Scars of a scandal

As an independent journalist, I lack the resources to do survey research. Nonetheless, I have done informal polling among the journalists and scholars with whom I collaborate. To a person, all are convinced that the Clinton presidency is damaged — probably beyond repair. Many believe impeachment is unlikely, but they are virtually certain Clinton’s ability to enact any progressive agenda is finished.

My respondents believe that the president has been damaged more by lies about his sexual activities than by the indiscretions themselves. The president lied when he denied engaging in any improper relationship with “that woman.” He also apparently deceived his closest political associates, thereby leaving them out on long political and even legal limbs.

I then asked my associates why the media, and presumably much of the public, make so much about this particular set of lies. Lying to the public about a sexual relation is serious, but is it more serious than other lies this President has told us? He promised labor unions he would negotiate trade treaties that protect wage and labor standards and then did exactly the opposite. Millions of workers have suffered from Clinton’s political deceit.

He further compounded the deceit in a speech last spring by admitting, almost bragging, that in the process of certifying human rights progress in nations with whom we trade, he routinely fudges the numbers. He then blamed Congress for imposing too strict requirements and standards. Imagine your reaction if a teenage child, upon being chastised for lying about school work, complained that the parent’s demands for honesty were unreasonable! And consider the labor leaders and dissidents world wide who are tortured because of this cavalier defiance of Congressional mandates.

A long time student of the presidency reminded me that our highest office combines two functions often separated in Europe. The President is a political leader, but he is also head of state, a kind of ceremonial “father of our country.” Apparently we expect of our fathers a degree of personal virtue that we wouldn’t necessarily seek in a mere political leader.

This last thought makes a great deal of sense to me. Nonetheless, I would go on to add that we now worry so much about the private character of the president and his role as “head of state” because our politics is far more scandalous than our president. My presidential scholar friend foresees a disaster for Democrats. It is not so much that voters will repudiate local Democrats because the party is seen as tainted by Clinton’s excesses. She believes that Democrats are divided not only by Clinton’s actions but by his tactics as well. The Republican Party is also divided between a social conservative element and a business elite primarily interested in economic matters. But paradoxically, Republican voters from both camps can unite to elect Republicans in an effort to impale a President neither likes. She cites preliminary studies projecting voter turnout of nearly sixty percent among Republican leaning voters and only about half that number for Democrats.

Whatever one thinks of the relevance of personal character to public performance, one large lesson here is that when broader politics collapses, we all suffer. If one’s issue is security for children and the elderly, the rights of labor, the abuse of women in homes and workplaces, all these causes suffer when we lack parties that stand for a real agenda and political processes to hold those leaders accountable for their public performance.

I can end only with two limp wishes, that some candidates will still run on a reform agenda and that at least a few liberal and labor activists will remind citizens that failure to vote for these candidates opens the door to an even more degraded politics.

John Buell is a political economist who lives in Southwest Harbor. Readers wishing to contact him may e-mail comments to jbuell@acadia.net.