American Royalty: an insight

Wealth Creates Arrogance

By Fred Mazelis

Directed by Lauren Greenfield

 

The new documentary, The Queen of Versailles, advertised at least in part as a kind of reality show based on the tale of a Florida billionaire and his wife who set out to build a 90,000-square-foot home inspired by Louis XIV’s palace in Versailles, is in fact a good deal more serious than its media coverage might suggest.

Filmmaker Lauren Greenfield, also an artist and documentary photographer, has come up with a movie that to some extent holds up a mirror to twenty-first century America. It would be difficult for any thinking viewer of the film to come away without some serious questions about the state of contemporary society.

David Siegel, 74 years old when the film was begun some four years ago, grew up in Indianapolis. His father was a businessman who apparently gambled away most of his earnings. The younger Siegel was determined to achieve wealth on a grand scale. He got his big chance in 1980, launching what was to become Westgate Resorts, a vast empire based on timeshare vacation homes.

Jackie Siegel, 30 years younger than her husband, comes from a working class background in the upstate New York town of Binghamton. When she met and married Siegel in 1995, it was her second marriage and his third.

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Why Mary Martin (SWP) Will Never Win the Washington Governor's Race

It's voting time in the great Pacific Northwest... and, we'll, like a lot of people I haven't been following my local politics all that closely.

So when voting time came up, well I just didn't know who to vote for in this election's primaries.

The first thing I did was Google for a socialist candidate for Governor in WA state. Somehow I ended up on this page, Meet Washington’s lesser-known candidates for governor. For about the first half of the article, I actually thought that Shahram Hadian, a very decent professional looking fellow, was the socialist candidate (he's a Republican btw, a quick glance on his defense of man on woman marriage will confirm that).

Anyway the actual socialist candidate for WA Governor is discussed, in brief, toward the bottom of the article. One, Mary Martin, who prefers the Socialist Workers Party and apparently used to be a Communist Political Organizer, her campaign was announced April 9th 2012, in The Militant, a socialist publication... out of New York.

Mary Martin; only known photo?

I think it's fairly reasonable.... to, maybe wonder why perhaps a candidacy for WA state Governorship wasn't also mention in maybe some....more local outlets?

I am aware that we live in a global society and that the Internet belongs to everybody, but uh... I mean, ...if it were me, running for WA Governor, I'd want to make sure that the good folks of WA state knew about it. I'm thinking maybe staking out a spot next to the mascot for Little Caesars on 16th Ave, holding a flashy sign. Maybe a shout-out to "Go Huskies" or something.
I mean, it'd be more targeted that those occasional "WORK FROM HOME" posters I've seen driving around town, what with the small print lettering of a number to call, and then the light turns green and you gotta go.

There is a reason why you've probably never heard of Mary Martin. She has, in summation, no campaign, no website, and next to little exposure. Her biggest exposure comes from the brief mentioning of her candidacy and positions in the Militant.

Other than that, you're lucky if you can even find 2 photos of this woman. And I'm gonna tell you right now; I haven't. Other than the photo that looks like it's from 1969 I have no idea what this woman looks like.

"You're fired!"

Of course, when running for any office, one's appearance is not always the most important, we reserve that for reality TV show stars and part-time doll house wig models, like ooh lay la ->


To this day, we know little to nothing about Mary Martin, save that she appears to work at an airport in the baggage section, and her campaign has basically consisted of establishing that all her co-workers agree with her on most important issues.

Campaigning at an airport is fine, after all airport employees work long hours, and their thoughts and opinions matter, be it in a national or a local election. But she's campaigning at the place where she works... a place she needs to go to anyway.

You can almost just picture, the dedication it must of taken, maybe she got there a little early one morning to remind her co-workers that they're her only hope.

"Mary C'mon, it's like an every day occurrence now, enough with the campaigning, one year it's WA D.C. City council now all of a sudden it's WA State. C'mon I'm tired, it's 5am I gotta de-ice the plane, just let a man go to work in peace."

Though to be clear, all we know about her co-workers is that they support her.

But look, this is 2012, a bw photo isn't going to cut it anymore. People actually want "feel-special" time with their favorite candidates because they like to believe those candidates... are their friends!

Googling your name doesn't even bring up a candidacy. In fact, if you Google her name all you get is a mention on the WA State, census. And I'm not even sure if it's the same Mary!


So, for goodness sakes, get on youtube! Start a Facebook page. Tumble around on Twitter, I duno. Do something!

Anyway, as über-lib as I may be, I can't vote for someone, I barely have any information on. And that, is why, I'm making a...fairly safe prediction that she won't win.


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Lastly, please try to understand, though I've made an effort to research my facts, other than the fact that she apparently at one time or another worked at the Reagan National Airport, I can't confirm if she actually still works at either that airport (doubtful) or if she now works for an airport in WA. It is very, very difficult to get any info on this candidate. And there is no excuse. You don't need money to have a youtube account, or a Facebook page, and webhosting these days is very, very, inexpensive.