Bringing War Back Home: Vietnam & Siege Mentality

EXCERPTS FROM MANAGING CHAOS

REVIEW: WHO WILL TELL US THE NEWS?

Norman Stockwell, The Progressive

BY GREG GUMA

Around the time I turned 21, Sen. J. William Fulbright described what was taking place across the country as a “spiritual rebellion” of the young against a betrayal of national values. Almost half the US population was under 25 at the time. I’m not sure how spiritual they were, but, speaking personally, I did feel betrayed, conflicted and rebellious. 

It was March, 1968, and the US Senate had opened an investigation on the Tonkin Gulf Resolution, passed four years earlier. The resolution had given President Johnson a blank check to wage war in Vietnam, based on a trumped-up military incident. Half a million troops were mobilized as American leaders used communist fears and falling dominoes to rationalize a major invasion. 

The operative logic was that it might be necessary to destroy the country in order to save it.

Anti-war protest at the Bennington Monument (GGuma/1969)

For a moment the storm clouds parted. Eugene McCarthy, an ardent opponent of the war, won an encouraging 42 percent of the Democratic Presidential primary vote in New Hampshire. Four days later, Robert Kennedy officially entered the race. By the end of the month Johnson announced that he wouldn’t seek re-election. It felt like history was speeding up and moving forward. But on the same day Kennedy announced his run, American troops lined up hundreds of old men, women and children in a South Vietnamese village, Mai Lai, and killed them. It was one of several massacres that were hidden for two years. 

Just as the country looked for a way out, it was losing its soul.

In the midst of this chaos the prescient muckraker I.F. Stone wrote something in his weekly newsletter that stuck with me. “Everywhere we talk liberty and social reform,” he warned, “but we end up by allying ourselves with native oligarchies and military cliques — just as we have done in Vietnam. In the showdown, we reach for the gun.”

As if hammering that home, a few weeks later, two months before I graduated from Syracuse University, a shot rang out in Memphis and ended the life of Martin Luther King Jr. A political assasination, five years after the death of President Kennedy, this one was possibly linked to a racist (and perhaps FBI) conspiracy. In the days that followed, riots erupted in at least 125 American cities, resulting in more than 20,000 arrests and the mobilization of federal troops and the National Guard. Like millions of others, I was stunned, confused, angry, and scared. Two months later, just after I moved to Vermont, Robert Kennedy was assassinated in Los Angeles on the night he won the California primary.

The war had come home with brutal violence and death. In the first five months of the year, almost 10,000 soldiers died in Vietnam, more than in all of 1967. By July, there had been over 200 major demonstrations on campuses across the country. Yet despite the obvious signs of domestic unrest, especially about the war, it continued to escalate. And the domestic repression was just beginning.

After my last classes and a few goodbyes, I didn’t even hang around for the graduation ceremonies. Instead, I packed a suitcase, stored my Yamaha bike, and drove to Bennington. Nestled between Albany and Western Mass in southern Vermont, it felt like an escape from the urban rat race, high-energy aggression and ruthless competition, mass anxiety and gnawing fear. 

Out there, but not too far… 

a media saga, personal story and cautionary tale 

MAVERICK BOOKS, 317 pages, illustrated

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Managing Chaos: Adventures in Alternative Media — an eye-witness account that explores the unique, tumultuous history of Pacifica radio and alternative media in America. Filled with episodes from an eclectic career, Greg Guma’s new book discusses the evolution of radio and television, the impacts of concentrated media ownership, the rise of the alternative press, his complex relationship with Bernie Sanders, his work in Vermont before and during a progressive revolution that changed the state’s power structure, and decades later, what happened while he managed the original listener-supported radio network. Here is another excerpt.

Siege Mentality

In-person meetings of Pacifica’s national board were all-weekend affairs. Really more than a weekend: Managers and staff began arriving Wednesday for a full-day, staff-only summit on Thursday. Held every three months, these quarterly rituals took considerable energy and preparation time.

