Jim Miara is a columnist for Banker & Tradesman. His column runs in the first issue of every month. He can be reached at: Miara@comcast.net.
Should you be upset that the Democratic National Convention is coming to Boston, causing a weeklong disruption, or should you be elated that for the first time in the city’s history a national party convention is being held here? Should you applaud the boldness of our civic leaders who ventured and gained the convention for our city, or should you rant against their hubris that prevented them from seeing beyond the glory of the event to the chaos it would create? And what should you make of all the politicians, union leaders, merchants and journalists who are either trying to exploit the situation for their own gain or insist the sky is falling to get attention?
My suggestion is you treat it all as high urban drama and appreciate each of its parts. Boston has many role players – the virtuous civic leader, the political opportunist, the grudge holder, the extortionist union head, the supercilious journalist who knows how to jump on bandwagons – and they are now all cranked up into action.
A very good TV detective show that aired in the early 1960s became famous for its closing intonation: “There are 8 million stories in the Naked City Â…” Unlike traditional cop dramas (Just the facts, ma’am!), the “Naked City” portrayed the psychology and sociology of individual citizens who, during the course of the everyday battle for survival in New York City, found themselves in trouble with the law. The show’s goal was to create compelling drama out of the passion, pain and universally understood conflicts that are present in mundane existence.
Dramatis Personae
If the producers of “Naked City” could engage the soul of audiences with stories of an innocent ex-con accused of murder or a lonely city bureaucrat overcome by suicidal despair, what could they do with the citizens of Boston struggling for life, liberty and economic prosperity during the “Four Nights of the Democrats” coming in late July? Here on our gritty streets and pocked sidewalks we have the elements of a Shakespearian drama, or perhaps a 19th century Russian novel filled with angst so thick it barely flows, guilt so palpable you can reach up and touch it, and characters too numerous to track without a Palm Pilot. It is Henry V applying psychology to his grumbling troops in the field before Agincourt the night before battle. It is “The Godfather Part III,” with the old Don Corleone looking back with despair on his life of bad decisions. It is, perhaps more aptly, “My Big Fat Greek Wedding,” in which a young bride tries to convince her Greek relatives that something different, i.e. a non-Greek groom, may be survivable.
The characters in this Boston drama have played their roles to perfection. There’s Mayor Menino, the benign leader who hopes the DNC will bring honor to his city, its citizens and, coincidentally, himself. There’s Gov. Romney, with that lean and hungry look, whose disruptive statements are designed to further his national Republican Party ambitions. There’s the head of the police union maneuvering for individual advantage by manipulating general anxiety. There are the heads of the state police and MBTA who, in apparent grudge-settling gestures, leave their posts as the event nears. There are the town merchants who, initially bewitched by the prospect of windfall profits, later turn into Jell-O when hydra-headed obstacles appear. And then there’s the business columnist who gratuitously applies the Watergate conspiracy question (What did they know and when did they know it?) to Menino and the DNC when it looks like the convention will not produce anticipated revenues. Even sports columnist Dan Shaughnessy, Boston’s Doctor Bile, suggests convention gridlock may trap the reviled New York Yankees, who will be in town July 23-25, in our midst. Finally, there’s John Kerry, our Hamlet, who is accompanied everywhere by a meteorologist. (Footnote: The self-aggrandizing role usually played by the Speaker of the House is temporarily discontinued while Speaker Finneran battles a potential grand jury investigation).
The Plot
The central questions of this drama are these: Will local merchants lose millions and millions of dollars during the four-day period or make millions? Will the police union’s uncivil tactics be rewarded with a budget-busting contract or be hooted down by an indignant populace? Will Romney, Iago-like, nibble at the confidence of the citizenry to the point that they curse the DNC, or will voters insist that he get out of the way if he can’t lend a hand? Will the local journalistic pundits get off the “sky is falling” bandwagon and return to the “this is a great event” wagon they rode earlier?
And then there are the subplots: Will extensive highway closures for four evenings in late July lead to road rage and an increase in births nine months hence? And will the Yankees actually be trapped in our midst?
The Resolution
The drama is in full swing, each player hitting his or her mark and delivering prescribed lines on cue. Here is how it will be resolved. The convention will cause disruption for four days, but it will ultimately be seen as an overwhelming success, a watershed event for the city. Downtown merchants will find that business was slightly above normal. The terrorists will not be present. Journalistic pundits will remind everyone that before they predicted the sky would fall they predicted it would be a great event. John Kerry will make a ho-hum acceptance speech in which he’ll manage to score a touchdown for Harvard and kick a field goal for Yale.
The denouement will come with a masterful speech by Mayor Menino in which he rallies sagging spirits by invoking the words of King Henry V on the battlefield before Agincourt. The English army is outnumbered a thousand to one by the French, and by firelight on the eve of battle there’s general grousing. An English lord complains to the king: “O, that we now had here but one ten thousand of those men in England that do not work today.”
King Henry protests. He doesn’t want any more men. In fact, he insists that those who want to go home be given safe passage. He explains that the coming battle (DNC) will be a once-in-a-lifetime event and “The fewer men, the greater share of honor.” The event will be chronicled for generations to come, the king (Menino) says, and those who were present will boast of the role they played. “He that outlives [the DNC] and comes safe home will stand a-tiptoe when this day is nam’d Â… He that shall see this day and live old age will yearly on the vigil feast his neighbors and say [Tomorrow is the anniversary of the 2004 DNC in Boston]. Old men forget; yet all shall be forgot, but he’ll remember with advantages what feats he did that [week of the DNC].”
