“When James Schlatter, a G.D. Searle chemist, happened upon an exceptionally sweet-tasting chemical—marketed as aspartame—while researching an anti-ulcer drug back in 1965, he unknowingly unleashed on the world one of the greatest food debacles of all time,” Sanchez said. “The FDA initially denied approval, given evidence of neurotoxicity. However, certain events paved the way for its approval; events like the sudden acceptance of a position in Searle’s law firm by Samuel Skinner, the U.S. Attorney in charge of investigating Searle’s reported criminal misconduct. That stymied the investigation until the statute of limitations ran out. Donald Rumsfeld’s new position as Searle’s CEO also helped. A little over two decades later, Jack Conner created a competitive sweetener—three hundred percent sweeter than aspartame—called Connulose. Ladies and gentlemen, today, nearly three decades later, these dangerous additives are still adversely affecting the health of all users. Only one year after soft drink companies began using aspartame, the Center for Disease Control began fielding hundreds of complaints for headaches, cardiac and liver problems, and neurologic symptoms. All of you who drink diet sodas and who add this chemical—yes, a chemical, not a food—to your coffee need to be aware of the toxicity of these sweeteners and their direct influence in the rise of obesity in our country. Look around you.” Most of the audience shifted uncomfortably in their seats. “Again, I urge the FDA, once and for all, to quit bowing to the demands of the food and drug lobby. It is a disgrace.”
The Democratic senator had barely put a period on her paragraph when Senator Libby seized control.
“I would like to remind everyone of Dr. Robert Brackett’s testimony in a November 2006 hearing. He was the Director of the Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition. In his superb delivery, true to the reputation of the Bush administration…”
There was a murmur in the chamber, a few smiles and soft chuckles. Senator Libby raised his voice. At five foot seven, his soft chin supporting round cheeks, he looked more like a sagging marshmallow than the powerful senator he had become. As he peered through his thick glasses, his massive, balding head still managed to dwarf his overweight frame.
“Dr. Brackett made it eminently clear that obesity is a result of lifestyle and overconsumption, not Connulose. And, it was determined, my honored colleagues, that the argument against Connulose is moot, since it has been unequivocally shown to be a natural substance, utilizing constituents from high-fructose corn syrup. I ask you, what could be more natural than corn in the good ol’ U S of A?”
The commission chair—Senator Dade—took the opportunity to clarify a point. “As a reminder, the FDA still has on its plate a future agenda in which it will decide the precise parameters of what it means to be ‘natural.’”
“Yes, and in the meantime,” Senator Libby boomed, “I can assure you that Connulose is all natural and not in the least responsible for any obesity, or neuro…tosis, or whatever, in this fine country.”
A distracting hubbub had broken out. Many of the senators looked toward the sidelines, their eyes focused on one key figure—Jack Conner. Conner just smiled, nodding to those who were on his side. He appeared completely unruffled.
Lishan took note of Libby’s comments, of Conner’s attitude, writing them in her five by eight Moleskine. Ideas were forming quickly in her head.
The hearing lasted another hour. The commissioner closed by suggesting meetings with the public and industry groups. As the meeting adjourned and people filed out, Lishan held back, disappearing into a less conspicuous part of the room. She was curious about how Jerry and Schuler would interact. She didn’t have long to wait.
Conner and the senator were speaking privately. The two men simultaneously made eye contact with Lishan before turning their backs on her.
Jerry had walked over to the table where Schuler had made his presentation. The two men walked out together, chatting and smiling.
As Lishan exited the building, she felt a fist push into her back, but there was something more, almost like a nasty bee sting. She turned to find Conner, his earlier smile still plastered on his craggy face. Lishan was resolute to be unshaken, or at least not to let it show, though Conner’s 6’3” frame reeked of the excesses of power and strength.
“Hello, little girl.”
Lishan narrowed her eyes. “Ms. Amir to you.” She tried ignoring the pain in her back.
