Former NU law student
takes on government
MANTMiPY from page 8
display without a permit. I
He said his usually oblique mes
sages change in content from day to
day. Last Friday, the arrangement of
words was one of the 36-year-old’s
more direct presentations:
IRS-FITS-RICO- CROOK.
The words spell out his belief that
the U.S. government uses tactics that
are unfair to the American people and
are similar in nature to that of gangs,
he said.
Manthey said the IRS is a prime
example of the U.S. government
manipulating its population to keep a
few in power and the people they
serve “in the dark.”
“There are 7 million words of IRS
coding that we’re suppose to under
stand,” he said. “It’s like reading the
manual to your VCR or something.”
Manthey said his main problem
with the government is that it employs
“adhesion contracting.”
“If one has wants to drive a car in
this country, that person must basical- |
ly pay rent for the right to use that car
by getting it licensed,” he said. “It’s
non-negotiable. Where else in society
is there such one-way contracting?
And do you ever really own your
car?”
Although he has disdain for the
contractual nature of the federal gov
ernment, Manthey doesn’t say he’s a
protester, much less anything else.
He dodges most every question
with a philosophical, angular answer
that sounds as if it’s coming out of a
Sean Penn interview. However, unlike
the narcissistic nature of a Hollywood
actor, Manthey avoids self-definition
in obvious terms because it might
actually get him arrested.
“I can’t say that I’m a protester or
anything else, really,” he said. “ I don’t
know what you’d call me, most people
just say I’m ‘the psycho on the cor
__ __
ner.
Manthey, with a coy smile emerg
ing from his bearded face, was com
menting on what has proven to be a
popular analysis of the people scoot
ing by his comer stage in motored
vehicles. He said people usually yell
the “psycho” word out their windows,
as well as many non-printable terms.
Such a simple, insulting assess
ment of die man would not only be off
the mark, but intellectually trite as
well.
Manthey is not Lincoln’s Ted
Kaczynski. In fact, he seems to go
about his T-shirt protesting with the
same normal and gritty sense of
humor one would expect from an
upstanding blue-collar worker.
He normally greets people who
are curious enough to ask him how he
is doing with “same shit, different day,
different comer.”
However, it’s been obvious that
Lincoln authorities have approached
his patient and idealistic daily perfor
mance with caution. And in post
Oklahoma City-bombing America,
the careful tactics are reasonable
enough
Manthey said that more than a
year ago, the Lincoln Police
Department sent a professional from
the Regional Center to talk to him.
“She asked me frivolous ques
tions, so I gave frivolous answers,” he
said.
And this is where Manthey per
forms best - using his self-educated
intellect to bob and weave the govern
ment, and anyone trying to get in the
way of his mode of expressing his ver- .
sion of the truth.
A former law student, he admits
to speaking “legalese” when con
fronted with potential interrogation.
Furthermore, Manthey is really
Lincoln’s most famous street juggler,
although he’s out there every day jug
gling libertarian ideas instead of
bowling pins.
He is someone Barry Goldwater
probably wouldn’t have minded talk
ing with about western, freedom
seeking politics. Although, unlike
Goldwater, Manthey refuses to join
the system in any form.
“That would be like joining the
Ku Klux Klan to change the Ku Klux
Klan, and that doesn’t make any
sense,” Manthey said.
Manthey is vigilant and punctual
in his sidewalk exhibitions - Monday
through Friday just before lunch and
dinner time is when the people in mil
itary or business attire keep the feder
al building’s revolving doors rotating
at their highest rates.
However, he sounded as if he
believed those people take him about
as seriously as they would the sheep
dog punching in and out of watch duty
in the old Warner Bros, cartoons.
“I believe my impact has been
absolute zero,” he said.
Federal employees seem to be a
bit dumbfounded by Manthey’s
antics, but none interviewed
expressed feelings of fear.
Tracey Daley, a janitor at the fed
eral building, gave a popular answer
when she said, “I just wonder what
he’s doing.”
Although equally dismayed as
Daley, Travis Henning has found an
admirable quality in Manthey’s day
to-day work.
“At first I thought it was funny,”
said Henning, who works for the U.S.
Attorney’s office. “And then I realized
what kind of dedication it took to be
out there every single day and was a
little impressed by that.”
Steve Hrral, a maintenance work
er at the federal building, said he
thought Manthey might be protesting
what a lot of people complain about
these days - government waste of tax
Heather Glenboski./DN
TOM MANTHEY SAID, “We are all
under contracts with the govern
ment without our knowledge or
consent.” He performs his back
and-forth, eight-step routine
every day during the noon and
evening rush.
dollars.
“(The government) doesn’t
always have the ladder on the right
wall,” Hrral said.
Anyone who talks with Manthey,
will find him to be anything but uned
ucated - especially about his sidewalk
showcasing.
By wearing a T-shirt and moving
to a different comer every 30 days,
Manthey avoids a grocery list of
applicable misdemeanors, which
includes unauthorized protesting and
obstructing the flow of sidewalk traf
fic.
Manthey said he dropped out ot
the NU College of Law in the 1980s.
He said he reads non-fiction nightly at
his home in south Lincoln and earns a
living by selling aluminum siding,
which he finds in trash bins.
He’s never been on welfare and
believes he’s using his self-education
to help humankind, Manthey said.
