Idiots!

Steve Brown January 22nd, 2008

*^%&^#$%$#$()&^!!!!

I don’t care if this helps you or not. What follows isn’t for you. It’s for me and, if I don’t say something, I’m going to go nuts.

You were chosen.

I’m mad as…well, really ticked…and I’m not going to take it anymore!

Do you know what I’ve been doing for hours? I’ve been dealing with idiots!

Uh…Jesus just told me that I couldn’t say that because they are idiots for whom he died.

Okay. Let’s start over.

I’ve been dealing with bureaucrats (a.k.a. idiots) whose purpose in life is screwing up the world.

Let me explain.

It started with Steve Brown, Etc., our nationally syndicated talk show where we use “bumper music.” The music we wanted to use was licensed by two companies, BMI and ASCAP. They regularly give licenses (for a reasonable fee) to radio stations for the use of the music. Because the program is live streamed on the Net, distributed as a podcast and then aired later on radio stations, we figured that there wouldn’t be a problem.

We would get a license. That’s reasonably easy. Right?

Wrong.

They don’t grant licenses for podcasts. Doesn’t matter how much you’re willing to pay, doesn’t matter who you are, doesn’t matter if you’re “religious,” doesn’t matter if this is increasingly the way people hear audio.

It’s a policy.

Erik told me the problems he was having and I thought he was exaggerating. He wasn’t. In fact it was worse than he said.

Do you know how I found out? I tried to get permission to use short partial lyrics from two of Michael Kelly Blanchard’s songs. My publisher, Howard/Simon & Schuster, is republishing a book I wrote years ago (Approaching God) in which I had used those quotes and gotten permission with a proper footnote.

Seems that the original permission doesn’t last forever.

I already got permission the first time. Michael is a good friend. The quotes should help me sell some more of his music. The copyright people will make a few bucks. I’ll have good illustrative material.

No problem. Right?

Wrong.

I wrote Michael to ask him and he told me that he didn’t “own” the lyrics and gave me the name of a person to call. Turned out that that person was only the beginning…and he gave me the number of the person who grants permission. I called that person and she gave me another number of someone else—they owned only 75% of the lyric and the other company owned 25%. So I called that company to be told the hoops through which I would have to jump in order to get permission there.

That’s when I gave up. But I don’t ever quietly “go into the night” and said to the anonymous voice on the other end of the line, “I know you don’t run this company, but you need to know that you work for crazy people. I’m trying to help a friend with his music, have an illustration in my book and even make a little money for your company. And you won’t let me. It’s no skin off my nose because I will just take the lyric out of the text, but you need to know that your company is run by idiots.”

Wait. There’s more. If you listen to Key Life, you know that I mentioned on the air that I was doing this book on prayer and if people would send me their “prayer stories” they might be included in the book. Subsequently, we decided to use some 30 of those stories in the book. I figured the fact that they sent me their stories for the express purpose of the book meant that that was permission enough to use them. Right?

Wrong.

Now we have to get formal, legal permission forms filled out for all 30 of the stories. It has required hours and hours of work by Robin at Key Life. She is as frustrated as I am…

(Will Rogers used to say that he grew up in the country where they didn’t have legal birth certificates for proof of birth. “Seemed to us the fact that you were there proved that you had been born.” I felt that a letter or email with a story that was sent because it would be used in a book was permission enough. Not even close.)

Wait, there’s more.

Not too long ago, I was invited by a graduate school to teach a week-long course on communicating to post-moderns. That’s easy and I enjoyed teaching the course. It’s what I do. No problem. Right?

Wrong.

Weeks after teaching the course, I received forms that I needed to sign. The bureaucratic lawyers and auditors got involved. They get paid for screwing up the world and, the more they screw it up, the more money they get.

I had to read the institution’s policy on fraud, on IT users and on a conflict of interest…fairly long, detailed documents. And then I was required to sign a form about each of those, affirming that I wasn’t a fraud.

What? If I was a fraud, I would sign the documents! Why? Because that’s what a fraud does, dummy. What? Do you think I would send the documents back and say, “I can’t sign these…I’m a fraud”? But I had to sign them because some bureaucrats (a.k.a. idiots) with time on their hands and their underwear too tight need to get a life, that’s why.

I have a lot more—a whole lot more—to say on this subject, but Jesus told me to stop and repent of what I wrote.

Okay. I repent.

Besides, I don’t have time to write anymore. I have this new employee policy I have to write for Key Life (the parent company for Steve Brown, Etc.) so that when people here tell me I can’t say what I just said because it will be offensive and cause people to get angry…

I’ll say, “Sorry. I can’t change it. It’s policy.”

It’s a good thing to be the boss and to write policy.

God writes policy too, doesn’t he? (I need to say something religious.)

You will find one of his policy statements in a document titled “The Ten Commandments.” The cool thing about God is that he doesn’t live by his policy. He deals with us as people and he knows our failure to live up to the policy. So he makes allowances (at considerable cost to himself, to wit, his son dying on a cross) so that the policy won’t kill us. The cross and the imputation of Christ’s righteousness, you could say, is God’s most recent policy meant to abrogate all previous policies.

When I write my critical letters to the people mentioned above (oh yes, I’m not finished yet), I’m going to say, “You don’t run the world. God does. Do it God’s way or he might give you the hives!”

Won’t do any good. They’re bureaucrats! The difference between bureaucrats and God is that God doesn’t think he’s a bureaucrat. Bureaucrats, on the other hand…

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