“Wait,” I said. “I didn’t write that.”
“Kurt, be quiet,” Rowe replied amiably.
That was my first article after college graduation: The one I wrote did not have my byline; the one I didn’t did.
* * *
—
I loved the Monthly. The best part was that no one cared about my epilepsy. If I had a seizure, people nearby followed the instructions I had discussed earlier with them, then they returned to their jobs. If I arrived at the office struggling from a recent seizure, the editors asked after my well-being, then told me to get to work. For the first time in years, I didn’t fear someone might upend my life because of my health.
As my internship neared its end, I asked Peters to consider me for an editor position when one opened up. He wanted me to continue writing for the magazine, he said, but I could never be on staff. Finances were tight, and a longtime employee suffered chronic health problems; because of that, Peters often tussled with the company that provided group health coverage. If he hired me, the insurer could cancel the policy or raise rates beyond the magazine’s budget. Given my preexisting condition, no company would sell me individual coverage that I could use to avoid being on the Monthly’s group policy. Under my father's insurance with the medical school where he worked, I could retain coverage till the age of twenty-five, but I hoped my job would last longer than that. I would eventually need the Monthly's group insurance, and that could lead to everyone at the magazine losing their coverage. Charlie apologized for telling me that because of insurance, I could never be hired.
“That makes sense,” I replied. “Thanks for being honest.”
Afterward, I visited Rowe to discuss job prospects. He mentioned that he had previously worked for the Center for Study of Responsive Law, run by consumer advocate Ralph Nader. An old colleague had told Rowe that the group was looking for someone to write a book about state governments. Rowe promised to contact his friend and urge him to interview me for the position.
The prospect struck me as promising. Working as a consumer advocate was not a path to a newspaper job, but writing a book certainly could be.
* * *
—
In recommending me for the job, Rowe never mentioned my health, and neither did I. Despite the Nader group’s reputation as a fighter for the little guy, I trusted no one when it came to applying for work.
One of my first interviews for the job was with a young woman who chatted with me in her cubicle about my background. She asked how I would approach writing the book, and I gave a detailed response based on some intel from Rowe.
Then a voice called out, “Does anybody know anything about seizures?”
I stopped midsentence. “I do,” I shouted.
I was brought outside, where an older man was having convulsions. This was only the second grand mal seizure I ever witnessed; I had been too frightened at Swarthmore to reveal my epilepsy when a kitchen worker needed help during his convulsions. Not this time.
A passerby was pinning the man’s shoulders down, and I told him to let go. Then I slipped off my jacket and slid it beneath the man’s head before checking his pockets for a bottle of medicine or a medical-alert card. I looked up at the terrified faces in the crowd, expressions I recognized, and was surprised that they found something so minor to be so shocking.
Someone approached with a spoon to put in the man’s mouth. I explained why that was unnecessary, and the onlookers relaxed. Eventually, the man woke up extremely disoriented. I explained what was going on and where he was. Two people helped me take him to the Nader office, where he gradually became more coherent. Soon he said he wanted to go home. I told the staffer who had been interviewing me that I would return in a few minutes; I wanted to accompany the man to make sure he was not heading out too quickly.
Walking down the street on that sunny day, I asked if he wanted me to stay with him until he reached his destination. He declined but seemed uncomfortable. I told him not to feel embarrassed. I understood that emotion, I explained, because I also had seizures, but we had no reason for shame.
We reached the corner. He took my hand and squeezed it. “We’re both gonna be all right,” he said.
I watched him slowly cross the street, and for the first time, I believed that was true.
* * *
—
My interviews with the Nader group continued for days. While in the office, I met other staffers and engaged them in conversation. One, named Russ, relayed the organization’s history. I noticed many filing cabinets labeled with the words “American Automobile Association.” I asked Russ if someone had written a book about the AAA.
“Not really,” he told me. There had been a report about a decade earlier, but it was fairly inconsequential. “The AAA has been an obsession of Ralph’s for years. But there’s no story there, so it just keeps getting assigned to people they want to push into quitting.”
That seemed cruel. If they want to get rid of employees, I thought, they should fire them, not waste their time on a pointless assignment.
* * *
—
My final interview was with Nader’s top aide, John Richard, and took place in a side area of the cluttered offices. Supposedly, the meeting was a formality. Again, I discussed how I would handle the book, and then he told me the salary. To a recent college graduate, the awful pay sounded like a fortune.
Richard asked his last question. “If we offered you the job, would you take it?”
“Absolutely,” I replied.
Wait a minute. Medical bills.
“Um, hold on. Does the job come with group health insurance?”
Richard gave me an odd look. “Yes.”
“Okay,” I said. “Then I’ll take it.”
We shook hands, and I left the building, ecstatic that I was a leading candidate for a position that ultimately could help launch a newspaper career.
* * *
—
The next day, my home phone rang. On the line was John Richard calling with good news. “We’ve decided to offer you the job,” he said.
