o be in the same room as John Walter, whom he was convinced was leaking like a sieve and whom he blamed for the failure of the SBC merger discussions. Furthermore, Allen had been hearing complaints about Walter from a steady stream of executives, both company veterans and newcomers. According to them, Walter seemed unable to focus on any subject for more than twenty minutes and was quick to criticize, but offered no solutions. They said he still didn't have a grasp of the business's fundamentals and didn't seem to be making any effort to learn them. He had made little progress on basic operating issues, such as fixing the billing sys- items, despite his early expressions of disbelief at their inadequacy. Walter had particularly alienated the former McCaw wireless exec- utives when he complained about having to fly all the way to Seattle for a briefing on their fixed wireless project and cut short a tour of the secret manufacturing plant they had built in a Redmond office park. In fact, he openly questioned the company's wireless investment. His efforts to make a show of "firing people" offended many executives and caused some to question his integrity. Allen himself was beginning to believe Walter was a brilliant sales- man but superficial, dealing in tired bromides. At one board meeting just before the executive session when Allen met alone with the out- side members, Allen asked Walter to give an operational review. He spent twenty minutes talking about his efforts to instill a sense of ownership into the company's employees, told Ross Perot's snake story, and ended by declaring that AT&T had all the elements to be a winning, learning organization. When he left the room, Allen simply said, "See what I mean?" Unfortunately, back in April we had scheduled Allen, Walter, and Zeglis to attend an editorial board meeting with USA Today on June 30. Putting the three of them in front of a group of reporters would be like dangling raw meat in front of lions, but we decided to keep the Expect the Dumbing Down of Reality 