Molly Ivins October 22LINCOLN, Neb. — Here we are, toward the end of a long, uninspiring campaign. In fact, it's so uninspiring that great minds are now addressing the particular component qualities of its uninspiredness. Meg Greenfield, writing in Newsweek, says we're all embarrassed by our own politics: "embarrassment at the spectacle, a feeling not even so much about the two men who are running for president as about the way they are running and what our politics, a-slosh in money and manipulation and phony positioning, has become. It's almost as if both sides had decided not to even pretend anymore about the panderings and half-truths they were serving up to the public. This is, in that respect, an election without shame, though there is a certain feeling of being ashamed among a lot of the spectators. It is that, in my view, which accounts for so much of the seeming indifference and neglect. We pretend not to see." Alan Ehrenhalt, writing in The New York Times, says we're suffering from sobriety. "It is easy enough to mistake this current state of mind for contentment, or, at the other extreme, to dismiss it as a cynicism. But sobriety is really the word for it. This election is being conducted not with the usual anticipation of change but with the hard-earned recognition of how difficult and expensive change really is." Taking solace where we can find it, let us note approvingly that BobDole popped up the other day in favor of some campaign finance reform. Setting aside the hypocrisy factor, this is a pleasant development. He wants to close down soft money from corporations, rich folks and unions. Good on him. There has been much Republican whining this year about union money. The unions dug deep and came up with $35 million from their members, and naturally, they spent almost all of it trying to elect Democrats. The Center for Responsive Politics sat down and toted up the contributions on the other side: In this election cycle, business has raised $242.4 million, almost all of it spent trying to elect Republicans. That's just about the normal 7-1 ratio of corporate money over labor money in politics, so keep that in mind next time you hear a Republican whining. And who should show up to put in his 2 cents' worth on the evils of accepting money from resident aliens but the ineffable Newt Gingrich.
Of course, it turns out that Gingrich has raised money from green-card holders himself. I have yet to hear that man accuse anyone else of anything he hasn't done himself, usually doubled in spades. The details of Gingrich's fund-raising from legal immigrants were limned in excruciating detail by his hometown paper, The Atlanta Journal. It gets to a point where you almost have to admire his shamelessness. Another sudden turn along the Happy Hypocrisy Trail came when the Dole camp had to pull down a television ad attacking President Clinton's ethics. The ad claimed that the Clinton administration boasted "more investigations, prosecutions and convictions than any administration in over two decades. Does the truth matter? Does it matter to you?" It turns out that it doesn't matter much to the Dole campaign. Even drawing the cut-off line at Richard Nixon, it turns out that the Reagan administration holds the record. More than 100 Reagan officials were accused of illegal or unethical conduct. Clinton has been investigated by four independent counsels; the Reagan administration drew nine. According to The Washington Post, those indicted or convicted under Reagan included his national security adviser, deputy chief of staff, interior secretary, labor secretary, defense secretary and deputy defense secretary. His attorney general and housing secretary were also investigated. Twenty-eight people were convicted in the Iran-Contra and Department of Housing and Urban Development scandals. The Dole campaign issued a list of 32 Clinton aides who it claimed were "investigated, fired or forced to resign." But the list includes those who resigned because they caused political embarrassment, like former Surgeon General Joycelyn Elders, who was never accused of anything unethical. The only official on the list who has been convicted of anything is former Associate Attorney General Webster Hubbell, whose misconduct did not take place while he was in office. Not that it says much for our politics that we sit around comparing the sleaze factor in different administrations. But one consequence of the Republicans' having made mountains of ethical molehills during the last four years is that the public is now more convinced than ever that "they're all a bunch of crooks." *** Molly Ivins is a columnist for the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. COPYRIGHT 1996 CREATORS SYNDICATE, INC.
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