Campaign seasons are always entertaining. Few, however, are as weird as this one.
Let me count the ways.
Let’s start with candidates in other states. A woman who thinks Hispanics look Asian. That was the baffling Sharron Angle. There is the Minnesota congresswoman Michele Bachmann, who, channeling Joe McCarthy, thinks anyone who doesn’t agree with her is anti-American. And we have Delaware’s always-entertaining Christine O’Donnell. I never imagined a candidate for the U. S. Senate would have an opinion on masturbation, much less make it known. We truly are in uncharted territory.
Even Massachusetts candidates have gone loco. Suzanne Bump, a candidate for state auditor, claimed a resident’s property tax exemption in Boston as well as the same exemption on her house in Great Barrington. Everyone else knows the rules about resident exemptions. How can Bump be the auditor if she’s unaware of basic practices? The only problem is her opponent. Mary Zarrilli Connaughton is also a piece of work, as we saw when she sat on the turnpike board. What’s a voter to do?
And how about Mrs. Clarence Thomas, one half of a couple who can be counted on to keep the nation buzzing. She’s not a local candidate, but she “reached out” for an apology to Anita Hill, now a Massachusetts citizen. Hill didn’t want to testify 19 years ago against her former boss, but finally did so, and since then has lived a quiet, responsible professional life.
Her testimony was pretty convincing. Even the senators who voted to confirm Thomas must have believed Hill, since they did not hold her in contempt of congress for lying, as they saw fit to do with Roger Clemons, who as far as I can tell is only a baseball player, unaffiliated with government, unlike confirmation hearings for a supreme court justice.
And poor Mrs. John Tierney. Poor Mr. Tierney. Wives and husbands make financial decisions on their own these days, so we can’t hold Tierney fully accountable for Mrs. Tierney’s shenanigans with her shady brother. But, people, you’re married. Don’t you discuss with one another strange requests from an obviously compromised family member? Don’t you give one another advice? Tierney stood by his wife’s side as she faced the judge. I imagine the conversations inside their home have been interesting.
A real downer in this election is the loud, obnoxious and false television advertising. Surely such aggression turns off as many people as it turns on. When such an ad starts running, even a political enthusiast like me has to go find something more enjoyable to do, like cleaning out the catch basin at the end of my street.
My personal false advertising favorite is one from the congressional campaign of Jeff “Strip-search” Perry claiming that his opponent, Norfolk DA Bill Keating, had voted to raise his own salary.
Quick. A civics consult. District attorneys can’t raise their own salaries. The legislature, in which Perry serves, does that. It’s so insulting that he thought we wouldn’t know this.
The last weird aspect of this campaign season is the “angry” voters.
What are they angry about? They squawk and snarl and brandish weapon-like accoutrements aimed at government. Their taxes went down in the past two years. They collect social security and unemployment compensation, drive on federal highways and now, thankfully, enjoy health care for their previously uninsured children. Finally, when they themselves get cancer, their insurer won’t be able to drop them. They won’t go bankrupt any more over an illness they couldn’t help getting.
The anger has a false ring, but it’s familiar. We endured it before the Civil War, most visibly when a South Carolinian legislator beat Charles Sumner senseless on the floor of the Senate. We viewed it on television when Bull Connor brutally turned on civil rights protesters. Anger in America has always been strongest when racial balances are in flux. Those that are whipping up the enraged urge them to “take back our government.”
From whom?
Americans are good at interpreting racial codes, so we know the answer. They’re taking it back from a black man. The fact that this black man is smarter, more gracious, fitter, better educated and more successful than they are only adds to their “anger.”
The New York Times’s poll of the Tea Party said it first. They’re almost all white. The media have focused on the fact that the Times poll showed that Tea Party people are wealthier and better educated than their appearance, behavior and statements would indicate. And there’s a lot of pressure to portray Americans as having moved beyond the racial barriers we’ve been burdened with, so we don’t like to talk about it. But I will. Tea Party members’ answers to two questions gave them away. Large percentages said that Obama favored the poor and blacks over everyone else.
Funny, those of us who are not angry didn’t think that.
As I watch the “anger,” I also understand the blessings of America right now. Americans are free to be ridiculous. It’s part of our charm. The pitch may get harsher before it settles down, but it will settle down. We’ll get through this patch as we have gotten through others more severe. But not before candidates’ and their enablers’ behavior gets weirder.