FACES AND PLACES: Of beets, mushrooms and borsch (04/16/00)

FACES AND PLACES

by Myron B. Kuropas

Of beets, mushrooms and borsch

As he gears up for the presidential race George "Dubya" Bush is receiving no end of advice - some good, some ridiculous.

Liberal Democrats and Republican moderates urge George W. to move to the political center, jettison the Christian right, resurrect the "big tent" and become "more sensitive" to the pro-choice lobby, gays, African-Americans, soccer moms, and the poor and "disenfranchised." Am I wrong, or am I hearing echoes of the 1980 campaign when Ronald Reagan was steering the party firmly to starboard?

Conservative Republicans want George W. to remain faithful to his conservative base and select Colin Powell or William Bennett for his running mate. Neo-conservative Republicans are hoping the Texas governor will bring John McCain into the fold because he reached out to Democrats, "told the truth" and remains "a genuine war-hero." Puh-leeze! McCain Democrats didn't give a whit for the truth or his war-hero status. They wanted to sink George Dubya.

For what it's worth, allow me, a lifelong Republican romantic, to drop my two beets into the political borsch.

The most important decision that Mr. Bush will have to make in the next few months is the selection of a vice-presidential running mate. Colin Powell would be wonderful, but he is untested on the campaign trail. Hero or not, the media would shred him. The same holds for Bill Bennett. Nice guy. Sound philosophy. But untested in the take-no-prisoners election drive that is shaping up for November.

My personal choice for a campaign partner is Alan Keyes. His conservative credentials are impeccable: pro-life, school choice, against racial preferences, for lower taxes, and less government - all positions espoused by thinking Americans. His is an impressive record of measurable achievement: family man, Harvard Ph.D., ambassador, interim college president, author, talk-show host and an eloquence on the stump that is second only to Ronald Reagan. Anyone who listens to Dr. Keyes for five minutes can barely resist standing up and singing "God Bless America." Ambassador Keyes is also a Catholic who can think on his feet. Most important of all, by weathering the primaries, he has been tried and tested. He is principled and panders to no one. As one Keyes partisan has pointed out, Gov. Bush needs "a hammer to pulverize the party of moral decay." A keynote address by Dr. Keyes at the GOP convention would galvanize the party.

Dr. Keyes' only negative is that he's the right color but the wrong party. Most of his racial brethren are captives of such media stars as Jesse ("I am somebody") Jackson and race-baiter Al Sharpton. Both are partisan Democrats who will fight like wounded wolverines to prevent GOP intrusions onto their turf. They abhor Clarence Thomas and other Blacks who don't support racial entitlements. But who knows? Politics is a strange beast. African Americans are less monolithic than the media would have us believe and more and more are educated and affluent, always a plus.

My second suggestion for George W. Bush is simple: stop talking about "compassionate conservatism." It's meaningless, patronizing, smacks of pandering, loopy, and sounds too much like "the kinder, gentler America" the elder George Bush preached before the Democrats ambushed him.

Suggestion three is also straightforward. Reach out to European Americans. Resurrect the GOP Heritage Groups Council that President Bush helped sink during the 1992 campaign. The Republican National Committee succumbed to leftist extremists who convinced the Republican leadership that the Heritage Council was a haven for former Nazis and anti-Semites. It was all nonsense, of course, but it didn't matter. The damage was done.

While the GOP was sinking its ethnic base, the Democrats were resurrecting theirs. In some 40 years of involvement in American politics, I have never witnessed a more impressive ethnic outreach program than the one perfected by the Clinton administration during the past seven years, an operation that is still very much alive and eager to assist Al Gore.

George W. will have a tough time getting Ukrainian American votes for two major reasons: his father's "suicidal nationalism" remarks in Kyiv on the eve of Ukraine's declaration of independence, and Al Gore's cozy relationship with President Leonid Kuchma. Mr. Gore is perceived as a sincere friend of Ukraine while George W. probably doesn't know who Leonid Kuchma is. The elder Mr. Bush shouldn't blamed for his Ukrainian blunder because he was mesmerized by national security adviser Brent Scowcroft, a leader of the "don't rile the Commies" club in both the Ford and Bush administrations. What is scary is that many of the old Ford-Bush "why can't we just get along" foreign policy crew are now advising the son.

My last piece of advice to Mr. Bush has to do with pandering. Face it. He'll never win the hearts and minds of ACT-Up, radical feminists, the abortion rights lobby, organized labor, pagan Hollywood, the National Education Association, the animal rights lobby, environmentalists, most soccer moms, Larry King, Geraldo, Jane Fonda, the editors of The New York Times and The Washington Post or the news directors of ABC, CBS and NBC. No matter what Gov. Bush says or does, he won't touch their souls. Fortunately, the "annointed" of the secular left represent but a very small segment of the voting public. It's all the other people, the "benighted," salt-of-the earth tribe of God-fearing Americans committed to Judeo-Christian principles who will decide the future of America, but only if they can be mobilized to vote.

This year's presidential campaign promises to be the toughest, knock-down, drag-out campaign we've seen in years. Many issues will be addressed: education, foreign policy, health care, social security, immigration, crime, China, Russia, foreign aid. Victory will depend on each candidate's ability to do three things: identify, confront and define the issues closest to the electorate; overcome the baggage that each brings to the campaign; be accepted as trustworthy.

Al Gore is ahead today and appears invincible. He can be beaten, but only if George W. drops all talk about honor and integrity (it didn't work for Bob Dole) and aims for Al Gore's soft Clintonian underbelly.

My advice to Ukrainian Americans? Be a mushroom. Jump into the borscht, mix with the beets, and swim, splash and be heard.

Myron Kuropas' e-mail address is: mbkuropas@compuserve.com

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