"Your frame of reference is unrealistic, Mr. Macro. It's impossible for any man to clear himself today. These things are chain-reactive." Audibon flung down the dossier and began to pace energetically. "Touch the American pulse and what do you find? The systole and diastole of paranoia. Do you know cybernetics ... the science of minds and machines? There's a cybernetic feed-back in the American nervous system today. The average American is synaptically inhibited. He can't believe in the innocence of a man once he's been accused. He can't believe in guiltlessness even after acquittal."
Macro stared at Audibon.
"Apart from the issue of freedom of conscience," Audibon went on passionately, "there's the quanta of Popular Villainism. Literature went through an Industrial Revolution in this country and was transformed from an art-form into a story business. The political thinking was metamorphised the same way. You don't find people weighing political factors and extrapolating for valued judgements. Savanarola died in vain. No, our people turn every political issue into Cops And Robbers ... Boy Meets Girl ... Peter And The Wolf, you should excuse the expression."
"I'm afraid I don't follow you, Mr. Audibon."
"Peter And The Wolf. Written by a Russian composer named Tchaikovsky," Audibon explained patiently. "A musico-political joke."
"But this isn't a question of Russian aliens, Mr. Audibon. It's simply—"
"It's a question of the write-in habit," Audibon interrupted. "The basic mistake radio made. Radio tried to bring entertainment into the home. Then the problem of audience response arose and we had to encourage the write-in habit for purposes of analysis on a broad consumer basis. From writing in about products, the public has taken to writing in about politics. This is one mistake television will not make. We're not going to bring the show into the home. We're going to bring the home to the show."
"About these people, Mr. Audibon...."
"I know them all, Mr. Macro. They're artists, all of them; not necessarily talentwise, but because they have magic. Talent died with Goethe. These people have theatricality and mesmerization, not intelligence. Three quarters of them probably did what they did out of Gestalt ... out of emotions. How can we judge them on the cybernetic level?"
"Mr. Audibon," Macro said in exasperation. "I'm a business man. Let's get down to cases. Is your network prepared to suspend the employment of these subversives, or must I call the attention of our sponsors' organization to your—"