“I always did enjoy your feistiness. In any case, it’s a pleasure, you can be sure.” As he turned to walk away, he put a small pocketknife back in his pants pocket, the tip covered in fresh blood. He looked at Lishan, smiling. “Good luck with your career…or finding a new one.”
As she began to leave, Lishan felt her back where the sting was not diminishing, not at all. The spot was moist. When she checked her hand, Lishan’s eyes grew fully round. There was blood.
She proceeded to the lady’s restroom where a young woman took a look for Lishan, confirming that it appeared to be a puncture of some kind, about the width of the woman’s tiny pinky finger. Lishan always carried a spare Band-Aid and a small, square gauze pad. With her acquaintance’s help, and a couple of minutes of applied pressure, the bleeding subsided.
Lishan’s fury was rising, as was her fear.
She stopped at one of her favorite coffee shops, one with a Bohemian flair. She couldn’t help but consider the thick connections and good ol’ boy influences in this town. With an Americano in hand, she sat in a deep, comfy chair and pulled out her laptop. Typing in help.senate.gov to get to the Hearings section, Lishan skirted through the various listings until she found the collaborations she was looking for.
Jerry, Schuler, and Conner went back a number of years, well before Schuler became commissioner.
The puncture in her back still hurt, but the pain was subsiding. The bleeding had indeed stopped, so she wasn’t worried about the wound itself. But the fact that Conner wouldn’t hesitate to inflict pain—that worried her. Damn him.
- - -
The air was unusually cool, prompting Lishan to clear her head with a long walk home instead of taking public transit. It gave her time to think, time to contemplate her next story, and time to listen to her music. Cherish the Day streamed through her tiny Bose headphones. Sade’s lyrics and soulful voice always added to Lishan’s resolve.
Lishan had learned one consistent truth in her investigative reporting: where profits and food magnates were concerned, virtually any case could be made to fit an agenda. Any product could be “tested” so the results were ascribed to the desired end-point. Skewing lab findings or statistics toward a particular outcome was a highly developed art and science.
She remembered remnants of articles she had read. One, from a supposedly prominent journal, repudiated the claim of danger in trans fats. Lishan recalled digging, peeling back the layers until she uncovered the truth. Not in black and white, to the casual observer, but there, nonetheless. The food processing company had, surreptitiously, through the subsidiary name game, funded the study. The presiding scientists were not available for comment.
Lishan stopped just short of her apartment complex. To hell with Jerry, with the Conners and Libbys of this town. Inside her apartment, a glass of chardonnay, Camembert de Normandie, a baguette, and a movie ended all aspirations for the rest of the evening.
6
The following morning, Lishan returned to work at The Mirror. After a couple of hours, she realized she wanted to be elsewhere, prompting her to head out for a cup of neighborhood coffee. As she left The Mirror and passed through the elegant, manually-operated, three-chambered door of brushed bronze, she was greeted by the bright sun, a slight chill, and the intense stare of a taxi driver standing by his ubiquitous, illegally parked Yellow cab. Turning right on the expansive sidewalk, she noticed the driver hurriedly getting into his cab.
The streets and intersections were wide in this part of D.C., with traffic and pedestrian signals geared toward the professional on the move. Lishan smiled as she remembered her time in Ho
nolulu, where, just when a mainland driver’s patience ran out waiting for the light to turn green, a glance at the ‘walk’ signal revealed another twenty-five seconds to go. Lishan briskly stepped out into the second of five intersections she needed to traverse before arriving at the café.
An alarmed voice shouting “Look out!” and a strong hand wrapped around her right arm were her last recollections before she fell to the pavement amid the sound of squealing tires.
“Miss, are you alright?” Hearing the caring male voice was reassuring. At least her hearing and other senses were likely still intact. “Don’t move just yet. When you’re ready, let me help you up, if nothing feels broken.”
Lishan slowly sat up, brushing off bits of miniscule stone fragments and grime as she took stock. Her right thigh hurt, but it felt no more than a bruise.
“What happened?” she muttered.
“You’re quite lucky,” the voice offered.
