North from Calcutta is a fictional account of an incident that sounds like what one gets from the news media on an almost daily basis. "Ripped from the headlines!" is the usual hyperbole that's used. I suspect, although I admit there's nothing that's been published that resembles it, that the incident is a thinly-veiled account of something Duane Evans came across in his posting in South Asia.
Been there; done that. Four small, empty words, yet full of meaning.
It’s often easy to see if the author of the book one is reading has been there and done that; or is s/he making it up? Duane Evans has been and done. Sure it said so in the credits, but the proof is in the telling, isn’t it? Anybody can make the claim, but the truth is in the telling. Looking at Evans’ photo, however, I wonder why. Early middle age, apparently in good physical condition and health, a doer and a go-getter in his job. Why did he leave CIA?
In a bureaucracy such as CIA has become, compounded during the past generation, there are plenty of reasons. Some selfish, some altruistic. But it all boils down to whether you’re still having fun, doesn’t it? My guess is Evans is another of the casualties of the revolving door of inept, ignorant and sometimes downright stupid political appointments and their clones that the appointees have empowered in CIA and other front-line organizations. Promotions depend more on ticket-punching and sucking up, than on accomplishments and the personal benefits a person has made to the organization.
Evans shoots straight from the hip, and his words come straight from the heart. Maybe that’s too much for the average idiot in the street (or the average political appointee) to take. The truth? Yeeek! We’re so used to getting our news in small, dainty, sanitized, pasteurized and homogenized bits, presented to us by our local television versions of Steve Stunning or Dianne Dreamboat, all diced nicely into palatable pieces, whether it’s the truth or the latest manufactured lie, the usual heavily filtered, heavily flavored pap that’s fed to citizens of planet Earth on a three-times-a-day or more diet.
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