Musings
an Online Journal of Sorts

By Alyce Wilson

While I have a brief break in my work, a few thoughts that have been running through my head this week:

First off, I am thrilled to announce my brother and his wife have discovered they're having a boy. They have a beautiful ultrasound to prove it.

Now, I was just as certain that my they were going to have a boy as my dad was certain they'd have a girl. Should I brag about my psychic abilities? After all, it is a 50-50 chance. I think I'll be gracious and keep quiet about it.

My brother says he'll put his baby's sonogram pictures in his baby album. One day, all children will be able to compare such pictures: "And here's how I looked before I was born."

But the best comment from my brother was this: "You could actually see through him. Imagine, this is the only time in his life I'll be able to say that."

"Yes," I said, "and one day when he's standing between you and the television, you'll wish you still had that ability."

I try, I really do. I try not to let it bother me. But my job involves intensive exposure to cable news, and I couldn't help but be a little irked at how the Republicans used Democratic Georgia Senator Zell Miller, who's become disillusioned with the Democratic Party and agreed to be their keynote convention speaker.

As Paul Begala, CNN Crossfire co-host and former Clinton campaign advisor, said of Zell, his mentor, it sounded as if some "right-wing thugs" had put words in his mouth. The speech, he said, didn't sound like Zell, and it made Zell look bad: bitter, nasty and illogical.

So afterwards, when the Democrat "war room" responded and the cable news anchors inevitably began asking Zell the tough questions, such as, "Why are you criticizing Kerry for voting against the very same weapons systems that Cheney also voted against," Zell had no answers.

"I'm talking about Kerry's record," he said, but you could almost see his palms begin to sweat.

And do you think that the Republicans defended this man, in whose mouth they'd put the most vicious attacks of the convention? You don't know them very well, do you? Karen Hughes, who is supposedly a former Bush advisor, but whose omnipresence on political talk shows seems to prove otherwise, and who admitted that she worked on the Bush twins' convention speech, said, with a trace of a smirk, that everyone says the GOP convention was hateful but that the most "impassioned" criticism came from a Democrat.

It's a cynical version of good cop-bad cop, but we shouldn't be surprised. It's a favorite tactic of the Bush camp.

Take, for example, the swift boat controversy. By now you've certainly seen them: the ads by Vietnam vets, none of whom actually served on Kerry's boat, calling his heroism into question. Swift Boat Veterans for Truth they call themselves, a name as Orwellian as the Patriot Act.

Let's not get into the fact that three members of Bush's campaign had to resign after admitting they had direct connections to producing the swift boat ads. We don't need to mention that, through the help of conservative commentators like Sean Hannity, the swifties parlayed a $200,000 ad buy into three weeks of heavy (free!) media exposure.

We don't have to go any further than noting that the swifties' spokesperson, one John O'Neill, is the very same person specially recruited by Nixon and his team to discredit Kerry back in the early '70s, when he was active in anti-war activities, after his return from honorable service in Vietnam.

Yes, that's right, Nixon. Tricky Dick. And yet, why has nobody done any research into O'Neill's background, to try to determine what his real motivations might be? He's clearly got an old, old chip on his shoulder.

And yet, with the swifties launching these "outside" attacks, the Bush camp gets to sit back and tsk-tsk over all these outside political groups making nasty comments.

Wake up and smell the napalm, people.

It was only a matter of time before Alan Keyes, Republican Illinois Senate candidate and perennial electoral loser, would self-destruct, but no one could have predicted how flashy would be this time's flame-out.

This past week, during an interview with Sirius OutQ, a New York City-based satellite station for lesbians, gays, bisexuals and transexuals, he said that homosexuality is "selfish hedonism." When asked whether Mary Cheney, Vice President Dick Cheney's daughter, an out lesbian, was a selfish hedonist, he said, "Of course she is."

The timing couldn't have been more comical. Keyes made this ill-fated statement only days after Cheney had publicly, for the first time, expressed support for his daughter and stated he disagreed with the president's position against gay marriage. The more cynical would say that this public statement was a careful ploy by the Bush/Cheney campaign to appeal to gay and moderate voters.

But Keyes, like a dog that's never been house-trained, blundered into the room, and left a big, stinky mess on the floor for the GOP, then walked off smiling, as if he'd given them a present.

Bad Keyes. Bad Keyes.

The GOP is trying to downplay its impact. Conservative commentator Bill Bennett said that maybe he'd go from 40 points down to 45 points down in Illinois. Otherwise, he said, it shouldn't impact the fall elections.

Meanwhile, the Democrats are throwing Keyes biscuits and asking him if he wouldn't like to try another run for president, maybe in 2008?

Demonstrating once more their inability to think on their feet, the Kerry campaign allowed the Bush/Cheney campaign to beat them onto CNN today, to express concern over former President Clinton's heart bypass surgery, reportedly scheduled for tomorrow.

The Bush/Cheney spokesman, Terry Holt, expressed his concern for the president and his family, and said that "we'll be praying for him."

So what does the Kerry spokeswoman do when she gets on air? After expressing wishes for a speedy recovery, she allows herself to get drawn into a discussion about whether this would dampen Democratic hopes for Clinton to boost Kerry's election chances.

She said, well, maybe he'd recover in time to help get out the vote. Wrong, wrong, wrong. The right thing to say would have been, "Well, we just hope that he recovers fully. We know the thoughts of the American people, Democrats and Republicans alike, are with him at this time."

Even if it were true, even if Clinton were the Great White Hope of the Democratic Party, admitting it on national television in such an off-hand way sounds callous. It's pretty sad when you let the GOP get the upper hand on compassion when the subject is the health of your party's most beloved living leader.

That's just my two cents.

Copyright 2004 by Alyce Wilson

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