Fortunately for everyone’s personal nutrition, dinner was not ruined. We finished forking and knifing our vegetarian fare while congenially bashing Bush and his Black Gold Administration.

“It’s all about export and import, nothing else.”

“The family is unbelievably connected. Skulls & Bonesmen. They’re an excessively competitive bourgeois form of Royalty.”

“He looks like and thinks like a Chimpanzee. Put him at a typewriter for two thousand years and maybe he might come up with a coherent thought of his own, maybe.”

But our complete digestion suffered, and our epicurean satisfaction ended when one of the dinner guests tossed a glob of undone opinion across the table and hit grisly Mr. Dozer smack in the craw.

“I had a very interesting conversation this afternoon with an absolutely stunning young black woman who was worried about how she was going to manage her future on a low six digit income. There would be day care costs, school supplies, college expenses, vacations, vehicle costs, …”

“Hold it,” squawked Dozer, “ you mean you’re telling me that this woman was bemoaning a six digit income.”

“Well, she wants to maintain her lifestyle. She doesn’t want to drift backward.”

“Wait, wait.” The plates were hastily cleared by our hostess who, knowing Dozer for over two decades, sensed trouble. “This black woman was complaining that …”

“Dessert? Coffee?” The hostess tried again.

“I don’t think it’s very enlightened of you to turn this into something racial.”

“You said black not me. But leave that aside. I just want to know why you’re even mildly sympathic to a person complaining that their six digit income may not be enough to meet their hypothetical needs.”

“Did I say ‘complaining’? Did anyone else hear me say ‘complaining’?”

Well, that’s how it started and from there it went on to lobbing grenades and belching poisonous bursts of warped logic from the dining room to the kitchen to the parlor until the host initiated a momentary truce by pulling out a toilet-sized Webster’s Unabridged to at least get the definitions right.

“Capitalism: an economic system in which investment in and ownership of the means, production, distribution, and exchange of wealth is made and maintained chiefly by private individuals or/and corporations. Socialism: a theory or system of social organization that advocates vesting the ownership and control of the means of production, distribution, and exchange of wealth in the community as a whole.”

“Well, I’m sorry I just don’t agree with you. Making money is not an intrinsically evil thing. In fact, I believe, that it’s absolutely wonderful to see diverse peoples and cultures who have suffered centuries of oppression and poverty have things and more things.”

“You are not hearing me. I did not say ‘making money’ was intrinsically evil, although others have. I said Capitalism and its principles are detrimental to life on this planet. And people who purport to be in favor of social change and social justice should not be defending Capitalism and its principles in any form.”

“Sorry, I see nothing wrong with making money.”

That’s when the dictionary came out and the dinner began to roil in our collective stomach. What was irking the crusty old lefty (Dozer’s undergarments are dotted with faded red stars) was that this “moonbeam saver of whales” (his words) was wearing, in his eyes, a flimsy veil of social concern that barely cloaked her right wing economic self-interest. And said so.

“Oh I see. It’s all right for you to accumulate and hoard your wealth under a system designed to favor the ‘haves’ by allowing them to have and amass more while the bulk of us chumps play by the rules created by the haves in favor of them getting and having more. You can do that because you’re a good person. I see.”

“That’s absurd. You can’t believe what you’re saying. And if you do I feel sorry for you. I’m not going to be cornered into defending my actions against your delusions. And! Turning a discussion into a personal attack! Well, you do not have the slightest idea of who I am or what I’ve done.”

“Oh, how wrong you are! I’ve known you for more than three decades, ever since I read what Sal Alinsky observed about you.”

“Who?”

“Sal Alinsky, Reveille for Radicals. I quote: ‘Liberals protest; radicals rebel. Liberals become indignant; radicals become fighting mad. Liberals do not modify their personal lives, and what they give to a cause is a small part of their lives; radicals give themselves entirely. Liberals frequently achieve high places of respectability; the names of radicals are rarely inscribed in marble but they burn eternally in the hearts of the people.’ Liberals’ -- that’s you –‘like to talk a good talk, radicals walk it all the way.’”

The host made another effort to rescue us from the path we had been spirited away on by sending her screaming toddler into the parlor flailing its arms and trailing a drooping diaper as it joyfully scaled the sofa before falling onto the floor in a tumble that shook the glass patio doors.

“Well, frankly, I’m hoping to be well off before I’m too old to enjoy it, and I find nothing wrong with anyone who has rightfully earned his or her way doing the same.”

“Brilliant.”

“Doing okay is okay, and doing better is better.” She pushed a little further.

“And when does okay become okay enough?”

“The point, Mr. Dozer,” his head was now as red as his faded underwear, “is that self-interest is a natural motivator. It’s a scientific fact. You’d be better suited addressing what people do with their wealth once they’ve accumulated it, than raising the banner of out-dated economic ideologies. Maybe a little focus on the positive side for a change? At least acknowledge the good that money has done. The Macarthur Foundation, Carnegie, Ford, …”

“Don’t say Rockefeller. Just don’t say Rockefeller or any of the other robber barons. They’re contribution to social economic progress was machine-gunning striking miners and squeezing thousands of small operators out of business.”

“And the Communists?”

“Are you calling me a Commie! Is that what you’re doing? Where’s the dictionary? Communism. Look it up. Not the same as Socialism. Look, I’m going to try this one more time, it’s not making money in itself that is detrimental to life – although some people, including Jesus Fuckin’ Christ, have said so. It’s that Capitalism, a system based upon an unregulated free market, is. Free market means, if you read your Adam Smith, buy cheap any way you can and sell dear any way you can. The motive is profit, unlimited profit if you can swing it. And to me, before I make my exit … I want you to know … from me to you … that I believe that when the accepted, indeed the toted, celebrated, cheered for, promoted, and reinforced system of economics governing our every breath is based upon profit it opens the door to profiteers. And it’s the profiteers who benefit from it not the people, not the earth, not life itself. Thank you and good night.”

With that he closed the door behind him and disappear into the late night buzz of the urban jungle. He didn’t turn back to look at them through the glass wall dividing the parlor from the garden. Nor did he wave “bye bye” to the toddler whose face was pressed against the sidelight. He left in a bridge-burning huff. And after a few “whews” and “I’m sorries” the hostess served cordials and several flavors of coffee that we sipped with relief and occasional sighs of “I’m glad that’s over.”

“Well,” said the lady who started it all, “Wars, hurricanes, gas storages, and reactionaries. This is what the Bush administration has brought us. I don’t know what I’m going to do if something doesn’t change and change quick.” I just about choked on my cracker.