Politically Disenfranchised

With the exception of NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg the Republicans took a pounding yesterday. Even the Terminator's reforms went down in flames.

I have to wonder if Republicans these days feel like my father did after Watergate. I know Bush is not in as much trouble as Nixon, but the hounds are baying at his heels. How much trouble remains to be seen.

Back in the day, my father was a Nixon Republican. Of course, that was before the bottom fell out. Watergate was a milestone in the history of voter disillusionment. Republicans were on a rudderless ship and the damn thing was sinking.

"Who do we trust now? How did things get so out of hand?"

Looking back at how Nixon got to the point of being the first president to resign, my father and his contemporaries were a part of the generation that had wearied of Johnson's Texas politics. It was time for a change. Besides, Johnson, who had enough conscience to at least be aware of soldiers dying in Vietnam, declined to run.

"How about that guy who almost beat Kennedy? Maybe we can find some integrity there. Nixon will be tough on the Ruskies and maybe he can even save us from the hippies."

Whenever anything went wrong in the late '60s and early '70s many people in my parents' generation would blame it on the hippies. It was an easy way to exercise the hound of discrimination without being too specific about who they were barking at.

So, they elected Nixon and it was smooth sailing for a while. Most citizens weren't too concerned with domestic situations. "We have enough to worry about with those pesky Russians and nuclear Armageddon."

Dad was not what I would consider fervently political, but living under his roof and rules, I was well aware of how he felt about national issues and hippies. Walter Kronkite delivered the news and my father would digest it right along with his dinner.

We had an old fridge in the garage where we kept the overflow of groceries needed to bivouac a family of six. One Easter morning we woke to discover that "hippies" had stolen our Sunday ham. Not only that, but they swiped our American flag, too.

How did my dad know they were hippies? "Well it's obvious, isn't it? Some hippy got stoned, ate our ham and is now cruising toward Berkeley with our American flag pinned to the ceiling of his VW Microbus."

This made perfect sense and it might have been totally accurate for all I know. I'm just sorry that I was too young to appreciate the symbolism at the time.

After Watergate hit, my father, and I suppose many Republicans, weren't so vocal on national issues. It was kind of a nice little vacation. Whatever hangover the Republicans are suffering this morning, it won't last forever.

The political scene is just so divisive these days that I am not optimistic about our chances to heal this country. I just hope we can find someone we can really trust in 2008.