I remember sitting on my grandmother's couch and watching the Democratic National Convention. I was eleven years old in 1968 and Hubert Humphrey gave what must have been a good speech, though I don't remember it.
I do, however, remember feeling that what he said made sense, though I've wondered why.
I've been watching political campaigns for forty years, with varying levels of attention. Though I do not remember Kennedy's speeches, I remember vividly coming home from school one day to find my mother crying. I asked her what was the matter and she told me that someone had shot President Kennedy and that he was dead. "They killed him," she said, as though she had a clear vision of exactly who 'they' were. I didn't have a very clear idea of who he was, but I knew that people liked him.
One thing that came through loud and clear, though, is that I took an instant dislike to Richard M. Nixon. It seems, in my memory, that the first time I looked at him, I didn't trust him at all. This mistrust was later rewarded by watching the Watergate mess unroll slowly on television and in the local newspaper. I knew it all along, I thought.
On the night my first son was born, I was in the waiting room watching television, as my wife had gone for a C-section. I don't remember what we were watching, but it was interrupted by a "Special Report". President Carter appeared on the screen and explained how he and the US Military had come up with a plan to rescue our hostages in Iran. He told us that it had gone disastrously wrong, but not due to enemy action. He then stated plainly and flatly that the responsibility for the action was his and his alone and that if anyone needed to look for someone to blame, they could come to his door.
I thought, "Wow. Here's a guy that has the courage of his convictions. Here's a man that is very serious about where the buck stops. Good man." He was, coincidentally, a Democrat. He understood the position of President and knew who it was that had hired him, and his dedication to the ideals of peace very much impressed me.
Ronald Reagan never impressed me at all. When the Iran-Contra situation cropped up, I wasn't surprised and watching Oliver North clothe his blatant disregard for the law in faux patriotism made me want to vomit. I still get a queasy feeling every time I see him or hear him speak.
From Reagan to Bush to Bush again, it has been a parade of Republican dirty tricks and unprincipled campaigning. In each instance, I hoped that the American people would see through the Republican rhetoric to the truth, to the real issues, and been disappointed many times.
What seemed so obvious to me, that the Republican ideas of strong moral values were essentially nullified by a clear lack of respect for the law, that lying in campaign ads was not an indication of a principled politician and that torturing people undercut the very idea of who we are, was not so obvious to many that I worked with every day. I've always wondered how you could accept such behavior without wanting to call it what it is. How do you be a Republican?
What I don't know is whether or not my apparently instant dislike of Republican candidates was because I recognized how empty their words were, or because my family has always been Democratic in outlook. Is it nature or nurture? This question comes up more strongly now that my sister has announced her intention to marry the man that she has been close to for the last five years, a man who is a dedicated Republican.
My sister is Democratic in outlook as well, and she tells me that there are simply some things that she and her fiance do not discuss. I don't know if I could live like that, but, in a lot of ways, I am happy that she has found what completes her. And make no mistake about it, he is a good man, always treating her with care and concern, completely accepting of her family.
Yet, it irks me. I want to ask about torture, about lack of due process, about gerrymandering, about illegally funding Nicaraguan rebels, about the shoddy introduction of end-of-life issues that are none of our business for the sake of generating public support. It's like an itch I can't scratch.
In a way, it's a microcosm of the political decisions that have faced some Presidents along the way. Do you go to war or work for peace?
Right now, I'm thinking of Jimmy Carter, Anwar Sadat and Menachim Begin... and my sister. I don't know what it is that makes me a Democrat, but I think that peace is a good thing.