It may not be the great Washington novel we’ve been waiting for, but this story by Washington Post writers Mary Beth Sheridan and Del Quentin Wilber about the couple accused of spying for Cuba will do for now The first paragraph alone, though it may seem like a parody to out-of-towners, presents a priceless tableau of contemporary Northwest D.C.:
He was a courtly State Department intelligence analyst from a prominent family who loved to sail and peruse the London Review of Books. Occasionally, he would voice frustration with U.S. policies, but to his liberal neighbors in Northwest D.C. it was nothing out of the ordinary. “We were all appalled by the Bush years,” one said.
You can certainly see how Walter Kendall Myers was able to blend in with the local population. The only way to blend in better would have been to wear a Che t-shirt.
JOHN adds: The criminal complaint alleges that the Myerses have been spying for Fidel since the 1970s. Still, one can hardly be surprised that their neighbors’ first thought is to blame George W. Bush.
UPDATE by JOHN: A reader who knows Myers writes:
Myers’ voicing of “frustration with U.S. policies” often took the form of ranting — albeit often in genteel sarcastic tones — about what he called “Likudniks” infiltrating the U.S. government, as well as the usual anti-Bush stuff. Yes, he blended in very well indeed.
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