Thursday, May 19, 2005
What is a Democrat?
I saw an enormously fat man pumping gas into his SUV the other day and felt some sympathy for him because it was costing him a fortune.
He had a skinny child with him and I thought he’d be better off putting some food into the kid rather than pouring high-priced Arab oil into his tank, but there you go.
Morning was dragging toward noon and it was getting hot. The fat man unzipped his gigantic jacket and I could hear the zipper making a sound like a cat crying in the distance.
My sympathy for the fat man waned a bit when I spotted one of those stupid cartoons of a little boy doing what little boys do in the woods. The cartoon was on the vehicle’s rear window. At the bottom of the cartoon stream were the words “Democrats.”
This passes for political debate in some circles.
It did bring Democrats to my mind, however, and I thought of Theodore Sorenson, who, you may remember, was counselor to and speechwriter for President Kennedy.
The fat man who put his political ideas on the back of his automobile probably doesn’t remember Ted Sorenson, but I can tell you Sorenson is a titan, a man of great intellect and great humility.
Sorenson is a Democrat and has said why. This is it:
- Government's job is more than just to get out of the way of private interests.
- Some problems, created or made worse by an unregulated market, are best solved by government.
- The federal government must work to reverse the decline of real wages and other workers' benefits, seeing to it that workers receive their fair share, reducing the gap between rich and poor.
- Equal opportunity for all citizens is impossible without federal affirmative action in education and employment.
- Devolution of power to states and localities is good in principle but cannot entirely replace national policy-making and national standards.
- Presidents Reagan and (both Presidents) Bush created our huge national deficit. Democrats must, therefore, assure that the poor, the elderly, the unskilled and the ill do not now pay for Republican budget busting.
- Law and order are strongest when the nation attacks the causes of crime by strengthening gun control and assuring equal access to courts.
- Families are strengthened through economic opportunity, not by breaching the wall between church and state or by diminishing personal choices and privacy.
- The USA is but one part of a larger world. The U.S. government must lead in international organizations such as NATO and the United Nations. Democrats reject "protectionism, unilateralism, and fiscal isolationism."
- Government's first duty is to the "little people." The government ought to be there for people too poor to afford their own lobbyists, for ordinary citizens and for underdogs.
What’s wrong with that, I ask you?
My new, fat friend does not know what’s good for him. And he’s vulgar.
...kenmatthews@yahoo.com
I saw an enormously fat man pumping gas into his SUV the other day and felt some sympathy for him because it was costing him a fortune.
He had a skinny child with him and I thought he’d be better off putting some food into the kid rather than pouring high-priced Arab oil into his tank, but there you go.
Morning was dragging toward noon and it was getting hot. The fat man unzipped his gigantic jacket and I could hear the zipper making a sound like a cat crying in the distance.
My sympathy for the fat man waned a bit when I spotted one of those stupid cartoons of a little boy doing what little boys do in the woods. The cartoon was on the vehicle’s rear window. At the bottom of the cartoon stream were the words “Democrats.”
This passes for political debate in some circles.
It did bring Democrats to my mind, however, and I thought of Theodore Sorenson, who, you may remember, was counselor to and speechwriter for President Kennedy.
The fat man who put his political ideas on the back of his automobile probably doesn’t remember Ted Sorenson, but I can tell you Sorenson is a titan, a man of great intellect and great humility.
Sorenson is a Democrat and has said why. This is it:
- Government's job is more than just to get out of the way of private interests.
- Some problems, created or made worse by an unregulated market, are best solved by government.
- The federal government must work to reverse the decline of real wages and other workers' benefits, seeing to it that workers receive their fair share, reducing the gap between rich and poor.
- Equal opportunity for all citizens is impossible without federal affirmative action in education and employment.
- Devolution of power to states and localities is good in principle but cannot entirely replace national policy-making and national standards.
- Presidents Reagan and (both Presidents) Bush created our huge national deficit. Democrats must, therefore, assure that the poor, the elderly, the unskilled and the ill do not now pay for Republican budget busting.
- Law and order are strongest when the nation attacks the causes of crime by strengthening gun control and assuring equal access to courts.
- Families are strengthened through economic opportunity, not by breaching the wall between church and state or by diminishing personal choices and privacy.
- The USA is but one part of a larger world. The U.S. government must lead in international organizations such as NATO and the United Nations. Democrats reject "protectionism, unilateralism, and fiscal isolationism."
- Government's first duty is to the "little people." The government ought to be there for people too poor to afford their own lobbyists, for ordinary citizens and for underdogs.
What’s wrong with that, I ask you?
My new, fat friend does not know what’s good for him. And he’s vulgar.
...kenmatthews@yahoo.com