“That’s great!”
He again told me the salary. “But, rather than putting you on a group policy, we’re going to pay you five hundred dollars more so you can buy private insurance.”
Oh God, I thought. As soon as I’m off my parents’ policy, I’ll be uninsured.
I was about to reply, then stopped. I’d screwed up the day before—my question about group insurance had revealed I probably had a health problem. Now I had to tell the truth.
“I can’t get private insurance, John.”
“Why not?” he asked rapidly. He sounded almost proud to have trapped me into answering the question raised by my response the day before.
“You could have asked me yesterday,” I answered. “I have epilepsy, and my seizures are poorly controlled. No insurance company will sell me a policy. Most don’t cover preexisting conditions or don’t kick in to cover chronic health problems for almost a year.”
He drilled me with questions about my epilepsy, each more pointed than the last. None were about how to handle a seizure; instead, he focused on the severity of my convulsions and how they might affect the staff.
Richard suggested no solutions for the insurance problem, which concerned me. If I wasn't included on the group policy, my employment would always be tenuous. My job there could only last until my twenty-fifth birthday, the day I would be off my parents' insurance. I couldn't gamble that I would immediately find a job with group insurance at that exact time. I would have to walk away from the organization whenever I found an employer—any employer—with the insurance I needed to protect myself from the destruction of my finances, my credit, and my health.
When he finished, I said I would see him in the morning. Afterward, I sat on the couch, worn-out. This could be ba
d.
* * *
—
I strolled down a treelined street near Dupont Circle the next day, anxious but ready for what I hoped would still be my first day of work. When I arrived in the Nader offices, a woman approached.
“Hi, I’m Kurt Eichenwald. I’m starting here today.”
“Hello, Kurt! Welcome aboard. Let me get you set up.”
Her bright smile relieved me. She gave me some forms to fill out, then handed me keys for the building and office doors.
“I’m sorry. We don’t have much room,” she said. “There’s a cubicle about to open, but until then all I have is a storage area.”
She showed me the space. There was a desk and a phone, more than enough for me to do the job. “This is great,” I said.
“Well, I’ll move you to the better spot as soon as it’s available.”
She told me where to find office supplies, wished me luck, and headed out. I fetched a pen and a yellow pad so I could get to work. My panic had been for nothing. I have to stop being so easily frightened, I thought.
Over the next hour, a few staff members dropped in to welcome me to the organization. Then John Richard appeared.
“Kurt, could I speak with you?”
“Sure,” I said. I followed him across the office to a spot where we could talk alone.
“We reviewed your résumé again, and we’re worried you might not actually have enough experience to write a book…” he began.
Oh God. Here it comes.
“…so we think it’s smarter to give you a freelance assignment, then decide if you’re up to the book.”
“I don’t understand,” I said. “You have clips of my freelance articles. What is one more going to show?”
“You haven’t written anything for us,” Richard said. “We don’t know how much of your articles was written by you and how much was the editors.”
I protested—by that standard, no one could be hired without first taking a freelance assignment for the Nader group. But I quickly gave up. What kind of outfit, I asked myself, would hire someone after weeks of interviews, then take away the job a day after discovering the new employee has a chronic health condition? They had known everything about me when they offered me the job—everything except my epilepsy. This wasn’t about skills.
Richard trotted out conditions: I was off staff with no salary. Instead I would be paid five hundred dollars when the article was published. Plus, I was forbidden from working in the offices.
The last rule hurt the most. Just like Swarthmore, the Nader group wanted me out of sight. Still, I masked my disappointment. I had learned from being thrown out of school: Gather information, assess, then plan a response.
“Okay,” I replied. “What’s the assignment?”
“It’s something that’s important to Ralph,” Richard said. “We want you to investigate the American Automobile Association.”
Say nothing. I remembered Russ’s words: Everyone knew there was no AAA story. That was the assignment given to anyone they wanted to force out.
I accepted the project and gathered my things to leave. As I walked onto the street, I shoved my hand into my pocket: Yes, I still had the keys I had been given that morning. I remembered the lesson from Health and Human Services. I would ignore Richard; instead, I would return in the morning to occupy the Nader offices every workday, for as long as I could. If they wanted to get rid of me, they’d have to throw me out.
* * *
—
The next day, after using my keys to let myself into the offices, I hurried to the storage area where I had set up shop, hoping to avoid Richard’s watchful eye. The spot was perfect: It held filing cabinets stuffed with more than a decade’s worth of reporting about the AAA. I opened the top drawer of one cabinet and pulled out some records.
I had a plan, driven by my rage. If Richard ordered me to leave, he would have to explain his logic for denying me access to the AAA documents. Of course, I knew there was no AAA story in those files. I had a different idea. I would give them an article, but not the one they might expect.
