Jory read about it online in the news. The Red Cross had taken the survivors to a prison hospital. There, CNN interviewed John Walker Lindh and took a photo that Newsweek Magazine published as its Cover Story. The headline tagged Lindh as the “American Taliban,” a label that spread unconstrained in front-page stories on every newspaper in America. The CNN interview morphed into a phenomenon, with the broadcast media jumping on the terrorism hysteria following 9/11, along with President George W. Bush’s War on Terror.
In 2002, Jory giggled as he read that former President George H. W. Bush had commented that Lindh was “some misguided Marin County hot-tubber.” Marin residents were enraged; the media enjoyed a mini free-for-all. The residents of Marin, which is the California County north of the Golden Gate Bridge, wrote “Letters to the Editor,” published in the Marin Independent Journal,telling the former president about their home. Many of them chastised him publicly in the newspaper. Then, the La Times published a retraction of the statement by Bush Sr., which stated that the former President said he was sorry he maligned Marin by describing American Taliban fighter John Walker Lindh as "some misguided Marin County hot-tubber."
"’Call off the dogs please. I apologize. I am chastened and will never use 'hot tub' and 'Marin County' in the same sentence again. I won't even try to explain my position except to say I was and remain so offended by John Walker Lindh that I hurt others' feelings.
"In the opinion of your outraged letter writers, I condemned all of Marin County with a hot tub reference. Obviously, I struck a nerve. Now your readers have attacked me on my granddaughters, on my residence, on abortion, on Enron, on my being a Texan and on my pronunciation of Marin. You name it, a lot of angst has surfaced, and it's all my fault. Though I only garnered 23% of the vote in Marin in 1992, I was your president and I should have known better. I apologize to those who supported me that were offended, and I also apologize to the unenlightened who did not support me. I will now soak in my own hot tub and try to be more sensitive to the feelings of others--not John Walker Lindh, though.” George H. W. Bush
Jory was exasperated that the media was linking the American Taliban to Marin. After all, Lindh spent the formative, first 10 years of his life in the East Coast before his family moved to San Anselmo, the town adjacent to Fairfax. His parents divorced and his father moved to San Francisco. He was home-schooled by his mother. Briefly, he attended Redwood and Tamiscal High Schools before dropping out and getting a GED at age 16. John Walker Lindh really had no connection to Fairfax, yet the media was managing to create sensationalism by hooking Lindh up with Jory’s town and community, to which Jory was indignantly loyal.
One night, our phone rang a little before 11 PM. I jumped with concern to answer it. “Hi Mom,” burst Jory. “Turn on the 11 O’Clock News. Hurry!”
“Are you ok?” I asked. (It’s a mother’s job to make sure her kid is ok when they call late at night.)
“Yes, I’m fine. Are you watching the news? I’m in a new band, The Towelie Band, and we made it onto the news!”
There on the TV was a young news reporter stating that she was on the street in Fairfax, California, the hometown of John Walker Lindh, the American Taliban. Standing directly behind her was Jory and a few of his buddies, all with bath and beach towels wrapped around their heads! We couldn’t believe our eyes.
“We’re protesting behind this absurd reporter and it’s broadcasting internationally! Can you believe it?” chortled Jory with glee.
“She has no business in Fairfax because she doesn’t even have her facts straight. Not only that, she called the cops on us, but Officer Chris is my friend and told us to ‘Carry on’ as long as we don’t do anything that could get us arrested,” he blurted out in one breath.
“My friend in Toronto left me a message that he saw us on TV. It’s crazy!”
Yes, it was crazy, but not totally unexpected from Jory. He was always true to his beliefs and willing to turn a serious issue into a comical one. As parents, we learned to always expect the unexpected from Jory, support him as long as it was legal, and accept his silliness with a smile.
The next day, Martha E. Ture, the legislative affairs editor for Native News Online and an appointed government official in Fairfax, California (aka Hottubistan), wrote and published the following account of the event:
TALES FROM HOTTUBISTAN
NEWS FLASH!
JOHNNY WALKER LINDH THE FAIRFAX KID DIDN’T EVER LIVE IN FAIRFAX !
We have a friend here in Fairfax named Jory, who plays guitar, bass, and tricycle horns, and who did the sound for Ralph Eggleston’s Academy Award-winning “For The Birds.” One Friday night he was taking a post prandial amble when he saw a news team from San Jose Channel 3 TV on the Fairfax main drag, shooting street scenes while their overgroomed brunette reporter talked about Fairfax, the hotbed home of traitors and alternative lifestyles.
“New concerns about the acts of the man now known as the American Taliban," she said sonorously.
John Walker Lindh did not live in Fairfax, despite the pronouncements of the Wall Street Journal, CNN, the Boston Globe, and Newsweek. John Walker Lindh lived in the next town over, San Anselmo, for six years. After the family broke up, his mother moved to Fairfax, and he visited her in Fairfax once. The Marin Independent Journal reported this news when CNN and all the rest of the media mobbed Mrs. Walker’s sidewalk the day after her son John was found among the prisoners at Mazar-e-Sharif.
