From: dgil@IPSAINT.IPSA.REUTER.COM (Gillett, David)
Subject: Election afterthoughts
Reply-To: dgil@IPSAINT.IPSA.REUTER.COM (Gillett, David)
Organization: Reuters APL Software Division
Date: Thu, 5 Nov 1992 08:05:37 GMT

1.  In her victory speech, Barbara Boxer (full-term senator from CA) said that
    voters had rejected the politics of hated, of fear, and of divisiveness.
    In his concession speech, her opponent, Bruce Herschenson(sp?) made it
    clear that he did not feel this fairly characterised his campaign.
      Sorry, Bruce.  Every single BH TV ad that I saw qualified as "negative",
    attacking (usually Congress rather than Boxer...) but never presenting a
    positive alternative.  As far as I could tell, BH's TV career has been
    built upon his appeal to the most rabid elements of the "Right Wing"; that
    won him the primary, and he rejected out of hand the very idea that he
    might moderate his message to broaden his appeal.
      (I honestly expected Seymour, the moderate ('stealth') Republican running
    against Dianne(sp?) Feinstein, to do much better than Herschenson, simply
    because it was less clear that it would make a difference who won.  Fooled
    me completely.
      Humourous footnote:  When Seymour held a rally underneath one of his
    billboards attacking Feinstein, the woman who *owned* the parking lot came
    out and told him to get his rally off of her property.  Seems it had never
    occurred to him to ask for permission in advance....)

2.  The man, George Bush, who declared that he would say or do whatever it
    would take to win re-election, failed to deliver on even that vacuous
    promise....

3.  I watched bits of Rush Lumbaugh's TV show last night.  I say "bits" because
    my gag reflex tends to kick in after about 30 seconds.
      He did a bit where he claimed that a list of Jesse Jackson's hopes for
    the next four years doesn't match Clinton's campaign promises.  I don't
    find that discrepancy at all surprising; if they matched, Jesse should be
    bound for the White House methinks.
      Anyway, he then went on to claim that this discrepancy "proves" that
    Clinton and Gore are really just Liberals *pretending* to be Moderates.
    Say what?  If it proves *anything*, it proves that Limbaugh's axiom that
    Democrats == Liberals is, at very best, incomplete; at worst, it simply
    doesn't hold water at all.

4.  Limbaugh went on to trot out Bush's line that the economic malaise which
    brought down the Republicans doesn't really exist.  Duh!  Six quarters (if
    it's that many) of negligible growth doth not a healthy economy make.  The
    biggest and best point of Perot's infomercials was presenting the facts and
    figures which demonstrate fundamental erosion of the economy, the utter
    bankruptcy of "tinkle down" economics.  Creating minimum-wage service jobs
    to replace skilled manufacturing and managerial jobs is *not* a sustainable
    trend.

     Anyway:  My uncertainty about the future is not yet lessened, by Clinton's
victory replaces much of my Fear with Hope.  We shall soon see if it is
justified.
                                      Mentor the Sage

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