The location rotated according to a mandated sequence, another bylaw restriction created by the reformers who recaptured the network, evidently designed to equalize local participation. The trouble was that housing dozens of people for days in a venue like New York, plus a meeting space large enough to accommodate an audience and “public comments” from activists, could cost double the price of the same digs in Houston. But a summer session in Texas could be unbearable. It was arbitrary, uncomfortable, and sometimes unnecessarily costly.

On the other hand, the gatherings brought together people from disparate communities and cultures across the country. If the vibe was right, an in-person PNB meeting could build momentum behind new ideas. My plan for the March 2006 session in Los Angeles, two months after I started work, was to lay out problems and win early “buy in” for a network-oriented response. Not to reach consensus. It was more like critical mass.

As Affiliates Program Coordinator Ursula Ruedenberg delicately put it during a “thematic” discussion that weekend, national programming “is very thorny just beneath the surface. It set the stage for what happened in the ‘90s. There began to be pressure to work as a national network,” she recalled, “and that process aroused all sorts of issues.”

The timing and location looked right. The board was about to adopt a National Programming Policy, which would trigger the hiring of a coordinator. Theoretically, he or she could pull together people and programs across the country. Meanwhile, outside the hotel in the streets of Los Angeles, over a half a million people were gathering for “La Gran Marcha,” part of a nationwide protest against a proposed law to raise penalties for illegal immigration and classify the undocumented — or anyone who helped them — as felons. 

Over the next few days hundreds of thousands also showed up for rallies in places like Denver, Cleveland, Columbus, Detroit, and Nashville. In the wider debate over immigration these protests not only demonstrated opposition to the bill, they called for a “path to legalization” for the millions of people entering the country without documents or permission.

Living in Los Angeles more than a decade earlier, I’d watched immigration politics play a role during the riots of 1992. Border Patrol cops deployed in Latino communities arrested more than 1,000 people. Afterward, the INS began work with the Pentagon’s Center for Low-Intensity Conflict and the line between civilian and military operations was largely erased. Human Rights Watch accused border cops of routine abuse, a pattern of beatings, shootings, rapes, and deaths. In June 1995, detainees in a private jail had rioted after being tortured by guards.

In some ways, Southern California embodied both the American Dream and the right’s cultural nightmare. A confluence of climate, capital and demographics had made it an international zone and the world’s image capital. By the early 21st century, the City of Angels was populated heavily by brown and black residents, many of them recent immigrants. It would soon be more than 40 percent Hispanic, 12 percent Asian, 10 percent Black, and less than 40 percent European-American. As David Rieff noted in his book, Los Angeles: Capital of the Third World, the rest of the country, and possibly the world, would likely follow the L.A. model.

Moving to New Mexico in 1996, I ran a non-profit that provided legal support for both legal and undocumented immigrants. By then the border had become a battlefield. Government strategies for combating undocumented immigration had remilitarized the entire region. The recently-passed North American Free Trade Agreement meshed neatly with more obvious aspects of low-intensity conflict doctrine. The definition of immigration and drug trafficking as “national security” issues brought military thought and tactics into domestic affairs. Just as the projection of a “communist menace” had been a smokescreen for post-war expansionism, a “Brown wave,” the “Drug War” and terrorism were used as pretexts for military-industrial penetration.

Immersing myself in immigration law and regional race politics, I developed a coalition of sympathetic groups to fight back against the most draconian aspects of a new immigration reform law. We staged public rallies in Albuquerque, and brought Latino and Asian spokesmen to Santa Fe to testify at legislative hearings. 

Defending the rights of immigrants was a perfect focus for Pacifica, and the national board promptly took time out to join the march. For KPFK it was a golden programming opportunity. The station went live for five hours that day, airing reports and coverage in Spanish and English, the first show of its kind. Yet the other sister stations didn’t take it as a national feed, preferring local coverage or the usual shows.

