Copyright © 2000 Henrietta W. Hay

Election 2000 October 20, 2000

"The idea that you can merchandise candidates for high office like breakfast cereal -- you can gather votes like box tops-is, I think, the ultimate indignity to the democratic process." Adlai Stevenson 18 Aug. 1956, at Democratic National Convention.
Election years bring out the best and the worst in Americans and Adlai has certainly described the worst. But they are exciting times, too, and they are a vital part of our heritage. So here are a few thoughts in the weeks before the election:
For eight years I have admired the Vice President, a highly intelligent, dignified man who sat quietly at the table of power and took an active part in the administration of the country. Now I find from reading and listening to the media that he is not dignified, but stuffy, he wears starched shirts, his suits are the wrong color, he raises his eyebrows when he disagrees with something and he was only a journalist in Vietnam. All those things, they say, are questionable in a presidential candidate. On the other hand we have the governor of Texas who has trouble speaking the English language, is not quite sure which country is on which continent, never even saw Vietnam and admits to drug use in his early youth. It has become a campaign of style over substance. One of my friends watched debates with the sound off to get used to seeing Dubya's face in case she has to look at it for the next four years.
I really don't care what they did -- within reason -- when they were young and silly. I do care about their brains and maturity and experience as adult men. One pollster, desperately hunting for a new angle, asked a cross section of men what kind of a car each of the candidates would be. The men said Gore would be a Volvo and Bush a Mustang convertible. For fun, I'd rather have the Mustang, but for a President, I'll take the Volvo. So here is one vote for Al Gore.
With the violently partisan and belligerent Congress we have, however, they won't get much done anyway except appoint Supreme Court Justices. This is really a judicial election as much as a presidential one -- and a vitally important one.
There are a lot of strong women running for Congress, but I don't get to vote for any of them. We need a lot more than nine women in the Senate and there are several women who have a very good chance of adding to that number. I wish I could vote for Hillary in New York. I am still planning to live to see a woman President.
In Colorado there is a lot more excitement over the amendments than the presidential election. They do affect us more immediately and more directly. We all got the little blue book in the mail, the one that analyzes each proposed amendment and referendum. It is pretty heavy reading, but we do owe it to ourselves and our neighbors to read it and make an informed decisions. I still have three to go.
Then on a local political level of sorts there is the granite tablet with the Ten Commandments carved on it which is sitting glumly at the side of the new City Hall. Since church and state have two very different functions in our lives (at least in mine), and since their separation was decreed by the constitution the tablet should not be there on city land. The First Methodist Church has graciously offered to put it on their property on the corner which is less than a block north of its present location. That would certainly be more appropriate and the tablet would actually be more visible. The guys that offered to buy the six square feet it now sits on could buy a few beers with the money they save and not look quite so foolish.
In two more weeks the election will be over and life will settle down again into some sort of rational patter - or will it? In any case, the Republic will survive some way for another four years. The sun will come up.