Nick Jimenez

Sunday, February 27, 2000

The ugly side of politics

I love politics and I hate what politics makes people do. There is no more exhilarating moment in American politics than Election Night. Finally, all the campaigning is over, all speeches have been made, and all advertisements have been run. Now the voters get their turn.
   One of the last acts of American community takes place in presidential election years when citizens across the nation go to their neighborhood polling places and cast their ballots. Slowly (and it was best when they came in slowly), the results roll in from precincts across the nation, one by one, from tiny ones in New England villages to large wards in big cities.
   But getting to that point can take some turns that aren't pretty.
   Take the scene at the Apollo Theater last week where Vice President Al Gore and former New Jersey Sen. Bill Bradley debated. Well, it was actually closer to a brawl, with both candidates baring their most unattractive and most contentious selves. Bradley tried to shove a sheaf of papers into Gore's hand and the vice president ignored him. Gore said Bradley's health plan would harm the elderly and AIDS patients.
   The worst aspect of the tawdry show was the presence of the Rev. Al Sharpton, the black activist who has espoused the worst sort of racial demagoguery. Both Gore and Bradley should have been ashamed of themselves for legitimizing Sharpton by allowing him to pose the first question.
   Of course, on the other side of the political aisle, there was George W. Bush at Bob Jones University. His appearance at the university in South Carolina came directly on the heels of his loss in New Hampshire. Did he need to win in South Carolina? Absolutely, if he was to keep his campaign alive. Did he need to go to Bob Jones? No.
   Bob Jones is one of those religious universities that espouses its love for its fellow man by a policy of exclusion. It bans interracial dating on the grounds that, as the university says on its Web site, it "opposes one world, one church, one economy, one military, one race and unisex. God made racial differences, as he made sexual differences. Each race and each sex should be proud of what God made it, and none should reproach the other."
   Just a few more nudges to the right and Bob Jones University would meet Al Sharpton coming from the left.
   I asked Michael Williams what he thought of Bush's appearance at Bob Jones University. Williams is running for the state Railroad Commission. He's served in the administrations of Presidents Bush and Reagan. He's an attorney with a glittering record. He's also a Republican, a Catholic and, if elected, would be the first black to be elected to the commission.
   It was obviously painful to Williams. "If I would have had my druthers, I would rather he would not have gone," Williams said.
   Bush's appointments of Williams to the Railroad Commission, of Al Gonzales to the Texas Supreme Court and of Jose Montemayor as commissioner of insurance, show that the governor is solid on the appointment of minorities.
   Obviously, Bush does not share the racist opinions espoused by the tenets of Bob Jones University.
   So why go to Bob Jones University? Why embrace Al Sharpton?
   The defense is "well, it's politics."
   In other words, such things don't matter.
   I don't buy that.
   If there was anything that Bill Clinton should have taught us, it is that the candidate we see on the campaign is the officeholder we will get. The campaigning is the precursor for the governing.
   Someone once said that democracy is the worst form of government - except for all the other forms.
   So it is that elections are the worst way to pick the best person to fill a political office - except for all other methods. And it's not very pretty, either.
  

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