Word: renting
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...many times as he needs to. Last week Bill Clinton emerged from his self-imposed post-pardon-scandal exile. When he opened his new office on 125th Street in Harlem, with its $350,000 annual rent (his first choice, Carnegie Towers in midtown, would have cost taxpayers $800,000), it was full-frontal Clinton--winking, mugging at the most mundane remarks, pointing excitedly into the crowd as if he had just spotted a long-lost friend or a donor. Except for Senator Chuck Schumer, stage center, trying to boogie with the homeboys, it was picture perfect, a routine ribbon cutting...
...many times as he needs to. Last week Bill Clinton emerged from his self-imposed post-pardon-scandal exile. When he opened his new office on 125th Street in Harlem, with its $350,000 annual rent (his first choice, Carnegie Towers in midtown, would have cost taxpayers $800,000), it was full-frontal Clinton--winking, mugging at the most mundane remarks, pointing excitedly into the crowd as if he had just spotted a long-lost friend or a donor. Except for Senator Chuck Schumer, stage center, trying to boogie with the homeboys, it was picture perfect, a routine ribbon cutting...
...Wahid's credit, his departure was at least peaceful--no small achievement in a city where the practice of rent-a-crowd is so standardized that slum enforcers print up rate cards. (For $2, you get a supporter for three hours; banners and chants are extra.) The question is whether Megawati can maintain a semblance of order. She has stronger backing than Wahid in parliament. And the military likes her: they share a common abhorrence of the separatist fever sweeping through Aceh and Papua (the former Irian Jaya) provinces. Her dynastic birthright helps too. Megawati is the daughter of Sukarno...
...trouble begins even before you enter. As authorities have banned fossil-fuel vehicles in the area, visitors must rent battery-driven cars or carts drawn by horses or camels. Despite fixed rates, overcharging is the norm. The drivers are rude, the hiring and negotiating shambolic. Flies swarm the animals and the dung they liberally scatter across the potholed roads. When you reach the entrance to the mausoleum that Emperor Shah Jahan built for his second wife, Queen Mumtaz Mahal, hawkers touting miniature Taj Mahals, bottled water and postcards, add to the chaos. You may shake them...
...Indeed, the system has become so evolved that there are well-established rent-a-mob organizers with laminated price lists. It's somewhere in the region of $2 a demonstrator per hour, more if there are banners. And if you want them for more than three hours, you have to provide lunch...