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Political Matters
by Lady Liberty
This past week, I traveled back home for a family event. As most of you
know, I decline to fly (and will continue to do so as long as needlessly
invasive security measures remain in place). That means I spent two very long
days behind the wheel of a rental car with little to do but endure traffic jams
on my way through several large cities and listen to the radio.
On my first day on the road, virtually every talk show featured
discussions of former President Bill Clinton's autobiography. Callers
chimed in to say that they thought he was a good guy with some bad
habits, or that he was perhaps the "lyingest" politician ever to hold
office (which, given the typical politician, is really saying something).
Snippets of Clinton's appearances on the media circuit were aired and dissected
at length. It was, without question, the story of the week.
After my weekend visit with friends and family, I was back on the road
and listening to news talk shows once again. This time, from station to
station, the topic of the day was filmmaker Michael Moore's "Fahrenheit
9/11." Callers told hosts the movie was a lengthy political attack ad,
or that Moore might have had a point amidst his manipulated material.
The "documentary" (I use the term exceedingly loosely) was number one at
the box office over the weekend in ticket sales, and was patently the
top story leading off the news week.
After having spent a couple of days hearing the airwaves thoroughly
saturated with these two stories, it might be reasonable to assume that
pretty much everybody was talking about books and movies, most
especially those from Bill Clinton and Michael Moore. But it struck me
that, in the time between those two days in my car, neither of these
things were mentioned even once.
I'm from a place that east and west coast liberals like to scathingly
refer to as "flyover country." People there are stolidly middle class,
family-oriented, hard working, and usually possessed of feet planted
firmly on the ground. In other words, they exemplify the traditional
average decent American, the backbone of the country and, lest the
politicos be tempted to forget, a sizeable voting block. And what were
these people talking about while much of the media was waxing eloquent
on literary liars and fibbing filmmakers? Well, aside from catching up
with the latest family or local goings on, they seemed to find plenty to
discuss, including:
*A cousin ready for her last year of graduate school (she's about to
receive a Master's degree in Education) wondered aloud not only about
the job market, but about her possible future as a teacher in a rapidly
declining public school system (worries brought home to me when another
of the younger generation asked if anyone had a calculator so that he
could subtract a check he'd just written from his bank account balance).
*A mother, while updating everyone on her children's latest status,
mentioned almost in passing that one son was in Kuwait and getting ready
for an imminent deployment to Fallujah, Iraq (if any of you don't
immediately grasp the import of that remark, type "Fallujah" into a
search engine and watch the scary stories scroll up).
*While talking in general terms about the Internet, an elderly family
friend happened to note that she got all of her prescriptions from
Canada via online sites because she couldn't afford them at American
pharmacies.
*A teenager who hoped to travel this summer was having a difficult time
convincing her mother that she'd be all right flying alone. Security was
only a peripheral thought in the mind of the worried parent who seemed
to be even more concerned for the haphazard (at best) customer service
offered by airlines with a penchant for lost luggage and delayed or
cancelled flights.
*An older couple talked quietly about the places they'd wanted to go
this summer, but lamented that the combination of their modest and fixed
income with high gas prices was keeping them close to home instead.
*A man in the midst of a messy divorce could hardly credit finding
himself the victim of a politically correct system that - at least for
the time being - has allowed a wife of less than a year to have
possession of his longtime family home while forcing him to go elsewhere
until his case is resolved.
*Another mother took note of the fact that two of her children had been
prescribed psychotropic drugs, one for being "slow" and "distracted,"
the other for, ironically, the opposite. Neither child, she said, is
"quite himself " (I wonder why).
Politicians in this election season talk about the bad things their
opponents have done in the past while glossing over their own
indiscretions (sure, Jack Ryan isn't a couth man, but he's one up on
former President Clinton seeing as how he at least wanted to commit his
sexual peccadilloes with his own wife). Members of the media listen
closely to what people like Barbra Streisand or Ann Coulter have to say
about politics, and it seems that right and wrong are all too frequently
dismissed in favor of right and left. Talk show hosts on both ends of
the political spectrum are spending substantial air time on books and
movies instead of more important issues (for the moment, anyway; perhaps
next week, we'll see the topic change to something equally impactful,
like whether or not John Kerry's hair looks good on television -
something else, by the way, I actually heard discussed at some length
one afternoon a few weeks ago).
But ordinary Americans - the ones that America is supposed to be all
about, and who even now comprise the vast majority of the population -
have little in common with politicians (thank God!), the media, or the
famous elite. Instead, despite the efforts of politicians, the media,
and the famous elite, their concerns are close to home and hearth and
very much resemble those worries expressed by my own family and former
neighbors last weekend.
Perhaps instead of a junket to Europe, politicians might consider a trip
back home for a family reunion where they might finally get a little
dose of the reality the rest of us live in. Maybe instead of another
sensational interview with a woman who killed her babies, talk show
hosts should think about an interview with a mother who loves her
children - and worries about their future in light of various of the
present trends in government.
Or maybe - just maybe - the majority of Americans who are ordinary
people - and who have perfectly ordinary problems - should stand up and
be extraordinarily angry that they're being ignored. While I doubt that
Barbra Streisand or Dan Rather would care, politicians are easy. They'll
go where the votes are. It's just up to the voters to let them know in
no uncertain terms where those votes lie - and where they'll be cast
instead if attention isn't paid to those things that really matter. The
catch, of course, is that voters have to care about politicians as much
as politicians don't care for the average citizen. And that's a whole
'nother battle, one that may prove even harder to win.
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