As the American presidential election campaign enters the homestretch, poll after poll shows that a majority of people outside the United States, would, given the chance, choose the Democrat Party’s nominee Sen. John F. Kerry against President George W. Bush.
One poll, conducted in 35 countries for the London daily The Financial Times, gives Kerry a two to one lead over Bush.
Despite favorable poll figures inside the United States at the moment, Bush may still be defeated. Some 40 percent of the Americans are so angry with him that they would, if necessary, vote for the devil rather than George W. Since another 40 percent are equally dedicated to Bush, the final decision is left to the 20 percent of so-called “floating voters.”
Democracy, as originally practiced in ancient Athens, was aimed at choosing the best leaders on the basis of a comparison of characters and programs of rival candidates.
In modern democracies, including the United States, however, the choice is often between rival personas planned, shaped and marketed by party strategists, media gurus, polling specialists and focus groups. The candidate is a product designed to appeal to the market on the basis of the moods of the moment.
The result is that rival candidates end up looking, talking and behaving alike on most issues. That, in turn, leaves the voter without a choice beyond personal likes and dislikes. Let us have a look at Sen. Kerry, for example.
Everything in his biography shows that he is a liberal, social-democratic-style politician nurtured on the ideas of the 1960s.
Having spent four months in Vietnam during the Indo-China war, Kerry developed a deep horror of war in general. He spent part of his youth campaigning against the US involvement in Vietnam, and exposing “the war crimes” that he claimed the US soldiers, including himself, had committed in Indo-China. Kerry’s anti-war conviction is not a pose.
As a member of the US Senate for 20 years he voted against every military budget presented by the Pentagon. He was against US support for anti-Communist fighters in Central America and Afghanistan in the 1980s. In 1991 he voted against US participation in the liberation of Kuwait from Iraqi occupation. In 2001 he was against military intervention in Afghanistan.
In 2002, however, he voted for the invasion of Iraq because his advisers told him that he would have no chance as a presidential candidate if he appeared to be anti-war. But even then, Kerry’s anti-war sentiments were echoed in the 4,000-word speech he made to explain his vote.
In it he put so many “ifs” and “buts” that, observed to the letter, would have made war impossible. Shortly afterward, Kerry underlined his anti-war convictions by voting against the budget needed to pursue the war in Iraq.
And yet, those who stage-managed the Democrat Party’s convention in Boston decided to market Kerry as an enthusiastic war leader, “reporting for duty”. This was a disservice not only to Kerry but also to the American voters. The result has been confusion. Kerry has been forced to speak with a forked tongue about the war.
In states where the pro-war camp is strong he has beaten the drums of war, promising to send more American troops to Iraq. In states where the anti-war camp seems to be in majority, he has promised to withdraw all American troops from Iraq within six months. It is clear that when he speaks for the war he is uncomfortable, and when he speaks against the war he is speaking from the heart.
Had Kerry stood for election on a clear anti-war platform, arguing that war was an evil to be contemplated only in response to an attack and as a last resort, he would have been offering his genuine self to the electorate. One may or may not agree with such a position. But it has the merit of being clear and principled.
The real Kerry has also been scripted out of other issues of the campaign. Kerry’s entire career shows that he believes in the distributive role of the democratic state. This means that the state has a right, indeed a duty, to take from the rich in order to improve the lives of the less fortunate. For 20 years in the Senate, Kerry voted against every tax-cut and for every tax increase. And yet, Kerry’s handlers have transformed him into a pale imitation of George W. Bush, accepting the massive tax-cuts of 2001-2 but promising to make them temporary.
This is no position at all. All tax cuts and/or increases are temporary by definition because they could be repealed by any future Congress and president. Imagine how much more convincing the real Kerry might have been.
He could have told the Americans that they should not tolerate that a third of their fellow-citizens live in relative poverty and that almost a quarter should have no medical insurance cover. He could have told them that he would impose a set of tax increases on the rich and the corporations to finance a welfare state, as was the case in Britain, France, West Germany, and Canada after the Second World War. There is nothing dishonorable in that. The whole of European Social Democracy is based on a similar philosophy.
The real Kerry has also been scripted out of social, cultural, and life-style issues. Kerry’s record shows that he favors women’s choice in abortion. And, yet, his handlers have persuaded him to claim that he is both for and against it.
The real Kerry has no objection to gay and lesbian “marriages”, on the grounds that this is a matter for the individuals concerned. And, yet, his handlers have persuaded him to speak against such “marriages”, especially in states where the Christian right is strong.
The briefest glance at Kerry’s life shows that he is not a religious man, let alone a devout Catholic. In any case, he could not please the Pope if only because he is a divorced man who has remarried. And, yet, his handlers have organized photo-ops showing him attending church, and even organized a front group called “Catholics for Kerry.”
When it comes to foreign trade and the global economy, the real Kerry is uncomfortable with the idea of an open economy obeying no rules except those of the market.
He is as worried about the “outsourcing” of American manufacturing jobs as is his fellow-Democrat Dick Gephardt. A believer in the European-style “social market” economy, the real Kerry would pursue policies that are closer to those of German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder than British Prime Minister Tony Blair. And yet Kerry’s handlers have forced him to be a free-trade champion one day and a market regulator another.
Kerry is clearly on the left-wing of the Democrat Party, in fact the first genuinely leftist candidate to win the party’s nomination since Sen. George McGovern more than 30 years ago. And yet his handlers are trying to sell him as a rightwing Democrat in the style of President Bill Clinton.
The real Kerry’s brand of politics has won almost 60 percent of all elections in Western Europe since the mid-1940s. And, unless it is honestly presented to the American votes, we will not know how well or how badly it might do in the United States.
In despotic societies, dissimulation, always prompted by fear, is part of an individual’s self-defense mechanism. But what about democratic societies?
Should the fear of losing an election force a candidate into selling the electorate a bill of goods?
Kerry may yet win the election. But if he does he would know that he did so thanks to dissimulation. And that could put his presidency on the wrong track right from the start.
