Rush and Me: How I missed my own moment of infamy
Before the storm, there is that familiar, electronic "brrrrrring" that musically alerts me to e-mail.
I click on "Inbox," and find the top of a message from North Carolina. Subject: "Your paper is a liberal rag."
Hmmmm. What's that about? I'll find out later. Back to the task at hand.
Another musical "brrrring." Click. Subject: "Disgusting!"
And another, this one from somebody who calls himself "Rightwinger." Subject: "You Commie Bastard!"
Who could resist that one? Click on the icon. Full message: "You Commie Bastard!"
Huh?
Within minutes, my trusty computer is ringing like an old-time coffee percolator. I watch the messages pop up on my Inbox screen until I spot one from a familiar e-mail address - my older sister in Texas.
"Gosh, little brother. I am soooooo impressed," she writes. "You made the Rush Limbaugh Show!"
Wow! Your mild-mannered reporter makes the big time. Rush Limbaugh, King of Talk Radio, conservative "Doctor of Democracy," nationally syndicated Voice of Right-Thinking People.
I've listened to this guy, and he's very good at what he does. But how can I be on national radio and not know it?
I tune to KVI radio. Rats. He's talking about something else. I've missed my own moment. But at least I'm figuring out what it's all about. Two days earlier, The Seattle Times published my story on Seattle's top-10 electricity-users - including the residential users. Based on information obtained from Seattle City Light, the top-10 residential consumers use up to 50 times the city's average household consumption. We named names.
And Limbaugh didn't like it. His Web site calls it "probably one of the most outrageous articles I've seen on any subject in a long, long time."
The wealthy homeowners in the "Soviet of Seattle" are portrayed "as though they're guilty of something for buying power," he says. "These people pay for every kilowatt they use. It's as though they're scofflaws who haven't paid their parking tickets for the past 10 years. We're told to blame the eeeeevil rich owners of big houses for this fix. We've got to string them up or send them to sensitivity seminars and make them feel guilty.
"There's a real Soviet feel to this piece," he goes on. "And what really bothers me is that these people apologized for using electricity, as if they've committed some crime, for crying out loud. This illustrates just how successful the left's hate-the-rich propaganda has been."
California's energy crisis, he says, was caused by "environmentalist wackos" who "have insisted that not a single new power plant be built."
Then comes a link to The Times story and my e-mail address - the marvels of the Internet.
Speaking of which, the messages continue to crackle onto my computer screen. They come from across the nation, from California and Maine, Florida and Minnesota. A few actually come from Seattle.
"Heard Rush talking about your rag today and your slanted/stupid/liberal (one and the same) article," writes my North Carolina correspondent. "Thank God for the Internet. Hopefully it will allow people more access to the truth and eventually we can eliminate papers like yours."
They come in waves, apparently responding as the radio show is rebroadcast on different stations at different times.
"These 10 people are also probably 10 of the biggest philanthropists in Seattle," writes another. "More power to them, and I could care less about their electric bill."
Caleb, an 18-year-old college student from Texas, has just finished reading Ayn Rand's "Atlas Shrugged," and sizes me up as one of those "weak-minded people who are always supporting the actions of the weak minds in power, blaming the industrialists for everything."
"What are you, a Nazi?" asks another e-mailer. "It is vermin-spewing socialists like you that will bring back the Vigilantes of the old West. May you choke on your Latte. ... Too bad your mom did not believe or have access to abortions. She would have done us all a favor."
The response is impressive. By the end of the following day, my computer counts more than 300 e-mails, most of them unprintable in a family newspaper. Despite slight variations in the vulgarities, each reflects the guru's tone: These people paid for their power, and printing their names is a vicious, socialistic, left-wing device.
I try responding to a few of my new friends.
"The issue of privacy is legitimate, and we debated the issue before going to press," I write. "But we decided that the right to privacy was outweighed by the nature of our regional electricity shortage."
Seattle owns its own electric utility, which provides clean hydro-power at the lowest rates in the nation. Alas, we are experiencing a drought. The reservoirs are dry, and there isn't enough hydro to run the generators. So City Light has to buy replacement power on the open market at 20, 40, sometimes 100 times the cost of our own hydro. So, when our neighbors waste electricity, we all share the costs of that replacement power. ... And so forth.
"Anderson," responds Jerry from Texas. "Spoken like a true fascist.... I just love to see you socialist liberals foam at the mouth about private industry and individuals being in control of their lives. ... I know what side you are on and I am your enemy, buddy. You Left Coast intellectuals are going to get what you asked for."
Huh?
Sean, of Palo Alto, Calif., stands his ground. "I still think you should take issue with your elected officials," he says. "I have a difficult time believing this empty-reservoir problem came out of nowhere. Even a city the size of Seattle can't run through that much water overnight, can it?"
Still, Sean says he's "frankly amazed" that I responded. "I also respect your point of view," he says.
Caleb, the young Texan, is even more generous. "Thanks for a humbling lesson," he writes. "I guess a kid like me shouldn't be writing such vehement letters to people when we have heard only one side of the story."
Thus emboldened, I fire off a one-pager to Limbaugh. Dear Rush: We have never met, but I am a now-and-then listener and, more to the point, the object of your wrath on March 20. ... The response was truly impressive.
I walk through the argument - the Northwest energy crisis, the city-owned utility, the empty reservoirs, the costly replacement power, rights of the individual vs. rights of the community.... Nobody proposes to outlaw wasting electricity. But if people know that wasting electricity may lead to some embarrassing publicity, perhaps they'll look for ways to conserve. ...
I urge him to visit our little "soviet." You'll find we walk and talk, love our kids, pay the mortgage, drink our beer from the bottle and see the world much the same way you do - except from the opposite coast.
No response yet. But that's OK. As I told my new buddy Rush, I might have chosen another way to spend my 15 minutes of fame. But I'll take it as it comes.
