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By Root 1286 0

above the stage displayed a series of patriotic images: the Statue of Liberty, the Lincoln Memorial, amber waves of grain. In one of the morning’s first speeches, an executive hailed the restaurant industry’s record profits the previous year, adding without irony, “As if things weren’t good enough, consumers also dropped all pretense of wanting healthy food.” An ongoing industry survey had found that public concerns about salt, fat, and food additives were at their lowest level since 1982, when the survey began — one more bit of news to justify the industry’s “current state of bliss.” Another executive, a self-described “sensory evaluation specialist,” emphasized the importance of pleasant smells. He noted that Las Vegas resorts were now experimenting with “signature scents” in their casinos, hoping the subtle aromas would subconsciously make people gamble more money.

Robert Nugent, the head of Jack in the Box and honorary chairman of the Twenty-sixth Annual Chain Operators Exchange, broke the cheery mood with an ominous, unsettling speech. He essentially accused critics of the fast food industry of being un-American. “A growing number of groups who represent narrow social and political interests,” Nugent warned, “have set their sights on our industry in an effort to legislate behavioral change.” Enjoying a great meal at a restaurant was “the very essence of freedom,” he declared, a ritual now being threatened by groups with an agenda that was “anti-meat, anti-alcohol, anti-caffeine, anti-fat, anti-chemical additives, anti-horseradish, anti-non-dairy creamer.” The media played a central role in helping these “activist fearmongers,” but the National Restaurant Association had recently launched a counterattack, working closely with journalists to dispel myths and gain better publicity. Nugent called upon the fast food executives to respond even more forcefully to their critics, people who today posed “a real danger to our industry — and more broadly to our way of life.”

Not long afterward Mikhail Gorbachev appeared onstage and received a standing ovation. Here was the man who’d ended the Cold War, who’d brought political freedom to hundreds of millions, who’d opened vast new markets. At the age of sixty-nine Gorbachev looked remarkably unchanged from his appearance during the Reagan years. His hair was white, but he seemed vigorous and strong, still capable of running a mighty empire. He spoke quickly in Russian and then waited patiently for the translator to catch up. His delivery was full of energy and passion. “I like America,” Gorbachev said with a broad smile. “And I like American people.” He wanted to give the audience a sense of what was happening in Russia today. Few people in the United States seemed to care much about events in Russia, a dangerous state of affairs. He asked the crowd to learn about his country, to form partnerships and make investments there. “You must have a lot of money,” Gorbachev said. “Send it to Russia.”

A few minutes into Gorbachev’s speech, the audience began to lose interest. He had badly misjudged the crowd. His speech might have been a success at the Council on Foreign Relations or at the United Nations General Assembly, but at the Grand Ballroom of the Mirage it was a bomb. As Gorbachev explained why the United States must strongly support the policies of Yevgeny Primakov (the Russian prime minister who was fired not long afterward) row after row of eyes began to glaze. He earnestly asked why there was “some kind of a dislike of Primakov that is widespread in this country,” unaware that few Americans knew who Yevgeny Primakov was and even fewer cared about him, one way or the other. I counted at least half a dozen people seated near me in the Grand Ballroom who fell asleep during Gorbachev’s speech. The executive right beside me suddenly awoke in the middle of a long anecdote about how the Mongol invasion had affected the Russian character in the Middle Ages. The executive seemed startled and unaware of his surroundings, then glanced at the podium for a moment, felt reassured, and