The Boston Globe identified Fairfax as the hotbed of aging radical hippies who turned into millionaires. Well, that would be Dr. Dean Edell, but most of us are secretaries, commuters, and small businesspeople. Claudia Rosett of the Wall Street Journal wrote that “Traitors come from American culture at its most neurotically all-validating no-fault New Age nadir of nattering nonsense. Nowhere in the nation could this particular picture have more naturally taken shape than in that Mecca of moral muddling, Marin County-a place salted with rich aging radicals of the 1960s, long on dollars but still short on sense."
She did not write an article that identified Oklahoma City bomber Tim McVeigh's home county, Niagara County, New York, as a hotbed of social evils like bowling, church bingo, and football.
So Jory walked up to the Channel 3 cameraman and said, “He didn’t live here.”
“Are we having a conversation,” the cameraman said. Purple Cheeks the reporter glowered delicately, as though she could tell by looking at him that she was a more influential, intelligent, important journalist and human being than Jory will ever be.
She faced the camera again and composed her expression to signify `At the risk of life and limb I stand on the dangerous streets of Fairfax, California, to bring you the news, an intrepid war reporter in purple shirt, purple lipstick, and purple blusher.’
Why is it so important to keep reporting a Thing Which Is Not So, and trying to make it The Truth, when it is Not True? Why is it so difficult to get the news reporters and editors to acknowledge the truth or do their homework and respond politely to people? Why didn’t the camera man say, “How do you know he didn’t live here?” Why didn’t Brave Reporter ask that Jory reveal his sources?
So Jory and a few likeminded friends went home and got some towels and blankets, put them on their heads, and went back downtown, where they stood behind Deep Purple, Brave Reporter in every shot the camera crew tried to take, parading down Broadway with towels on their heads like The Towelieban.
Deep Purple, got so angry she called the cops.
And the Fairfax Police Department sent two officers, Chris and a rookie.
Chris said, "Hi, Jory. What are you all doing?”
Jory said, "Hi, Chris. We are searching for our leader, Bed Linen.”
Rookie said, "She's got a right to be here and do her job without interference."
"And I have a right to peacefully protest, which I do, because there is no story here in this town, and I don't like the media coming here telling the public a lie about my town," Jory said.
So Chris said, "Well, just don't do anything you could get arrested for."
And Jory said, "We'll be very careful not to touch anything."
So Chris and Rookie went away, Jory and the Towelie Band continued their parading around behind the brunette reporter with the purple cheeks, and a woman came out of Peri's bar and told Jory they made the ten o’clock news, and the camera crew didn't go away.
So Jory figured Purple Cheeks would try to do it again for the eleven PM news and the Towelie Band stayed on watch, and sure enough, Purple and the San Jose Channel 3 TV news crew tried again and the Towelie Band paraded behind her. At 2 a.m. Jory taped the whole thing off the news rerun, and you can see it yourself (on YouTube) if you click here https://youtu.be/0O1g9x4kifY or copy it into your browser. (Jory is the one in the gray bath towel headress.)
Jory (2008)
I am a member of my community and strive to see it constantly improve and thrive.
I can be silly at times, but often need it sparked from the outside.
Molly Presser
Great start for the new year! Jory fought for what was right, but with a sense of humor😜!
Barbara Talento
As always a delightful story. Thanks
Feather Hickox
I'm not sure if this is the best Jory Story of all, but it sure brought back some of my best memories of him and of Fairfax. We think of Jory almost daily and miss him terribly, and I just love reading your posts and sharing them with my family. Jory is with us always. Thank you and good 2019 to you! Feather (former Deuce Ct. neighbor and long-time Fairfaxian).
Great start for the new year! Jory fought for what was right, but with a sense of humor😜!
Barbara Talento
As always a delightful story. Thanks
Feather Hickox
I'm not sure if this is the best Jory Story of all, but it sure brought back some of my best memories of him and of Fairfax. We think of Jory almost daily and miss him terribly, and I just love reading your posts and sharing them with my family. Jory is with us always. Thank you and good 2019 to you! Feather (former Deuce Ct. neighbor and long-time Fairfaxian).
Cindy Ross
I remember my friend from Virginia (who had started NAFCJ) calling me saying she saw the Fairfax Theater on CNN and wondering how close that was to where I lived.
Jimmie Dunne
I enjoyed reading about Jory as a young boy and a young man. Keep em coming.
Judy Sowell
What a wonderful, humorous story. Well written as always.
Credits:
Duncan Campbell (July 16, 2002). "From hot tub to hot water | Special reports | Guardian Unlimited". The Guardian. London. Retrieved March 22, 2010.
"America's 'detainee 001' – the persecution of John Walker Lindh" by Frank Lindh, in The Guardian, July 10, 2011
http://articles.latimes.com/2002/feb/28/local/me-bush28
Newsweek Magazine
Wikipedia
Wikipedia
© Leslye J. Prum 2017 All Rights Reserved