Lishan shook off the fog and focused on her rescuer—a dark brown-skinned male, nearly black, perhaps thirty-five, with beautiful facial features.
He continued, “That taxi driver ran the light, and not by a slight margin.”
Lishan could do little more than blink as the reality sank in that she may have just narrowly avoided being killed, perhaps murdered. As the small crowd dispersed, she stood, slowly. She felt a slight limp in her right leg as she tried to walk. Gradually, the limp eased.
“I...I can’t thank you enough. I believe you saved my life. My name is Lishan.” She extended her hand.
“I’m Osiris,” the man said.
“Can I buy you a coffee, or lunch?”
“Kind of you, but I’m running late for a meeting—unless you could still use my help.”
Lishan gave herself another once-over. “Just a scrape or two. So how can I thank you?”
“Your well-being is all that matters. Thank you, though.”
As Lishan began to walk off, she thought to turn and ask if he thought the taxi driver had tried to hit her, but she brushed off the thought. Then she remembered Conner. He wouldn’t go that far, would he?
She wrestled with the possible answers, finally convincing herself that the cabbie had simply been in a hurry. Aren’t they all? she asked herself. Lishan was shaken enough that she decided to head back to The Mirror, sans coffee.
- - -
Her desk was neat and organized—not the norm in the newsroom. Nobody understood this quirk in her otherwise typical journalistic nature. Everyone remotely connected to the business knew that journalists were slobs at their desks, with stacks of newspapers that caused even the most seasoned fire marshals to shake their heads during inspections.
The plaque on her desk read, “We create our own conflict.” To Lishan, it wasn’t a suggestion to lie low. She framed it as a philosophical view of the world and how it came to be.
The gray cubicle walls surrounding her were only four feet high, ensuring that no one could easily hide from Jerry’s view. This was where Lishan allowed her clutter. Her wall space was filled with none-too-flattering articles about various senators, governors, or the FDA. As she sat back in her squeaky, low-grade ergonomic chair—the product of a tightening budget—she replayed the words delegated by her supposed boss.
Dammit, she thought. It’s the journalist’s job to keep the country running smoothly, to prod honesty from those government officials with unspecified vacations to the Bahamas, those CEOs whose frosted seven-figure bonuses were just never enough, the shareholders who measured their stock gain without regard to who gets hurt.
Conner Foods and Conner Pharmaceuticals were at the top of Lishan’s Public Enemy list, along with eight other companies that dominated food and drugs in the U.S. Lishan knew most people were surprised by the holdings of these companies, thinking the brand names they knew and loved were still wholly-owned and produced by the original companies. Few knew these ten companies dictated over ninety-five percent of the two behemoth industries. Lishan was determined to remove the blindfolds.
Then there was Senator Libby with his notorious reputation for bending legislation that smoothed the way for much of Conner’s shenanigans. Lishan paused and shuddered as she recalled the morning’s close call.
The afternoon was disappearing. Lishan looked ahead at her assignments for the week, always considering them “tentative” since news didn’t align itself in neat, tidy packages. The world was too disorderly and dynamic to submit to a weekly timetable.
She noticed there was nothing controversial on the list, nothing remotely connected to government. This was usual when Jerry felt like exercising his ego, but the list did seem conspicuously clean this week—not a polemic in sight. Heading down to the lunchroom to get a cup of the dregs, she noticed a new product in the snack vending machine: potato chips with “zero trans fats” clearly marked in the upper right-hand corner. On a reporter’s whim, Lishan dug in her pocket for the sixty-five cents. The six-ounce pack spiraled forward, but it stopped just short of its intended fall.
“Doomed,” Lishan muttered to herself. Digging again, she found only sixty cents. Another expletive. Calculating its importance, and not wanting to be seen with two bags of chips, she stood there for a moment, curling her toes inside her Timberlands, fidgeting.
“Lunch or dinner?” It was her publisher. “Chips at that!” she grinned.
“It’s for an article I’m writing.” Lishan felt sheepish. Of all people to run into.
