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This is the first time I’ve written about politics in this space. However
the subject is kind of in the air this year and no matter how much you try to
avoid it, it crops up. It’ll tend to disappear later in the year when the
baseball races intensify. The Founding Fathers showed great foresight 200 years
ago when they scheduled elections to be held in November instead of October, so
as not to interfere with the World Series. They hadn’t heard of the Series
yet, of course, but as I said they had foresight. A good thing too, because
otherwise the election might very well have been ignored and Ralph Nader would
be President today. His people always vote.
Interest in the election, which is at a low ebb right now, and will drop even
further in October, will tend to revive enough by November to create a
massive turnout of 50% or more of the eligible voters on Election Day. That is the
problem. They will have a hard choice, especially for the second place, where
the Democrats have nominated a young, breezy fellow to go up against a crabby
old veteran whose looks would sour milk, in other words, Dick Cheney. ( I
have gotten over calling him Chaney and mixing him up with the ex-coach of the
Knicks.)
I don’t intend any disrespect to Mr. Cheney here, just a recital of some
practical reasons for calling for his replacement, which have nothing to do with
his character or competence but touch on the question of what kind of strength
or weakness he brings to the Republican ticket. More of the second than the
first, is my assessment.
His first problem is that he has a bad press. He didn’t use to, but the war
caught up to him. It’s unpopular and that spills over on him. Now the media
is being echoed by the public, which is buying into its negativity and
adopting it for its own. That’s why Cheney was booed at Yankee Stadium two weeks
ago. For once the people are believing what they read in the papers. We can’t
have that.
The second problem for Cheney is that he has no future. Hopefully a long
life lies ahead for him, but it’s not going to be in the White House. Not as Bush
’s elected successor anyway, although he might always succeed otherwise, that
is, the hard way. Even if he did, he wouldn’t be nominated for a full term
in 2008. Four Vice Presidents who succeeded deceased Presidents weren’t
nominated for a full term as President; four were. Cheney wouldn’t be, because of
his age and health. That has always been assumed.
That means the Republicans are throwing away a great 2008 opportunity for no
return in 2004. They’re disregarding the way the Vice Presidency has changed
as an office, so that it’s no longer looked on as a Dispose-All for overage
politicians. Truman and Johnson turned out to be important presidents, not just
fill-ins, giving the people a new idea of the meaning of the office. Before
Johnson, Nixon had become the first sitting Vice President to be nominated for
the presidency since 1836, an indication of its increase in importance.
Since 1968 no less than six Vice-Presidents have run for the top job, whereas in
the 175 years preceding only five did this. In 1968 two Vice-Presidents,
Humphrey and Nixon, ran against each other. This would have amazed John Adams, the
first V.P., who called it the “most insignificant office” ever conceived by
the perverted ingenuity of mankind, or words to that effect.
Some of the Veeps who ran for President didn’t do it right behind their term
in the Vice Presidency, but four years later, or even eight years in the case
of Nixon (second run). But it was their Veephood that was the springboard
that propelled them into the main event, the presidential race. Without that
behind them, it’s unlikely any of them would have been nominated.
With all this history before them, how can the Republicans contemplate
throwing away the opportunity to give to give their potential 2008 presidential
candidate a running start by installing him in the V.P. slot this year? Things
have changed. The man who has been Veep now has an edge in the run for the
White House. The job is no longer something “between a disgrace and a crime” as
it used to be. Today it’s a good reference. George W. Bush ought to know.
His father was the best possible example of the possibility of capitalizing on
the job. His eight years in it paid him well, better than any previous
occupant. He practically walked into the White House with the momentum he got from
the success of the Reagan administration. And all this also led to the
eventual inception of the second Bush Presidency, or the Second Empire as its
opponents call it.
Nomination for the vice presidency this year doesn’t mean an automatic
presidential nomination in four years. A bad loss for the ticket this year could
mean an automatic rejection then. A win, though, will mean a head start. There’
s no way around that, and the other aspirants will have to put up with it.
The favorite doesn’t win every time, as we found with Smarty Jones.
So who is the lucky person who will replace Mr. Chaney? Senator McCain looks
inevitable to me. He’ll get support that Bush can’t get. He’ll completely
dispose of the war-hero issue. He obviously “can be President” just as much
as Cheney can. The only regret his public will feel is that he won’t be
running for the top job, but in four years he’ll get that chance. It’s win-win
all the way. And he won’t be booed at Yankee Stadium or anywhere else.
.Oddly enough, he’s actually five years older than Cheney, whom I’ve been
calling “too old”, but when you think presidential, a lot of that is in the
mind. Cheney just never has been thought of as a candidate, so he’s too old at
63, but McCain isn’t too old at 68, just like Reagan wasn’t at 69 in 1980.
McCain has had cancer, but Cheney had quadruple bypass surgery in 1988, which
makes him a worse health risk At the same time it gives him a perfect
opportunity to carry out my master plan by announcing that in the present state of his
health he believes it would be better for the county if he retired from the
vice presidency and made room for someone in better condition. Bush-McCain then
take over and Dick Cheney will have done the job he was asked to do -- add
the weight of his experience and reputation to an administration in need of
it.
McCain does have one problem: outbursts of misplaced indignation which cause
shock and awe to his hearers, such as his rant against the tobacco settlement
in 1997 and his recent opposition to the pro-marriage amendment, which is
needed to prevent corrupt federal judges from imposing Massachusetts notions on
the whole country. Let there be no more of this.
I haven’t written this kind of thing before because I don’t have any
knowledge of politics over what I read and see on television. My inside sources have
all dried up or been arrested. There was a guy that was sneaking documents
out of the White House, but that was nothing to do with me. His name was
Frankfurter or something like that, I believe
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