. Even though he intensely suspects
his practice of offering “advertise
ments” won’t change the world
around him, Manthey speaks in philo
sophic layers about his determined
one-man show.
“Metaphorically, with my sublim
inal messages, I’m playing the role of
the government and its people,” he
said. “The government, whether you
know or not, works in a subliminal
nature.
“I’m out here affecting the popu
lation much in the same manner as the
government, with vague politician
like messages. But I’m also part of
that population, so I have both ends
covered.”
Renowned director Kubrick dies
KUBRICK from page 8
director, Anthony Mann, and Kubrick
did not regard the finished product as
a great success.
“I tried with only limited success
to make the film as real as possible
but I was up against a pretty dumb
script which was rarely faithful to
what is known about Spartacus,”
Kubrick told an interviewer.
“Lolita,” starring James Mason
and Shelley Winters, was based on
Vladimir Nabokov’s controversial
novel about a professor who is sexual
ly obsessed with a 12-year-old girl.
The work was filmed in Britain, in
part because of censorship problems,
and thereafter Kubrick was based in
Britain.
“Dr. Strangelove,” starring Peter
Sellers and George C. Scott, was a
black comedy about nuclear war
released in the early 1960s during a
I
period of great fears over the bomb
and Cold War tensions.
“2001,” a science fiction film
about the evolution of man and
humanity’s place in the universe,
combined dazzling visual imagery
and an inspired use of music. It
proved to be a great success for
Kubrick.
In an interview with Playboy mag
azine, Kubrick said he had “tried to
create a visual experience, one that
bypasses verbalized pigeonholing and
directly penetrates die subconscious
with an emotional and philosophic
content ...just as music does.... You’re
free to speculate as you wish about the
philosophical and allegorical mean
mg.
“A Clockwork Orange,” set in a
violent future, is a graphic film about
a young thug who carries out rapes
and beatings before being sent to
prison where he is brainwashed.
I
The film was one of Kubrick’s
most controversial - it was even dis
paraged by Anthony Burgess, whose
novel was the basis of the film, and
Kubrick eventually removed it from
screens in Britain. One of Kubrick’s
memorable touches was to have his
hero sing “Singin’ in the Rain” while
dishing out a brutal beating.
“The Shining,” a thriller based on
a Stephen King novel, starred Jack
Nicholson as a writer who went mad
and attacked his family while at a
deserted, snowbound resort hotel.
Kubrick was married three times,
first in 1948 to Toba Metz, then after
divorcing he married Ruth Sobotka in
1954. Their marriage ended three
years later, and in 1958, he wedded
Suzanne Harlan, with whom he had
three daughters.
Details about funeral arrange
ments were not immediately avail
able.
Television special explores
Native American culture
SPIRIT from page 8
belief system had to offer,” Buffett
said.
His inspiration for “Spirit” was an
experience a friend of his had. She
realized, after her relatives had tried
to hide it from her, that she had
American Indian heritage.
Her newfound knowledge
changed her outlook on life, Buffett
said. She began to understand feel
ings that she never had before.
I he music style that Spirit has,
Buffett said, is a hybrid between his
style of music and what would be
considered traditional American
Indian music - or at least what has
survived to be known - which
includes drums, flute and voice.
He mixes*this with his style,
which has been influenced by artists
such as the Beatles, Steely Dan and
Peter Gabriel.
Buffett also worked in close col
laboration with Chief Hawk Pope, the
principal chief of the Shawnee
Nation. In addition to serving as a
narrator and vocalist for “Spirit,” he
provided other support to the project.
“(Pope has) been an invaluable
component because of what he brings
both musically and his knowledge of
the history of the nations,” Buffett
said.
“Spirit” has premiered already on
PBS stations around the country, and
it will continue through March in dif
ferent markets.
After its television run, work will
begin on a touring show. Several
changes will have to be made, Buffett
said, and the show will increase in
length from its current 40 minutes.
But even at this early juncture m
his production’s exposure, Buffett
already feels like he’s succeeded.
On Wednesday, “Spirit” had the
power to pry people from Monica
Lewinsky’s interview with Barbara
Walters, Buffett said.
“I was in Baltimore and I was on
against her, and the phones still rang,”
Buffett said. “There actually are peo
ple who could watch something else.”
The experience embodies the
focus of the show: It’s for people who
are tired of the gossip and triviality of
today’s world and want to explore
something deeper.
Lied Center for Performing Arts presents
The Tamburitzans of
Duquesne University
\
Young folk artists present the music, song and
' dance of Eastern Europe.
Wednesday, A/larch 10, 1999, 7pm
i
Stefan Milenkovich, violin
Friday, March 12, 1999, 8pm
Johnny Carson Theater
Locally sponsored by CableVision and The Cookie Company.
Tickets: 472-4747 or 1-800-432-3231
Box Office: 11 KX)am-5:30pm M-F
http://www.unl.edu/lied/
\TnUtvi nlr o Lad Center programming is awaited by to Friends of lied and grants from the National Endowment far Ihe Arts.
INcUIclbxt d Mid-America Arts Alliance and the Nebraska Arts Carol. All events are made possible by the Lad Perfbr
gnTiiVBT«f *mmA-liwcolw mance Fund which has been established a memory of Ernst F. Lied and his parents, Ernst M. and Ida K. Lied.