Latino programming was at the top of the agenda. Largely at the urging of KPFK, the board had decided that a daily Spanish language news show should be launched nationally. New York and DC Latino activists were lobbying for more airtime. They had a practical point. The demographic trends in signal areas and nationally pointed to a large “under-served” audience. According to Arbitron, Latinos spent more time listening to the radio than any other ethnic group. 

In fact, Spanish-language media — Univision, Telemundo and radio stations — had helped to mobilize people for the immigration protests. In L.A. , Eddie “Piolin” Sotelo, a Spanish radio personality, persuaded friends at other stations to rally listeners and cover the event. But commercial radio’s interest in the issue was likely to fade, while Pacifica, if it made a sustained commitment, could build a large and loyal new listenership.

“I’m feeling a lot of pressure for change,” I told the board, “people waiting to see whether I will take sides, and waiting to judge. I’m bound to disappoint some people. There’s really no way to satisfy all of the expectations.” It might be possible to find common ground, I allowed, but winner-take-all wasn’t the best starting point. 

“What we have, with certain exceptions, is a siege mentality,” I reminded them, “sometimes referred to as protecting turf.”…

From the Epilogue

Pacifica had been through a decade of internal struggle when I arrived in Berkeley. Worried about a possible corporate takeover, members of the staff, board and volunteers at the stations had fought back, and eventually created a new, more democratic governance structure. You might even call it hyper-democratic. But also incomplete, unwieldy and difficult to amend. It didn’t prevent factions from forming at various stations. In fact, it seemed to produce contested board elections and bitter charges that the process was unfair, even rigged. 

In January 2006 the organization was battle-weary, but recovering and financially stable. The next two years were more peaceful than most. But the animosity and tribalism didn’t vanish. Rather than become the center of yet another internal power struggle, I stepped aside to make way for the next chief executive, someone who had been fired years before. 

As it turns out, she didn’t appreciate the new democratic structure and stayed for less than a year. Six years after that, one of her successors barricaded herself inside the national office rather than accept a replacement. The mood had gone from suspicious to openly hostile.

Personally, it was a productive decade. Despite the warning before becoming ED, I did work again. Once back in Vermont, I returned to writing and journalism, and wrote about Burlington and national politics for VTDigger.com, a new online platform that established itself as a leading news source. Gannett still owned the Burlington Free Press, but it was no longer a Vermont media leader and not much of a daily. Now a top news source was Seven Days, a robust print weekly that succeeded the Vanguard Press and provided breaking news through an effective online platform. 

After the Democrats resumed control of City Hall, I also ran for mayor, something I had postponed for decades, ever since stepping aside for Bernie. 

Chapter One: Excerpt

Other Excerpts: The Road to Change

Media Maverick: About the Author

Death at a Revolution (Noir Exit in Santa Monica)

The headline was a shocker. Less than three months earlier I had been managing this place.

       Feminist Bookstore Closes After Owner’s Suicide

By KATHLEEN KELLEHER, MAY 28, 1992, 12 AM. 
SPECIAL TO THE TIMES

SANTA MONICA —  Revolution, a Santa Monica bookstore that in just six months of operation developed into a significant gathering place and community resource for Westside feminists, artists and political progressives, has closed.

The store, in the Edgemar complex on Main Street, closed earlier this month, several weeks after the suicide of its founder and owner, Gail Stevenson.

Covering 2415 - 2449 Main Street in Santa Monica, Edgemar was a mixed-use shopping center designed by architect Frank Gehry. It combined early 19th century warehouses, a 1940s Art Deco office building and new construction. When completed in 1988, it included roughly 16,000 square feet of space for retail (ours covered 3,000), 8,000 for office, 3,500 for the restaurant, and 8,000, plus mezzanine, for the museum.

Gail launched Revolution, her “eco-feminist” bookstore, about three years later.

Her sudden death, less than six months after its celebrated October 1991 opening, should have been a shock. And might have raised some questions. Yet, for the Times it was just another local tragedy, and one easy to explain.

Stevenson, 47, a clinical psychologist long active in feminist causes, shot herself in the head April 12 at the West Los Angeles office where she conducted her practice.