“Right,” Elizabeth chided. “I think I’ll buy a Snickers. The editorial board wants the low-down.” Noticing Lishan’s dilemma, she dug out a quarter and gave it to Lishan. “For your research.” She grinned as she proceeded to another vending machine to buy a guava juice.
Lishan took in the ingredients list on the bag of chips. There was the usual flair, speaking to the cravings, the need for instant gratification. But, caveat emptor, Lishan thought. Highly paid professionals stood behind the claims and allure in most every packaged food. The question she often sought to answer was how much the food companies weighed share prices versus consumer health. And what about that FDA?
In the past six months, the marketing contingents throughout the greedier food companies had caught on to the public’s growing awareness of trans fats. She imagined, though, that not every consumer made the connection between trans fats and the hydrogenated or partially hydrogenated oils in the ingredients list. But Lishan did.
On her new purchase, there it was: partially hydrogenated oil in the ingredients. “Zero trans fats” on the front of the bag, right-hand corner. Mutually exclusive. How can they get away with this?
“Merde!” she muttered, an angry breath finishing her thought.
The problem gaining momentum in Lishan’s mind was that the FDA wasn’t being straight with the public. The Agency could stand behind its belief that a small quantity of a harmful ingredient, like trans fats, was not harmful. But to intentionally mislead the public, allowing statements on the front of packaging that an ingredient did not exist in a food, when in fact it did—that was an injustice. Deceit with a dollar sign. She could feel the next exposé forming. Perhaps “The Hydrogenated Oil Caper.”
The publisher had returned. Catching the drift in Lishan’s demeanor, with a nod toward the chips, she said, “So, do something about it.” Leaving a smile to underscore her support, the publisher disappeared through a set of double doors.
With two bags of chips in hand, Lishan headed back up the single flight to her desk.
- - -
Settling in, she grew contemplative. She recalled her father—Jemal—a tall, good-looking Ethiopian man whose genes influenced Lishan’s height and skin the color of creamed coffee. They once lived in the Bronx, having left Ethiopia when the Derg came into power, threatening intellectuals like Jemal and his family. Lishan was ten. Nightmares of the escape through Kenya plagued Lishan throughout her teen years. Her two brothers had died at the hand of a juvenile Derg soldier before her father overpowered the youth.
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When she was nearly twenty-four, her parents were shot as they were coming home from a literary event. Her mother, Anne, of Czech and New England descent, died instantly. Her father died three days later. Lishan had already moved to D.C., where she remained after finishing her bachelor’s. She felt so alone.
Immediately, Wayzero Niesha—a very close family friend and sage, mostly known to Lishan as “Auntie,” who watched over Lishan in her early childhood in Ethiopia—became Lishan’s protector. Niesha had moved to the U.S., along with Jemal’s family, at the age of thirty, working in the Ethiopian embassy as an economics advisor. She was well respected, having earned the Wayzero title for her wisdom and compassion in all manner of political and humanitarian efforts in her homeland.
Lishan had grown up in a culture where one’s word, one’s promise, was as binding as any legal contract. When she thought of the likes of Jerry, with his hypocrisies and self-serving ways, her nostrils flared in annoyance. His imperious nature led to exactly the kind of injustice Lishan couldn’t stand—big business and elites working their intimidation so no one would interfere.
- - -
“What are you doing, Lishan?” Jerry stood behind her, a commanding stance. Perhaps he’d been there more than a few seconds. Lishan couldn’t be sure.
“I hope you’re just eating those. They won’t be Exhibit A.” Looking up, as though contemplating a ship on the horizon, he addressed another reporter, having inflicted his intended damage on Lishan.
“Hey, Jody, what’s the status...” Jerry’s voice trailed off, following his body as he headed over to provide guidance to another lost soul.
Lishan opened a drawer in her gray metal desk, a carryover from the old days before desks were made of compressed sawdust. Removing an unmarked hanging folder from the rear of the drawer, she thumbed through its contents, finding article after article referencing failures, intentional or otherwise, where the public’s health was compromised.
Silence Her Page 3
