Op-Ed

LONDON -- In a way, it was heartbreaking to watch the Mother of Parliaments deal with half of a particularly nasty problem in an impressive way. It was sad and depressing for an American because the United States seems so unable even to begin to address the first half of the same problem -- how and why were we so badly misled about the reasons for going to war with Iraq. Did our leaders lie to us, knowingly distort or exaggerate? Or was their own intelligence that bad, and if so, why? And why isn't something being done about it.

Engaged in a continuous PR blitz, presidential campaign strategists always strive to portray their candidate as damn near perfect. Even obvious flaws are apt to be touted as signs of integrity and human depth. Such media spin encourages Americans to confuse being excellent with being preferable.

     Eager to dislodge George W. Bush from the White House, many voters lined up behind John Kerry in late January. It’s true that the junior senator from Massachusetts is probably the best bet to defeat Bush -- and, as president, Kerry would be a very significant improvement over the incumbent. But truth in labeling should impel acknowledgment that Kerry is not a progressive candidate.

            AUSTIN, Texas -- Philanthropy may not be high on your list of Stuff to Think About -- except maybe to hope that some might be headed your way. But political philanthropy is in fact playing a large role in your life -- indeed, it is shaping the entire nation's life to an extent that deserves to be put on your list of Stuff to Think About.

            The National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy is an outfit "committed to making philanthropy more responsive to people with the least wealth and opportunity." You probably thought that's what philanthropy was -- money to help people with the least wealth and opportunity. But to an amazing extent, you would be wrong. A report by the Responsive Philanthropy folks points out that more and more foundations and corporations are instead giving their money to conservative think tanks, which in turn use the money to push the right-wing political agenda.

My fellow American media consumers:

     At a time when news cycles bring us such portentous events as the remarkable wedding of Britney Spears, the advent of Michael Jackson’s actual trial proceedings and the start of the Democratic presidential primaries, it is time to reflect upon the state of the media union.

     The achievements are everywhere to be seen and heard.

     On more than a thousand radio stations owned by the Clear Channel conglomerate, the programming quality is as reliable as a Big Mac.

     In cities and towns across the nation, an array of outspoken radio talk-show hosts can be depended on to run the gamut from the mushy center to the far right.

     Television provides a wide variety of homogenized offerings. With truly impressive (production) values, the major networks embody a consummate multiplicity of sameness, with truncated imagination and consolidated ownership. These days, there’s a captivatingly unadventurous cable channel for virtually every niche market.

AUSTIN, Texas -- Love those Iowa results. Nothing better than a huge political scrum where the front-runner stumbles, the guy everyone wrote off for dead six weeks ago comes roaring back, an unknown emerges, an old war-horse drops out -- a wonderful scenario. Let's hear it for upset, confusion and the conventional wisdom with egg on its face. A banana cream pie right in the kisser for everyone who pretends they know how a political race will turn out. Happy days. Ain't democracy grand?

            Not saying I necessarily agree with the conclusions reached by the Iowa caucus-goers, but I do love it when voters make fools of the pundits, including me. My biggest reservation about the result is John Kerry, who could take the excitement out of a soccer riot.

AUSTIN, Texas -- My fellow Americans, the state of the union's finances is enough to make an Enron accountant gag. When George W. Bush took office, he was handed a going concern. Projected annual surpluses from 2002 to 2011 were $5.6 trillion. In its most recent projection, the Congressional Budget Office says it expects $1.4 trillion in total deficits from 2004 to 2013. Bush's new future spending proposals -- including everything from the goofy manned-flight-to-Mars to the promotion of marriage -- already total an additional $2 trillion.

            When Bush took office, the national debt was $5.7 trillion and his first budget proposed to reduce it by $2 trillion over the next decade. Today, the debt is $7 trillion. Last year, Bush predicted a deficit of $262 billion. According of the CBO, the deficit is currently $480 billion. Bush plans to cut biomedical research, health care, job training and veterans funding, and that still leaves a projected deficit of $450 billion.

The father of President Bush the Second called it “the vision thing” -- which he was widely presumed to lack. By early 1987, Time magazine reported, George H. W. Bush was using that phrase “in clear exasperation.” Then, as now, journalists seemed to clamor for presidential candidates to seem visionary.

     Many politicians have grandly quoted from the Book of Proverbs: “Where there is no vision, the people perish.” The biblical invocation plays into the media-fed notion that great leaders succeed when they persevere according to their own lights.

     But such popularized concepts of political leadership -- encouraged by countless journalists -- are long on vision and short on hearing. With apparent self-assurance, politicians often have a way of filtering out the messages they don’t want to hear, even from their own supporters.

 AUSTIN, Texas -- My long-reigning favorite Bushism has now been edged out by a fresh contender I cannot resist. The old fave goes back to Oct. 4, 2001, when Bush, still trying to reassure a shaky nation, said, "We need to counter the shockwave of the evildoer by having individual rate cuts accelerated and by thinking about tax rebates."

            I didn't think he could top that, but there is something so winningly confused about my new No. 1. This is from Paul O'Neill's report of the large meeting in November 2002 about a second round of tax cuts. O'Neill argued against it, noting that after 9-11 and the war in Afghanistan, the budget deficit was growing and the nation faced urgent problems.

            Everyone expected Bush to rubber stamp the plan, but he surprised them by asking: "Haven't we already given money to rich people? Why are we going to do it again?"

Like many progressives, I've felt torn between Howard Dean's and Dennis Kucinich's respective strengths. I've resolved this conflict so far by embracing my indecision and giving money to both. Kucinich has spoken out, eloquently and thoughtfully, taking stands that challenge the conventional wisdom of our time, and point toward powerful long-term alternatives. Dean's stands are more cautious, but he's revived the Democratic Party by being willing to challenge Bush on a host of key issues, and brought more ordinary citizens into electoral politics than any Democratic politician in years. When Dean says, "America is not Rome," it contrasts starkly with an administration that's tried its best to make us the world's imperial policeman.

Many pundits say President Bush is sitting pretty, but this year began with new poll data telling a very different story. A national Harris survey, completed on Jan. 1 for Time magazine and CNN, found that just 51 percent of respondents said they were “likely” to vote for Bush in November, compared to 46 percent “unlikely.” When people were asked to “choose between Howard Dean, the Democrat, and George W. Bush, the Republican,” the margin for Bush was only 51-43, and when the survey focused on “likely voters” the gap narrowed to 51-46.

     While other polls have some different numbers, clearly the race for the White House could be quite close. But one of the obstacles to Democratic success is the pretense of having a chance to carry a bunch of Southern states. Actually, for a Democratic presidential campaign in 2004 -- in terms of money, travel time, rhetoric and espoused ideology -- Dixie is a sinkhole.

     In 2000, the Bush-Cheney campaign swept all of the South, albeit with electoral thievery in Florida.