this being the margarita that would inspire his girlfriend to ask, “don’t you think you should slow down?”

“Or ‘300’?”

At least the little bar didn’t play Mexican music. It was hard to find a drinking spot in small towns that didn’t constantly have mariachi’s belting out “Cielo Lindo” from a tinny mono.

“‘Gladiator’, ‘Robin Hood’, ‘Rome’? I mean, they’re all pretty much the same: epic tales about very tough men persevering in the face of enormous physical resistance. Middle ages, Rome, Greece: it doesn’t really matter when it takes place, it’s unrecognizably different from now, and so are the impossibly hard heroes. Sitting there, watching them swing their swords, rally their loyal followers on horseback, and make the tough decisions that shape histories both personal and global, you’d like to think to yourself, ‘Man, I’d fucking lay down and spill my innards on that wheat field for the safety of my people too. I’d be epic too. I’d be hard if I had too.’ ”

The sound of a blender too can be grating in your home, but somehow it too had a reassuring, comforting sound here at the Cantina Fresco.

“Invariably in these films there is a foil for the hero. A lizard-like senator or court sycophant who skulks in the halls of power, bending to the fascist will of whichever power is oppressing our hero. Preening his long hair with soft, slender hands, he sides with the establishment for no other reason than it will afford him the greatest personal luxury. Sometimes he is a traitor, which I’ll admit is bad. But mostly he’s just a man who has been faced with overwhelming odds, and decided not to resist. He saw the paradigm changing, and positioned himself for the new reality.”

No one at the bar liked the direction this was taking. A crew-cut teenager paid his tab with wrinkled notes from his bathing suit.

“How come his story is never told? He behaves like just about every single man in the audience would, if faced with similar a similar reality. I, for one, know that I wouldn’t cauterize my own wounds with a firebrand just to bound back into muddy battle. No sir. I’d be in the Senate, planning; or in the palace, counting the King’s money. And I’d be thanking my fucking stars that I was clean and dry.”

Not even the cicidas argued.