My strategy for fighting against discrimination had evolved. Now if someone tried to deny me my rights, I would strike back hard. I expected—or at least hoped—that my plan would teach the Nader organization a very rough lesson.
* * *
—
I contacted Rowe at the Washington Monthly and told him what was happening; I had no doubt Richard was trying to drive me out because of my health problems. Rowe insisted it must be a misunderstanding and advised I speak to Nader directly.
Days passed with nobody ordering me out of the office. Either Richard didn’t know I was there, or he wanted to avoid a confrontation. Eventually, I saw Nader arrive in the office. I approached him and described how I had been hired to write the book, only to have my job changed after I revealed my epilepsy. I watched him as I spoke; he didn’t look at me.
“Talk to John Richard,” he said as he walked away. “He’ll take care of it.”
Sometime later, the phone rang at my desk. On the line was Sidney Wolfe, a physician sometimes called “Ralph Nader’s doctor” who headed the Health Research Group, a Nader organization. I braced for another discussion about my health.
Wolfe’s questions were reasonable and informed, not like the ones Richard had posed. After a few minutes, he wrapped up the call. “Ralph’s just being a hypochondriac,” he said.
I hung up more anxious than before. Now I had reason to believe the aversion to my seizures might be from Nader himself. I had to find a new job and get out of there fast.
* * *
—
About a month earlier, I’d attended a party at the invitation of a Washington Monthly editor. The event had been a soirée of the capital’s political and media power players. I introduced myself to some people, and now I needed those contacts to help me find a new employer before I turned in my AAA article. So I stayed home one day, phoning everyone I had run into at the get-together. I called former Monthly editors, such as Michael Kinsley, who ran The New Republic. I received invitations to write freelance articles for various magazines but no job offers.
Then, some luck. I reached a young journalist named Tina Rosenberg whom I had met at the party. She wrote for many magazines and struck me as brilliant. To my surprise, she remembered me. I told her I was in a bad situation and needed a job.
“Actually,” she said, “I’m about to quit mine.”
She had joined the speech-writing staff of Walter Mondale’s presidential campaign, she told me, but hated the work. She was a journalist, not an advocate, and wanted to move on. The chief speech writer, Ross Brown, needed someone for Rosenberg’s slot, and she offered to pass on my résumé.
Working as a speech writer seemed like a step backward. Then again, it would get me out of the Nader organization and possibly grow my contacts in journalism. My current situation was untenable, and the longer I stayed, the more my career would veer off track. Any option was better than that.
* * *
—
I met Ross Brown a few days later at Mondale campaign headquarters in Georgetown. She radiated the demeanor of a political junkie—stressed, with a rat-a-tat-tat speaking style but friendly and no-nonsense. After I met with one other person on the staff, Brown told me the job was mine. This time, though, I wasn’t going to accept immediately.
“Thank you,” I said. “Now I want you to withdraw your job offer.”
A puzzled look. “What?”
“Withdraw your offer. I have something to tell you. In the past, after hearing this, some people have chosen to push me out. I’d rather be turned down for the job than work in a place where I’m not wanted.”
“Okay,” she said hesitantly. “The job offer is withdrawn.”
“Thanks. I have epilepsy. It’s poorly
controlled, and I still have grand mal seizures. That means that I might have convulsions in the office.”
Brown glanced toward the wall in front of her desk, appearing to be deep in thought. Finally she spoke. “I don’t want to be the kind of person this matters to,” she said.
“Then don’t be,” I replied.
She nodded and turned to face me again. “I’m not,” she said decisively. “The job is yours if you want it.”
* * *
—
I completed my AAA article. The Nader group wanted something explosive, and I delivered just that.
Rather than exposing wrongdoing at the AAA, the piece detailed the secrets behind Nader’s obsession with the auto club, based on the consumer advocacy group’s own files. I found documents dating back to 1969 and 1970 in which Nader demanded that AAA officials work with him as consumer advocates for car buyers. The letter Nader had received in response was, to say the least, not complimentary. The records showed that AAA’s missive and its refusal to join his cause had enraged Nader; he’d ordered an investigation of the group, assembling a twelve-member team to dig up dirt.
Nader publicly announced the project in 1971, and the AAA agreed to cooperate. The internal records showed that the Nader researchers planned to feign objectivity and utilize the auto club’s assistance to advance preconceived attacks. While there was no indication Nader knew, one investigator stole a pile of the AAA documents out of its headquarters. Nader followed up weeks later with a demand that the association release all of its financial records, and soon, AAA ended its cooperation out of a belief that they were being set up. In August 1971, Nader announced his report would be ready by winter and demanded to speak at the AAA annual meeting the following month. After the association refused this demand, the investigators picketed the conference while the AAA president assailed Nader for harming the cause of public safety. That angered Nader more. The report promised for the winter of 1972 took three years, and it landed virtually unnoticed. The investigators found almost nothing. Nader demanded more digging.
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