We need more "vanilla" in our politics

Can anything appear more quaint than the Carter vs. Ford presidential campaign?

We expected politicians to be decent and measured in their statements. It might have been the last presidential election year when the traditional New Deal Democrats seemed to have a natural advantage.

Republicans were gentlemen but they seemed to defend a business world that in the minds of many common people was not in their interests. Most people seemed to think government existed to help them. Call it a fundamental tenet.

Carter vs. Ford was in 1976. It's quaint to think of Ford's misstatement on Eastern Europe as being such a gaffe. It was perceived as such then, and it might have tipped the scale. Ford probably just stumbled in his word choice.

The two candidates were intellectually sound and knew the proper decorum. The ideological screamers back then seemed relegated to the fringes.

I remember being at the Minnesota State Fair, seeing the Libertarian Party booth and reacting as if observing an exotic animal at the zoo - perhaps a multi-colored tropical bird. Such people didn't gain currency in our mainstream media. It was like tasting cinnamon ice cream - you'd quickly go back to vanilla.

How reassuring it would be to have good ol' vanilla in our political races today - candidates (and surrogates) who are simply reasonable and not grenade throwers.

The pathetic Herman Cain circus that we're witnessing now makes me hope this is just a phenomenon of our new media landscape, a landscape in which fringe voices - the equivalent of a carnival freak show - get traction.

Cain makes gaffes that a child could notice. His contradiction when discussing abortion was uncomfortable for any rational person to watch and should have caused him to fade. He admitted no such contradiction. He went into verbal contortions.

Same with his pronouncements on China, in an area of international relations where he'd better be careful what he says. Bill O'Reilly of Fox News was obviously skeptical when getting Cain's views on our stance toward Iran.

Fox News isn't doing the knee-jerk promotion of a Republican when it comes to Cain. But while the propagandists at Fox might want the pizza magnate to fade away, they don't determine the numbers. Conservatives in middle America seem to be saying "Damn the torpedoes."
The poll numbers show that Cain is taken seriously to the point he's getting the "front-runner" tag in some circles.

The only way I can square this is by citing the central premise of the book "What's the Matter with Kansas?" by Thomas Frank. People who once pushed populism are now buying the right wing rhetoric. They do so at their own peril.

Author Frank was perplexed at how so many people would adopt politics against their own interests. These are people in the heartland, a world away from Wall Street, the latter being where politicians seem to be willing to pat the fannies of so many people.

The incestuous relationship was underscored to no greater degree than by the purportedly conservative administration of George W. Bush. Bush was really a wet noodle. But that's a charitable description next to what we might affix to Herman Cain.

The disgusting circus of the sexual harassment allegation, strung out so painfully like so much smelly laundry, is hopefully just a sign of an imploding political campaign and not a longer-term decline in our civilization.

It wouldn't matter much, had Cain's poll numbers begun cascading downward. We could have begun just ignoring him. But the laundry just hangs out there. And we end up feeling like we're downwind.

It's 2:45 a.m. as I write this and I wonder what revelations we'll get today, Thursday. It's garbage day for those of us on Northridge Drive in Morris. It might be garbage day all day on the cable news channels.

Will a fourth woman come forward? Will Cain continue in desperation pointing fingers at other campaigns as "leakers," as if this is what we're all waiting with baited breath about?

On cue the right wing barking dogs will assail liberals and the "liberal media" as pouncing on poor Mr. Cain.

"What's the matter with Kansas" when we can't see all this as being just a big pro wrestling production? But it's a campaign for president of the U.S.

Jimmy Carter and Gerald Ford did it the way us boomers were accustomed to when we were young. At the highest level, people in politics had a sense of temperance and decency. Dick Nixon unraveled but he got caught and disposed of.

Cain has made asinine statements and has been given the courtesy, oddly, of being allowed to "talk them back." A high school student guilty of similar contradictions and illogic in essay writing would be graded down and perhaps asked to see the school psychologist.

It was the same when Mike Huckabee asserted that Barack Obama grew up in Kenya and was influenced by the Mau Mau Revolution. Huckabee tried talking that back and was given too much courtesy by the media.

Many in the media are intimidated by the "righties." The right wingers adopt the stance of bullies and are allowed to get by with it. Their puppets on the national stage, people like Cain, can be ignorant beyond comprehension and get a pass.

Rick Perry can give a speech like he just came from happy hour and he remains a viable political player. What if Obama was seen at a lectern embracing a bottle of syrup? Next to such clowns, Obama increasingly looks like the indispensable father figure on the national stage.

The biggest danger is if we see the continuation, or (heaven forbid) growth of the "What's the matter with Kansas?" phenomenon. If we see sensible people mesmerized by right wing rhetoric to their own detriment.

Because heaven help us if the likes of Cain get elected and actually impose their judgment on hotspots around the world.

I suspect they would let "advisers" take over. Like when Bush talked up TARP and said "my economic advisers tell me if we don't do this, our economic system will collapse."

So much for the free market.

And with Cain and the daily pro wrestling type of distractions, so much for sanity. We can absolutely pine for the civility, restraint and sensibility of the Ford vs. Carter campaign.

Say what you want about Jimmy Carter, he was a caring soul. Can we say the same about Cain?
Is Cain taking some sort of perverse pleasure in the continuing circus?

We pine for a day when NRA meant National Rifle Association, not National Restaurant Association.

- Brian Williams - morris mn minnesota - bwilly73@yahoo.com