Death of a Salesman?

When you think about it, Henry Paulson is a new kind of Willy Loman. If there has ever been a sales job done it has been Paulson with the ultimate. Arthur Miller would have had a heyday with this one.

In the famed play by Mr. Marilyn Monroe, he had an aging salesman who is no longer able to earn a living, and receives only a small commission. He is losing his mind and has attempted to kill himself by inhaling gas from the water heater, as well as crashing his car. He is obsessed with the post war interpretation of the American Dream.

In the new revised story we have Paulson making everyone else lose their minds, and rather than inhaling gas from the water heater we find ourselves swallowing an unbearable oil pricing as we listen to the news about South Dakota Congressman Bill Janklow getting off for murdering someone with his car. The obsession with the post war interpretation is now obsessed by the ongoing multi manufactured war and the failing interpretation of the American Dream.

Well, Henry Paulson makes a slightly different new Willy Loman than the original character, but he has created many just like Loman due to his sale of the century. Perhaps Paulson is more like Willy's brother, Ben. Ben is the wealthy and recently deceased older brother who only appears during Willy's day dreams and time shifts. Willy looks up to him with the highest regard. Perhaps Congress is more like Willy Loman, but let's move on. But, Miller's Willy worked for a man who only had to wake up in the morning, put his slippers on, and make phone calls, and had made millions of dollars. Willy assumes that one does not need to work or have ambition, but that all these men needed was a "smile and a shoeshine" to be successful. So, as the new kind of Willy, Paulson came from the failed companies that we, as the tax payer pansies (or is it ponzies?), are now bailing out. He had reached a dead end in his career. This new Willy was at the top of his game but the sky was falling in on him. His only recourse to his career and life was the ultimate sale, the ultimate con. The final closeout, pre-holiday sale. And that he did.

In a sense Paulson has just shown the American people that the American dream can still exist. He created a Trillion dollar sale within a few weeks at best to give him, Bush and cronies their job security and offshore padding to last many lifetimes. What a commission! With that said, again, perhaps Paulson is more of brother Ben. By making a few calls and doing a few meetings he has been able to take the retirement away from nearly everyone for two generations at least. He has bested some of the greatest salesman of the world with this one.

Congress sat back and ate up the whole story. Like the old Willy Loman. The new Willy, Henry Paulson, sold everyone on the idea that the world was going to crash if this money isn't put into the bad home loans immediately. Has any of the money that has already been distributed gotten there yet? No, the economy just gets worse. So, the new Willy, in another amazing sale, Paulson comes forward and states that he thought that the industry need stability first. I guess he forgot to mention that in the initial discussions. So, is the industry stable now?

This modern story of the famed play is taking different turns and we get to watch it play out. In the final scene of Miller's play we have fittingly a funeral scene, with everyone standing over Willy's grave. Biff who is Willy's oldest son, Happy who is the younger son, Linda who is Willy's wife, and their neighbors Charley and Bernard. The eldest son, at this point learns to accept himself for what is, Happy, the younger generation still wants to carry on Willy's dream of success in the city, and Linda explains that she can't cry. Despite all of the problems that Miller's Willy Loman had she had made the last payment on the house, ending with the words "We're free, we're free..."

In Paulson's rendition the ending is going to play out a bit differently. The older generation will remain the same and will resign themselves to what is, and the younger generation will also remain similar and try to carry out the American dream in the big city. This is America and always has been. But, for the character of Linda, there will be that day when there will be no more tears left but there will be no more house left to make a final payment on as the foreclosure took that dream away. That dream that Bush so proudly talked early on in his first term of helping American's get into a home and enjoy the American dream of home ownership. The pre-planning was happening and no one noticed.

With Paulson creating the new generation of Willy Loman, we give Paulson the great ironic line that Miller gave to Happy, who says it best. "All right, boy. I’m gonna show you and everybody else that Willy Loman did not die in vain. He had a good dream. It’s the only dream you can have-to come out number-one man.”




This, the 208th entry in bloggoland! Thanks for reading and coming back. I always enjoy the comments, emails and the banter!!


(c)Copyright 2008 Doug Boggs