The mayor began his Tuesday morning news conference mumbling about his latest junket to Jackson Hole, Wyoming, where he'd been the guest of our governor, his brother-in-law. To pre-empt the inevitable follow up questions, he noted that he had not used any local tax dollars-for some reason, we were supposed to feel better that our state tax money paid for his ski weekend.

Anyway, it was a national governor's conference on economic growth. The mayor had seen the future. It was biotech.

His speech seemed something akin to Mrs. Robinson's in The Graduate, as she told Dustin Hoffman the future was plastics. A reporter interrupted and asked what the mayor was going to do with this newfound knowledge.

And then the mayor dropped the proverbial bombshell: I, Hesh Reinfeld, his corporate counsel and golf buddy, would become his science advisor. It fell to me to draft a plan to attract 500 new biotech jobs to our city in the next 18 months.

We actually made the noon news on TV. I was shown commenting on how excited I was with my new appointment. My pals in the press corps were nice enough not to push and ask what kind of credentials I had to be the mayor's science advisor. Nor did they inquire how many mayors of cities of 112,000 (on a good day) had a science advisor.

My knowledge of science? Like most attorneys, I had problems even getting through National Geographic. I never looked at the stories, just the photos. Back in college, I had taken one biology course, but I realized that I could never major in a subject that did not have essay questions on the final exam. How else was I going to talk my way into getting an A in the class?

I knew from other hot political issues it made no sense to ask the mayor where he had come up with the idea that our little city would become a biotech powerhouse. And why me?

Back at my desk, I considered the obvious. To attract even 100 jobs, our biotech industry would have to grow exponentially like a virus and become as large as the auto industry within two years.

The key seemed to be to market ourselves as the number-one city in a biotech-friendly category. I learned quickly from the Internet that the key criterion for biotech venture capital firms was the amount of National Institute of Health grants received by local medical research institutions. Boston and Baltimore were the leaders since they were the homes of Harvard and John Hopkins. Hell, we didn't even have a medical school. Perhaps our smart youth could move us to the top. I checked with the superintendent of our school district. How did we match up in the number of high school students taking advance placement courses in biology and math? Not bad-we ranked 8th in the state. Unfortunately, our state ranked in the lower quartile nationally. We fared much better in the number of high school football lineman who received scholarships to Big Ten schools. But I could not find any useful connections between linemen and biotech other then perhaps the use of steroids.

The more research I did, the more depressed I got. We were not at the top in any category. The silver lining, at least, was that we were also not at the bottom in any category. Garrison Keillor's fictitious Lake Woebegone may have had all the above average children, but we were stuck with all the average ones (including my own).

The mayor called and asked how I was coming with my master plan. He suggested we skip out early and discuss it on the golf course. I was dejected and really did not want to play, but he is the mayor.

He asked for details as he readied to tee off. I told him we needed to find a niche, to be number-one in something to gain the necessary PR. So far, I had nothing.

"So, I guess, all we can say about our fair city is that we are average," he said.

"Yes your honor (I loved calling him that. He hated it)." I replied.

Then he gave me that look, the one I had seen so often in his political career. It was the look that said, "I've figured a way out."

"Average!" he screamed with joy. "That will be our brand, our identity."

"What are you talking about?" I asked, totally confused.

"All those biotech firms need to test their new drugs," he said. "They need populations that mirror the entire country to run their clinical trials. Well, they can do it all right here. We'll be Average Town USA and proud of it, the perfect place to experiment with human cloning and call home, too."

I think he actually had a winning idea. He had dropped his clubs and was already on his cell phone asking his press secretary to arrange a live press conference that would lead the six p.m. news.

I even heard him say. "Yes Brokaw, get Brokaw. This is big."

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