Thusly, the firing news is broken
Note to readers: There’s nothing funny about this; it’s a damn serious moment
Says Boss Lard to Bret Boner: You couldn’t even come up to my office, sensing what this is all about, without that silly and ill-fitting Media Man costume, like it’s going to shield you from the worst.
Dun-da-duuun!!! Here I am! I don’t care what happens to me!, sharply and heroically retorts Boner, weakly lowing his paean from the depths of his underdeveloped thumb-shaped diaphragm. I’ve done everything in my freedom-fighting powers, and this is who I am! What’s important is the ideals I leave behind!
Boy, ideals don’t pay the bills; news does.
Boner blinks silently at Lard like a goat who’s had his chewing straw taken away, clearly dumbfounded by Lard’s succinct and piercing reply.
Lard continues: Why couldn’t you just report the news; what’s going on with local business; what’s happening in this community? It seems to me that’s all anyone has had to do to bring the ad revenues in. It’s a tiny market, not nearly as large and complex as, say, London or New York. It seems to me that if the paper just told the local story, not ignoring, of course, the greater international dimension, but also not putting all the emphasis on it, then the local business interests would recognize themselves reflected in the paper, and they’d park their money here. It seems to me that if you just told the story, then you’d be practicing freedom of speech without talking about it all the time, without wearing it on your sleeve. Freedom of speech would be clear on its face.
Things just aren’t that simple, Boner replies, his arms akimbo. And where did you suddenly get all this knowledge and insight from, Lard? It was you who would compare the Kyiv Poster and its great freedoms to the New York Times, Wall Street Journal and Washington Post, claiming we had it better.
Boy, I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about. You hijacked those freedoms, which should have belonged to the small community the paper services, to fulfill a personal agenda; for the usual reasons – power, ego, vanity. And what’s the result? What good have you done the paper? After five years, I ask you: Who are you; what have you actually achieved?
His arms fall to his sides; Boner lowers his head and falls into deep contemplation, wherein he encounters his own end and the void, and with a shudder, starts back. Who was he, what mark has he left, what legacy, and what has he achieved, indeed?
Struck dumb (which is to say he was struck even dumber than he already is) Boner’s silence persists; Lard continues trumpeting into the vacuum.
You’re so ineffective as chief editor, you weren’t even able to get rid of that miniature version of yourself. You killed it, but it came back. Now, I admit it’s not human, but, heck, boy, the five minutes it spent on that paper sure paid off in earned revenue. That one issue made more money that you made for the paper all year. I’m seriously considering finding that thing and hiring it for your post – uh, your old post, that is.
The silence persists; Lard continues.
And then that delusion you have of yourself as some kind of local superhero – Media Man. All the time you spent scraping the outskirts of town trying to track down and I assume capture that brutish wild half-naked renegade and beastly Animal Boy outside a McDonald’s. Do you know how dangerous a risk you’ve been running, boy? Why, you’d not only lose the contest, he’d rip you to shreds. You’re stupid – duuuuhh – you’re utterly and completely stupid. I can’t believe I defended you in one of my Backlog columns from Kyiv Unedited against their libelous insults, which turned out to be true, by calling you handsome, among other fine things, with movie star-like qualities qualifying you for an old Hollywood newsroom B-flick from the ‘50s. You’re fired! Now, get out.
No, I’m leaving on my own terms.
No, you’re fired.
Duh, leaving on my own terms.
Fired.
Leaving –
Knock, knock, knock…
Lard: Damn, who could that be? Come in!
Nyu-u-u-akaptoler-xzluuu…
Welsh Losser! What the hell are you doing all the way over here? Did my wife let you out of the Boss Lard PR agency, where you’re still supposed to be my communications consultant? And why aren’t you at Penmanship International, the global leader in human vices consulting services about whom its Internet site gives a very blurry picture, and whose shady-seeming existence is likely located in approximately the same premises as my other offices?
Well, Boss Lard, I heard you were having some chief editor issues, and I thought I might be able to – nyu-u-u-ooog – help…
There’s a knocking at the window and the sound of a part-demon voice going, Heh, heh, heh-heh-heh…
Filed by Jack Step, May 8, 2013