A debate about politics
with a captive audience

HISSES and sputters aren't what you'd expect to hear from an electronic device unless the contraption produces popcorn, which this one doesn't.

Communication is its purpose and the diagnosis from a service representative, who finally freed herself from those pesky "other customers" invariably needing help at the same time I did, was that it was "underperforming."

I said, "No kidding."

Thus began "Project: Fix the Phone," an endeavor that consumed two days and required three repair people.

Day one brought a pleasant woman sturdy enough to muscle a file cabinet away from the wall to get at a snarl of wires and plastic-capped boxes. The hiss was due to a broken piece of equipment, a common doohickey she didn't have, but that was widely available at most retail outlets, she said.

Three retail outlets and several hours later, I managed to liberate a new one from its shrink wrap, plugged it in and picked up the handset. Hiss.

Day two fetched an older man who evidently discovered that laceless work boots made for efficient shoe removal even as they made walking a bit awkward. Life's full of hard choices.

He began testing lines, which required him to dial up a central circuit and punch through a series of menus, a procedure I thought was reserved only for customers. More amazing was that he was put on hold.

It was during one of these waits that he noticed the faint voices of politicians on TV.

What are you watching? he asked. C-SPAN, I said.

What's C-SPAN? It's the public-service cable channel, I said, explaining I preferred a broadcast unfiltered by the gaggle of talking heads who crowd commercial networks.

What's going on? The Democratic National Convention, I said. Democrats? he spat. Why are they only doing the Democrats? Why don't they show the Republicans, too?

Uh, because the Republican convention isn't until next month, I said.

Then one of the convention speakers signed off with the standard "God bless America."

"I don't think God will ever bless America again," he said, not when sex, permissive behavior and the "rot of the media" rule, not when people like the ACLU ("I'd take a hatchet to them all," he declared.) are trying to remove "under God" from the pledge, not when Islam is being taught in California schools when public schools in Hawaii can't teach Christianity.

"God's not going to bless us," he said. "God's probably giving America the finger."

At this point, he realized he had not gotten the test he'd ordered and hit the disconnect button. Sliding into his boots, he clumped down the driveway. Then he called on my other line to say he could not do the repair because it wasn't a phone problem but probably a DSL malfunction. After his lunch break, he would call the DSL fixers, he said. Boo, hiss.

The afternoon brought another repairman, who also noted the convention broadcast. He began testing lines while delivering a commentary on the state of American politics and the reasons for his choice of John Kerry over the current White House occupant: "Too many of our guys are dying in Iraq," employment numbers don't take into account lower pay, the nation has lost its standing overseas due to the president's policies, and "I just don't trust those guys."

Awhile later, he thought he had the problem licked. Hiss. He rechecked every stretch of line and piece of equipment from the utility pole on down. Hiss. Dismantled and replaced all kinds of things. Hiss.

By day's end, he'd traced the malfunction to the company's central office, something that should have been examined initially, he said with distinct frustration. Hiss.

He called the next day to make sure the repair had been made.

"I guess it's working; I can hear you clear," he said, adding, "That Kerry guy's gonna win." Yea!