Stevenson’s husband, psychologist Carl Faber, said she had no history of clinical depression. He said he believed that his wife’s suicide was in part an outgrowth of her “personal pain and despair that had a lot to do with her efforts to inspire change as a feminist and leader.”

I had never seen signs of such pain or despair, at least about inspiring social change. If true, it was a very convincing deflection, manifested in high personal achievement, constant activity, and compulsive spending. She didn’t exactly make me feel comfortable, but I appreciated her determination and didn’t sense deep frustrations. For almost six months I worked with her at least four days a week.

If anything, she seems self-satisfied, verging on entitled. For example, she frequently wondered aloud how long I could stand living in Los Feliz, so far east in L.A., and proudly sang the praises of life on the west side, especially in sunny Calabasas.

Faber said his wife was suffering at the time of her death from fatigue, insomnia and stress, all of which were related to the running of the bookstore.

That could be. I wasn’t there right at the end, and he was her husband, and a famous psychologist with a cult-like following and his own radio program. Still, the bookstore wasn’t the only thing on her mind. There was also her lover, the architect who had designed her dream store.

Without Stevenson to lead it, Faber said he believed the bookstore could not survive on a day-to-day basis. The store closed May 5 after one last book signing by Carol Tavris, a feminist who wrote “The Mismeasure of Women.”

Stevenson launched Revolution last October with an appearance by Susan Faludi, signing copies of her book, “Backlash: The Undeclared War Against American Women.”

I remember the night, attending as Gail’s recently hired bookstore manager. I had been on the job for a few weeks, a new arrival from Vermont. The news account was true, as far as it went. But just part of the story.

Gail and I had met the year before at the American Bookseller’s Association annual trade show, where she interviewed me for the job after hearing about Maverick Bookstore. I had started Maverick in Burlington’s Old North End in 1985, eventually moving it to College Street for several years before shutting down in 1991. The remaining stock and accounts were sold at cost to the local Peace and Justice Center. 

On North Street there had been a gallery for shows and meetings; on College Street we rented a 2nd floor suite of rooms that allowed us to host readings and other events.

Allen Ginsberg mentioned Maverick Bookstore in a 1986 poem, Burlington Snow.

Gail wanted to start something similar — a community-based bookstore with space for gatherings and exhibits, a center of thought and action. Only much bigger than Maverick, and located in Santa Monica, just a block from the Pacific Ocean. I can’t say it wasn’t fun at times. Hey, I sold books to Faye Dunaway and Dana Delaney, managed a large staff, and hosted dozens of events. 

The location was prime, the patrons affluent, the space large and airy. But Gail was more concerned about what it looked like than how well it functioned as a business. The interior was designed by Topey Schwarzenbach, a Venice building designer partial to deconstructionist style, who thought books could be effectively piled on rough crates or stacked on stark metal shelves that, unfortunately, made effective display difficult. 

Six months after the opening, an event heralded by a complimentary front page piece in the style section of the Los Angeles Times, the renovations still weren’t complete. Still, the clientele, cafe pastries, and press relations were fabulous.

Polishing the Image at Revolution

A CALL TO ARMS - Los Angeles Times, February 9, 1992

No matter how much money we made, it wasn’t enough. The main reason was Gail’s inability to stop spending, and usually on anything but books. The kid’s section had to be a posh playground with toys and designer pillows, the coffee bar had to feature only the best espresso machine and pastries. There were always more ads to place for upcoming events, and new ideas for an even better image. Meanwhile, I struggled to make payroll for a large seven-days-a-week operation and keep up with monster bills from wholesalers.

     

When I mentioned problems to Gail, pleading with her to get a grip on the spending, her gaze would drift away, as if distracted by an invisible marvel somewhere in the middle distance. When I finished talking she’d turn back and say something like, “We need better biscottis.” It was maddening. But obviously also a red flag.

     

Eventually, I demanded some real changes. Making a comprehensive list of what was essential to get the operation into the black, I presented my case. The next day she introduced my replacement. Cold, but I was relieved. Two weeks later I was unemployed. A month after that I got a shocking call from a member of the staff. Gail was dead.

