Cheap People

That’s the phrase my rich sourpuss neighbor used to call everyone he met. What we now call the 99%. He had been on a bomber crew that flattened Japan in WWII. “Once you’ve seen one Jap you’ve seen them all’ he told me. He came back and went to USC (on the socialistic GI Bill) and then worked himself up to the boardroom during the post-war boom. He retired to Newport Beach on his stock options and other Unsocial Security instruments. When I met him in 1989 he had just ditched his first wife and married a true bimbo who he saw in the LA Times wearing a mink bikini. I go into this excessive detail to sketch out the kind of person who would gladly pepper spray kids and cheat on his taxes (he was an accountant). He would probably volunteer to operate a guillotine pro bono if it were available. He represents the old triumphal America, now ready to shuffle off this mortal coil. He was much older than me so he’s probably dead by now. Come to think of it he was already dead when I met him.