Point of View
Tomorrow canceled due to lack of interest
By Carl Heintze
Lately I've been turning over in my mind an old phrase I got from somewhere: "Because of lack of interest, tomorrow has been canceled."
What's brought it to mind is the just completed campaign for the presidency of the United States.
I've been through about 10 presidential campaigns in my lifetime. Well, maybe nine, I can't really remember much about the Roosevelt-Hoover contest except that my family, to a man and woman, were solid Republicans and viewed the coming of FDR as a disaster.
But, then, I thought the same thing about Harry Truman, to my mind, in retrospect the last really good president we've had.
I also remember something of those that have come after and none of them have been as lackluster as was the Bush-Gore skirmish.
But then I thought the same thing about Harry Truman, to my mind, in retrospect the last really good president we've had
Maybe it is the time in which we live, dedicated, it seems to me, pretty much to greed and excess. On the whole, we've never had it so good. I realize there are parts of the body politic who would challenge that, but, on the whole, unemployment is at about zero; inflation is still inflating, but very slowly; and we are inundated by a sea of SUV's, cell phones, DVD's, computers and other benefits of the electronic revolution.
It's hard to find fault with the country. The candidates didn't seem interested in doing that anyway.
Mr. Gore wanted to maintain the status quo while making it plain that he was not Bill Clinton. (I think that is pretty evident.)
George Bush wanted to maintain the status quo, but run it, so he says, even better. He also wanted us to believe that he was not Bill Clinton (which, it seems to me, also is evident), and that he's not his father's child--which I don't find so evident.
Both candidates zoomed back and forth across the nation by air, mostly, but without apparent pattern and without apparent message. (Or if they had a message, it never became apparent to me.)
One week they were on the East Coast, one week in what were sometimes known as the "battle ground" states, mostly the Middle West, and now and then they dropped in on California.
That's somewhat surprising because California has more political clout than most of the rest of the country.
Mr. Gore, however, seemed to take California as a given. Mr. Bush seemed to be leaning in the same direction, although he said he was going to win the state. Most pundits, until the very last week, thought it was Goreland.
My own guess is that most of the country thought of the campaign as a big yawn. The candidates made much of the fact that was an "issues" campaign. The few attempts to make it a difference in personalities didn't worked very well.
That's because there is little basic difference in personality between the two candidates. They're both pretty colorless.
Neither candidate has much in the way of personality--or so it seems to me, anyway.
Of course, no nation should have a William Jefferson Clinton running for every chance at the presidency. Mr. Clinton's been what is called a "consummate politician." (He's been called a lot of other things, too, but presumably we're putting that behind us.)
I think what that means is that the former kid from Hope, Ark., has been more adroit than most at playing the Washington political game. I have another guess: that if he were running again, he might well get elected, Monica not withstanding.
But he's not, nor is John McCain, who injected a sense of humor, at least, into partisan politics.
Instead, we were asked to choose between two men who seemed much alike. That is to say, both are fairly colorless. Both played it safe by struggling to stay in the middle of the road. Neither addressed the problems that loomed somewhere on the edge of the campaign.
Both seemed to be following, rather than leading, and neither came up with a ringing phrase, a passionate speech, a memorable line, a way to make the electorate believe they want to lead. They wanted to govern, sure enough, but neither seemed capable of being a leader.
And that's a shame. We need leadership. We need something other than spin doctors, public relations experts, pollsters and pundits, press people eternally looking for new scandal to tell us how to live. We need a President.
The problem is, we didn't get one. Or so it seems to me.
Instead, we got a president, just another president, and not a very memorable or inspiring one, at that. It would have been the same regardless of which candidate was elected.
Tomorrow is being canceled, mainly because of lack of interest.
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Saratoga, California Since 1955
