Wooing For America's Top Job
By Sharon Hughes (08/02/04)
My Dear Fellow Americans,
As thousands of hopeful democrats filled the convention halls in Boston, "more united than ever" we are told by party leaders, I wondered, what impact this convention would have on the outcome of the election since the nominees have already been determined? Not since 1952 have party conventions actually nominated their candidate, so what's the point? A party for the faithful? A week of free media coverage?
Hillary Clinton said tonight "Let's join together to do everything we can to convince our fellow Americans to act on our convictions...to send Kerry and Edwards to the White House." We know that the democrats' strategy for this convention is to make sure the speakers tone down the anti-Bush, anti-war rhetoric. This makes sense when you are trying to convince the undecided viewing audience towards your point of view, especially when you have speakers on the program who have displayed unrestrained outbursts, such as Al Gore and Howard Dean.
However, what we, as American voters, need is not a well orchestrated show of what will appeal to us, but just the plain old truth, from both parties, of their real agenda, attitudes and ability to lead this nation. We don't need to be wooed. Just tell us the truth and we'll decide. But, unfortunately, that is not the nature of politics. So, each of us has to take it upon ourselves to discern between the "advertising and selling" of convention campaigning and the quality of the "product."
It's interesting to note that the original Greek for hypocrite is "play-acting". A soft definition would be to pretend; a harsher one would be to deceive. Equally interesting are the three definitions given by FreeSearch online: when someone pretends to believe something that they do not really believe or that is the opposite of what they do or say at another time; He's a hypocrite, he's always lecturing other people on the environment but he drives around in a huge great car. Their accusations of corruption are hypocritical, they have been just as corrupt themselves.
Just as accurate history is a reliable source to knowing what really happened in an era, so a candidate's record, not what they say or what others say about them, tell us what they really believe and how they've acted on what they believe. We can't lose sight of this in the midst of the "best" foot forward performances and wooing that takes place.
There's too much at stake to settle for anything less than the truth...the real truth about where the candidates stand on the issues. So, don't just take their word for it, look at their record, and look at who supports them and their record, and then compare those to the measuring rod of our Constitution, the Bill of Rights and the principles upon which this great nation was founded. Any other standard would not be "American."
As my recent radio guest, Mason Weaver, Author if "It's Okay to Leave the Plantation" and founder of the New Underground Railroad, says, "The truth is not as you see it; the truth is as it is..If you do not know the truth when you find it, you will follow the one with the greatest lie."
Tomorrow we'll take a look at the records...
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