Back in February, while I was still managing day-to-day operations, a film crew had set up in the bookstore and interviewed her for an upcoming documentary.

from MediaBurnArchive on Vimeo. (Gail & Topey are the first two interviewed)

You can watch raw footage for The 90's, an election special.  A series of short interviews were recorded inside the bookstore, as customers browsed around them. They asked several people, starting with Gail, who they would like to win the 1992 presidential election and what issues were important to them. Bits of the store can also be seen in the background.

     After a sound check, Gail was asked to describe President George H.W. Bush in a word: she chose liar. Abortion was a more important issue than military spending and the economy, she said, because abortion will indicate whether the country moves forward or backwards on women’s issues as a whole. (Pretty self-possessed so far.) She didn’t support any of the current candidates but would write-in Hillary Clinton; she and other women’s groups were supporting the New Party as a third choice, she clamed. She acknowledged that Bush espoused support for women’s rights, but found it superficial. Politics and the media involve a lot of lying, she said.

     Next was Topey the architect. He summed up President Bush as “nothing.” We didn’t know it yet, but his affair with Gail had been going on for quite a while.

     Topey thought Bush was hypocritical, one more in a line of presidents that avoided responsibility and lacked direction. He said the economy was the most important issue, but saw the public as sluggish, worried, and chaotic. Politically, he was undecided. For the first time since Eisenhower, he claimed, there was no candidate that he could support. All of them promised the same checklist of deliverables, he chided, but none were believable.

Gail did not look like a woman under extreme stress. Yet just two months after these interviews, on her 47th birthday, she apparently purchased a gun, learned how to use it at a shooting range, then drove to her Westwood office to kill herself. She was accomplished, attractive, and wealthy, with a young son, an admired spouse and A-list friends. None of it turned out to be enough to save her. From exactly what we’ll never know. Considered an obvious suicide, however, her death was investigated no further, and never explained beyond that single L.A. Times article. It continued:

Topey Schwarzenbach, the Venice building designer who built the store and knew Stevenson for about nine years, helped closed the shop for the last time along with four employees.

That made sense. Topey had been there since the start, before that even, and never really left. His architectural vision was a major driver, but also a source of friction and expense. The same could be said of his relationship with Gail.

“People have been really reeling since Gail died,” Schwarzenbach said. Adding to the sense of loss, he said, was a sense among numerous friends, activists and customers that Revolution “was just starting to make it. The book signings were becoming an institution and the community center was just taking off. Gail’s death happened before the bookstore put out deep enough roots.”

(Her husband wasn’t as enthusiastic.) Faber said he hopes to sell the bookstore in the next month to someone whose “interests are in the spirit of what Gail wanted to do with the store.” There are about five prospective buyers, he said, none of whom he would identify. The store, which is part of Stevenson’s estate, is in probate.

Peg Yorkin, president of Fund for the Feminist Majority and a longtime friend of Stevenson’s, said she considered taking over Revolution as a tribute to Stevenson but has since bowed out. Yorkin said she concluded that “it just is not what I do.” (She was actually pretty angry.)

“I was willing to put money into it, but I couldn’t very well be an absentee owner,” she said. “It’s a shame for the community. It wasn’t just a feminist bookstore; it was a beautiful children’s center and community center.”

For now, only the glow from the aquariums in the front windows illuminate the place. Schwarzenbach goes in daily to feed the fish.

Speaking for the family, Stevenson’s stepdaughter, Jollee Faber, 26, said: “It’s a beautiful place. It would be our dream to keep Gail’s dream alive. Hopefully, someone will be able to take it over.”

In addition to her husband and stepdaughter, Stevenson is survived by a son, Carl, 9; stepsons Eric, 28, and Seth, 19, and her mother and siblings. The family has asked that contributions in Stevenson’s name be made to the Fund for the Feminist Majority.

The business did not survive, and at Gail’s funeral speakers publicly chided the departed for violently deserting them. I remained in L.A. for another year. But after managing this Revolution and witnessing Gail’s strange demise, I couldn’t connect with the city’s ephemeral, often narcissistic culture. Something had spoiled the mood. 

Three of my screenplays did make the rounds. One was an historical epic on the Haymarket bombing, developed into a commercial screenplay with a co-producer hoping to make a comeback. Handled by the legendary talent agency CAA, Haymarket languished in packaging limbo, unable to attach “talent” like Gary Oldman as Albert Parsons and Whoopi Goldberg as Lucy. I eventually re-imagined the story and staged it as a play. (Check out INQUISITIONS and Other Un-American Activities)

Another script was a film noir take on the CIA’s notorious MK-Ultra mind control program, based loosely on a true story. The reaction to that one was quite strong wherever it was pitched, but my co-producer questioned whether a period mystery with a gay hero could work. I changed his gender preference and continued to build contacts, aimed toward connecting with John Cusack, before my plans had to radically change. I still think it works. (Check out UNWITTING: The Secret War on William Pierce for the true story.)

There was also The White Hand, an adapted contemporary thriller about religious fundamentalists who carry out assassinations for a covert right wing group. A bit ahead of its time then, I suppose. Now it’s too on the nose.

In the early nineties, none of these scripts flourished in high-concept Hollywood. But to be honest it wasn’t them, it was me. After all, I never even considered developing this story as a script, and it’s a real L.A. mystery, one that may just need a strong third act.

The Coast also didn’t do much for my marriage. The third one. But that’s another story.

Epilog:  Noir Exit in the Garment District

The sudden death of my grandfather, patriarch on my mother’s side, has been a nagging question since it shook the family tree in early 1953. Less than a year before, he had been a successful manufacturer of women’s clothing in New York’s thriving garment district. His company, established in the 1920s, was called Metro Coat & Suit, and by then had a showroom at 500 7th Avenue in Manhattan. 

But sometimes in 1952 Bruno Lupia suddenly sold the family business and retired to Florida. At age seven, I was visiting him in Miami with mom in early 1953. One day, however, he didn’t show up for playtime. Mom eventually told me he was dead, and later that it had been a heart attack.

It made sense for a while. After all, he was in his sixties, overweight, a cigar-smoker. But later mom changed her story. “The unions killed him,” she claimed, “they broke his heart.” What could she possibly mean? The only clarification ever provided was that grandpa, who supposedly treated his employees like members of family, had also asked them for some short-term concession due to hard economic times. When turned down, presumably by their union rep, there was no choice but to shut the business down.

This has long felt a bit simplistic. I finally get a plausible, deeper explanation for this mystery in a new labor history by David Witwer and Catherine Rios. Murder in the Garment District suggests several other factors, some right there in the subtitle: The Grip of Organized Crime and the Decline of Labor in the United States.

Bruno (at right) in 1946, surrounded by a few of
his business friends, lobbies President Truman.

Unions had considerable power after World War II, representing up to a third of the workforce. But by the late 1940s crime figures were making inroads, especially in the garment industry and trucking.

At the most basic level, some gangsters collected payments for protecting firms willing to comply. Some of that money was used to help garment center gangsters serving time in prison. And that pool was managed by Joseph Stracci and Ben Kutlow, both former members of Louis “Lepke” Buchalter’s gang. Stracci also ran a clothing firm, one of many with an office in the same building as my grandfather’s showroom and women’s fashions “knock off” factory. 

More to the point, Witwer and Rios chronicle the rise of “paper locals,” unions that exploited exployees and put gangsters in covert alliances with both manufacturers and unions. They also expose how politicians confused the issue, conflating earlier Communist organizing with criminal syndicates and corrupt figures like Jimmy Hoffa, ultimately using both strikes and congressional hearings to discredit union leadership in general.

By this time, my grandfather was long gone. Based on this new research, however, my suspicion is that he found himself caught somehow between union locals and the mob, and was forced out as their grip tightened. I could say more... but then I’d have to kill you.